Questions for Dispensationalists

Ok... So do you hold that God determined that man must fall and then determined the means for him 'to' fall?

 

That statement is non-sense if you understand what eternal means. No where in scripture are all of God's decrees ever declared eternal. Just because they were decreed before time in no way makes them eternal. Their purpose makes the decree temporary or eternal by nature not when it was determined. That which is eternal is in a state of existance for all time never to be removed.

For example His decree to allow sin - This decree is not a decree that has no end thus being eternal (ingoring of course that eternal can also encompass no beginning as well). So on this point alone your assumption is incorrect regarding His decrees (meaning all of them) being eternal.

There are some decrees of God which are eternal and those we do have scripture making reference to them in that they are stated as His "eternal purposes". And there are other decrees which are only temporal in nature so as to manifest and complete His eternal decrees.

 

God has a somewhat different response as recorded by the writer of Hebrews.

Hebrews 11:8-16

8. By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went.
9. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise:
10. For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God.
11. Through faith also Sara herself received strength to conceive seed, and was delivered of a child when she was past age, because she judged him faithful who had promised.
12. Therefore sprang there even of one, and him as good as dead, so many as the stars of the sky in multitude, and as the sand which is by the sea shore innumerable.
13. These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.
14. For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country.
15. And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned.
16. But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city.

Then of course we can go to Revelation to find the identity of that city, the New Jerusalem, the Church.

Revelation 21:2, 10, 14

2. And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

10. And he carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain, and shewed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God,

14. And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and in them the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.

 

Allan, actually it's not nonsense. God exists outside of time and space. He sees the before, beginning, present and future through a lens we are incapable of seeing. He is able to process all things at all times as though they were in front of Him at one moment. In that sense all that God thinks or does is eternal.

Now, are all things manifested for eternity? Of course not. Sin was vanquished on the cross and it's residual effects will be eradicated in the eternal state. But that doesn't mean that from eternity past (an eternal aspect) God did not know and order all things (first and second causes).

 

I like the way the 1689 London Baptist Confession phrases it:

btw I don't come in here much anymore. I pop in once in a while just to see what's going on.

 

Brother, good to see you again. I hang out on the PB (I'm a moderator there), run a blog for my church and also preach/teach. Reformed Baptists are a rarity in here so that's why you don't see me all that often.

 

Deleted because of prior post addressing part of this thread.

 

Deleted because of prior post addressing part of this thread. If at first you don't succeed try, try again.