Featured Coming to God

Been down that road... change my wording to "ability to be willing" and it stands the same.

Nitpicking the analogy?

Ok, I'll play.

Instead the dog is drugged by the master with a chemical that causes him to love his pole and his chain...better? Does it change anything regarding the point of responsibility for which I was arguing? No. If he is unable to be willing, then he is unable, period. The means of the inability is inconsequential.

Right, but why presume that truth is unable to set men free or an appeal for reconciliation is unable to call a rebel to respond?

Once approached with a Holy Spirit wrought powerful life-giving appeal for reconciliation he might.

That is actually what predestination is all about. Whosoever believes has been predestined to adoption, sanctification and glorification. Once one believes they are given the HS as a guarantee.

We affirm the effectual nature of regeneration, just like you do. We just don't order it as you do. You think we are given life so that we will certainly believe but God teaches, "But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name." John 20:31

Without influence? You think the powerful gospel has no influence? Paul thinks differently...he said the gospel is the very power of God unto Salvation.

An actor causes his actions. A chooser causes his choice. You may deny the possibility of this yet to do so denies the possibility of God himself, who is the ultimate proof of an 'uncaused cause,' and only one who would deny the omnipotence of God would deny the possibility that he could create other such autonomous creatures. Mysterious indeed, but impossible with God? Never.

Hardly. Being free hardly suggests omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent powers.

Wrong. I'm only as free as my abilities allow. I could want to flap my arms and fly all day but it aint happening. We are talking only about man's moral freedom to respond to God's genuine appeal. There is NOTHING to suggest such divinely granted freedom puts us on His level. That is like saying if a father chooses to give His two year old daughter the ability to choose to sit down at the dinner table then he must not be as physically strong as she is.

 

Translation: I regularly come to a debate forum but if I happen to come across someone who is as sure of his position as I am mine I won't bother to engage.

So, can we assume by this post you won't be back here to 'preach to your respective choir' anymore or is this just a diversion?

 

Well, when I was a Calvinist I was pretty darn sure I was right back then too. Truth be told if my world view is right then I believe there is a chance for me to convince you to change your mind, and if your view is right then you believe God may have decreed for you to help change my mind, so the volley continues, unless one feels he'd rather not engage a discussion that might push him beyond his pat answers for once. :smilewinkgrin:

 

This happens a lot. I'm sure someone will try to wiggle out... We are free to choose anything we want, but in our sinful state, we never will want Christ. Salvation 100% of God.

exactly! No man wants to come to Christ but can't.

Very biblical!

:thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

 

What use is there in speaking of what one wants when even what they want is determined by God? You think this approach avoids the inherent problem of your system? It doesn't. It only serves to subtly bury the blatantly obvious issue of divine culpability. Regardless of how you word play it, you have God determining men's choices in such a way that they couldn't be otherwise. Whether He does that by first cause or second cause or third cause is irrelevant.

 

Scripture does not teach that unregenerate men are unable to repent.

Isa 55:7 Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the LORD, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.

Does this say a regenerate man forsakes his ways and thoughts? NO. It says a wicked man, an unrighteous man. The scriptures do not teach that the unregenerate man cannot repent and turn to God, they teach he can, and if he does so God will have mercy on him and pardon him.

 

Yes, exactly. We appeal to mystery prior to drawing unbiblical conclusions. Calvinists draw unbiblical conclusions and then appeal to mystery when pressed.

Arminians: Appeal to mystery regarding how any free moral agent makes free moral choices, we just know the choosers make choices, period.

Calvinists: Libertarian free will can't be explained so that must not be true, so God must causally determine all choices. But we appeal to mystery as to how God makes choices.​

They both appeal to mystery, but we do BEFORE creating the divine culpability problem and the unbiblical notion that God casually determines the sinful choices and actions of man.

Again, you seem willing to appeal to mystery but then you continue to attempt an answer based on finite human linear logic.

I agree. That is why I also reject that mode of thinking. It is still finite and linear. When I appeal to mystery, I mean it. I don't attempt to answer something so far beyond our comprehension. I just know we make choices that we are held accountable for. I don't draw hard conclusions about how God must have casually determined them in order to accomplish His plan. I think God is bigger than that. I don't believe He is reduced to having to 'play both sides of the game board' to ensure a victory. I believe His is powerful enough to defeat a real, independent and free enemy. Why? Because the Bible presents His enemies as just that.

