Please respond to this verse!

1 Pet 1:10. This salvation was the subject of the search and investigation of the prophets who spoke of the grace you were to receive,
11. searching out the time and circumstances for which the Spirit of Christ, bearing witness in them, was revealing the sufferings of Christ and the glories to follow them.
12. It was revealed to them that it was for your sake and not their own that they were acting as servants delivering the message which has now been announced to you by those who preached to you the gospel through the Holy Spirit sent from heaven. Even the angels long to catch a glimpse of these things.

Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. How shall they hear except they be sent a preacher?

 

MOst of us, apart from a few primitives, do not dispute that. Your obstacle is that the Bible tells us they cannot hear (i.e., hear with understanding) apart from the work of the Holy Spirit and makes this distinction between those who can and those who cannot. If everyone receives this work, as you claim, then the Bible makes a distinction which does not really exist, problemmatic to say the least.

We can account for this biblical teaching. YOU cannot.

 

Then you are a mere parrot! Not having your own belief. If you believe it you can express it in your own words!

 

1 Cor 2:14, a verse that you have misinterpreted as I have shown from teh context.

The gospel is a part of the work, in terms of illuminating and regeneration. ThE HOLY Spirit does much more.

I don't deny this.

This is simply not true.

 

Why should I if someone else has already expressed it better?

You can refute me until you are blue in the face, but you can't refute Biblical truth, Yelsew.

 

I hope that one of these times after discussing this, you will take the time to study it. V. 14 is a followup of the previous verses from 1:18 on that talk about the foolishness of the gospel. What the Corinthian church did not understand was the maturity and what it meant in their lives. Their division was because of the immaturity. They had not yet matured so Paul had to address them as children. You have divided the passage wrong.

Scripture? </font>[/QUOTE]Scripture about what? YOU ARe seriously questioning whether or not the Holy Spirit regenerates, baptizes, seals, indwells, fills, calls, convicts, illuminates??? Come on now Bill ...

What are you talking about?

No, my belief requires the effectiveness and significance of this work. Your are trying to paint my belief as something it is not, even though you have been told the correct position many times.

Oh, now that is a argument with some real substance Larry. </font>[/QUOTE]This falls into the category of how many times do you say the same thing when someone isn't listening. The proof that your statement is not true is sprinkled liberally throughout this forum and it some places it is just outright dumped out. The proof is there.

 

Why should I if someone else has already expressed it better?

You can refute me until you are blue in the face, but you can't refute Biblical truth, Yelsew. </font>[/QUOTE]KenH, if you as a high school graduate cannot articulate your own personal beliefs in your own words, you do not have beliefs, but are expressing the opinions of others. You are a parrot, voicing agreement with the beliefs of others.

The question is what do you believe? Not, What does so and so believe? Of course if you are a Calvinist, you are taught that you do not have the free will to believe, but must parrot Calvin or someone else who has used their free will to believe and has written down or expressed their belief in their own words. But you cannot do that because you do not have free will to do so.

Scriptures tell us to make our own minds the mind of Christ, who, you will shout till blue in the face, has free will! If you are to make your mind the mind of Christ, then you must acknowledge that you have free will to do that! And that you had free will before you were "regenerated".

You can block the truth if you wish, but you cannot negate the truth!

 

Peter lovest thou me?....John 21 'feed my sheep'

What benefit is in this; in simple feeding of the flock there is found no glory, no great swelling numbers may flock to our preaching, we may be in some backwoods, forgotten part of the world and only a handful of God's elect ever be found where we are sent...who wants to feed his sheep? WE WANT TO MAKE HIS SHEEP. Only in this can we receive the glory of men...feed his sheep, that is menial labor, we want to be on the cutting edge of new found doctrines, we want to be in the national limelight...if this means we have to preach a gospel that is another gospel that is not another, then so be it...let one of those untrained, unlearned 'God called' men go into the mud and the muck of the church and feed his sheep, them all huddled about him, always crying for more, there is no time for new things, no time to expand the ministry into places that are ubiblical where no man has gone before...feed his sheep?

Can someone find an obedient rooster somewhere please, Rhode Island Red, Banty, I don't really care, I just need a rooster so I can be awakened to the denial of my Lord that is found in the rambling of my words above.

In the old days when the Lord called a man into the ministry he answered sooner or later by saying here am I; in our day they seem to be saying HERE I AM.

 

I cannot do that. I do not believe I have free will and I will not lie by saying that I do.

And by the way, I am a college graduate. I have a B.S. degree in accounting.

