The Image of God IS Freewill

[Ran the Man]

I got this reading another post.

"This only have I found: God created mankind upright, but they have gone in search of many schemes."
Ecclesiates 7:29
Who is the author of our sin? Most certainly not God. This is not to say God could not be otherwise, but to His credit He chooses to be righteous. God does as His nature is, and His nature is as He does. but he could possibly have done otherwise.
Man is made in God's image. He could be righteous, but he CHOSE evil. Now that tendency is inherited by his offspring
If God made man anything but upright, He would be unrighteous, because He would be guilty of creating evil.
Here is my point: God cannot create one for hell and one for heaven. To do so would be to create evil. Therefore double predestination and limited atonement cannot be correct.
To quote an old rap song:
" A child is born with no state of mind, blind to the ways of mankind."

 

[37818]

God . . . to His credit He chooses to be righteous.

Did God choose to be God?

Man is made in God's image. He could be righteous, but he CHOSE evil.

How did man choose to be evil not yet having God's knowledge of good and evil?

 

[Ran the Man]

Did God choose to be God?

Absurdity.

 

[Wesley Briggman]

I agree, God IS freewill since there is no being that can successfully challenge or condemn Him. I believe Adam had freewill until the fall. My understanding of freewill that no bias or outside influence swayed your decision. In the human experience, this is not possible.

Consider Jonah. He defied God's command and went his own way. If he had freewill imparted to him by God, there would have been no consequence for his decision/action. God would honor the freewill He had endowed mankind with.

Additionally:
Mat 7:21 KJV - Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.
Mat 7:22 KJV - Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?
Mat 7:23 KJV - And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.

I conclude that the "many" mentioned herein were denied entry to heaven although that was the desire of there so called freewill.

 

[Ran the Man]

I agree, God IS freewill since there is no being that can successfully challenge or condemn Him. I believe Adam had freewill until the fall. My understanding of freewill that no bias or outside influence swayed your decision. In the human experience, this is not possible.

Consider Jonah. He defied God's command and went his own way. If he had freewill imparted to him by God, there would have been no consequence for his decision/action. God would honor the freewill He had endowed mankind with.

Additionally:
Mat 7:21 KJV - Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.
Mat 7:22 KJV - Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?
Mat 7:23 KJV - And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.

I conclude that the "many" mentioned herein were denied entry to heaven although that was the desire of there freewill.

But God didn't zap Jonah into being an obedient zombie like Calvinists claim. He twisted his arm until he did what God wanted.

 

[Ran the Man]

Man

I agree, God IS freewill since there is no being that can successfully challenge or condemn Him. I believe Adam had freewill until the fall. My understanding of freewill that no bias or outside influence swayed your decision. In the human experience, this is not possible.

Consider Jonah. He defied God's command and went his own way. If he had freewill imparted to him by God, there would have been no consequence for his decision/action. God would honor the freewill He had endowed mankind with.

Additionally:
Mat 7:21 KJV - Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.
Mat 7:22 KJV - Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?
Mat 7:23 KJV - And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.

I conclude that the "many" mentioned herein were denied entry to heaven although that was the desire of there freewill.

Man IS in God's image. He never stopped being in God's image in spite of his fall, so he still has freewill. All of the church fathers before Augustine say so.

 

[37818]

I believe Adam had freewill until the fall.

. . . that was the desire of [their] freewill.

Does not make sense. The latter example is after the fall of man.

 

[37818]

But God didn't zap Jonah into being an obedient zombie like Calvinists claim. He twisted his arm until he did what God wanted.

How do Calvinist make such a claim, please provide citation? Else this is just a straw man argument.

 

[37818]

Man

Man IS in God's image. He never stopped being in God's image in spite of his fall, so he still has freewill. All of the church fathers before Augustine say so.

Where in the word of God is choice called "free will?"

 

[Wesley Briggman]

But God didn't zap Jonah into being an obedient zombie like Calvinists claim. He twisted his arm until he did what God wanted.

God had His way. If Jonah had freewill granted to him by God, God would be obliged to honor Jonah's "freewill".

 

[Wesley Briggman]

Does not make sense. The latter example is after the fall of man.

Sorry for the confusion. I edited my OP in an effort to clarify my understanding of how proponents of freewill believe. As stated, I do not believe in freewill.

