Is God Patient With His Decree?

[Baptizo]

If foreknowledge is an attribute of God, wouldn't it follow that patience is not?

Like most things we learn of God, let's just say it's beyond comprehension.

 

[Ekklesian]

Of course, you’re quick to play that card when someone disagrees with your views.

*sigh* someone didn't get the joke.

I’m well aware of some of the nonsense you post over at the Fundamentals forums and I’m here to tell you, those tactics aren’t going to work here at the Baptist Board. We’re smarter than that.

Yes, I apologize. I often underestimate the sophistication and learning of my opponents. I should not have tried to bring Scripture into the argument so soon.

I'll back up.

Did you have any participation in your first birth?

 

[Baptizo]

Did you have any participation in your first birth?

I don’t remember.

 

[Ekklesian]

You've just nullified your entire argument. Looks like my work is done here.

 

[Ekklesian]

I don’t remember.

Quite the philosopher, you are!

 

[Silverhair]

*sigh* someone didn't get the joke.


Yes, I apologize. I often underestimate the sophistication and learning of my opponents. I should not have tried to bring Scripture into the argument so soon.

I'll back up.

Did you have any participation in your first birth?

Now does that question so the desperation of the calvinist.

Our rebirth comes about by the grace of God through faith in His son. Now I know that is a concept that you will find hard to accept or even believe but the bible is clear.

Eph 1:13 In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise,

Rom 10:9 that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.

Eph 2:8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God,

 

[Silverhair]

Quite the philosopher, you are!

I find that the philosophy comes from the calvinist us bible believers stick to the word of God.

 

[Ekklesian]

Now does that question so the desperation of the calvinist.

Our rebirth comes about by the grace of God through faith in His son. Now I know that is a concept that you will find hard to accept or even believe but the bible is clear.

Eph 1:13 In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise,

Rom 10:9 that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.

Eph 2:8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God,

Let's just say that birth is passive, for the one being born anyway. Certainly all the travail is on the part of another, for whom this day is set aside incidentally. (To the reader: today is mothers' day, if you're reading this on a different day.)

Let's look a few things that you would have to agree that were and are completely and totally out of your control.

Your conception
Your birth.
Your gender.
Your race.
Your family tree
Your time in history.
Your nationality.
Your societal status.
Your stature.
The number of hairs on your head.
The nurturing you received in your formative years.
Your estrangement from God.
Whether or not you would hear the Gospel.

You would have to agree that God was completely and wholly sovereign in all of these things, correct?

 

[Ekklesian]

There's one more...

Whether or not you could believe the Gospel. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

 

[Baptizo]

You've just nullified your entire argument.

LOL your utilization of the Windows snipping tool proves nothing. I appreciate the effort though, keep at it and maybe you’ll get good enough to graduate to Photoshop.

Quite the philosopher, you are!

If you’re going to ask me silly questions, then I’m going to give you silly answers. Of course I didn’t participate in my birth. Next, you’re inevitably going to ask me if I participated in my second birth. To that, I would answer yes. The Gospel was preached to me and I chose to accept it. That was my experience and it was real.

 

[Ben1445]

I'll just go ahead and cut to the chase. You will, rightly, affirm that God is omniscient. But your argument that foreknowledge or determinism would seem to invalidate God's virtue of longsuffering toward us, would also invalidate His expressed anger toward the disobedient.

Paul anticipated your objection when he said, Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? Ultimately that's what every argument against Calvinism boils down to.

Baptizo wilt say unto me, What reason doth he yet to have longsuffering? For who hath resisted his will?

The answer to that is easy, because Paul answered it for us. Now, you may not find that answer satisfying, and if not, then your issue is with the Spirit, and not with Calvinists, and you may have to re-evaluate the premises you're arguing from.

One major reason Calvinist such as yourself have so much confusion is that you use the words but you don’t know what they mean.
Determinism is exactly what it sounds like. According to Calvinism, God has decreed everything any determined everything (even the dust, that man was given responsibility for) before any of it ever happened.
Foreknowledge is knowledge of what will happen. Knowledge of something doesn’t mean will to do something. I know what will happen if someone knocks down the first domino in a chain. That doesn’t mean I made it happen. It doesn’t mean I set it up. It means I know something that hasn’t happened yet.
Stop mixing up your terms and you won’t get your doctrines all mixed up.

 

[Ben1445]

*sigh* someone didn't get the joke.


Yes, I apologize. I often underestimate the sophistication and learning of my opponents. I should not have tried to bring Scripture into the argument so soon.

I'll back up.

Did you have any participation in your first birth?

You must not be too familiar with the subject. At birth, a child has plenty of its own will. It doesn’t mean it will be allowed to make any final decisions during the day. But we aren’t on a one day old level either when we come to Christ.
It really is not a good analogy for the subject.

