Featured Did God predestine ISIS & Boko Haram to rape, torture, kill the Christians?

Brother Joseph,

Good to hear from you.

Yes, it is correct that the underlying assumption is that God is merciful to all human beings and the Original Predestination by God was to save everybody in the whole human race.

Brother Joseph,
I often hear this kind of Logic from Calvinists.
Bible doesn’t classify the human choice or the human belief as the works as we read Romans ch 4:3, 4:5, 16)
Believing is not the work but the reaction from human beings expected by God.
The whole history of human race is the continuous reactions between God and men, either cooperation or conflict.
There are some things that the Almighty God cannot do.
God couldn’t make Adam and Eve not to pluck off the fruits of the knowledge of Good and Evil.
If He had done so, His creation of sons of God should have been stopped.
Mercy was offered to all human race but if it is rejected, the Wrath of God stays there as much as the sins are there.

Dear Brother Joseph,
1. As for Jacob and Esau, many statements can mislead the people and therefore we have to be prudent in this matter.
A) Esau never served Jacob in his life. On the contrary, Jacob bowed down to Esau and called him Adonai, Adonii( My Lord) ( Gen 33:3-10)
Jacob bowed down to Esau 7 times and called him Adonai, and told him that he had seen Esau as if he had seen the Face of God.
B) God foresaw that Jacob is a perfect man ( Tam in Gen25:27 means Perfect in Hebrew- mistranslated by many versions)
C) What Paul mentioned in Romans 9:12 was about the nations, and Edomites would serve Israelites.
D) < 15 For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. >
God shows His mercy to the person whom God foreknew, the person who will accept His mercy, will be obedient to Himself.
E) God foreknew that Pharaoh would not let Israel go ( Ex 3:19), therefore He deserted him and as a result he became hardened( Ex 4:21).
F) << Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?>>

God is not Grumpy, and what Paul says here is that God has a certain reason for Himself that we don’t know, which doesn’t mean that God can do anything un-righteously or grumpily.
This verse must not be misunderstood as meaning that God can do many funny things as like a grumpy boy.
But it means that God has a good reason for His operation of the universe beyond our comprehension, but He works for the Justice and Righteousness, and Holiness all the time.
It doesn’t mean that God predestined only a few % of people to believe in Him while He predestined the most of the people
not to believe in Him and to reject Messiah and thereby to commit sins and to be wicked to kill the Christians, and to insult Himself, the Almighty and Holy God.
This is a great misunderstanding by the Calvinists, as if God is like a grumpy boy.
Here again I find some problems with the Hermeneutics of Calvinists
G) God loved Jacob and hated Esau. Here the word Hate must be reviewed again.
Jacob hated Leah (Gen 29:31). Was Leah really hated by Jacob? She was less loved by Jacob than Rachel was.
God loved Esau as well! But He loved Esau less than Jacob. Why? Because He foreknew that Jacob was a perfect man ( Gen 25:27) and would love
Him while Esau would love hunting and the heathen women, disobeying Him, would neglect the importance of the Birthright.

2. The providence of God’s management for the whole universe was a matter of time sequence so easily that we can grasp and explain in a few pages.
Even before the Babel Tower, people departed from Middle East,
Some of them were Northern Asians who moved toward East ( Gen 10:30) The Eastern mountain area might be the Pamir Mountain area,
and they moved further to Mongolia, Siberia ( Shephar in Gen 11:30). At that time they may have departed from the presence of God too quick.
There must be many reasons and they could feel after Him or grope after Him. But in such cases they may be punished less ( Acts 17:30) as Jesus taught
The less punishment (Luke 12:48). God didn’t predestine the most people not to believe in Him, but they departed from Him.
In that sense, the Love of God is poured out everywhere, even to the wicked people ( Mt 5:45)
God Loves Everybody but there may be some difference among the people because He foreknew the human reactions in advance.


Eliyahu

( to be continued)

 

Brother Joseph,
Before the Fall, according to the Predestination Theory, God predestined the most of the people not to believe in Him and to become wicked.
If you claim that God didn’t do so, then you are departing from the theory of Predestination.
Predestination theory is to believe that even the Fall of Adam and Eve was predestined before the Creation, for His Good Will and Pleasure.
Yes, indeed we were there in the loin of Adam when the first couple committed the Sin.

