Seeking God is a element of Faith Heb 11:6 but yet scripture states of man by nature this Rom 3:11 that is right none, zero seeks after God ! Also the same greek word for seek in Heb 11:6 is also used in Rom 3:11 ! Now this does not say that man does not seek after a god, he does, but it's a false god of his own natural understanding and not the True and Living God !
All Scripture has meaning. If your meaning does not harmonize with the rest of Scripture, then it is the wrong meaning.
Now consider:
Act 17:26-31 And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation; (27)
That they should seek the Lord, if haply
they might feel after him, and
find him, though
he be not far from every one of us: (28) For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring. (29) Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device. (30) And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but
now commandeth all men every where to repent: (31) Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.
Paul is speaking from Mars' Hill to a purely pagan audience who worship idols. They do not know Christ, neither have they heard the gospel. This is the longest gospel message to the unsaved in the NT. Yet, look at the points Paul makes to this pagan, idol-worshiping people.
1. They need to seek God.
2. They need to "feel" or reach out for Him.
3. They need to find God.
4. He assures them that God is close to them so that all of the above is possible for them.
5. Then Paul tells them that NOW God commands them to repent.
--Note that repentance and faith go together in the NT. God will not give them the ability to repent or to believe. They must do this on their own.
All of the above Paul tells them they must do on their own.
The Calvinist view of God is a very cruel unloving view of God.
Here is another quote from Dave Hunt's book,
What Love is This:
Calvinism drives us into an irrational dead end. There would be no need for God to plead with the elect, whom He has already predestined to salvation, a salvation which He allegedly effect sovereignly before any faith is exercised on their part. Nor does it make any better sense for God to present the gospel to and plead with the non-elect who cannot believe it until they have been sovereignly regenerated, but whom He will not regenerate, having already damned them by His eternal decree. Yet He continues to plead and blame them for not repenting, even while He withholds from them the essential grace that He gives only to the elect! And this is only one of Calvinism’s gross misrepresentations of God.
Totally irrational!
