What happens first?

[J.D.]

Here is a a link to a great article that exposes the fallicy of Arminian philosophy and destroys the concept of free will. If you don't want to read it, I'll sum it up with one question: If your will is free, did you freely choose to love your mother - can you just decide one day to start hating your mother without some external influence guiding your decision? Can someone that hates God just decide to love Him, or can someone that loves God just decide to hate Him, without something outside of him influencing that decision? All choice are influenced, and therefore are not truly free in the libertarian sense.

http://www.calvinistgadfly.com/?p=263

 

[Brother Bob]

I don't know there are a lot of mothers who hate their child at birth and kills them. So I don't think your argument has much merit.
Yet most mothers love their child at birth, so you tell me does your explanation fit?

 

[Scott J]

Can't you see if its the "means" then it is exactly what I have said all along that to get to Grace you have to have a "means" to get there and that is faith. amen

"Means" are not "causes". Your car is the means for reaching church. Your initiative is the cause for the means being employed. Faith is the means by which we are saved. God's grace towards us is the cause for the faith.

Your own definition fits my explanation perfectly.

Nope. You wish to make man's decision to have faith the first cause for his salvation... in fact, the critical cause for his salvation. Ultimately, you make man's salvation dependent not on God but on man's own goodness of will.

But you said God gave us a choice to choose good or evil. Why would it be boasting if God made us that way?

It would be cause for boasting if it was our goodness that caused our faith rather than God's grace.

 

[Scott J]

Quote:
I have been seeing all along. I have seen you evade main points and work hard to establish straw men. I have seen you avoid answering main arguments and points that expose your system as unbiblical. Unfortunately, your comment above suggests you are getting further from the truth seemingly due to pride rather than closer.

I wish you would just be honest enough to say that God saves men because they make a good choice... and therefore contribute their own personal goodness to Christ's sacrifice in order to secure salvation. That is the direct and unavoidable implication of your insistance that man's choice is the critical difference between the saved and unsaved rather than God's choice.
You have seen me defend what I believe the Scripture says. I would never say something that I didn't believe it was Scripture.

I don't doubt that for a minute. I simply believe you are overlooking this directly resulting conclusion from your insistance that God must depend on man's good choice.

I will say that man chooses to let the good Spirit lead him to Christ. The Salvation is of the Lord and not of man whatsoever.

Those statements are contradictory. How can you say that such a choice in the first sentence is a) not an action/decision and b) not good? It is an act of will and it is good... and according to what you are arguing, it is the critical contribution to a man's salvation. Man's goodness is what you must declare as the difference between the saved and unsaved.

You said that "Salvation is of the Lord" but the reason he is saved is because he makes a good decision independent of the Lord.

At least you have been civil about this debate Scott.

You too- and I appreciate it.

I kept overlooking that faith=means is how you describe it. That is a good way to put it. I will use that from now on.

Feel free. I don't even know that it is particularly calvinistic of its own accord. The part I would like you to catch though is that the initiating will to "turn faith on" so to speak... is God's good will, not ours.

Quote:
They conclude what they believe in a natural sense is best for them... not in a righteous sense whatsoever. The natural man sees only the natural things and makes his choices selfishly based on that perspective.

Unless of course you are arguing that selfishness is the motive that causes a person to have faith and accept Christ... IOW's "the sin of selfishness" leadeth thee to repentance.

When you don't have a good answer you switch from Spiritual to natural.

Certainly not intentionally. I must not have understood what you meant or else you don't know what I mean.

You used natural world examples. I simply pointed out that the "good" unsaved people do in those examples is due to natural impulses. They are spiritually dead. Driven by their natural will... they will make a decision about what is good for them without respect for God's will whatsoever... They do it for selfish reasons, not spiritual reasons. Even their "good" works are as filthy rags. They are not only not pleasing to God but instead very offensive to Him.

I have to admire you Scott, you know how to play bait switching.

And things had been so cordial up to this
__________________

 

[J.D.]

I don't know there are a lot of mothers who hate their child at birth and kills them. So I don't think your argument has much merit.
Yet most mothers love their child at birth, so you tell me does your explanation fit?

Right, and did those terrible mothers just "decide" to hate their own babies? No, they were influenced by external factors. By external I mean external to the decision. They were influenced by some form of selfishness or an organic mental problem.

There is no true libertarian free will. All decisions have a motive behind them - inclinations, propensities, desires, etc.

The arminian concept of free choice is based on the idea that a choice must be totally uninfluenced in order to be free. But is there such a thing as an uninfluenced choice? Give me one.