When Predestination Theory tries to escape the burden of the Author-ship for the sins, it should get closer and more similar to the Foreknowledge.
This was the problem with the Predestination Theory.
Was the Predestination of the most of the people not to believe in Him and causing them to be wicked a greater Good?
What if God, as the Almighty God who can make 100% people to believe in Him and thereby let them live the holy life obedient to God, predestined 100% people
Believe in Him and never to commit sins at all? Wasn’t it less good?
As for Acts 4:26-28, I already explained it. God didn’t cause Pilate, High Priests, Elders, Sadducees, Scribes, to be wicked. But they were already wicked. God foreknew their wickedness.
Therefore, God wanted to utilize such wickedness for the redemption of the world.
God placed His Son into that situation so that the Son, Yeshuah might be killed resulting in the World Redemption.
God’s Counsel and Determination was not the Wickedness of Pilate, High Priests, Elders, Gentiles and Israelites, but the accomplishments of the World Redemption.
God never predestined the people of Israel and Gentiles to be wicked but was to utilize such wickedness.

Brother Joseph,

This portion is similar to my understanding not to the theory of Predestination, because
Predestination theology teaches that God predestined the Assyrian King should attack Israel even before the Fall of Adam and Eve.
Predestination theology teaches that God predestined only a small fraction of the people were chosen to believe in Him, and the rest majority were deserted no to believe in Him, resulting
In the wickedness of the people.
Yes, God has His own personality and can react with His own purposes, but not for the wicked will or to make people be wicked.





Eliyahu

 

God predestined 100% people to believe in Him and His Son, but on the contrary to His Will, human beings committed the Sin and the Sin entered this world.
The Almighty God was not creating the robots or puppets but the sons of God who have the free wills.
However, God prepared the B-Plan for that and prepared the Redeemer.
God predestined the Crucifixion of Jesus Christ by utilizing the wickedness of the human beings and place His Son into the situation where His Son could be killed.
It doesn’t mean that God made the High Priest, Elders, Pilate, Scribes to be wicked and murderous. God never willed the people to be so.
God just utilized such wickedness of human beings. If God willed and made the destinies of the human beings to be wicked and murderous even though
He could make them all to be good and righteous, just and holy, He must be accountable for such wicked premeditation.
Al-Baghdadi may be the Master-mind of the ISIS which kill thousands of the innocent people.
Is he not guilty of sins? He is much less influential to the fighters of ISIS than God of Predestination can be to the wicked people of the world.
God of Predestination theory is absolutely responsible for the sins of the world because such God of Calvinism preplanned and made the
most of the people to have the inevitable destinies of not believing the Truth and Jesus Christ and thereby to commit all the crimes,
even to insult and blaspheme the True God.
Yet, Calvinists insist that their God is not the Author of sins.
Such theory is to start from the false representation of the True God and to end with denial of the responsibility of destining the
most of the people to be wicked.
If Osama Bin Laden planned for Sept 11 Bombing and masterminded the hijackers to blow the buildings, is he not the author of the sin?
God of Calvinism did much more things for the sins of the world, and the relations and ties between the God of Predestination and the crimes
Of the world is much more stronger than Osama Bin Laden’s involvement because one hair of the hijackers couldn’t fall without the permission
of the God of Calvinism.
God of Calvinism orchestrated everything for the crimes of the Sept 11 hijackers and ISIS, Boko-Haram, Al-Shabab, Hezbollah etc.
It must be the common sense to rule such God of Predestination as the Author of the Sins if we can ask the high school students about such questions.

