Featured Is there really a conflict between Freedom and Sovereignty, if rightly defined?

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First, I will show you yet ANOTHER contradiction within your Creeds and Confessions:

Westminster Confession 1646, Sec III

"I. God from all eternity did by the most wise and holy counsel of his own will, freely and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass; yet so as thereby neither is God the author of sin; nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures, nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established."

Another preemptive clause that contradicts the explicit implications of His foreknowledge as previously stated just one clause prior to the highlighted portion. Again, this is why Calvinists can't separate the distinctions between God's KNOWING and God's DOING because the Confession obfuscates the issue. When will the Calvinist GET that KNOWLEDGE IS NOT A FORCE it means TO KNOW and KNOW is all that KNOW means.

If God was the author of sin, then why can't He look at it?

" Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity: wherefore lookest thou upon them that deal treacherously, and holdest thy tongue when the wicked devoureth the man that is more righteous than he?" Habakkuk 1:13

James 1:13 "God can not be tempted with evil, NEITHER TEMPTETH HE ANY MAN"

1 Cor 14:33, "For God IS NOT the author of confusion".

"And they built the high places of Baal, which are in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to cause their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire unto Molech; which I commanded them not, neither came it into my mind, that they should do this abomination, to cause Judah to sin." Jeremiah 32:35

Romans 5 says "for as BY one man's sin" not "for as by God's eternal decree sin came into the world". Romans 5 says "by ONE MAN'S DISOBEDIENCE" not "for by God's eternal authorship of sin" did death pass upon all for that ALL (not GOD) have sinned.

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NO, it's not a straw man because these are the implications and conclusions that Calvinism has drawn based upon philosophical speculations that are not supported in Scripture. They have defined definitions that defy the commons terms ascribed to knowledge, foreknowledge, decrees, free will and destiny. They have made the knowledge of God the active force in determining and controlling whatever IS and whatever comes to pass when the very first book of the Bible says that's NOT how God brought the world into existence. The world did not come into existence based upon God foreknowing that it would, it came into existence because "GOD SAID" so.

And you are right that God knew and does know the future but you are equating what He knows with what He does. You are making God a slave to His foreknowledge which gives foreknowledge an elevated deified status above God.

 

What is quoted above is your response to my first question. Notice, there is no answer there. Notice also that there is no question in your post. My post that is quoted is a direct question to you.

My point? You shucked and jived first. Your critiques fall flat when you are guilty of what you accuse others of doing.

 

There is a distinction. It has to do with immediate vs ultimate.

A murderer wants to die.
A jury also wants the murderer to die.

The murderer wants to die because he got caught and cannot kill people any longer.
The jury wants the murderer to die because justice calls for his death.

They want the same thing for very different reasons.

This is a distinction.

God wants evil to exist though he hates evil just like I want the gym to exist though I hate going to the gym.

It serves a good purpose.

 

1. Physicists rarely (even those of faith) overly "engage" the metaphysical, natural scientists typically stay within boundaries of measurement, unless they are quite comfortable in the philosophical realm. I don't "have a problem" with intellectual ideas from a purely rational perspective.

2. I think (just my observation) that most scientists except it as a "given" that knowledge is never complete, and future investigations, ideas and discoveries will either enhance current understanding or perhaps send things in an entirely different direction

 

And those responses have been shown to be inadequate by several others.

God does not originate a thought. Has it never occurred to you that nothing ever occurs to God?

Now lets dosy doe about anthropomorphisms.

 

If God WANTS evil to exist, then why is He planning on destroying it? That is a blasphemous statement that defies the very nature of the love of God. Justice punishes evil because being good by nature demands that it can not equally coexist with evil and demonstrate what God desires. God explicitly says that He does not desire the death of the wicked. Ezek 18:23. What He punishes does not mean that's what He WANTS. God is NOT WILLING that any should perish (2 Peter 3:9)

And again, how can you be the author of something you can't see? Notice in Genesis everything that God created is followed with "and God SAW that it was good" but notice what is missing from the creation account. God SEEING the creation of evil, God even MENTIONING the creation of sin. God said clearly that He can not look at sin. Hab 1:13. There is nothing in the Bible that shows that God used Braille to write the first 10 commandments, or that that He wears glasses because something is wrong with his vision. If God thinks evil is good, then why would Isaiah 5:20 say woe to those who call evil good and good evil? This makes it clear that evil is not a good thing. God works against evil, but does so IN SPITE of the presence of evil, not BECAUSE OF it.

