Philosophical discussion about free will

Preach it, John. Your arguments are extremely well founded in Scripture, and that's the bottom line.

So much of the opposing arguments boil down to, "I can't feel good about God if that is true, so it must not be true." It is pointless to struggle with His word, though. It's all there in black and white (and red in some cases).

 

Hi dwmoeller;

Man's ability is what makes man responsible for his own fate. God doesn't send men to hell they go there because it's the result of there choice. God is not responsible for man's choice. Which is why the idea that God's foreknowledge causes a man to be and do what he does is ridiculous. God's foreknowledge of the actions of men is known by God because man does them, not because God's foreknowledge makes them do it.
If God didn't create men who wind up in hell then God wouldn't have known they would go there to begin with. Can God know what doesn't exist? Or can He know those He never created?
MB

 

It's interesting when others tell you what you believe when they haven't a clue. God does direct our steps because we are His. Not everybody belongs to God. The steps of the believer is directed such as Jonah. However Jonah already belonged to God. God may convince and convict those who will listen but He never forces Salvation on anyone. We belong to whom we serve. Your suggestion that God directs every man's steps in life makes God a sinner. Everyone sins so did God make us sin as well?

God isn't a liar either we are responsible or He is responsible. If we do what we do because God directs us to do what we do then God is responsible.

If God didn't create them then God wouldn't have known. God isn't a fortune teller

What man does is what God knows if the man dosn't exist then the man can't do it therefore God wouldn't know it because it never happened.

If man goes to hell only then can God know it.

All true but men are not part of the redemption of the world. We aren't God's only begotten Son. I believe it to be heretical to compare men to God.

So by this your are saying that Hitler was directed by God to murder 6 million Jews and Christians. I believe that is called blaspheme.
Pro 21:2 Every way of a man is right in his own eyes: but the LORD pondereth the hearts.
What is the Lord pondering if it isn't the descissions of men?. Why ponder something you directed?

All true and it didn't take saving them before faith to do this at all. Being convinced is not being saved or regenerated. because it isn't our faith that saves us but the faith of Jesus Christ.
Gal 2:16 Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.

I would hope that you do.

True again. We are first chosen by God convinced by God convicted by God and granted repentance by God. Yet we still must willingly listen to the word in order for all this to happen and then we must voluntarily put on the righteousness of Christ before we are saved. We can only have grace by entering in to it through faith.
Rom 5:1 Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ:
Rom 5:2 By whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

Are all things possible with God or not?

Why am I suppose to ask why does He still blame? I know why man is to Blame, and it isn't just because God said so. We are to blame because we are responsible for our own actions. I don't blame God for my sin or my actions. I know I sin because it's my desire to do so. It isn't because God predestined it to happen, or because God knew I would, or because God directed my steps. Therefore causing me to helplessly sin as if I had no choice.

There is nothing valid about the theories of man.

Both belonged to God Sinners don't.

If this were true you wouldn't believe that God's foreknowledge is the cause of what we do.

It's true that not all of what you claim lines up with scripture. Some things are right but most of it is not scriptural.

God doesn't tempt men. Though many are turned over to reprobate minds.

If you're not deceived then why does your theory of what God's foreknowledge is like, isn't found in scripture.

Sheep belong to Christ. The lost are not sheep although there are lost sheep. The Lost are every non-believer. Paul said we are His by faith.
Gal 3:26 For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.

I agree with this. No one seeks God, no one is righteous. isn't it wonderful that this still doesn't keep us from believing in the gospel and accepting Christ as our Savior.
I didn't seek God He saught me. I am not saved by my righteousness but by His.

You haven't proved that at all. The denial of man having a voluntary will is a denial of the entire gospel.
MB

 

While God may not be responsible for man's choice, how can you say that He doesn't send men to hell? After all, Matt 13 describes very clearly that God sends men to hell. Sure, its a result of their choice, but God is still responsible for sending them to hell. Man may make choices which result in hell, but God is still the one who set up the consequences and enforces the consequences.

Agreed. I said nothing at all about God's foreknowledge causing men to do something. I simply argue that since God's know for certain what man's choice will be, yet God still decides to create the man whom He knows will reject Him, then that would make God culpable in some way. After all, if I KNOW that if I give Bob a gun he will turn around and kill someone, then I would be help partly responsible for the results even though I did nothing to cause Bob to choose as he did.

Interesting thought. Lets clear this up. Did God know what Bob would do before He created him? If not, then we have an essentially different understanding of God's foreknowledge. If so, then wouldn't that mean that God can know what doesn't exist yet?

 

I understand what you believe...I am not seeing the logical necessity for your line of thinking though. If, as you tried to argue, the only possilbe logical option to your choice lead necessarily to infinite regression, then I could see the logical necessity of your position. However, I have already addressed why infinite regression is not, in fact, the only other option.

So, unless you can show the deficiency of my alternate line of reasoning in addressing the problem of infinite regression, I guess we are simply at the point where there are two logically valid options and we will simply have to agree to disagree, at least as far as the philosophical aspects of the discussion go.

Hmmm...if thats all you have been talking about, then we have definitely been talking past each other. If we allow that there are choices were multiple options which do no contradict the choosers nature, then I will allow the contra-casual position as viable.

On the other hand, do you allow that man can no more choose against his nature than God can? If so, then it seems the central issue is *not* about the nature of choice, but about the nature of man's nature.