It is the arminian view of free will that comes near to making man a robot - a being completely independent of manifold influences, able to make decisions based purely on some pre-formed logic table.

It is the calvinist view of the will that shows the human will with its human weaknesses and the need of Divine influence in man to believe and repent.

 

[Scott J]

I don't know there are a lot of mothers who hate their child at birth and kills them. So I don't think your argument has much merit.
Yet most mothers love their child at birth, so you tell me does your explanation fit?

I think a much better analogy would have been did you "choose" your mother? Did you choose to be born? But even if you didn't, were those things a "violation of your will"?

Love is most certainly a choice and most certainly influenced... but the initial cause that preceeds any decision made by the child to love or hate was the decision of the mother to conceive.

 

[Scott J]

There is no true libertarian free will. All decisions have a motive behind them - inclinations, propensities, desires, etc.

Amen. Only good motives can lead to decisions good enough to please God... and therefore the first "motive" must be God's grace toward the elect individual.

 

[webdog]

Brother Bob,

In another post you wrote:


I have heard arguments about this very thing—is it grace, is it faith?

Ephesians 2 is quite specific in answering the question.

Ephesians 2:8-10
8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.


Let’s look at the verse and ask some questions of the text.

Verse 8
How have we been saved? By Grace through Faith.

Is this something we can do or gain for ourselves? No. (It is not [our] own doing.)

If, as the Scripture says, it is not [our] doing, how do we get Grace through Faith? It is a gift of God.

Technical Question: What does “It” refer to? Grace AND Faith.

If memory serves, the word “Grace” is feminine and “Faith” is feminine—they are both feminine nouns. The pronoun “it” in this case is neuter.

If “it” referred to Grace only, it would have to be presented in the feminine form, it isn’t; if “it” referred to Faith only, it would have to be presented in the feminine form, it isn’t.

“It,” being neuter, then, refers to BOTH Grace and Faith. Therefore both Grace and Faith are gifts of God.

Verse 9

Can the Faith/Grace gift be because of anything we do? No.

Why can the Grace/Faith gift not be a result of our works? So that we can’t boast about our being saved, as if it were something we did.

Now, I agree, as you posted, that we MUST believe. But, Scripture says that Faith is a gift. It is a gift of Grace.

I’m sure we’ll have much more to talk about, but let’s stick with the Ephesians passage for now. Until later…

Blessings

The Archangel

This exegesis has been shown to be false, and has been show before here on the BB. The "gift" is salvation, not faith ("by grace you have been saved by faith", is the "it" referenced), and you are not saved by grace apart from faith.

 

[J.D.]

Not all men have faith. For those that do have faith, from whence getteth them it?

 

[webdog]

Not all men have faith. For those that do have faith, from whence getteth them it?

The greek word for faith here (πιστις) means "trustworthiness". The same words were used about God (πιστος δε εστιν ὁ Κυριος.) in describing the Lord as faithful. This does not support Ephesians 2 at all and really has nothing to do with it.

 

[Brother Bob]

Are you saying the external forces was God to make her kill her baby?

 

[Brother Bob]

Those statements are contradictory. How can you say that such a choice in the first sentence is a) not an action/decision and b) not good? It is an act of will and it is good... and according to what you are arguing, it is the critical contribution to a man's salvation. Man's goodness is what you must declare as the difference between the saved and unsaved.

You said that "Salvation is of the Lord" but the reason he is saved is because he makes a good decision independent of the Lord.

God made us that way, amen

Feel free. I don't even know that it is particularly calvinistic of its own accord. The part I would like you to catch though is that the initiating will to "turn faith on" so to speak... is God's good will, not ours.

Turn faith on, lol. Faith is to believe and when you say all men have not faith is that all men don't believe, but they have a measure of faith, enough to know that is a God and good and evil.

I think a much better analogy would have been did you "choose" your mother? Did you choose to be born? But even if you didn't, were those things a "violation of your will"?

Love is most certainly a choice and most certainly influenced... but the initial cause that preceeds any decision made by the child to love or hate was the decision of the mother to conceive.

Well the mother chose to kill her baby and she could of chose not to kill it. Amazes me that man can choose everything in life even to killing himself if he wants, he can choose to do good like giving to the poor, he can choose to do evil like lusting after his neighbors wife but for some reason the Calvinist believe he can't choose God. Amazing!

 

[J.D.]

Are you saying the external forces was God to make her kill her baby?

If you'll carefully notice what I said, it was "selfishness" or "mental problems" that I cited. God did not make man sin, and you've never heard a reputable calvinist say such a thing. Still arguing with the calvinist boogy-man made of straw, Brother Bob?

