Does James disprove Free Will?

[Dave G]

This is conception to being reprobate.

It is God's descroption of the Fall to man becoming completely resistant to God, hating Him and falling in love with Sin, Tim.

We are, as a race, now completely reprobate and have been, since well before the Flood.

Free will as belief has not been well defined. Accepting something as true, with assurance is the ability to choose unimpeded. Only the Holy Spirit can even get us to that point.

Amen.

Nothing concerning Salvation and Atonement is about us. We really do not have a choice in our flesh nature.

Again, Amen.

I am just sticking with the ability to choose unimpeded by necessity or fate.

I commend you for following your convictions.

You cannot choose without free will. Free will is the ability to choose.

One does not have free will, if they do not have the mental capacity to make a decision.

I can see how you come to that understanding of it.
However, I look at the subject a bit more technically.

I see the Bible stating that our will follows our corrupt nature, and we love sin.
So, since the nature is corrupt, we therefore follow that corruption with acts of the will.

To sin continually and to never seek God, not in all our ways.

 

[Dave G]

Well, I have truly learned something today. John (3:16) lied when he said; “- - WHOSOEVER - -“!!!!!!

...Still means "whosoever", only the "whosoever" is now further defined by God's word.

{Sarcasm, friends, to show the fallacy of claiming that God chooses (allows OR denies) who can/will be saved. If this is true, then it is God, not the individual, who chooses heaven or hell for the person.}

Exactly.

God, who is Just and the justifier of the ungodly ( that's all of us as men ) chooses who to save and who to damn.
He decides our fate as our Judge, not us.

He does not allow us to pick whether to be pardoned, He does the pardoning and then notifies us of that act by the Gospel of our salvation.
Have you believed on Christ for the forgiveness of your sins and are you relying on Him to deliver you from all your trials and tribulations?

Then to me, you have been pardoned for His mercy's sake.

If true that God DOES choose who is saved or goes to hell, and John DID lie about this, then what else might be a lie that we don’t even know about now???????

John didn't lie.
In fact, he was inspired to write, just 3 chapters later, why some believe and why some do not.

Please see John 6.

One verse does not give enough information for us to go on...
There's way more to the Bible than just John 3:16 and what it says about the "whosoever believeth".

There's Philippians 1:29, for example.
John 6:37-40
John 6:44,
John 6:64-65
John 8:43-47.
John 10:26.
John 17:2.
Acts of the Apostles 13:48
Ephesians 1:4-5

and many others.

 

[timtofly]

It is God's descroption of the Fall to man becoming completely resistant to God, hating Him and falling in love with Sin, Tim.

We are, as a race, now completely reprobate.

However, I look at the subject a bit more technically.
I see the Bible stating that our will follows our corrupt nature, and we love sin.
So, since the nature is corrupt, we therefore follow that corruption with acts of the will.

To sin continually.

We are not reprobate from conception. Paul would have had to shorten the passage, and leave out verses, leaving just the reprobate section.

Paul says we were sinners, not reprobates. God still accepts reprobates. Paul states some people in that condition have been changed. The problem is the state of mind may never change. If we are reprobate at conception, then God's Grace is more powerful, and morality alone is God's means of getting humanity back to just a sinful nature. I do not see that in Scripture, just in faulty human interpretation.

Sinning continually is the normal human nature. It is abject immorality that changes nature and God’s commands themselves that is a reprobate state.

Why would any one conflate the two?
There are athiest or God rejectors, who have a healthy moral sense, that some liberties we have taken in the past 50 years are naturally and sensibly wrong just from a natural standpoint. They claim God is not involved at all, except we know God set nature up that way.

It is quite possible that whole cultures are reprobate, but that is learned behaviour because those born into those cultures, have no other examples of cultures that are not in that condition. Nor is culture or the status quo of any society the deal breaker in God’s Atonement. That is why total depravity is a misleading lie, making human condition more important than God. It even takes the first spot in this miserable theology. It only gets worse as humans twist more Scripture to prove the first and seemingly most important point.