I would like those that believe in freewill to provide examples from scripture to support their position.

Scripture continually instructs the believer to submit his will to God's will.

Phl 2:5 KJV - Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:

Does not our will/decisions originate as a thought in our mind? If we have the mind of Christ, our will will be in compliance with His will. No correction, as with Jonah, will be called for.

 

[37818]

I understand man was made in God's image, in that, we are creative beings. We design and make things.. Unlike bees, spiders, birds or beavers or any other animals, none of which were made in God's image.

 

[Reynolds]

I got this reading another post.

"This only have I found: God created mankind upright, but they have gone in search of many schemes."
Ecclesiates 7:29
Who is the author of our sin? Most certainly not God. This is not to say God could not be otherwise, but to His credit He chooses to be righteous. God does as His nature is, and His nature is as He does. but he could possibly have done otherwise.
Man is made in God's image. He could be righteous, but he CHOSE evil. Now that tendency is inherited by his offspring
If God made man anything but upright, He would be unrighteous, because He would be guilty of creating evil.
Here is my point: God cannot create one for hell and one for heaven. To do so would be to create evil. Therefore double predestination and limited atonement cannot be correct.
To quote an old rap song:
" A child is born with no state of mind, blind to the ways of mankind."

You are expert at adding two plus two and getting 7.

 

[Wesley Briggman]

Man IS in God's image. He never stopped being in God's image in spite of his fall, so he still has freewill. All of the church fathers before Augustine say so.

Where does the Bible say so?

 

[Wesley Briggman]

Free-Will - A Slave

Free-Will - A Slave
By Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Dec 2, 1855
"And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life."—John 5:40

"This is one of the great guns of the Arminians, mounted upon the top of their walls, and often discharged with terrible noise against the poor Christians called Calvinists. I intend to spike the gun this morning, or, rather, to turn it on the enemy, for it was never theirs; it was never cast at their foundry at all, but was intended to teach the very opposite doctrine to that which they assert. Usually, when the text is taken, the divisions are: First, that man has a will. Secondly, that he is entirely free. Thirdly, that men must make themselves willing to come to Christ, otherwise they will not be saved. Now, we shall have no such divisions; but we will endeavour to take a more calm look at the text; and not, because there happen to be the words "will," or "will not" in it, run away with the conclusion that it teaches the doctrine of free-will. It has already been proved beyond all controversy that free-will is nonsense. Freedom cannot belong to will any more than ponderability can belong to electricity. They are altogether different things. Free agency we may believe in, but free-will is simply ridiculous. The will is well known by all to be directed by the understanding, to be moved by motives, to be guided by other parts of the soul, and to be a secondary thing. Philosophy and religion both discard at once the very thought of free-will; and I will go as far as Martin Luther, in that strong assertion of his, where he says, "If any man doth ascribe aught of salvation, even the very least, to the free-will of man, he knoweth nothing of grace, and he hath not learnt Jesus Christ aright." It may seem a harsh sentiment; but he who in his soul believes that man does of his own free-will turn to God, cannot have been taught of God, for that is one of the first principles taught us when God begins with us, that we have neither will nor power, but that he gives both; that he is "Alpha and Omega" in the salvation of men."

 

[Dave G]

But God didn't zap Jonah into being an obedient zombie like Calvinists claim.

"Calvinists", at least the ones that I am aware of, have never stated that in any piece of writing or verbage that I have been exposed to.
I've also seen and heard that charge leveled at them for years now, that they teach that God makes His children into obedient zombies.
He doesn't.

Rather, He changes their nature...making them perfectly willing to go along with God, despite their sinful flesh, and that they wrestle with doing God's will on occasion because of it.
Their new nature is to do God's will, but their flesh wants to do the opposite ( Romans 7:14-25, Galatians 5:17 ).

He twisted his arm until he did what God wanted.

"Twisted his arm?"
I agree, from a certain point of view.

In Jonah's case, he hated the people of Nineveh because of their wickedness and because they were enemies of the Jews...and he wanted God to judge them; God's purpose was to send Jonah and have him preach repentance to them...he ran the other direction, God firmly convinced His wayward servant that it was in his best interests to obey Him, and so Jonah had a change of heart when he was forced to sit in the belly of the whale for 3 days and 3 nights contemplating his relationship with God.


