Seeking the truth is hard, but I feel much more peace since starting to search with all my heart. My spirit is refreshed and at peace at almost all times, but my body is weary of so much deep, emotional thought.
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I am Genuinely Confused
- Thread starter Steven Yeadon
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Seeking the truth is hard, but I feel much more peace since starting to search with all my heart. My spirit is refreshed and at peace at almost all times, but my body is weary of so much deep, emotional thought.
SheepWhisperer
Active Member
A Christian should be able to "love his enemies" as Jesus commanded, in order to be like "the Father" as Jesus said, and to be able to truthfully tell any person he meets "God loves you"....."and sent His only begotten Son to die in your place so that if you only believe on Him you wouldn't have to burn, fry and scream in agony in the Lake of Fire for all eternity.
OK, look at the Lord's feasts. These are prophetic of the redemption of mankind.
Passover -- the select "predestined" of the Lord who will rule and reign in the Kingdom here on earth. This is a spiritual analogue to to tribe of Judah and Israel. who rules and reign over the rest of Israel This is the church. However, Christ's death covers all even in the future.
Pentecost- the firstfruits of God's church. Tabernacles... these are those saved during the millennium saved after the church.
The Last Great Day is the resurrection of all those who were not called or who antedated the time of Christ. These are those who are part of the general resurrection who are raised physically for the Great White Throne Judgment as to whether they follow God's Law or decide to rebel. Probably most people will decide to follow God in this "mini-millennium". As the book of revelation clearly teaches, "those who are not found in the book of life" will experience the second death, which indeed is total extinction and will cease to exist. This is eternal fire which in our English vernacular means "burned up forever". Most people will be saved, else Satan won and God is a liar, which is what Satan wanted to prove to begin with. Only a few are predestined now to be the church. But the church is not the end of salvation. More will be saved later. This answers the heated debated of "predestination vs free choice".
Passover -- the select "predestined" of the Lord who will rule and reign in the Kingdom here on earth. This is a spiritual analogue to to tribe of Judah and Israel. who rules and reign over the rest of Israel This is the church. However, Christ's death covers all even in the future.
Pentecost- the firstfruits of God's church. Tabernacles... these are those saved during the millennium saved after the church.
The Last Great Day is the resurrection of all those who were not called or who antedated the time of Christ. These are those who are part of the general resurrection who are raised physically for the Great White Throne Judgment as to whether they follow God's Law or decide to rebel. Probably most people will decide to follow God in this "mini-millennium". As the book of revelation clearly teaches, "those who are not found in the book of life" will experience the second death, which indeed is total extinction and will cease to exist. This is eternal fire which in our English vernacular means "burned up forever". Most people will be saved, else Satan won and God is a liar, which is what Satan wanted to prove to begin with. Only a few are predestined now to be the church. But the church is not the end of salvation. More will be saved later. This answers the heated debated of "predestination vs free choice".
So you are saying that to the Son's perspective he is after everyone, but to the Father's perspective, He is sovereign and is giving some to the Son that the Son will find?
That one is again hard for me to accept emotionally, but I must still think heavily on it. That would seem to be the perspective of the apostles, including Paul, all Believers, as well as the Son.
I will do things differently in one big respect: I want to eventually be a teacher when I am grown up in the faith, and it will give me the knowledge of what it is I should teach. I will also grow up in the faith free of intellectual and emotional baggage that must be dispensed with later. Also, I want Jesus to reward me after death for how well I did in seeking His truth.
This, oddly, makes me think on one big topic: Does God find a Pharaoh or a Judas to curse, who were terrible people who chose evil and were made examples. Or did He make a Pharaoh or Judas to curse? That Jesus loves the whole world is a given as well, but if predestination of the Elect is true, then how does the Father love everyone? How is He impartial in His judgments? There is also a future question, does the Father already know who the Antichrist and False Prophet are? Or will He find two people to make eternal examples out of for choosing such iniquity?
I may be thinking too individually here, as I am applying predestination to the Elect who will be saved from the Lake of Burning Sulfur. I see now that Romans 9 has a large part to do with people groups, but there are plenty more verses for predestination beyond it though.