I agree. All the more reason that Calvinists shouldn't dismiss the concept of LFW (libertarian free will) simply because it involves mystery. To do so presumes Calvinism is better when it likewise appeals to mystery. All LFW is claiming is that men make their own choices and could have done otherwise. It is just saying that your choice is YOURS alone and that no one or thing outside yourself determines that choice. Just because we can't fully define or explain the inner workings of man's will doesn't mean they must be determined by God. I believe that is an unbiblical presumption based on finite human logic.

 

Which is NO FREEDOM at all when someone else is determining your wants.

If I drug a child from birth with a chemical that makes him hate his parents and all authority figures to such a degree that he will NEVER obey anyone, there is no one in this world who would hold that child accountable for his rebellious deeds. Why? Because his desires were controlled by someone else beyond his control.

The bible doesn't teach men are born blind, deaf and unable to understand and repent. In fact, it says just the opposite in Acts 28:24-28.

 

sinners are able to do whatever their natures allow them too...

can worship false gods, have religion, even read the Bible...

just that unless/until the Lord reveals Himself to them , by Act of his will and grace, in their own state, cannot and will not come to jesus in order to be saved!

 

So men are born able to believe lies but not truth that is revealed by God himself with the intent to make an appeal for reconciliation? Interesting.

 

It's just what the Bible teaches Skan. I don't have any "system." I only teach the Bible. The Bible teaches that the natural man will never want Christ. I'm not word playing it. I'm wording it like the Bible does. Man is sinful and has no desire to come to Christ. It's only by the convicting work of the Holy spirit through the gospel that man ever comes to Christ. Without the spirit convicting the heart of the sinner(John 16:8) and changing his heart from a heart of stone to a heart of flesh(Ex 36:26) man will never have any desire to come to Christ. He will always choose to reject.

 

Quote chapter and verse.

You want Christ and you were a natural man so your statement as it stands is false. I think you meant to say, "The bible teaches that the natural man IF LEFT TO HIMSELF will never want Christ," which is a statement we can both affirm. You just falsely believe the work of God is irresistibly applied to a select few. (relatively few that is)

I agree, but the HS work through the gospel is not irresistible. People that God loves and genuinely longs to gather to himself are sometimes unwilling (Matt. 23:37). That is not a lacking on God's part, but on man's. God has provided all they need and thus they have NO EXCUSE.

I agree, but yet again, God does these things through resistible means. Men are able to trade the revealed truth in for lies, and thus will be held to account.

 

But the difference is that we don't draw a conclusion on this point, we merely appeal to mystery. Calvinists draw a conclusion that because free independent decisions are not explainable by human logic that the other option must be true, which is that God has causally determined all choice...a non-biblical conclusion. God wouldn't even tempt men to sin, much less casually determine it to happen.

I'm not saying you don't understand our argument, I'm saying you all reject human freedom and any true since of accountability because it is mysterious, yet your own system eventually appeals to mystery too.

Define sovereign.

1. God's complete control over everything, even sinful things, so as to determine the outcome He wants. (God plays both sides of the chess board)

2. God's all powerful and infinite ability to bring about his outcome despite and even through the independently caused evil choices of others. (God plays one side of the chess board and whips a real opponent by his awesome power and ability)

I think #2 is MUCH more Sovereign and powerful than the first.

I agree, but where in scripture does it teach that God causally determines every choice of man? It doesn't. That is a logical conclusion based on finite linear thinking. At times God intervenes to change men's minds (i.e. Jonah), but the very fact that he uses normative means such as a storm and a big fish proves he is not somehow manipulating the desires of men through innate means. Sure God intervenes to ensure his message is delivered but how does that prove God is always determining who will and won't respond to that message?

How can you call it a mystery while at the same time concluding men's sinful choices are God's choices? If you are talking about God's choice to permit that which is sinful, okay, but I don't think you merely saying God permits these choices, are you?

 

And the Philipian jailer refutes your view. You have said you believe regeneration and faith occur at the same moment, but the Philipian jailer came before he had believed. He did not even know that he must believe on Jesus until Paul and Silas informed him. And it was only after he washed them and took them home that Paul and Silas preached to his whole family and they all believed.

The Philipian jailer desired to be saved, and he was sincere. But he was not regenerated, he had not yet believed on Jesus.