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Responsible = Response Able

Discussion in '2004 Archive' started by Skandelon, Mar 2, 2004.

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  1. Skandelon

    Skandelon <b>Moderator</b>

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    Let's start with some basics:

    There are two types of biblical hardening; each are described in detail below:

    Self-Hardening of the heart goes beyond the tragic obtuseness of our inherited condition in the Fall of man. Working on the fertile soul of our innately immoral hearts, the act of sinning hardens the heart into a stubborn rebellion against all that is good. So, people may harden their own hearts, in sinful rebellion, in bitterness, or in sheer self-will. (Ex. 9:34-35; 2 Chron. 36:13; Zech. 7:12; Dan. 5:20; Eph. 4:18; Heb. 3:12-15)

    This type of self-hardening is most clearly seen in Zech. 7:11-13:

    "Your ancestors would not listen to this message. They turned stubbornly away and put their fingers in their ears to keep from hearing. They made their hearts as hard as stone, so they could not hear the law or the messages that the LORD Almighty had sent them by his Spirit through the earlier prophets. That is why the LORD Almighty was so angry with them. ‘Since they refused to listen when I called to them, I would not listen when they called to me,’ says the LORD Almighty.”

    Judicial Hardening -- In a few instances such as Pharaoh and the Egyptians (Ex. 7:3; 9:12), Sihon, king of Heshbon (Deut. 2:30), and the Hivites living in Gibeon (John 11:19-20), it is said that God hardened their hearts. Apparently these people were so irremediable in their rebellion against God that God entered into the hardening process so that he could accomplish his purposes in spite of, and yet in and through, that hardenness. It is God's prerogative, as God, to do this (Rom. 9:18-21). That they are morally responsible for their condition is a theological given, and we are warned not to harden our hearts as they did, a command that would make no sense if hardening were simply God's act (1 Sam. 6:6).

    Israel's hardening as a nation was an act of self-hardening followed by God’s act of judicial hardening as clearly portrayed in the scripture (Matt. 23:37; Rom. 10-11).

    God tells Isaiah that Israel, with its calloused heart, will reject him as God's messenger when he goes to them (Isa. 6:9-10). The event was taken as prophetic by Jesus (Matt. 13:14-15) and Paul (Acts 28:25-27) as referring to Israel's rejection of Jesus as God's Messiah. For Paul, Israel's hardening paved the way to a ministry of ingrafting the Gentiles (Rom. 10-11; Acts 28:28) and was not intended by God to be final, but only until the fullness of the Gentile’s ingrafting was accomplished.

    Only the Word of God has the power to cut or pierce a hardened heart (Heb. 4:12) and he has given that word through his Son, the Apostles, the scriptures and by his Spirit all of which can be resisted and ignored as seen throughout the Bible as the hardenness and callousness of the heart only grows thicker with each act of rebellion.

    According to scripture only those in a hardened state are unable to see, hear, understand and believe (Acts 28:26-28: John 12:39-40).
     
    #21 Skandelon, Mar 9, 2004
  2. Frogman

    Frogman <img src="http://www.churches.net/churches/fubc/Fr

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    Paul says that scripture has concluded all in sin, and that the carnal mind is enmity against God. This statement does not mean that the carnal mind is 'becoming' an enemy of God but that it is enmity, an already arrived at condition.

    Bro. Dallas
     
    #22 Frogman, Mar 10, 2004
  3. Eric B

    Eric B Active Member
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    The simple context. Paul was teaching that God "raised" Pharaoh to show His power to Israel. This has nothing to do with all lost people. They are not "raised" to be "condemned". But people insinuate that to get the surrounding statements about the witholding of mercy, and "vessels of wrath".
    I forget at the moment what that concept is.

    That is Calvinism's misinterpretation of "hardened" as synonymous with "depraved" (fallen), as in the Rom.9 interpretation. Hardening is a condition that comes afterwards, where a person is "given over" to their sins, and becomes more resolved in it.
     
    #23 Eric B, Mar 10, 2004
  4. Frogman

    Frogman <img src="http://www.churches.net/churches/fubc/Fr

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    Just for the sake of my understanding would you explain Romans 10 in the same strict context?

    Vss. 1-3 clearly are speaking of hardened Israel. So, then, is the so called Roman road applicable to the unhardened Gentile? I mean to the lost in general as it is applied.

    And if so, what makes the distinction since the immediate context is speaking of the people of the covenant who have the blessing of the oracles of God and have only to receive Jesus as the promised messiah?

    Do you understand the deeper reasoning for applying the context of Pharoah to the lost? Or have I only confused you more?

    Bro. Dallas
     
    #24 Frogman, Mar 10, 2004
  5. Skandelon

    Skandelon <b>Moderator</b>

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    And I agree with that. I don't agree with the part of TD which teaches we are born unable to see, hear, understand and believe the gospel message.

    You assume that being at "enmity with God" means we can't understand or respond in faith to his message of reconcilation. That is absurd to me.
     
    #25 Skandelon, Mar 10, 2004
  6. Eric B

    Eric B Active Member
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    The Romans Road is applicable to every sinner, of course. The story of Pharaoh was an illustration used to show how God worked out His plan. He raised Pharaoh for a particular reason, just like He raised Israel for a particular reason. Like Pharaoh, Israel's being raised by God does not grant them salvation automatically, as many had assumed. They in their natural state are among the lost, and must be saved the same way as everyone else. Pharaoh is a type of the lost in that case. But that does not mean that everything said about Pharaoh applied to all lost as individuals. It is just typology, not a dissertation on unconditional election and preterition or reprobation of individuals.
     
    #26 Eric B, Mar 10, 2004
  7. Frogman

    Frogman <img src="http://www.churches.net/churches/fubc/Fr

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    And I agree with that. I don't agree with the part of TD which teaches we are born unable to see, hear, understand and believe the gospel message.

    You assume that being at "enmity with God" means we can't understand or respond in faith to his message of reconcilation. That is absurd to me.     </font>[/QUOTE]Being at enmity does not mean becoming an enemy, it means being an enemy in all its capacity.
     
    #27 Frogman, Mar 11, 2004
  8. Skandelon

    Skandelon <b>Moderator</b>

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    Still, nothing there about inability to respond in faith to the Holy Spirit wrought gospel message.
     
    #28 Skandelon, Mar 11, 2004
  9. Frogman

    Frogman <img src="http://www.churches.net/churches/fubc/Fr

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    Still, nothing there about inability to respond in faith to the Holy Spirit wrought gospel message. </font>[/QUOTE]It means that 'ye will not'.
     
    #29 Frogman, Mar 11, 2004
  10. Skandelon

    Skandelon <b>Moderator</b>

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    Uh? :confused:
     
    #30 Skandelon, Mar 11, 2004
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