Hi Brother Joseph,
1. As I said, there are things which even the Almighty God cannot do. Especially, in the process of Creation of many sons of God, not the toys of God,
Freedom of the human beings and of the angels are in evitable and the human beings and the angels couldn’t follow His expectation and His Will.
Therefore such drop-outs took place. Read the parable of Good Seed and Tares in Mt 13:36-40
Why couldn’t God make all the seed be the good seeds? It is an on-going process of Creation and even God couldn’t make Adam and Eve not eat
the fruits of knowledge of good and evil. It was not His pleasure that the first couple committed the sins.
It was not His Will and Pleasure to see the people be wicked. They happen to be wicked against His Will and against His Pleasure.
If the God was pleased to see the most people be wicked, such God is grumpy and must be the Author of Sins.
God created the serpents to be good in the beginning as we read in Gen 1 ch. But after the sin entered, the serpents became crooked.
What Job and Isaiah were telling about was the status after the sin entered.

2. God formed the beasts and animals before the sin entered. But they became crooked after the sin entered either thru the Satan or thru his angels.
However, when the sin problem disappear, the infants will play in the holes of the vipers (Isaiah 11:8)
and the snakes will not be harmful living in the soil ( Isaiah 65:35) God didn’t make the animals be wicked and crooked but they looked good ( Gen 1:25)
But when the sin entered either thru Satan and the angels first or thru the first couple, then the whole universe started to groan ( Romans 8:22)


Eliyahu

 

Hi Brother Joseph,
Thank you very much for your bringing all the arguments possible against the Foreknowledge.
Again, as the most Calvinists miss, you misunderstand the attributes of God. Therefore you presumed that God had the power to prevent the Creation of the people’s unbelief and all the crimes.
However, as I emphasized many times, there are several things that even the Almighty God cannot do!
God couldn’t prevent the human beings from doing their own will and from rejecting the first commandment of God because God gave them the Free Will for behaving as the sons of God.
Restricting the human activities in detail and giving the free wills contradict each other, which Almighty God cannot do.
Neither we nor God can give the indefinite freedom to AA person and restrict him to do this and that at the same time.

You may say that the human tribunal cannot judge or charge the God of Predestination according to the human judgment.
However, the human conscience is not far from that of God since God created the human beings in His image and likeness.
God couldn’t command the human beings not to be masterminds of the sinners and the crimes while He willed and intended to create
the most of the people to be wicked and to insult Himself for His Pleasure.
None of righteous and holy human beings would will such wickedness. God is not so different from human conscience.
<< can you give an intelligent reason why God made such a being as would do those things? >>
God could not create all the seeds to be good but many of them to be tares ( Matt 13:36-40) because He was creating the sons of God
which have the free wills, not the toys or the robots. Giving the Free-Wills and Restricting the human behaviors are contradicting each other.
Shortly speaking, Almighty God could not make all human beings obey His commandments.
To His regret, many creatures of His own became wicked (Gen 6:6). Didn’t He know that before ?
He knew it before but it happened though He wished such crimes wouldn’t happen.
The key components for the answer is to understand that there are several things that the Almighty God cannot do not because of His capacity but because
some things contradict His truth and/or His attributes.
God cannot predestine each of the behaviors of the human beings while He give them enormous freedom so that they may behave as the sons of God, though
He react for every behavior of the human beings according to His own attributes and styles.
In such case the term Predestination is far from the truth while the Foreknowledge may describe the reactions and the destinies of human beings better.

Dear Brother Joseph,
For the saving of times each other, you may answer me with sufficient time, like once a week, around the weekend, or even slower than that.
I think we’d better focus on the Author-ship of Sin in case of God of Predestination.
Thank you brother Joseph as I have enjoyed reading your thoughts which included all the possible arguments from the other sides.

Eliyahu

 

I think this portion was not included in the answers above.

Foreknowledge doesn't mean that God is sleeping thru the ages without doing anythings.

God has been doing His work continuously according to His own Will, not according to the Calvinists Predestination.
His own Will and His original Predestination was to create all human beings in His likeness and in the resemblance of His Son. This work is continued even today.
God never intended to create the most of the people to be wicked but He willed and intended to create all the people to be conforming to His Son.
But the human beings failed, and therefore He is continuing to work out His Original Predestination ( 2 Pet 3:9, 1 John 2:2)

Foreknowledge doesn't exclude the involvement of God in the human history but acknowledge the continuous involvement and works by God.
But He never predestined the human beings to be wicked and to reject Him and to insult Him.


