Is predestination disturbing?

It is by love and by grace that any God hating, rebelious, evil man gets one heart beat in this world and EVERY heart beat of every unregenerate man is because God in his love withholds His wrath with every God supporting heart beat.

The assurance is MINE Wes because I take those promises of God sustaining me and keeping me. My faith is in HIM not in any power of my own. Which brings you to your weakness. You rely on YOUR choice for salvation. Thus what you choose today you might not choose tomorrow. YOU don't know what you are going to choose tomorrow do you? You chose red socks today but, maybe blue will be fun tomorrow... faith in choice is a weak faith.

 

How can you get that chain unlinked Bob... oh yeah... eisogesis.

He foreknows who He predestines, yes to be conformed... but read on!

Those that he predestined, he called and justified and GLORIFIED.

Who did He Glorify? Those He justified. Who did He justify? Those He predestined.

Universalim strikes again! Did he predestine ALL to conform? NO. If He did, He also justified and glorified them.... not rocket science. You can't pick a word OUT of the context Bob and lead on a meaningless rabbit trail. There is ONE OBJECT two which God is speaking of for which HE does ALL of those things... Ever notice that? God does it ALL, man does NOTHING.

 

Who did He PREDISTINE? Those that He FOREKNEW! How much does God FOREKNOW?? ALL!!!

And what OTHER kind of Predestination were "you" thinking of??

What happens when mankind REJECTS this predistination - this PURPOSE OF GOD for themselves??

Luke 7:30 "THEY REJECTED the PURPOSE of God for themselves"!!

WHAT IS God's predestined PURPOSE?? "THAT ALL should come to repentance" for "GOD IS NOT WILLING that any should perish"!!

DID I mention that God has FREE WILL??

In Christ,

Bob

 

Calvinist Bible -

"I STAND at the door and knock -- of course ALL mankind will DO NOTHING - so I then run around on the inside and OPEN The door welcoming myself IN. Then I sit the robot on the inside down at the table and command it to eat supper with Me".

The Arminian Bible

"I STAND at the door and knock - if any one HEARS My voice AND OPENS the door -- I WILL COME IN and dine WITH him and HE with ME"

Now lets hide and watch WHICH of this two Bibles actually gets PUBLISHED in Rev 3!

In Christ,

Bob

 

#1. No text of scripture says everyone in the church "is aved".

#2. No text of scriptured describes the "Saved experience" as "Being spewed out of God's mouth" -- which is the fate pending for the 7th church.

#3. No text of scripture describes the "Saved experience" as "Alone on the inside WITHOUT Christ".

In fact - in Matt 7 Christ argues that IF the fruit is NOT what God expects of a GOOD tree - then the TREE ITSELF is rotten to the core! He argues that you can NOT get bad fruit from a GOOD tree!

Paul makes the same argument about true spiritual circumcision in Rom 2:17-end

So "yes" the LOST state is the state of being "Alone" on the INSIDE while Christ is on the OUTSIDE knocking and waiting for you to open the door so that fellowship can BEGIN!

I am simply observing that God's Purpose for a person is expressed in His predestination for them.

I note that He has ABSOLUTE foreknowledge!

I observe that He PREDESTINES ALL that He "foreknows".

I note that God Himself argues in Luke 7:30 that the wicked who REFUSE His call to repentance and salvation are "rejecting God's PURPOSE for THEM"

I also note that this is the ONLY kind of "predestination" mentioned in the Bible!

There is nothing in here about "God does not know" or to be more precise "God does not FOREKNOW"! My argument is the opposite - I say He FOREKNOWS ALL with absolute foreknowlege!

But HE says "THEY rejected God's PURPOSE for them" Luke 7:30.

I can not deny that.

I also can not deny that His purpose is stated explicitly in that He PREDESTINES them to become CONFORMED to the Image of His Son!

In Christ,

Bob

 

David,
I do not believe in Total Depravity or Total Inability! In light of the truth they are nothing but MYTH! The truth is this, Man is as God created him. The part that is missing is the living relationship between the created and the creator. Sin separates them because God is pure holiness, man is tainted by the knowledge of good and evil resulting from the actual partaking of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

I do not see in scripture where man is in the state of depraved! The evidence in REAL LIFE says otherwise!

The REALITY evidence speaks otherwise! Man retains all that God created in him, and God expects and commands that man use his God given abilities. Scriptures tell us that God says we are to choose (an ability), Scriptures tell us to be kind (an ability) one to another. Scriptures tell us to feed the poor (an ability), care for the homeless, visit those in prisons, give drink to the thirsty, give a cloak to the cloak-less, etc. I could go on with a long list of things that scriptures demand that we do. If we lacked the ability as the doctrine of Total inability says, we could never do what God commands of us and we could not be held accountable for that for which we have no ability. So, David, NO I do not believe in Total depravity or Total Inability.