Similar to Job, he "saw" that God was just a little larger than what Jonah had initially given Him credit for, and that God's will gets done whether or not men like to do it.
In some places they call it, "having an attitude adjustment".



In the case of God's children, the nature is changed and they then begin to naturally gravitate towards doing His will and listening to Him, instead of fighting Him and ignoring Him.
But again, they sometimes wrestle with obeying Him.

 

[MartyF]

I believe Adam had freewill until the fall. My understanding of freewill that no bias or outside influence swayed your decision.

Lol. you don't see the logical inconsistency in these two sentences? If so, I'm not sure if there is any reason to either pay attention to you or try to convince you otherwise. Adam was obviously influenced by the snake and Eve. So you need to either work on your definition of free-will or re-read Genesis.

Matthew 7:15-27 NLT
“Beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep but are really vicious wolves. [16] You can identify them by their fruit, that is, by the way they act. Can you pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? [17] A good tree produces good fruit, and a bad tree produces bad fruit. [18] A good tree can’t produce bad fruit, and a bad tree can’t produce good fruit. [19] So every tree that does not produce good fruit is chopped down and thrown into the fire. [20] Yes, just as you can identify a tree by its fruit, so you can identify people by their actions.

[21] “Not everyone who calls out to me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Only those who actually do the will of my Father in heaven will enter. [22] On judgment day many will say to me, ‘Lord! Lord! We prophesied in your name and cast out demons in your name and performed many miracles in your name.’ [23] But I will reply, ‘I never knew you. Get away from me, you who break God’s laws.’

[24] “Anyone who listens to my teaching and follows it is wise, like a person who builds a house on solid rock. [25] Though the rain comes in torrents and the floodwaters rise and the winds beat against that house, it won’t collapse because it is built on bedrock. [26] But anyone who hears my teaching and doesn’t obey it is foolish, like a person who builds a house on sand. [27] When the rains and floods come and the winds beat against that house, it will collapse with a mighty crash.”

Too many times people take verses completely out of context on these forums. What Jesus is describing is that obedience to God and following the example of Jesus is the clear way one establishes oneself as a Jesus-follower. One can sing all the Hymns you want, preach at the local church, or even write the Institutes of the Christian Religion, but if one's behavior and actions do not follow Jesus' example, the faith of that person is dead. The person refused to truly believe.

The passage is not about the denial of free-will.

 

[MartyF]

Spurgeon does not equal Bible. Even Spurgeon would agree about that.

Next, almost no-one here is an Arminian. You can look up the post bout that. About 2 out of 20.

So, posting an argument about Arminianism is pretty silly.

Free-Will - A Slave

Free-Will - A Slave
By Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Dec 2, 1855
"And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life."—John 5:40

"This is one of the great guns of the Arminians, mounted upon the top of their walls, and often discharged with terrible noise against the poor Christians called Calvinists. I intend to spike the gun this morning, or, rather, to turn it on the enemy, for it was never theirs; it was never cast at their foundry at all, but was intended to teach the very opposite doctrine to that which they assert. Usually, when the text is taken, the divisions are: First, that man has a will. Secondly, that he is entirely free. Thirdly, that men must make themselves willing to come to Christ, otherwise they will not be saved. Now, we shall have no such divisions; but we will endeavour to take a more calm look at the text; and not, because there happen to be the words "will," or "will not" in it, run away with the conclusion that it teaches the doctrine of free-will. It has already been proved beyond all controversy that free-will is nonsense. Freedom cannot belong to will any more than ponderability can belong to electricity. They are altogether different things. Free agency we may believe in, but free-will is simply ridiculous. The will is well known by all to be directed by the understanding, to be moved by motives, to be guided by other parts of the soul, and to be a secondary thing. Philosophy and religion both discard at once the very thought of free-will; and I will go as far as Martin Luther, in that strong assertion of his, where he says, "If any man doth ascribe aught of salvation, even the very least, to the free-will of man, he knoweth nothing of grace, and he hath not learnt Jesus Christ aright." It may seem a harsh sentiment; but he who in his soul believes that man does of his own free-will turn to God, cannot have been taught of God, for that is one of the first principles taught us when God begins with us, that we have neither will nor power, but that he gives both; that he is "Alpha and Omega" in the salvation of men."