 

Now we understand

 

I don't have any patronizing comments for anyone, least of all you. You may well have parsed every word. I have as well. But I believe you missed the point and I believe accurate and careful study will show that to be the case.

We really don't need to go through this again. The text says what it does. I have read your arguments before and they were unconvincing. I assume they are the same and I will find them unconvincing this time as well.

This is all in teh context of the foolishness of the message preached. But you skipped right over that part. The message preached is what saves men and it is foolishness to those who are perishing. They don't understand it. I agree with vv. 10, 11, 12; they simply confirm what Paul previously said.

No I haven't. I hope you will read the topic I just started. This is the very thing that I target. This is a complete misrepresentation of what we believe. The Holy Spirit works through the means he has set forth in Scripture. He does not work apart from the preaching of the word. Only the primitives here claim that. He works through the preaching of the word. That is why Paul, in 2 Tim 2, said he was willing to endure hardship ... so that the elect would obtain salvation. Obviously they were elect but still needed the gospel preach so they could get saved. This guy I quoted makes an important part that many overlook: Unconditional election is not the same as unconditional salvation.

It is the content of faith (Rom 10:17) and it is the power of God to salvation (Rom 1:16). You do not ahve the corner on those verses. Its purpose to bring faith.

[qutoe]Its not to inform, because no one can understand it.</font>[/QUOTE]]Yet another misunderstanding that has already been addressed. They can understand the message. It is not a foreign language. They do not understand its significance. That means they do not accept it because it is foolishness to them, to use the words of Paul

[qutoe]Its not to persuade, because no one can be persuaded.[/quote]Sure it can persuade.

Sure they can. They have a duty to. But most reject it. When teh Holy Spirit opens the hearts, such as he did with Lydia, then they believe.

 

It is foolish becuase of the effect of sin on their minds. They are destined to perish because of their sin. They deem the message foolish because of their sinful minds.

Then why isn't everybody saved?? Is the Spirit really that weak?? I don't believe he is. I think he effectually woos the elect to salvation. The Spirit's power is not just in the word itself. It is in the Spirit's illuminating work in teh life. The same word is preached to all, but not all respond.

Effectual calling opens the sind darkened mind to understand the gospel. The gospel provides the content of belief.

No, this is according to your misunderstanding of my views. I don't think the gospel has failed at all. It has accomplished everything it is intended to accomplish. I do not think you believe this. It seems you are the one who would have say the gospel has failed.

Sigh ... You just don't get it. Their minds are darkened by sin. Their reasoning abilities are corrupt. That is why the reject it. They do not accept. It is not a matter of cognitive understanding.

Your analogy with your view of calvinism is a bad one because you give very little evidence that you even understand the simple meaning of it. The unsaved at least understand what we are saying; you don't appear to.

However, you say you judge it false because it doesn't fit your understanding. Who appointed your understanding as the measure of truth? I reject your understanding because I find it to be faulty, full of holes with a noticeable lack of Scripture. Scripture is teh judge of truth, not your understanding of it.

It is a lot more biblical. Lydia was a Gentile. The hardening was for the Jews. Again, this is pretty simple stuff. Total depravity is a biblical doctrine.

 

Hi Larry;
The words total depravity do not appear in the Bible. So how can you claim they are Biblical. I know what you mean by the term. But just like all the other points of the tulip they're not Biblical terms. The problem I have with your explanation of these points of doctrine is that you'll present a few verses and expect me to understand it when it is my policy to sometimes read the chapter, or even the whole book so that I can get a clearer picture and when I do this I see that the verses you have presented don't mean what you say they do. I wonder do you ever read the Bible like this when someone presents something to you that doesn't make sense.


On another message board such as this one, not Baptist board. I have met theologians who have never really sat down and read the entire Bible from front to back. They get there doctrine from a pick and choose system that never has a complete look at what is said. They sit and argue points of there doctrines like a pro. but are mystified when presented with a whole chapter.

They sometimes won't even look at the whole for fear that Satan is going to jump up and get them. I'm not saying that this is what you do but I do say that it warrants more attention than just the argument. Do you ever go to the word to read the whole chapter that someone has offered to prove a point? With there point in mind...
Romanbear

 

I cannot do that. I do not believe I have free will and I will not lie by saying that I do.

And by the way, I am a college graduate. I have a B.S. degree in accounting. </font>[/QUOTE]So?

 

Yelsew, do you ever pay attention?

You wrote "KenH, if you as a high school graduate...". Since you brought my education level into this discussion, I wanted to clarify it.