Scriptures reveal that Original sin is disobedience of God. God's first command to man was to not eat of the trees in the midst of the garden. All of man's sins throughout history have their root in "disobedience of God". I am convinced beyond doubt that original sin, which is in all of us, is "Disobedience". There is no sin without disobedience!

The bounds that I spoke of are environmental. God, who is spirit, created the environment in which he placed hisin created man, Natural. Man has not been successful in exceeding the bounds that God established for man, even space flight and travel to places other than this planet are things man can do. What man cannot do is go to where God resides, man cannot leave the natural realm, enter the spiritual realm and return to the natural realm. God did left the spiritual realm entered the natural realm, then reenter the spirit realm! The natural realm is God's creation.

 

1 Corinthians 2:14 14 The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.

Yes Man is UNABLE to go beyond the natural bounds God set up for Him...

 

God did not SET the bound of "SinFUL nature" -- it is a gift FROM ADAM. ROmans 5. Rather GOD'S GIFT is to that SAME group that is cursed in Adam.

1Cor 2 IS NOT claiming that CONVERSION is the great KNOWLEDGE - but that "Combining thoughts words with spiritual WORDS" resulting in doctrine and wisdom in all truth "For we have been given THE MIND OF CHRIST". 1cor2.

1Cor 2 is NOT making the Calvinist claim that the John 16 CONVICTION of the WORLD by the Holy Spirit is "worthless"!!

RATHER it is talking about the WISDOM and knowledge of the saved AFTER conversion - in discovering NEW truth and the deep things of God!!

Leave it to Calvinism to try to bend this around to the point that EVEN the CONVICTION of SIN and call to salvation is NOT "possible" though done for ALL THE WORLD!!

In Christ,

Bob

 

But, if Calvinism is right, God MADE Eve take the fruit and MADE Adam follow her in sin so God could torture and kill His only Son on a cross for THAT sin which God forced upon Adam and Eve. Right?

Again, that makes God the author of evil.

 

"Calvinists say they chose to sin. Who says they were forced?
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Cavlinists say that God chose who would go to hell and who would be saved. Since the only sin that results in damnation is rejection of Christ, saying God did not allow them to accept Christ is saying God forced them to sin.

 

The scenario isn't what the bible reports anyway.

God made a totally innocent man.
God said, "Don't eat of this tree."
Satan said, "Go ahead, eat it!"

Man chose to listen to Satan.

Calvinism, as written by John Calvin, means that God caused Adam and Eve to listen to Satan, then punished them from doing it.

Those who reject Calvinism say, "Adam had a clear choice of following God or not following God, and Adam chose not to follow God."

 

Exactly, TexasSky! Calvinist make God out to be some Michael Pearl type God who holds out the bowl of food to a hungry baby and then hits the child with a wooden spoon when the child touches the bowl.

 

Consider the attributes of God. God is full of mercy and love. Would you know His mercy, if there were no need of mercy? What of God’s wrath? His wrath is revealed from heaven against all unrighteousness. Then there is the solitariness of God, shown with Romans 11:35, a characteristic of God demonstrated by grace being freely bestowed without partiality, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth (Rom 9:11,20,21).

Romans 11:33 (KJV) O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!
34 For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor?
35 Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again?
36 For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.

By grace,
Bob Krajcik
Mansfield, Ohio

 

What of health, wealth, intellectual power etc? Is God to be faulted for not giving man a choice in these things?

Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?

For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.

By grace,
Bob Krajcik
Mansfield, Ohio

 

Bob I have wondered if that passage in Romans 9 was directed at Jews who were angry that Gentiles could be saved. Sorta like God saying, "what's it to you?" ya know?

 

Very few Calvinists say any of these things. It is hard to carry on a conversation when people insist on talking about something that no one actually believes. You guys are way too smart to listen to us tell you what we believe. Feel free just to make up your own opponents and call it Calvinism. That way, we who are actually Calvinists can be tarred and feathered with teh nonsense that you make up. Don't worry about what we believe, and certainly don't pay attention when we keep saying it over and over again. Don't let the facts get in the way of your own opinions about things. It is much easier to win debates the way you carry it on.

Those who believe Calvinism say this as well. There are very few Calvinists, if any, who would deny this.

But again, don't let the facts get in the way of your own opinion. It is much easier for you to go on thinking you are right, then to actually have to deal with what we believe.

I can't help but notice that Diane had steadfastly refused to tell us what God meant when he said that he "chose us to salvation." I wonder why Diane (or anyone else for that matter) won't deal with the actual text of Scripture?

 

Larry, many Calvinists do the same thing. They "think" they know what Arminians believe but in many cases they don't. I think there's room on both sides for us to learn what the other really believes.

 

I agree, and have said that often. Unfortunately, the same nonsense keeps getting brought up time and time again.