God is not Sovereign because He allowed an impossibility. He is Sovereign because His Atonement overcame any obstacles Satan can think of.

 

[1689Dave]

You cannot choose without free will. Free will is the ability to choose.

One does not have free will, if they do not have the mental capacity to make a decision.

You can choose sin or one sin from a variety of sins.

 

[AustinC]

We are not reprobate from conception.

Psalm 51:5

Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,
And in sin my mother conceived me.

Ephesians 2:3

Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.

Romans 5:12

Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned—

Romans 3:23

for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,

Genesis 6:5

Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

Ezekiel 18:20

The person who sins will die. The son will not bear the punishment for the father’s iniquity, nor will the father bear the punishment for the son’s iniquity; the righteousness of the righteous will be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked will be upon himself.

Hebrews 4:15

For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.

Psalm 58:3

The wicked are estranged from the womb;
These who speak lies go astray from birth.

Genesis 18:25

Far be it from You to do such a thing, to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous and the wicked are treated alike. Far be it from You! Shall not the Judge of all the earth deal justly?”

Romans 2:14-15

For when Gentiles who do not have the Law do instinctively the things of the Law, these, not having the Law, are a law to themselves, in that they show the work of the Law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them,

Jeremiah 17:9

“The heart is more deceitful than all else
And is desperately sick;
Who can understand it?

Tim, what you have stated is what Pelagian stated. Pelagian's view was condemned as heresy.

 

[1689Dave]

Well, I have truly learned something today. John (3:16) lied when he said; “- - WHOSOEVER - -“!!!!!!

{Sarcasm, friends, to show the fallacy of claiming that God chooses (allows OR denies) who can/will be saved. If this is true, then it is God, not the individual, who chooses heaven or hell for the person.}

If true that God DOES choose who is saved or goes to hell, and John DID lie about this, then what else might be a lie that we don’t even know about now???????

God appoints some to salvation in mercy. And the rest to hell in his righteous wrath.

 

[timtofly]

You can choose sin or one sin from a variety of sins.

The will will have it no other way. What about choosing God?

 

[1689Dave]

So I am guessing that you are a Calvinist?

I believe the first three points are perfectly stated by Dort.

 

[1689Dave]

The will will have it no other way. What about choosing God?

The will cannot discern God. He remains hidden until after the New Birth.

 

[church mouse guy]

I believe the first three points are perfectly stated by Dort.

So I am guessing that you are a Calvinist?

 

[timtofly]

Psalm 51:5

Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,
And in sin my mother conceived me.

Ephesians 2:3

Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.

Romans 5:12

Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned—

Romans 3:23

for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,

Genesis 6:5

Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

Ezekiel 18:20

The person who sins will die. The son will not bear the punishment for the father’s iniquity, nor will the father bear the punishment for the son’s iniquity; the righteousness of the righteous will be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked will be upon himself.

Hebrews 4:15

For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.

Psalm 58:3

The wicked are estranged from the womb;
These who speak lies go astray from birth.

Genesis 18:25

Far be it from You to do such a thing, to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous and the wicked are treated alike. Far be it from You! Shall not the Judge of all the earth deal justly?”

Romans 2:14-15

For when Gentiles who do not have the Law do instinctively the things of the Law, these, not having the Law, are a law to themselves, in that they show the work of the Law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them,

Jeremiah 17:9

“The heart is more deceitful than all else
And is desperately sick;
Who can understand it?

Tim, what you have stated is what Pelagian stated. Pelagian's view was condemned as heresy.

None of these verses are a reprobate condition. We have the word reprobate, to show a distinction between natural sin in a fallen state and a mind that is depraved beyond a certain point. God did not use the word "total depravity" , sin is not total depravity. In fact sin is a result of our actions and thoughts. Should we get rid of the words: action, thought, thinking, doing, and just use "total depravity" instead? We do actions. We think thoughts. Then the results are considered sin to God. We do all earthly things, and they are just filthy rags to God. We obey God in self righteousness and that is still sin to God. All humans can stop doing for themselves. They can choose to do all their earthly actions for God, and that is being righteous. Well not all that a human wants to do. There are still some things that destroy the body, that doing them for God is counter productive.