 

[Ekklesian]

One major reason Calvinist such as yourself have so much confusion is that you use the words but you don’t know what they mean.
Determinism is exactly what it sounds like. According to Calvinism, God has decreed everything any determined everything (even the dust, that man was given responsibility for) before any of it ever happened.
Foreknowledge is knowledge of what will happen. Knowledge of something doesn’t mean will to do something. I know what will happen if someone knocks down the first domino in a chain. That doesn’t mean I made it happen. It doesn’t mean I set it up. It means I know something that hasn’t happened yet.
Stop mixing up your terms and you won’t get your doctrines all mixed up.

I wasn't confusing the terms. I was using both terms to encapsulate both y'all's notions in my argument.

But, if God knows all things before they happen, and still allows them, then a non-deterministic theology is kind of dead theology isn't it? If things happen to you that are not a part of God's will for your life, then trust in God is nothing more than wishful thinking.

Kinduva sad, sorry, little faith you're preaching, don't you think?

 

[Ekklesian]

You must not be too familiar with the subject. At birth, a child has plenty of its own will. It doesn’t mean it will be allowed to make any final decisions during the day. But we aren’t on a one day old level either when we come to Christ.
It really is not a good analogy for the subject.

It's a perfect analogy. It's not called the second birth for nothing. But I would concede, that you contribute as much to your second birth as you did to your first one. Besides, I expanded upon the idea here.

 

[kyredneck]

*sigh* someone didn't get the joke.

...lol, this is a serious batch of Calvinist-slayers we have here, no sense of humor...

 

[Silverhair]

Let's just say that birth is passive, for the one being born anyway. Certainly all the travail is on the part of another, for whom this day is set aside incidentally. (To the reader: today is mothers' day, if you're reading this on a different day.)

Let's look a few things that you would have to agree that were and are completely and totally out of your control.

Your conception
Your birth.
Your gender.
Your race.
Your family tree
Your time in history.
Your nationality.
Your societal status.
Your stature.
The number of hairs on your head.
The nurturing you received in your formative years.
Your estrangement from God.
Whether or not you would hear the Gospel.

You would have to agree that God was completely and wholly sovereign in all of these things, correct?

God is sovereign, that should be obvious to all that claim to be followers of Him. But what does that have to do with whether one trusts in Him or not?

As the bible says the gospel is the power of God for salvation for all that hear and believe. But note even those that hear may not believe as they in either rejecting or accepting Christ have to exercise their free will.

But since God desires all to come to repentance has provided various means by which man can know Him.

 

[Silverhair]

I wasn't confusing the terms. I was using both terms to encapsulate both y'all's notions in my argument.

But, if God knows all things before they happen, and still allows them, then a non-deterministic theology is kind of dead theology isn't it? If things happen to you that are not a part of God's will for your life, then trust in God is nothing more than wishful thinking.

Kinduva sad, sorry, little faith you're preaching, don't you think?

Kinda sad that you think you are nothing more than a meat robot.

Maybe that is why some non-cal's think calvinists have just checked their brains at the door. No thinking required to be one.

 

[kyredneck]

Looks like my work is done here.

A Calvinist-slayer's work is never done because you'll never succeed in stamping out grace.

 

[Ben1445]

Let's just say that birth is passive, for the one being born anyway. Certainly all the travail is on the part of another, for whom this day is set aside incidentally. (To the reader: today is mothers' day, if you're reading this on a different day.)

Let's look a few things that you would have to agree that were and are completely and totally out of your control.

Your conception
Your birth.
Your gender.
Your race.
Your family tree
Your time in history.
Your nationality.
Your societal status.
Your stature.
The number of hairs on your head.
The nurturing you received in your formative years.
Your estrangement from God.
Whether or not you would hear the Gospel.

You would have to agree that God was completely and wholly sovereign in all of these things, correct?

Societal status is very fluid now a days. I will agree that God does put people in authority. But God doesn’t determine the drunk to drive himself to the bottom of society spending up his living and ruining his reputation with his lack of self control and self awareness.
Nurturing is the responsibility of parents. When there are no parents to take that responsibility, God says I will be a Father to the fatherless.
Estrangement from God is dot predetermined by God. God told Adam not to sin. So God didn’t contradict Himself and make Adam sin.
Whether or not you hear- Jesus said preach the gospel to every creature. So God determined that the gospel should be given to all. If it doesn’t happen the way Jesus commanded, that would be our fault and not the determination of God.

 

[Ben1445]

...lol, this is a serious batch of Calvinist-slayers we have here, no sense of humor...

I don’t actually find this to be a subject for levity. It’s pretty serious.