God allows it, however, for his own purposes.

 

[J.D.]

The greek word for faith here (πιστις) means "trustworthiness". The same words were used about God (πιστος δε εστιν ὁ Κυριος.) in describing the Lord as faithful. This does not support Ephesians 2 at all and really has nothing to do with it.

So we don't have to define words in their context as long as we know them in the Greek language? The Greek language does not have a context in which words are to be understood? Did the eunuch understand what he read in Isaiah 53? Did not Ezra and the Levites as recorded in Nehemiah "give the sense" to the reading of the word? How is it that the quotation of one greek word is to settle the meaning and sense of that word?

And just like all the gamblers I know that claim they never lose money at the game, all the Greek experts I know claim to be indisputably right.

Now let me ask the greek experts this - if the word means "trustworthy", why can't I find a single English version that uses that word. The only one I haven't checked is the NIV. Are all the scholars that translated all of those dozens of bible versions that inept that they can't see the difference between "trustworthyness" and "faith"? I think not.

So you that would claim that all men have faith, I would ask this - do all men have saving faith? Would it make you feel better if I said "Not all men have saving faith" instead of "Not all men have faith"? Sobeit, then the question remains, since not all men have saving faith, of them that have it from whence getteth them it? (sticks tongue out to break the tension)

 

[Brother Bob]

God allows a man to be lost but will not allow him to be saved. Amazing!!!

 

[J.D.]

And furthermore, even if we were to accept that all men have faith, even saving faith, and argue that men have only to "exercise" faith in believing the gospel, it remains unanswered as to how it is that many there be that have faith and yet do not believe? Can the arminian muster an answer? Is it that some men have a good heart and others a bad heart? Is there some residual of goodness in some or all men? Are we then saved because of that goodness within us?

 

[webdog]

So we don't have to define words in their context as long as we know them in the Greek language?

...that's part of what context is all about.

The Greek language does not have a context in which words are to be understood?

It does, and I showed it.

Did the eunuch understand what he read in Isaiah 53?

Did not Ezra and the Levites as recorded in Nehemiah "give the sense" to the reading of the word?

These last two question deal with the text in question...how?

How is it that the quotation of one greek word is to settle the meaning and sense of that word?

*see reply number one.

And just like all the gamblers I know that claim they never lose money at the game, all the Greek experts I know claim to be indisputably right.

I'm hardly and expert, but thanks for the backhanded compliment...

Now let me ask the greek experts this - if the word means "trustworthy", why can't I find a single English version that uses that word.

You're asking the wrong person, as I have never been on a translating team. The phrase "God is faithful", according to you then, should mean God is full of faith?

So you that would claim that all men have faith, I would ask this - do all men have saving faith?

The Bible makes no separation, calvinism does. Yes, all men are born with the ability to have faith. No, not all men have faith in Christ, which is faith that saves...not "saving faith".

Would it make you feel better if I said "Not all men have saving faith" instead of "Not all men have faith"?

Makes no difference what you say, it's what the Bible says.

Sobeit, then the question remains, since not all men have saving faith, of them that have it from whence getteth them it? (sticks tongue out to break the tension)

They were born with it, the same as thoseth who faileth to have faith (sticks tongue out back to you...to give raspberries) :laugh:

 

[npetreley]

God allows a man to be lost but will not allow him to be saved. Amazing!!!

Bzzzt. Classic free-willer mistake. No man wants to be saved. Therefore it isn't a matter of who God allows to be saved (as if some men want it, but some don't). It's a matter of who God saves. The rest get exactly what they want. There won't be a single person in hell who says, "But I wanted to be saved, and you didn't let me accept Jesus into my heart!"

 

[webdog]

Bzzzt. Classic free-willer mistake. No man wants to be saved. Therefore it isn't a matter of who God allows to be saved (as if some men want it, but some don't).

Have you told this to the countless cults and false religions who have become part of them with the desire of WANTING to be "saved"? This is a classic calvinism mistake.

All of those who say "Lord, Lord..." that are rejected WANTED to be saved, and thought their lives would end up in salvation. This debunks the "nobody desires salvation" argument.

 

[Brother Bob]

Bzzzt. Classic free-willer mistake. No man wants to be saved. Therefore it isn't a matter of who God allows to be saved (as if some men want it, but some don't). It's a matter of who God saves. The rest get exactly what they want. There won't be a single person in hell who says, "But I wanted to be saved, and you didn't let me accept Jesus into my heart!"

You must hang out with a different crowd than I do for I never knew a man who wanted to go to hell!!