 

You mean if one says that God raises up someone to kill or oppress people, that's blasphemy? The Bible includes a lot of blasphemy, then. Here's one of many examples:

And another:

 

This is interesting - I was just thinking about starting a thread entitled something like "God kills people" or "God hates people" and stand back and watch the indignant reactions.

God told Israel to utterly destroy their enemies. Including babies. Does God hate babies? I don't know, but He said to destroy them. If God knew who little baby Adolph (Hitler) was, did He love him? When God destroyed the earth, and all but eight people were killed, there were a lot of "good" people, and innocent babies, floating face down in that water, right? How about that guy that killed those little Amish girls in PA? Did God love him when he was a baby, knowing what kind of hanious act he would committ?

Something to think about.

 

No God has only created the consequence. Man sends himself to hell and suffers the consequence. If the man had been willing to listen and accept Christ he wouldn't go to hell. God has given man the chance to escape hell to escape condemnation to escape the deserved consequence. It is man who rejected Christ. Therefore man is responsible for his own destiny.

We can't make God out to be an accessory to our sins just because He gives us life. It's like saying Here God your responsible as well so take some of this blame and suffer from your own consequences to.

If we sin it isn't because God allowed it or wanted us to. He didn't have to create us but, His creation of us has nothing to do with our sinning. Thats our decision. God gave us our own mind, and will, in which we choose to do what we want to with our life, to live for good or evil. He gave us the life, it's up to us how we live our lives.

God knows all, there is nothing He doesn't know. He knew I would sin and you would sin and that the whole world would sin. However He also knew that some men would learn of Him and at least try to over come the sin in there lives through believing in His Holy and righteous Son. These few is what His plan is for, not those who never believe in Him.
In a court of Law to prove accessory before or after the fact. Intent has to be proved.
God's intention isn't that we sin but, that we come to believe on Him. Blaming God for the reaction of His action is to say He shouldn't have made any action to begin with. Sin it self is a by product of the Law. The minute God made Laws to live by, there was an opposite reaction called sin.
Was it the intent of God's heart for man to sin?, Or was it His intent that man have a choice?
MB

 

due to the fall it is appointed for everyone to die once...infants included. I believe the physical killing of these infants was an even greater love than we could possibly know, as God saved these little ones from following in the footsteps of their parents who would eventually die the second death, too. I see no lack of love on God's part, nor any hatred towards infants.

 

Please give me one Scriptural example of man sending himself to hell. Every mention I can find shows God sending man to hell. Sure God has given man the chance to escape but in the end, God still sends man to hell. He no only created the consequences, He also carries out the sentence. He sends men to hell just as surely as a judge sends a criminal to jail. The criminal may deserve jail by his own actions but it seems counterlogical to claim that the criminal sent himself to jail - the criminal generally does whatever he can to stay out of jail.

You are jumping to conclusions. I have said nothing which leads to the concept of God being an accessory to our sins. Thats not what this is about. I grant fully that man alone is responsible for his sins. What I am pointing out is the fact that God is still culpable in the end result since He could have just as easily have prevented the event by the simple expedient of not creating man.

Yes, we are responsible for our sin and we choose what we do with our life. BUT God created us knowing full well exactly what we would choose to do/not do. How can He not be at least partly responsible since He had a choice to not create a man destined for hell? Man may be responsible for his decisions, but God is responsible for creating the man whom He KNEW would go to hell.

Why in the world then did God create those men He KNEW would never accept His plan? He KNEW Bob would go to hell yet He still chose to create Him. Why would God purposefully, not only allow, but specifically create the necessary conditions for such a thing to happen?

I am not saying that God is culpable for man's sin, but that He is culpable for man going to hell. Legally speaking, intent is established if the doer knows or should know that the results of his conduct are reasonably certain to occur. Since God KNOWS the ultimate result of His creating Bob, legally speaking He would be considered to have intent and thus would be culpable.

 

Wow! Killing as an act of love.

 

:laugh: Ha ha, you're killing me! :laugh:

Aw, I guess you love me.

 

It's easy to ignore the whole of what I am saying to focus on a single phrase.

 

Ok, please demonstrate what part I ignore which would modify my conclusion above and I will retract it.

 

That's only because you have assumed all children are saved. There is ambiguity in the scriptures concerning the fate of reprobate's children webdog. You cannot know.

john.

 

It's a very simple phrase...figure it out.

 

You have eliminated justice from God's character. I do assume all children are saved, that's justice. Please show one Scripture that alludes to the fact that there is a reprobate child....and I don't mean physical death.

 

I'm not stating this is fact or being dogmatic about it..... but. lol..... there is that word.

If what Dr. Pettingill alluded to about the women somehow procreating with those who were either possessed with demons... or possibly even demons themselves, that would point to possibly why men, women, and even children would have been destroyed? I know....... I'm reaching....lol. You never do that do you web? :laugh:

 

I have done no such thing I merely state God's justice.

RO 9:14 What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! 15 For he says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion." 16 It does not, therefore, depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy. 17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh: "I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth." 18 Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.

You should ask why Paul bring this point up here? Is it because he knows your objections webdog and has eliminated them?

Are not all children born in condemnation? Why yes they are, PS 51:5 Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.
PS 58:3 Even from birth the wicked go astray; from the womb they are wayward and speak lies.

Your justice should be God's justice. If you want to knock why don't you complain that we are all destroyed by Adam's sin?

But I thought it such a big thing that God doesn't force anyone into salvation? What's your game man?

Rom 9:11 Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad...13 Just as it is written: "Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated."

john.