If God "wants evil to exist", then why did Jeremiah write that "And they built the high places of Baal, which are in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to cause their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire unto Molech; which I commanded them not, neither came it into my mind, that they should do this abomination, to cause Judah to sin."

God made it clear that He DID NOT cause Judah to sin. Yet if evil is God's desire, and God determines ALL THINGS then it should have logically followed that God in fact WANTED Judah to sin, and DESIRED that those children passed through the fire, and yet the exact opposite is stated in Jeremiah. If God WANTED evil, then He'd be a hypocrite for establishing punishments for things that He WANTED MEN TO DO.

 

Although Javert answered him on this, it was an unnecessary response. Accurate, but not necessary because as I explained to Jon, it is based on the loaded question fallacy. Free will is not dependent on exhaustive foreknowledge and thus there is no need to explain it. The question could likewise be reversed for Jonathon, explain why free will is necessarily contingent upon God's foreknowledge. That can not be answered without presupposing that exhaustive foreknowledge is an independent force that offers a definition of knowledge that makes knowledge a functional power instead of being simply descriptive of what God knows. This in turn makes God a slave to His to His foreknowledge and turns knowledge into it's own deity with the ability to create and dictate.

 

And another thing to add to my previous comment to Luke, if God WANTED evil, why would Paul write , "Fathers PROVOKE NOT YOUR CHILDREN TO WRATH" in Ephesians 6:4? You mean it's OK for God to provoke men to wrath, but God doesn't want the same example from His own actions? Yet if God wants evil, then why wouldn't He WANT fathers to provoke their children to wrath?

 

Absolutely, I look at it in terms of the sacrifices one must make not only from a philosophical but this going hand in hand with my theological viewpoint, regarding the reasoning for truth about such things as origin of evil, judgment and truth in the Words concerning the calling of God to come to Him.

I'm glad these guys see it my way. :smilewinkgrin:

 

And the failure to answer the question continues, you did not answer my question so it is ok not to answer yours, i.e. two wrongs make a right.

Rather than respond to my post, you asked a question to evade the position presented. Shuck and jive from the get go.

Calling all Calvinists, calling all Calvinists, can you answer this question: If God's exhaustive foreknowledge fixes the future such that God predestines whatsoever comes to pass, including our sins, why is God not the author of sin?

 

1) God has exhaustive foreknowledge, meaning He knows the future exhaustively.

2) Knowing the future fixes the future, thus the description of the doctrine as exhaustive determinism, God predestines whatsoever comes to pass.

3) God predestines and thus causes, using primary, secondary or whatever causes our each and every sin.

4) God is the author of sin, and therefore to punish us for what He caused demonstrates His glory.

Calvinism 101

 

Haha! Yeah, I get it. It's okay for you to call out others for doing exactly what you did first. Thanks for your input.

 

Here's one Calvinists answer: http://www.desiringgod.org/blog/posts/the-author-story-model

The whole series is worth reading, but he does most of the explaining in this post.

I would like to point out that I never claimed that God's exhaustive foreknowledge is what fixed the future. The future, however, is fixed (even most baptist traditionalists affirm that). The question is whether or not that fixed future is compatible with libertarian freedom. Greg Boyd said no.

 

Finally an attempted answer.

Basically it says God causes us to sin, but because He is God He cannot be "blamed" for the sin He causes. Irrational nonsense.

Calvinism claims God's exhaustive foreknowledge fixes the future. Some say the fixing preceded the foreknowledge, and others the foreknowledge preceded the fix, but no matter, once you get to creation, the future is fixed. So a bunny trail into the catacombs of epistemology.

Simply put God causes or allows whatsoever comes to pass, therefore He does not cause us to sin, which means God is not the author of sin. We make plans, autonomous choices. But our leash only goes as far as God allows. Pretty simple really.

Thus there is no conflict between Sovereignty defined as God causing or allowing whatsoever comes to pass, an idea contained in the WCF. His knowledge of the future somehow does not fix it, i.e. He did not decree what He foreknow, therefore God is not the author of sin.

The Calvinism answer simply is untenable.

 

Because he did not wish for it to exist FOREVER obviously.

Without sin there is no grace.

There is no receiving of praises by the Lamb of God from a multitude of the redeemed which no man can number for dying for sinners.

Ephesians tells us WHY he built this universe... that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us.