Free will

HP: No man earns salvation, but no man will be saved apart from the fulfilling of the conditions God has set froth in order to be saved. We are not saved for the sake of our repentance, faith and continued obedience, but neither will any man be saved apart from fulfilling those conditions. I have posted the prisoner illustration to illustrate this point several times on other threads, so I will not repost it now.

You say that the process of salvation is a foregone conclusion, but to whom is it a foregone conclusion, and does that necessitate it coming to pass? I say only God sees it as a forgone conclusion, and no man has the ability to see it from God’s absolute perspective, for if we could faith would be impossible. Your position must assume that one can have absolute knowledge of ones final standing before the Lord, while Scripture clearly tells us otherwise, in that our knowledge is hemmed in by faith. In this present world we are to make our calling and election sure, and to examine ourselves to see if in fact we are of the faith. Our works, i.e., the intents of the heart, serve as evidence that indeed we are of the faith. If a man says he has faith, but his works prove otherwise, that man is deceived.

HP: You speak out of both sides of your mouth here. On the one hand you say it is a foregone conclusion and now you say that we have the ability to refuse to follow God’s rule. You cannot have it both ways. Either it is a foregone conclusion or not, and if it is are you suggesting that you could refuse to act in a way God has determined for you to act?? Your free will is no free will at all. It is mere lip service to something your intellect tells you we have but your theology denies.

HP: You are again reasoning from God’s perspective of Omniscience. It is not tha you are unable to understand free will, it is that you try to run it through sieve of Omnipotence that you are not, yea cannot understand. This one point needs to be understood clearly. It is Gods’ Omniscience, not free will, that is your problem. You need to reason from the perspective God has granted to us, not that which he withholds from us. True fortitude of knowledge consists in not allowing this we cannot understand to confuse the things we of certainty know. I know that I am the cause of my intents as sure as I am sure that I exist.

HP: There is ample testimony in Scripture that indeed God does in fact judge us according to our works. “Isa 59:2 But your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear.” God determines our faith by our works for faith without works is dead being alone. Just the same, we are not ‘saved by our works,’ for nothing but the shed blood of Christ and His mercy and grace are the grounds of our salvation, but just the same we will not be saved apart from our works. Our works are the conditions God has mandated for us to do in order to be saved.

HP: Sure, I would give you that.:thumbs:

 

HP: You are absolutely right on. Our foreknowledge is limited to things of necessity, i.e. we can only foreknow things that of necessity MUST come to pass, where as God can know matters of perfect choice. What is amazing to me is those that cry so loud about God’s way being higher than our ways, are the first to limit God’s foreknowledge to like kind as we possess, assuming that if God foreknows who will be saved or how we will act under certain situations, it is a matter of necessity that it come to pass and not a matter of free will or choice. Strange indeed.

 

HP: How does that imply that if they were to live longer that they would be saved?

 

HP: And as you point out so clearly, such a notion is foreign to the Word of God.

 

HP: No man’s will is free to form an intent in a direction ones sees as a natural possibility. That does not prove anything that would detract from a proper understanding of a free will.

Concerning Adam and Eve, I suspect your ideas are in error. One look at the angel guarding the gate would put a damper in any ones will to enter in unless they were suicidal. As for their nakedness, they were ashamed BEFORE God spoke to them. They knew intuitively that they were in a condition that could not stand before the Almighty God. It was Adam’s and Eve’s choice that prevailed in choosing to disobey God’s command not to eat of the tree. The consequences of that free will act, God controlled.

Free will is no misnomer.

 

HP: Show us how you do JD.

 

HP: Dead or alive, I will give it my best shot.

Joh 1:13 Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

This verse does not prove in any way that the free will granted to man by God is not active in the salvation process. It does state that our will is not the grounds of salvation nor the originator of the plan of salvation. God is the designer of the plan of salvation and His grace is the grounds of salvation.

Eph 1:11 In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:

HP: We are indeed predestined in God has predetermined that we would saved. His predestination or predetermination does not necessitate the outcome, but rather simply shows that God foreknows those that will fulfill the conditions He has set forth for man to be saved. It is His will that man, granted a free will by Him, should exercise that free will in a response that He accepts as being obedient to His conditions. God is the designer and executor of the plan of salvation. This in no way sets aside the fact that God has placed conditions for man to fulfill in order to make effective His plan in their lives.

(I believe you mean this verse, not 9:1 as you listed it. Ro 9:11 (For the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth

HP: The word children in this verse refers to ‘nations’ in that God chose certain nations to be granted certain privileges and benefits that others would not have, and this benefit had nothing directly to do with them doing anything good or evil, due to the fact that He chose to confer these blessings upon them before their existence.

Jas 1:18 Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.

HP: Nothing any man could possibly have done in any way could have forced God’s hand to confer upon sinful man a Savior. It was of his own will that salvation was designed and implemented. That in no way negates the part man’s will does play in salvation. It simply states that the plan was his to design and His to implement of His own will and not by force, coercion, or by any other.

 

HP: This verse does not speak directly to any individual as it is written, so it would be in error to apply it to an individual when in fact it is not referring to one.

 

HP: Well, they sure missed it there, and besides, if that is what they called truth that contradicted their false notions, they were not only in error, but they also were guilty of possessing a very sharp tongue.