 

[MartyF]

I would like those that believe in freewill to provide examples from scripture to support their position.

How many do you need?

I included some in the random scripture of the day in this post:

Come Unto Me

I get the feeling that I could quote a hundred blatantly obvious scripture verses, yet you would weasel out of all of them.

But why not. Here's another random scripture.

Genesis 6:5-13 NLT
The LORD observed the extent of human wickedness on the earth, and he saw that everything they thought or imagined was consistently and totally evil. [6] So the LORD was sorry he had ever made them and put them on the earth. It broke his heart. [7] And the LORD said, “I will wipe this human race I have created from the face of the earth. Yes, and I will destroy every living thing—all the people, the large animals, the small animals that scurry along the ground, and even the birds of the sky. I am sorry I ever made them.” [8] But Noah found favor with the LORD.

[9] This is the account of Noah and his family. Noah was a righteous man, the only blameless person living on earth at the time, and he walked in close fellowship with God. [10] Noah was the father of three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth. [11] Now God saw that the earth had become corrupt and was filled with violence. [12] God observed all this corruption in the world, for everyone on earth was corrupt. [13] So God said to Noah, “I have decided to destroy all living creatures, for they have filled the earth with violence. Yes, I will wipe them all out along with the earth!

 

[Wesley Briggman]

Lol. you don't see the logical inconsistency in these two sentences? If so, I'm not sure if there is any reason to either pay attention to you or try to convince you otherwise. Adam was obviously influenced by the snake and Eve. So you need to either work on your definition of free-will or re-read Genesis.

Matthew 7:15-27 NLT
“Beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep but are really vicious wolves. [16] You can identify them by their fruit, that is, by the way they act. Can you pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? [17] A good tree produces good fruit, and a bad tree produces bad fruit. [18] A good tree can’t produce bad fruit, and a bad tree can’t produce good fruit. [19] So every tree that does not produce good fruit is chopped down and thrown into the fire. [20] Yes, just as you can identify a tree by its fruit, so you can identify people by their actions.

[21] “Not everyone who calls out to me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Only those who actually do the will of my Father in heaven will enter. [22] On judgment day many will say to me, ‘Lord! Lord! We prophesied in your name and cast out demons in your name and performed many miracles in your name.’ [23] But I will reply, ‘I never knew you. Get away from me, you who break God’s laws.’

[24] “Anyone who listens to my teaching and follows it is wise, like a person who builds a house on solid rock. [25] Though the rain comes in torrents and the floodwaters rise and the winds beat against that house, it won’t collapse because it is built on bedrock. [26] But anyone who hears my teaching and doesn’t obey it is foolish, like a person who builds a house on sand. [27] When the rains and floods come and the winds beat against that house, it will collapse with a mighty crash.”

Too many times people take verses completely out of context on these forums. What Jesus is describing is that obedience to God and following the example of Jesus is the clear way one establishes oneself as a Jesus-follower. One can sing all the Hymns you want, preach at the local church, or even write the Institutes of the Christian Religion, but if one's behavior and actions do not follow Jesus' example, the faith of that person is dead. The person refused to truly believe.

The passage is not about the denial of free-will.

Thanks for your responses.

While I do not believe mankind has freewill, I am attempting to gain insight into what those who do believe in it believe about it. Does every one, non-repentant and repentant sinners, have it? Where they born with it? Can they lose it? If they lose it, can they regain it?

As for God's children:
Rom 6:16 KJV - Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?

As far as I know, no servant has freewill. If your servitude leads to death your master is satan. If your servitude leads to righteousness, your master is God. I do see where freewill is in accordance with this scripture.​

Gal 3:1 KJV - O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you, that ye should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth, crucified among you?

Clearly an outside influence (“who hath bewitched you") caused them to disobey the truth.​

Gal 5:7 KJV - Ye did run well; who did hinder you that ye should not obey the truth?

Freewill?​

Jesus Christ surrendered His freewill to His Father's will. Therefore, since you profess that you have freewill, I beseech you to do likewise.

My Bible does not reveal any interaction between Adam and the serpent as you stated.

If you chose, you can put me on your "ignore" list. Best to ya.