ROM. 8:28-30...The key progression here: foreknow = predestined = called = justified.
The greek word for foreknow, proginoceko, simply means to "know beforehand". Notice
everything here in this progression stems from "proginoceko", so the word "foreknew" cannot mean "chose".
This is simply false. Foreknew here means "Foreloved, chose, elected, determined, thought of in covenant relationship, eg. those whom he long ago thought of in a saving relationship to himself."
No lexicon supports your definition of "foreknow" in this passage. Some even note that your reading is not even possible for this text.
The verb proginksko is used 3 times in the NT with God as the subject. Romans 8:29, Romans 11:2; and 1 Peter 1:20.
The verb stem for this word, ginsosko, is built on the Hebrew "yada," to know intimately. "Yada'" is used in reference to Adam knowing Eve sexually and intimately. In this text, it also recalls Jeremiah 1:5. Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, And before you were born I consecrated you; I have appointed you a prophet to the nations." This same verb is translated as "chosen" in Amos 3:2 (NASB/NIV); "know" (as in "know intimately, be in relationship with) in the KJV. In the LXX, it shows up as ginsosko, the stem of "proginsosko" you cite above. The order here is conditional and causal. They are foreknown and predestined and called in that order. All those called are justified and glorified. Predestination to conformity to the image of Christ is so that He (Christ) might be the firstborn among many brethren. The people called, justified, and glorified and predestined are foreloved as brethren of Christ. The verb is active, not passive. God's foreknowing ahead of time men's free choices would render the verb passive voice, not active voice. God is actively foreknowing in Romans 8:29. He is foreknowing people. He is loving them ahead of time as His children by adoption.
Where do you think Paul got his doctrine of election? How about God's reasons for chosing saving His people in Deuteronomy:
Deut. 7: 6"For you are a holy people to the LORD your God; the LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for His own possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.
7"The LORD did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any of the peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples,
8but because the LORD loved you and kept the oath which He swore to your forefathers, the LORD brought you out by a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
--Will anybody seriously argue that we could insert "foreseen faith" or "your faith" or "your faithfulness" or any such thing into this text as a reason that God delivered Israel? No. It would be alien to the text. Paul thinks of believers as "the elect," chosen by God the same way, not because of foreseen merit, numbers, faith, faithfulness, wealth, prestige, power, etc...nothing at all except God's covenant love which God Himself says is based on His faithfulness to His covenant and His love alone, not any of those things.
God delivered the nation out of His faithfulness to his covenant with the Patriarchs, not because of foreseen faith or their faithfulness to Him in Egypt. In fact, it is manifestly true from the text that the majority of the Hebrews, while slaves, were all idolaters. They took the household gods of Egypt with them when they left, didn't they. Most of them had forgotten God. The Old Covenant is a visible model of the New Covenant, picturing God's work today. In the New Covenant, the Father gives the Son a people, just as God gave Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob a people. The Son purchases their salvation, and the Holy Spirit is sent by the Father and the Son to apply the benefits of redemption to that people. They are delivered from their sins and brought to their inheritance the same way that God was faithful to His covenant with the Patriarchs and delivered Israel from Egypt into the Promised Land, not because of Israel's faith, numbers, wealth, etc., but based on His covenant with the Patriarchs and His faithfulness to that covenant alone. --This is the image that Paul is drawing from in this text, not the idea that God looks into the future and choses and predestines those whom He knows beforehand will believe.
In 1 Peter 1:2, "foreknowledge" there means simply "plan" or "determination." It says nothing about "foreknowing foreseen faith." To allege it does, you have to smuggle in a defintion of foreknowledge not found in the text. There is no text of the Bible that says God elects based on foreseen faith. In fact, Acts 2:23 tells us that this foreknowledge is determinate counsel. In I Peter 1:20 we see that Christ was foreknown before the foundation of the world. The NIV translates this as "chosen." Will you seriously argue this means that God simply knew His identity or something He would do? That makes no sense.