Also, one thing strikes me, how fair and just is it for Abraham and his offspring, through Isaac, to be the chosen and holy people? That leads me to a very hard question, which is how did God work salvation for the righteous before Jesus Christ came to earth? The whole quandary about those who do not know about Jesus in this life, or those that never even got the Law to tell them right and wrong in this life.
SheepWhisperer
Active Member
Judas and Pharaoh were already evil. Pharaoh "hardened his heart" a number of times before God did. God KNEW that was going to happen before it happened when He told Moses "I will harden his heart". Here is a similar process.....
Romans 1:28 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; In other words, if you keep on rejecting God, He finally says "enough is enough".
Predestination and Election are true. In short, Predestination has to do with our ultimate adoption as sons and our conformity to the image of Christ. Election has to do with our service as purposed by God.
God knows the beginning to the ending. He "inhabits" eternity the Bible says. But just because He KNOWS who will do thus and so, doesn't mean he MAKES it happen. For example, Hitler, Stalin and Mao murdered untold millions of people, but God didn't make them decide to do these things. It came from their own wicked hearts.
SheepWhisperer
Active Member
Brother, they were chosen to bless us all........God bless Israel!
God speaking to Jacob (Israel)
Genesis 28:14 And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south: and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed.
The Bible says that Jesus is the "Lamb slain from the foundation of the world". People in the OT looked ahead to the advent/cross; we are looking back. And........
Romans 1:20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:
No. That's not what I'm saying at all. There cannot be a dispute between God the father and God the Son. Read my last post through again.
Sorry, I get it now. I would say you are advocating for a predestinationist viewpoint using selected verses in John..
I must be honest that part of what is tripping me up about double predestination is that to concentrate on how wonderful it is for me to be saved, it leads to immense sorrow for others who were not chosen. For those who advocate predestination, is that normal? is it biblical from your viewpoint?
Here's the thing, from our perspective, none of us know who will and who will not be saved. Its not our job to look at ppl and see who we think is going to be saved and treat them differently. Everybody we come into contact with we need to show them love.
But yes, I do grieve at the thoughts of anyone dying lost. But the bible is crystal clear many will suffer justly over their rebellious lifestyle.
Plus, predestination is not double. Predestination is how God works grace into the hearts of His chosen ppl. The others are justly left in their sins.
OK, an issue with the free will side I have is: How can you say that God knows everything beforehand, but does not, in His sovereignty, choose who does and who does not go to hell? I mean the Molinists have a real good point if you assume free will at all. God does not dictate the future but guides it, given free will, using an understanding of all possible futures. The problem is this is not in the bible at all. Then again free will is really implied by the bible and not set forth as a doctrine. The Molinist approach seems the only way for the doctrine of free will to make any sense to me. Am I missing something?
Molinism is a sincere effort to affirm both the sovereignty of God and free will. I won't bore you with the details, but the Latin Rite folks were facing a revolt among theologians called the Jansenists who followed Augustinian teachings on predestination (which was the fountain from which both Luther and Calvin drank). Jansenism was defended by no less a mind than Blaise Pascal, but it was to no effect. Jansenism was purged from the Latin Rite, leaving something very like Molinism or Arminianism (from a totally different intellectual process) as an accepted orthodoxy.
But I would not want you to think that Arminianism is consistent with the Latin Rite conception of salvation. Arminius would be horrified at the concept that salvation is grace plus works.
Anyway ... Molinism, intellectually and despite purposes to which it has been used, contradicts the concept of libertarian free will. There is, in fact, no such thing as libertarian free will among humans. We are all the sum total of our life experiences and choices. To think that humans have completely free will is to ignore reality.
If I'm 5 foot 3, I may have free will to become an NBA power forward. But it's not going to happen.
I might want to be doctor. But if I grow up in a house that denigrates education, my will may not be realized.
If I grow up in a home in which Dad uses Mom as a punching bag, that fact affects my entire life. Do you think someone in that situation has completely free will? No, it is colored by experience.
I might want to become a model ... well, you get the point.
Molinism, then, is a sincere attempt to put God in a box of our own making. God is required to consider the infinite algorithms of free will, which are in turn colored by thousands of decisions along the way so as to make free will essentially a myth, to determine what he will do.
