One must precede the other though!
What determines why we were now the elect, I chose God, who then elected, or God elected, then I chose Him?
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Two Views of Foreknowledge
- Thread starter JonC
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What determines why we were now the elect, I chose God, who then elected, or God elected, then I chose Him?
Two different Greek words are translated as foreknown and foreknowledge. Both words refer to information acquired or formulated in the past being utilized in the present. So when a predetermined plan is implemented, it is according to foreknowledge. This is the only meaning. Efforts to say the word is akin to "foresee the future" are utterly bogus. Efforts to say the word refers to a preexisting intimate relationship are utterly bogus.
Review the eight places where the word is used, and only the utilization of prior knowledge fits all of them.
Yet another unstudied assertion without a reference to scripture.
Two different Greek words are translated as foreknown and foreknowledge. Both words refer to information acquired or formulated in the past being utilized in the present. So when a predetermined plan is implemented, it is according to foreknowledge. This is the only meaning. Efforts to say the word is akin to "foresee the future" are utterly bogus. Efforts to say the word refers to a preexisting intimate relationship are utterly bogus.
Review the eight places where the words are used, and only the utilization of prior knowledge fits all of them
Problem #1, Attempting to put God's infinite knowledge into your finite little box - "God's foreknows all things, therefore He must have pre-determined all things."
Problem #2, unavoidable Theological Fatalism, God cannot determine or cause evil, - it is logically impossible for man to have both, human volition and to not have it, as if it can be both true and not true.
God either directly caused all things, or else He indirectly allows for it to happen, correct? Both are in operation.
You have not indicated you know how the two Greek words are used in scripture. Look at Acts 26:5. The idea is to use knowledge acquired when Paul was being raised, and testify he was raised a Pharisee. The claimed meaning do not fit.
The calvinists i've rubbed shoulders with seem to favor the latter view, that foreknowledge is a reference to God's love and choosing of individuals in eternity past.
the problem I have with this is, the words for knowledge and foreknowledge in Hebrew and Greek are never translated as "love" and lexicons never define these words as love.
I think foreknowledge means to know or experience in advance. I don't think it' means choose or love in verses like Romans 8:29. Nor do I think the word know means choose or love anywhere else in Scripture. Adam knew is wife is very different from saying Adam loved his wife. These are not synonymous words.
I actually think that the word called in Romans 8:30 is the equivalent of choose or appoint. I do not believe it's referring to God's drawing as most Calvinists do. I think it carries the idea of naming or reckoning which happened in eternity past, based on God's foreknowledge.
I agree (that has been my experience as well). It was not what Calvin himself believed or claimed, but I think that it is how the term has come to be known today.
Well put. Middle knowledge theory is fascinating and to me fits Scripture in that God decrees the future definitely and exhaustively, and yet responds to things. It makes sense to me, at least for now.
Correct. But it also doesn't mean "I never loved you." Know and love are different words that carry different ideas. It seems to carry the idea in this context of experienced or known intimately.
This is why the word can sometimes be used as a reference to sex as in a man knowing his wife. It doesn't mean he didn't love his wife before, nor necessarily that he loved her during. It's more of an experiential term, which would make sense regarding future believers. God knew them in a way he did not know unbelievers.
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I would say He never loved them as His bride. Maybe as a sparrow or a lily, as he loves them and gives them life as part of his creation. But certainly not as those to whom He gave grace to believe.
Like I said before, the word is never translated as love, nor ever interchangeable with love. You can speculate that God never loved them, but it's just speculation. It doesn't come from this verse.
What the verse does say is God, Jesus, never knew them relationally the way he knows believers.
It means God did not place that individual into Christ. Full Stop
Scott Downey
Well-Known Member
No will of the flesh is part of God the Father giving to Christ His people. In John 1:13 that is specifically also excluded because unless you are born of God you will not believe in Christ.
So we see election is of God and not of the man and eternal life age enduring is of God and not of man. Our faith is accomplished by God creating the situations in our life that lead us to receiving Christ, He is the author and finisher of our faith.
We never did love God until God loved us first. So there was no looking down time to see who would choose to love God and therefore God chose to love that person with His great love and make them alive who were DEAD. The spiritually dead dont love the true God and the true Christ. In truth Christ said the spiritually dead hate both the Father and Him.
1 John 4:10
In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
John 6:37 All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out.
John 6:39 This is the will of the Father who sent Me, that of all He has given Me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day.
1 John 4:19
We love Him because He first loved us.
So we see election is of God and not of the man and eternal life age enduring is of God and not of man. Our faith is accomplished by God creating the situations in our life that lead us to receiving Christ, He is the author and finisher of our faith.
We never did love God until God loved us first. So there was no looking down time to see who would choose to love God and therefore God chose to love that person with His great love and make them alive who were DEAD. The spiritually dead dont love the true God and the true Christ. In truth Christ said the spiritually dead hate both the Father and Him.
1 John 4:10
In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
John 6:37 All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out.
John 6:39 This is the will of the Father who sent Me, that of all He has given Me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day.
1 John 4:19
We love Him because He first loved us.
These assertions are not supported by scripture. Instead, they must be read into scripture.
1) Does John 1:12-13 say or suggest "unless you are born of God, you will not believe in Christ? Nope
But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name,who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. (NASB)
a) When do we become "children of God?" When we are placed in Christ (given to Christ) and are made alive (born anew). Therefore when we are given the right to become "children of God" is when God puts us into Christ spiritually.
b) The sequence presented in the passage is (1) we receive (put our faith in) Christ, (2) then God puts us in Christ. And this action (being placed in Christ and being spiritually born anew) was the result "not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor the will of man, but of God.
c) Therefore this passage says the opposite of the assertion, which is that unless we first "receive" (believe in His name) God will not cause us to become "children of God."
2) No verse or passage says God compels us to believe. Our faith is "accomplished" by (1) being open to God's word, (2) hearing, understanding, and being attracted (drawn) by the Father through the gospel of Christ, (3) and then after hearing and learning from the Father, fully committing to and being devoted to Christ as our God and Savior. Then, when and if God credits our faith as righteousness, God alone puts us into Christ spiritually.
3) Christ's birth, sinless life, death on the cross, and resurrection is the basis of our faith (which Christ authored at great price) and our faith in completely and fully in Christ and not also something or someone else, thus Christ is the finisher of our faith.
4) Yes we love God because He first loved us, for when we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
5) Foreknowledge refers to using or implementing knowledge acquired or formulated in in the past, therefore known beforehand. It never refers to intimate relationships or looking into the future.
6) God chooses for salvation those whose faith He credits as righteousness, thus we are chosen through or on the basis of faith in the truth.
7) Christ did not say the lost hate God at all times, and provided an illustration of the lost seeking God at Matthew 23:13.
8) Christ is not only the propitiation or means of salvation for us, He is also the propitiation or means of salvation for the whole world, 1 John 2:2.
9) Everyone given to Christ (placed into Christ spiritually) will be made alive, indwelt and never cast out.
think when its states God foreknows someone, is to state to us that God knows us in a real sense, Just as Adam knew Eve as a person... God determined Himself to commit Himself and to know us in a personal Covenant relationship!
Since God is sovereign and all things that come to pass were either directly determined by Him, or indirectly permitted by Him, would what actually happened be the only way could ever happen?
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