Is God Sovereign?

Jim 1999 brought up a distinction on another thread that needs a thread of it’s own. I have heard for some time some objecting to this form or that form of God’s choosing, and never really addressed it directly. Here was Jim’s remark.

Jim, to my knowledge, was not depicting any ideas of his own necessarily, but rather simply trying to clear up how those holding to a particular end time view might feel. So this thread is not about Jim’s personal views or those of any other on this list, but rather concerns the issues of foreknowledge and election and the manner in which a Sovereign God can or does choose to act.

My question to the list is, can God be sovereign in any sense if in fact we try and limit the way He chooses? Can we say that God does not or cannot choose directly as a result of his foreknowledge without limiting His sovereignty? If one tries to say that they do not believe that God chooses via His foreknowledge, and rather states that God chooses by absolute sovereignty instead, is their reasoning sound and their objection valid? Again, do we limit the sovereignty of God by declaring that He cannot choose according to His foreknowledge? If not, why not?

 

HP: You are thinking right on track, led by the truth of the Holy Spirit. Not only that, why would a Loving, Just, God CREATE them that He obviously had to chose to create by design simply to torment them for all eternity for a fate impossible to escape, i.e. sin, death, and eternal hell?

 

HP: Could God Sovereignly choose to create a man that was indeed the first cause of his moral intents, or will you limit His Sovereignty to things of necessity?

Sovereignty would indicate to me the ability to do anything He so desires. How is it not limiting God's Sovereignty to say that He must be in direct control of everything? Why could He not choose to allow some things a true measure of freedom to be the first cause of their intents and subsequent actions? Why would one limit God's Sovereignty in this manner?

Define for us the limits you place on what a Sovereign God can do and what Sovereignty actually means to you.

 

HP: We agree that God foreknows everything, but can He bring something to pass without decreeing it? Can He offer something or withhold something apart from decreeing it to be come to pass, or decreeing that it will not come to pass by the very act of withholding the only possible means for it to come to pass? If God passes over some, is that not a decree to do so, and as such their damnation the direct result of God's decree?

If God chooses to pass over some by withholding the only possible means of escape, their fate is necessitated by the withholding of the means to escape their fate, is it not?

 

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HP: What do you mean God takes no action?? Declaring men as sinners is an action. Declaring to withhold the needed grace from some would be an action. Why is choosing to do something an action when choosing not to do something is not an action to you? Maybe God simply did not know about those that would be lost. Now if that was the case I might agree with you, but of course that denies His omniscience.

I need food. I may choose not to go to the store or go to the store. Either one involves the formation of intent. Man needs a Savior. God either chooses to grant the means by which that is possible or withhold them. Both involve a formed intent that necessitate the outcome.

You cannot have God as the deciding sole player in salvation without double predestination as Calvin believed and taught. By the way, did you look up the reference I gave you about Calvin’s own admission to double predestination as a necessitated end of his own theology?

 

HP: I noticed you have not responded to my last post but I thought I might add this for your further consideration. You draw a distinction between a decree and ones chosen destiny. Who chose that destiny? It cannot be you or I according to Calvinism, for we are born spiritually depraved due to original sin. We were born estranged from God and rebellion was our only possible intent, at least according to those holding to original sin. Are we to believe that Adam chose our destiny? Not according to Scripture.

Eze 18:19 Yet say ye, Why? doth not the son bear the iniquity of the father? When the son hath done that which is lawful and right, and hath kept all my statutes, and hath done them, he shall surely live.
20 The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son: the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him.

If not Adam, who chose the destiny of those God withholds the means of salvation? You are left starring God in the face. Will you charge God with the fate of the wicked that you call their ‘chosen fate?’ If you say someone other than God, I ask you, is God Sovereign, or is mans will (even if limited to Adam) able to do despite man’s ‘chosen destiny’ as you say?

Did Adam choose his destiny to be lost or saved? Could have Adam chosen to be lost if God chose him to be saved? Could have his destiny ever been anything other than to be saved if in fact he was saved in the end? If God foreknew his destiny was to be lost, could have anything he ever have done changed that destiny? Was Adam ever in control of his destiny, knowing that God foreknows and was in control, being an Absolute Sovereign (according to the Calvinist), of it?

You do believe that God did foreknow his destiny do you not? Did God decree it or was God waiting around to see what Adam would do? If God was waiting around on Adam to make a choice, was God not Sovereign during that time? Does man's will determine the foreknowledge of God of his intents or is God an Absolute Sovereign and all things that come to pass are the direct result of His Sovereign will? (Does anyone see the notion that God is the author of all evil as well as good coming into focus?)

Double predestination is the necessitated consequence of the Calvinistic ‘iron clad logic.’ Once in agreement to its premise of God as an absolute Sovereign with all things in His direct control, you will find yourself unmistakably in the clutches of its end, predestination of the damned as well as predestination of the saved. Is that what you desire to believe? Is it the truth?