Eliyahu

 

Brother Yeshuah,

I am answering to Brother Joseph, not to the Hyper Calvinists.
I was talking about the Original Predestination by God and that didn't work since the Fall. Since the Fall, the Plan B started to work as we experience now.
Nevertheless, God still endure so that all the people should repent to the Salvation ( 2 Pet 3:9) and Yeshuah offered the Propitiation for the whole world, not only for the Believers.( 1 John 2:2)
The God of Predestination will be judged by the True God as the mastermind of all the sins and crimes of the world.
Calvinism will turn out as the Heresy and Blasphemy to the Holy God on His Judgment Seat.

Eliyahu

 

Brother Joseph,


I haven't read thru your posts.

Some time later I may read them all, but if not I think we should leave this matter to the judgment by God.

This statement that the Foreknowledge makes God subject to the will of human beings neglects the truth again that God creates sons of God which can exercise lots of freedom. Therefore God doesn't make Himself subject to the human beings but He does give the freedom to them as Love and Grace for His good Will.
God didn't make robots or puppets.

Were all of the sins that you committed predestined by God?
In that case the repentance mean that God shouldn't have predestined yourself to commit sins, right? Yet He is not responsible for predestining your life to commit sins, right?

Your struggle not to commit sins must have been either rebellion or resistances against God.

Your preaching Gospel to the people whom God predestined not to save must be a rebellion against God and the waste of time.

Your preaching Gospel to the people whom God predestined to save may not be necessary, because He will save them by any means even though you don't preach them.

It may be lack of trust in Him.

I don't believe such theory, Brother.

God bless.


Eliyahu

 

Brother Joseph,

I have read thru your posts.

They added some more study in more depth but include the misunderstandings a lot.

Therefore I have decided to answer you by this weekend.

Thanks.

Eliyahu

 

Brother Joseph,

Hope you are well in the Lord.
I am answering a little slow but hope you can continue to understand the whole sequence of the issues.
From the very beginning, Hi s grace has been equal to everyone, but foreknowing some would accept and obey His Will and Grace, it is more extended to them. He foreknew that others would not accept and obey His Grace and Will and accordingly would not extend it any further.
Mt 11: 25-28 is a good example of it. Because some people are wise in worldly wisdom and therefore God doesn’t reveal His Will and Grace to such people any more.
If they become babies again, then God will reveal His Grace abundantly again.
Anytime if anyone repent, then she or he will enjoy the more grace.
Therefore it is a continuous and dynamic reaction between God and Man, either Cooperation or Conflict.

God loved everyone as we read John 3:16. God loved the whole world.
We accepted such love.
The unbelievers didn’t accept the Love of God even though God loved them first.
God loved the unbelievers even before they were born on this earth and prepared the salvation and redemption thru Jesus. However, they are rejecting such love.
Therefore there is the reaction by God because He is a living God.
The Love of God was waiting for us even before we were born on this earth.

Romans 4:5 and Ephesians 2:8-9 clearly state the faith in contrast to the works.
The work of faith in 1 Thess 1:3 and 2 Thess 1:11 are the real works resulting from the faith.
For example, preaching the gospel anywhere is a work of faith. Pasturing the flocks in the chapels is another example of the works of faith. Testifying and evangelical activities are also works of faith.
Yes, John 6:29 tells us Believing is the work of God, not the work of human beings.
This is explained by Jesus because people asked how they can do the work of God ( Jn 6:28)
Jesus explains the concept of work of God
If we believe in God, it is not our work but the work of God.
At least the concept of the work may be different from that of Romans 4:5 and/or Ephesians 2:8-9 which is more classified in them.



Eliyahu


( to be continued)

 

Jesus gave Himself for All ( 1 Tim 2:6), not for the Elect.
Whosoever will can take the water of life freely
The Water of Life is like the air for us to breathe which is so important but free.
( Re 22:17)
And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.