 

[timtofly]

The will cannot discern God. He remains hidden until after the New Birth.

And we have to choose the new birth. God does not hit us over the head with it.

 

[timtofly]

God appoints some to salvation in mercy. And the rest to hell in his righteous wrath.

Did God appoint them on his foreknowledge? Because if He did, it would be based on their free will choice. If it was not foreknowledge, then you deny the verse and it's usage of "them He foreknew". Why not just say God knew He would force them to stay the way they were, and He knew, He would force them, thus He Predestined to force them to damnation?

 

[Dave G]

Paul says we were sinners, not reprobates. God still accepts reprobates. Paul states some people in that condition have been changed. The problem is the state of mind may never change. If we are reprobate at conception, then God's Grace is more powerful, and morality alone is God's means of getting humanity back to just a sinful nature. I do not see that in Scripture, just in faulty human interpretation.

Paul says there is a such thing as reprobation:

" Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?
6 But I trust that ye shall know that we are not reprobates.
7 Now I pray to God that ye do no evil; not that we should appear approved, but that ye should do that which is honest, though we be as reprobates." ( 2 Corinthians 13:5-7 ).

 

[AustinC]

None of these verses are a reprobate condition. We have the word reprobate, to show a distinction between natural sin in a fallen state and a mind that is depraved beyond a certain point. God did not use the word "total depravity" , sin is not total depravity. In fact sin is a result of our actions and thoughts. Should we get rid of the words: action, thought, thinking, doing, and just use "total depravity" instead? We do actions. We think thoughts. Then the results are considered sin to God. We do all earthly things, and they are just filthy rags to God. We obey God in self righteousness and that is still sin to God. All humans can stop doing for themselves. They can choose to do all their earthly actions for God, and that is being righteous. Well not all that a human wants to do. There are still some things that destroy the body, that doing them for God is counter productive.

All of those verses are a reprobate condition.

rep·ro·bate
/ˈreprəˌbāt/

noun

1. 1.
   an unprincipled person (often used humorously or affectionately).
   
   Similar:
   rogue,rascall, scoundrel, good-for-nothing, wretch, unprincipled person, rake, profligate, degenerate, debauchee, libertine, troublemaker, mischief-maker, wrongdoer,evil-doer, transgressor, sinner, roué, vaurien, scallywag, bad egg, scofflaw, hellion, rotter, bounder, cad, ne'er-do-well, miscreant, blackguard, knave, rapscallion, varlet, wastrel, rakehell, scapegrace
   
   
2. 2.
   ARCHAIC
   (in Calvinism) a sinner who is not of the elect and is predestined to damnation.
   

adjective

1. 1.
   unprincipled (often used as a humorous or affectionate reproach).
   "a long-missed old reprobate drinking comrade"
   
   Similar:
   unprincipled, roguish, bad, wicked, rakish, shameless, immoral, profligate, degenerate, dissipated, debauched, depraved, corrupt, incorrigible, hardened, unregenerate, scoundrelly, rascally, knavish
   
   Opposite:
   upright, virtuous, principled
   
   
2. 2.
   ARCHAIC
   (in Calvinism) predestined to damnation.

verb
ARCHAIC

1. express or feel disapproval of.
   "his neighbors reprobated his method of proceeding"

RC Sproul sad this about depravity:

In the Reformed tradition, total depravity does not mean utter depravity. We often use the term total as a synonym for utter or for completely, so the notion of total depravity conjures up the idea that every human being is as bad as that person could possibly be. You might think of an archfiend of history such as Adolf Hitler and say there was absolutely no redeeming virtue in the man, but I suspect that he had some affection for his mother. As wicked as Hitler was, we can still conceive of ways in which he could have been even more wicked than he actually was. So the idea of total in total depravity doesn’t mean that all human beings are as wicked as they can possibly be. It means that the fall was so serious that it affects the whole person. The fallenness that captures and grips our human nature affects our bodies; that’s why we become ill and die. It affects our minds and our thinking; we still have the capacity to think, but the Bible says the mind has become darkened and weakened. The will of man is no longer in its pristine state of moral power. The will, according to the New Testament, is now in bondage. We are enslaved to the evil impulses and desires of our hearts. The body, the mind, the will, the spirit—indeed, the whole person—have been infected by the power of sin.