I don't think so. But I may be wrong.
But I would not want you to think that Arminianism is consistent with the Latin Rite conception of salvation. Arminius would be horrified at the concept that salvation is grace plus works.
Anyway ... Molinism, intellectually and despite purposes to which it has been used, contradicts the concept of libertarian free will. There is, in fact, no such thing as libertarian free will among humans. We are all the sum total of our life experiences and choices. To think that humans have completely free will is to ignore reality.
If I'm 5 foot 3, I may have free will to become an NBA power forward. But it's not going to happen.
I might want to be doctor. But if I grow up in a house that denigrates education, my will may not be realized.
If I grow up in a home in which Dad uses Mom as a punching bag, that fact affects my entire life. Do you think someone in that situation has completely free will? No, it is colored by experience.
I might want to become a model ... well, you get the point.
Molinism, then, is a sincere attempt to put God in a box of our own making. God is required to consider the infinite algorithms of free will, which are in turn colored by thousands of decisions along the way so as to make free will essentially a myth, to determine what he will do.
I don't think so. But I may be wrong.
Thank you. I guess what you said makes a lot of sense. If I assume we have free will then I most assuredly do not believe that it is infinite or anything of the like. I mean, we are finite creatures, how could our choices be infinite? If our choices are not infinite, then we must be finite, and if finite, then we would be known by God out of His knowledge of the present alone.
Then again, I do not want to make any suppositions about the mind of God. I guess the biggest problem I am facing is that we have a belief called free will that is implied by the bible, but not taught. I understand now that my quest to understand this issue has hit a road block.
I guess the biggest problem I am facing is that we have a belief called free will that is implied by the bible, but not taught. I understand now that my quest to understand this issue has hit a road block.
Of course, God is sovereign and is charge of history and rules the world as an absolute king from His throne above the cherubim. I do not know how to rule the world, I think like a worm, slug, or at best sheep compared to God. Therefore, whatever is happening is just the way it is no matter which side is correct. A hard thing to do emotionally, but something that gives me incredible inner peace from the Holy Spirit it seems.
I also know that God somehow wants all to repent and live righteously, trusting in His Son. He invites all people at least even though not everyone is saved at the Day of Judgment. That when I pray for His will done on earth as it is in heaven, I am asking what seems impossible: I am asking that peace and goodwill abound to all people, that all people may be saved, and that all people would live righteously. The verses I have found on these topics when read in context are conclusive.
So, I am now going to look mat this idea of free will and see if it is supported by the bible at all. That is the crux of the whole matter in the American churches it seems. Is there free will or is it an accursed lie of humanism? Of course, I would love it if anyone posted their own bible verses on free will or its absence.
Of course, God is sovereign and is charge of history and rules the world as an absolute king from His throne above the cherubim. I do not know how to rule the world, I think like a worm, slug, or at best sheep compared to God. Therefore, whatever is happening is just the way it is no matter which side is correct. A hard thing to do emotionally, but something that gives me incredible inner peace from the Holy Spirit it seems.
I also know that God somehow wants all to repent and live righteously, trusting in His Son. He invites all people at least even though not everyone is saved at the Day of Judgment. That when I pray for His will done on earth as it is in heaven, I am asking what seems impossible: I am asking that peace and goodwill abound to all people, that all people may be saved, and that all people would live righteously. The verses I have found on these topics when read in context are conclusive.
So, I am now going to look mat this idea of free will and see if it is supported by the bible at all. That is the crux of the whole matter in the American churches it seems. Is there free will or is it an accursed lie of humanism? Of course, I would love it if anyone posted their own bible verses on free will or its absence.
Typically "double predestination" is used to define an idea more than God just not choosing people ("double predestination" is an act, just as election is an act - i.e., God actively choosing people not to save and God actively choosing people to save. The difference is that with election God is the author of man's salvation. But with "double predestination", God is the author of man's damnation.
I believe most, not all, Calvinists on this forum reject the idea of "double predestination". Some others, like John Piper, hold a a non-traditional definition (that it means God purposefully not saving people).
Thank you for the clarification.
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