Yes, as per God foreknew. God utilized the human wickedness and placed His Son in that situation so that He might be killed and thereby accomplish the Redemption for ALL, not only for the Elect but also for the whole world ( 1 John 2:2)

Esau never served Jacob but Jacob bowed down to Esau ( Gen 33:3)
God hated Esau because he disobeyed Him and loved the heathen women.
Romans 9:13
As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.
This is the quotation from Malachi 1:3 which was written 1500 years after Jacob and Esau were born and lived and died.

This doesn’t prove that God predestined the people without foreknowing them and their disobedience.
This passage simply tells us that God has the reason to hate someone because of the reasons beyond our comprehension.

Yes, God utilized the wicked people by foreknowing them and their wickedness as He did utilized the Pilate, High Priest, Judas Iscariot to accomplish the Redemption at the Cross.
God foreknew that Pharaoh would not let Israel go as per Ex 3:19.

Ephesians 1:5and 11 tell us the Original Predestination by God which means that God wanted to save All, God loved all the people of the world. God even wanted the first couple Adam and Eve would not fall.
Whosoever accept the Truth and believe in Him can enjoy such predestination by God, which is different from the Predestination theory of Calvinism.

I have read thru the whole TR several times and have been reading Hebrew Masorah for over 10 years.
Jacob hated Leah but had the children from her ( Gen 29:31) Jacob loved Leah less than Rachel.
God didn’t want Esau to hate the truth and to love the heathen women but He loved Esau and wanted Esau to be saved. But on the contrary to His will, Esau went astray. God didn’t predestine Esau to be wicked, but he chose the wicked way on the contrary to His Wish.


Eliyahu

( to be continued)

 

Brother Joseph,


God didn’t create the sins. But it happened by the creatures. Then He utilized it to resolve the problems.
If such creation of the sins for the greater purpose of goodness, can man steal the money for the good purpose of evangelizing the people?
Can we kill the people for the good purpose of God?
Can we torture the people so that more people may believe in God?
Do you believe the Coercion is right biblically?
This is why I find it interesting that RCC and Islam withhold the theory that God does many killings for the good pleasure of God.

If God didn’t predestine all the wicked people to commit the sins, there would have been no need for the Cross and for the Redemption.
It sounds like that God caused the diseases and He gave the medication.
If He didn’t cause the diseases then there would have been no need for medication.
Predestining most of the people to be wicked means a great sin because such God is the source of the sins.
Why couldn’t Almighty God predestine 100% of the people to be good and to obey Himself from the beginning so that there would have been no need for the salvation?
For His Pleasure? It sounds like grumpy and like Allah in Quran.

Brother Joseph,

Matsa in Ezekiel 28:15 can mean <find, meet, encounter>
Devil was created to be tamim, perfect. But afterwards He departed from God and therefore God found the inequity from him. As long as Adam and Eve were with God, they were OK but when the sin entered, there was a distance and therefore He had to call him, where art thou?. Likewise God created the Satan to be perfect expecting him to be obedient but he went astray.
As for Rev 17:15-17, it is a secondary stage after they all betrayed God. Therefore God utilize them and commit them the power so that the wicked people may follow her and the beast. God didn’t create the devil to be wicked but made him be perfect, but the devil departed from God. RE 17 doesn’t tell us that God created any creatures to be wicked but tells us that once they become wicked, God utilize even their wickedness.

Proverb 16:4 means that the wicked are abandoned for the day of evil.

From the beginning may have several meanings.
i.e. John 1:1 is earlier than Genesis 1:1.
Likewise, 1 John 3:8 doesn’t mean that God created the Satan to be wicked from the beginning. If God created the Satan as the wicked and sinful being from the beginning, the Satan couldn’t be Tamim ( Eze 28:15) Jacob was Tamim ( Gen 25:27) Noah was Tamim ( Gen 6:9).
So we can believe that God created the Satan to be perfect in the beginning. However, soon the Satan became arrogant and tried to do something for himself though God created him to work in harmony with Him.
This happened even before the creation of the human world.
Thereafter Gen 1:1 took place.
Therefore Jesus and John could say that Satan was the liar from the beginning, sometime after the Creation of him by God.


Brother Eliyahu


( To be continued)