A.W. Pink:
In like manner, the word "know" is frequently used in the New Testament, in the same sense as in the Old. "Then will I profess unto them, I never knew you" (Matthew 7:23). "I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine" (John 10:14). "If any man love God, the same is known of him" (1 Cor. 8:3). "The Lord knoweth them that are his" (2 Tim. 2:19).
Now the word "foreknowledge" as it is used in the New Testament is less ambiguous than in its simple form "to know." If you carefully study every passage in which it occurs, you will discover that it is a moot point whether it ever has reference to the mere perception of events yet to take place. The fact is that foreknowledge is never used in Scripture in connection with events or actions; instead, it always refers to persons. It is persons God is said to "foreknow," not the actions of those persons. To prove this we will quote each passage where this expression is found.
The first occurs in Acts 2:23: "Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain." Careful attention to the wording of this verse shows that the apostle was not speaking of God’s foreknowledge of the act of the crucifixion, but of the Person crucified: "Him (Christ) being delivered by."
The second is Romans 8:29-30: "For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called." Weigh well the pronoun used here. It is not what He did foreknow, but whom He did. It is not the surrendering of their wills nor the believing of their hearts, but the persons themselves, which is in view.
"God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew" (Rom. 11:2). Once more the plain reference is to persons, and to persons only.
The last mention is in 1 Peter 1:2: "Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father." Who are "elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father?" The previous verse tells us the reference is to the "strangers scattered," i.e., the diaspora, the dispersion, the believing Jews. Thus, the reference is to persons, and not to their foreseen acts.
If this is true, God wills all sin, too. This makes God the author of sin. This is false doctrine. Every rape, murder, abortion would be "willed" by God.
You have committed a category error. You have conflated responsibility and blame. Responsibility is a necessary, but insufficient condition of moral blame. A moral motive contrary to the Law is required to make one blameworthy.
What God decrees for His glory, men do with their own motives. For example, God hardened Pharaoh’s heart in order to judge Egypt’s gods. Pharaoh’s will was not violated, in that God allowed Pharaoh’s love of evil, which was his natural state, to increase, keeping Israel from leaving. Pharaoh did not keep them from leaving in order to glorify God and worship Him. He did it because he hated God, Moses, Aaron, and the slaves. What God did for a righteous motive, Pharaoh did out of hatred for God. The motive behind an act, therefore, determines whether or not it is truly sinful. In theory, if Pharaoh had done what he did to glorify and worship God, he would not have been condemned, however, a man that does such a thing is, in reality acting in faith and love for God and would have to be regenerate. Such a man would not hold Israel back; he would have released Israel and taken down Egypt’s gods. That was not God’s purpose for Pharaoh. For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, "FOR THIS VERY PURPOSE I RAISED YOU UP, TO DEMONSTRATE MY POWER IN YOU, AND THAT MY NAME MIGHT BE PROCLAIMED THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE EARTH." So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.
God is the author of evil, in the sense that He is first cause of all things. This simply goes with pay grade. His decrees, through either action or inaction render events necessary, but, evil is the result of permission, not His direct causation, or a result of His judicial hardening of sinners, an act of justice Scripture supports repeatedly, as in the above text and in Romans 1. Nothing happens that compels a man or demon to act in a way it does not wish to act or against its nature. He may withhold constraining grace, as in the fall, in order to render a thing certain, but the agent of the evil, in this case Adam simply acts in accordance with his nature as a second cause, for reasons and motives sufficient for himself and arising from his own nature. Men thus do what God decrees, but for motives all their own. In so doing, they may incur judgment. See for example, the predestination of Judas betrayal and Jesus crucifixion. These men did, with evil desires, what God desired and planned to happen since before creation, for Jesus is the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world itself.
I spent a long time putting that information together and I had to do a lot of studying and scripture hunting. If you don't want to read and consider a reply because it's to long then don't, but I don't see any reason to accuse people of quoting from commentaries when you don't know anything about the person that you are accusing. 
