God's coercion of the thoughts of men.
Discussion in 'Baptist Theology & Bible Study' started by Jope, Jul 29, 2013.
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Inspector Javert said: ↑There is a real problem here, because if God knows now what I shall do tomorrow, then it seems that either what I shall do is already determined,Click to expand...
Inspector Javert said: ↑or else that I shall have the power tomorrow to convert God's knowledge today into a false belief.Click to expand...
God, being sovereign, makes the decisions that I will make.
Or else How could he choose saints to believe, and others to be destroyed?
2 Thessalonians 2, NASB, bold emphasis mine
13 But we should always give thanks to God for you, brethren beloved by the Lord, because God has chosen you from the beginning for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and faith in the truth.
1 Peter 2, NASB, bold emphasis mine
8 and,
“A stone of stumbling and a rock of offense”;
for they stumble because they are disobedient to the word, and to this doom they were also appointed.
James 4, NASB, bold emphasis mine
12 There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the One who is able to save and to destroy; but who are you who judge your neighbor? -
Inspector Javert said: ↑In short...I think Boethius was wrong because he felt that the necessity of an Omniscient being's fore-knowing something renders that thing necessary...it doesn't IMO. If something is true for an Omniscient being than necessarily that Omniscient being KNOWS it....but it doesn't render the event itself as necessary. The only necessity, is that if it occurs, or is to occur...than an Omniscient being knows it.Click to expand...Inspector Javert said: ↑If something is true for an Omniscient being than necessarily that Omniscient being KNOWS it....but it doesn't render the event itself as necessary.Click to expand...
Acts 17, NKJV
26 And He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their preappointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings,
Job 7, KJV, bold emphasis mine
1Is there not an appointed time to man upon earth? are not his days also like the days of an hireling? 2As a servant earnestly desireth the shadow, and as an hireling looketh for the reward of his work: 3So am I made to possess months of vanity, and wearisome nights are appointed to me.
(In this case, the event is "their preappointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings", and Job's question implies that man's days are "like the days of an hireling").
According to Jeremiah 10:23, the event is necessary. God directs the steps of men.
NASB
I know, O Lord, that a man’s way is not in himself,
Nor is it in a man who walks to direct his steps. -
Jope...I think you are jumping back and forth in between both sides of the issue. I can't make heads or tales of which position you take.
You are denying Boethius one minute, and affirming him the other. I can't reasonably respond to this.
If you agree with Boethius I'll respond, if you don't, I'll respond as well.
But you are both affirming and denying him all at the same time.
I can't make heads nor tales of what you are submitting. You are seeming to take Both sides of the same issue. No one can respond to that. -
To answer the op, this is one of those times we must appeal to mystery. Nobody knows how an omni everything God chooses to interact and react with his finite creation.
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Inspector Javert said: ↑Jope...I think you are jumping back and forth in between both sides of the issue. I can't make heads or tales of which position you take.
You are denying Boethius one minute, and affirming him the other. I can't reasonably respond to this.
If you agree with Boethius I'll respond, if you don't, I'll respond as well.
But you are both affirming and denying him all at the same time.
I can't make heads nor tales of what you are submitting. You are seeming to take Both sides of the same issue. No one can respond to that.Click to expand...
Just because I asked if anyone has ever heard of Boethius doesn't necessarily mean that I've read all of him or that I agree with everything he has to say. I just asked if anyone had heard of him.
It turns out, I don't agree with Boethius' doctrine of no-free-will (if that is indeed his doctrine, and the stanford encyclopedia is correct). What I think is that men still have their free will, but I think that God also coerces that free will, so that both God and men are responsible for the decision. I see this as the position that all scripture agrees with. -
Jope said: ↑What I think is that men still have their free will, but I think that God also coerces that free will, so that both God and men are responsible for the decision.Click to expand...
Sorry my man...Much love :1_grouphug: :flower:
But what you said is absurd. -
Jope said: ↑Just because I asked if anyone has ever heard of Boethius doesn't necessarily mean that I've read all of him or that I agree with everything he has to say. I just asked if anyone had heard of him.Click to expand...
I digress. (Felt it was necessary though :p).
'Night Javert! -
Jope said: ↑...Just like, if I were to say that I was thinking about a specific love song, it doesn't mean that I'm thinking it about someone. It could mean that I'm thinking hypothetically and that this song may be what marriage is inevitably like (me being unmarried)...
I digress. (Felt it was necessary though :p).
'Night Javert!Click to expand... -
Inspector Javert said: ↑At brass-tacks...I think that statement is self-defeating and absurd. That's an explicit contradiction....
Sorry my man...Much love :1_grouphug: :flower:
But what you said is absurd.Click to expand...
Perhaps the only proper designation such a doctrine can be filed under is "dichotomy" or "paradox".
Paul preached a dichotomy (or paradox) in Romans 5:13-14:
ESV, bold emphasis mine
13 for sin indeed was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law. 14 Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sinning was not like the transgression of Adam, who was a type of the one who was to come.
The fact that death still reigned from Adam to Moses, even when there was no law to count that sin as death, is a dichotomy (or paradox).
Definition of Dichotomy:
a division into two especially mutually exclusive or contradictory groups or entities <the dichotomy between theory and practice>; also : the process or practice of making such a division <dichotomy of the population into two opposed classes>
dichotomy. 2013. In Merriam-Webster.com.
Retrieved August 16, 2013, from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/dichotomy
Definition of Paradox:
a statement that is seemingly contradictory or opposed to common sense and yet is perhaps true
paradox. 2013. In Merriam-Webster.com.
Retrieved August 16, 2013, from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/paradox
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