I like to replace the term total depravity with my favorite designation, which is radical corruption. Ironically, the word radical has its roots in the Latin word for “root,” which is radix, and it can be translated root or core. The term radical has to do with something that permeates to the core of a thing. It’s not something that is tangential or superficial, lying on the surface. The Reformed view is that the effects of the fall extend or penetrate to the core of our being. Even the English word core actually comes from the Latin word cor, which means “heart.” That is, our sin is something that comes from our hearts. In biblical terms, that means it’s from the core or very center of our existence.

TULIP and Reformed Theology: Total Depravity

 

[church mouse guy]

Romans 1:28 says that homosexuals have reprobate minds.

If you are guilty of breaking one law, then you are guilty of breaking all laws, right?

 

[timtofly]

Romans 1:28 says that homosexuals have reprobate minds.

If you are guilty of breaking one law, then you are guilty of breaking all laws, right?

When the KKK start marching in an LGBT parade, we are reprobate, right?

 

[timtofly]

(often used humorously or affectionately)

Really?, if you insist.

Wiki:
When a sinner is so hardened as to feel no remorse or misgiving of conscience, it is considered a sign of reprobation. This isn’t teaching that because of their wicked actions that God will not save them, but that God has withdrawn his offer of salvation and he gives them over to a seared conscience and now they can do vile actions. The vile actions and the many different things are evidence of a reprobate mind.

 

[timtofly]

Paul says there is a such thing as reprobation:

" Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?
6 But I trust that ye shall know that we are not reprobates.
7 Now I pray to God that ye do no evil; not that we should appear approved, but that ye should do that which is honest, though we be as reprobates." ( 2 Corinthians 13:5-7 ).

So does Romans 1:26-32

26 For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature:
27 And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet.
28 And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient;
29 Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers,
30 Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,
31 Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful:
32 Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.

Notice the last verse; they know the judgment of God. They know the truth, but they cannot do the truth. They lost the ability to choose. All those who do those things, and even those who enjoy those people's actions, ie, think they are ok, and doing God’s Will. No we are not born that way. That is not even the natural way of sin.

Is that a point where you think God elected the majority of humanity? God did not even elect people to sin. God just told Adam, if you disobey me, you will have knowledge of evil. When humanity was given the knowledge to do evil, God did make it easier to do evil things. It does not take much thought. In fact most act without thinking at all. That is the evil problem.

But when one starts to do evil and know it is evil and reject God in spite, and even those who thinks God ordains evil; those are the people who gets a hardened heart, mind, and a soul that can do nothing but evil. Yes, if one thinks that God ordains, elects, and forces humanity to do evil, they themselves are judged by God and will be lost in their sins. And no, God did not leave any name out of the Lamb's book of life.

 

[AustinC]

But when one starts to do evil and know it is evil and reject God in spite, and even those who thinks God ordains evil; those are the people who gets a hardened heart, mind, and a soul that can do nothing but evil. Yes, if one thinks that God ordains, elects, and forces humanity to do evil, they themselves are judged by God and will be lost in their sins. And no, God did not leave any name out of the Lamb's book of life.

No one thinks God forces humanity to do evil. Every Christian who holds to an orthodox view of God knows that humans are born under the curse of sin, in corruption, and need to be redeemed. Humans, living under the curse, do evil by nature. "There is no one righteous not even one." (Romans 3:10)
Second, billions of people know nothing about Jesus. Under your view they just have to not hear about Jesus and they will remain in the book of life. Since they know nothing about Jesus, they cannot reject him. If they cannot reject him they cannot be removed from the book of life. Therefore, don't evangelize or tell anyone about Jesus and you ensure they go to heaven.