The Foreknowledge of God and Matters of Morality

We go to the scriptures for the answer to your questions.

Acts 1;23. "Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain:..."

I find in this verse both God's sovereignty and man's responsibility. God had determined from eternity that the Son would be delivered up to wicked men to be crucified. His determinate counsel, therefore, makes the event a necessity. What God determines will happen. If it will, there is no possibility that it will not..

Yet, Peter describes the men who carried out this act as wicked, a moral judgment. This does more then imply that these men did this because they willed to do it. Not one of them would say they did it out of compulsion.

Now in that same verse above, Peter places foreknowledge right behind determinate counsel. Although they logically in order, I think you can place them side-by-side as occurring simultaneously. One may contend that foreknowledge (or foresight) by God of future acts of men does not imply necessity. But I hardly see how one can make that same argument regarding God's determinate counsel.

My conclusion again: God's decree and foreknowledge equals necessity, which co-exists with morality and responsibility for one's moral choices.

 

HP, looks as if you and I have this thread to ourselves so far.

A distinction between "will come to pass" and "come to pass by necessity" is a semantic distinction without a difference. There is just as much inevitability in one as the other. And in neither phrase is there a possibility that the opposite will occur.

I don't pretend to know the mind of God, except where God has revealed it,so we're agreed on that. So I know the mind of God when I say that those whom he foreknew ultimately were predestinated, called and justified. (Ro 8:29-30)

I certainly think Peter revealed what God saw in Act 1:23 (Determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God). and John described the "lamb slain from the foundation o the world" (Rev 13:8} I doubt if he was leaving any doubt that it happened of necessity, or that there was any alternative. There was no Plan B.

We don't have to guess what God knows and foresaw. There's plenty of scripture to help us out. We don't have to guess whom God foreknew.

 

I don't know why I didn't think of this before, but basically this is an old debate from Romans 9.

Let's set this up by recalling what Paul wrote. He first wrote about his choice of Jacob over Esau, unrelated to anything they had done. Then he quoted God as saying he'll have mercy on whoever he wants. Then Paul said that God's will is not dependent on the will of man. He also pointed out that God raised up Pharoah for the sole purpose of knocking him down. And that he will have mercy on whoever he wants, and will harden whoever he wants.

Well, this is pretty tough stuff, and Paul could just hear the objections from his readers. "Why, if that's true, Paul, how can we be held responsible. why, nobody can resist God's will the way you describe it. Why, that makes God responsible for the bad stuff we do, because we couldn't resist. God made us do it." That sorta sounds like the argument you're making.

I'm using a little hyperbole here for fun, but I don't think I've overstated anything.

Okay, I know that most non-Cals insist that this passage refers to nations and not individuals. Makes no difference. The principles don't change. God is sovereign. Man is responsible.

 

When I see one of my children on their way to do something disobedient, due to my experience as a Dad and my knowledge of them, I "know" what is going to happen. My foreknowledge has nothing to do with them doing it. I usually let them do their "evil deed" and parent from there. I use my sovereignty to obtain the best result for the children that love me. That sovereignty often see me "limiting" myself. My children would not have the opportunity to love me were I not to do this.

In Acts 2:23 determinate counsel has only to do with God providing the remedy for men's wicked hands. It has nothing to do with him determining that men would have wicked hands or that He would determine whose hands would be wicked enough to do such an act.

We are not guessing when we say what God foreknew unless we go beyond scripture. God foreknew that men would sin and that he would send Christ. We also know that he predetermined some for specific work on his behalf. We have gone beyond scripture when we say that God determines which people get the result of Christs work.

Saying that God will have mercy on whoever he wants is not necessarily determinative for individuals. It could be that his will determines the grounds for which he will have mercy. This is the case and those grounds are faith. That will inevitably lead us back to the depravity of man and his ability or inability to have faith and ...

BTW I have been very limited in my free time due to having 4 foster children who require a lot of me. That brings me up to 10 kids and 1 wife who need me. Not enough time to get to the BB I'm afraid.

 

Thanks for your visit to this thread, trustit! It's been a bit lonely in here, just HP and I.

I suspect you also will do whatever's necessary to stop them when they may harm themselves by their "evil deed." For that, I would think that your children would love you (eventually) because you kept them from harm. There are some analogies between earthly fathers and the Heavenly Father, but I'm not sure this one does the trick.

I think it goes further than you say. God's determinate counsel was specifically about Jesus' death by wicked hands, thus establishing two things. They did it willingly and without compulsion, and they will be held responsible for it. Whether God determined who those wicked individuals would be is a topic for another day.

Then you must deal with a number of scriptures which say that God chose some. Particularly II Thess 2:13 "God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation.....

Election is not the issue here. All of us of every stripe believes the Bible teaches election. We disagree the ground of election. What we're discussing here is, when God makes that choice, is it inevitable, and necessary for it to happen that way. Not just will happen, but must happen. And can we say "must" and still retain main's will in this matter?

Individuals or nations, the principle is the same. God chose Jacob (or Israel) over Esau (or Edom) before they were born, before either one had done anything good or bad. For one stated reason--that his purpose according to election might stand.

Paul also says the ground for God's showing mercy is-------that he just wants to.

My contention is that whether God chooses individuals, determines that things will happen according to his own will; or whether such choices are based on his foreseeing that they will happen, the result is the same, and inevitable.

HP sees it differently;

So the lines are drawn. If one believes that what God foresees may not necessarily come to pass, he must explain why he has just denied God's omniscience and immutability. He must also explain why this is not Open Theism, since, if what God foresees doesn't happen, then God didn't actually foresee it. It also destroy's God's omnipotence, since he is powerless to keep individual future choices from messing up his foreknowledge (or foresight).

 

Or, his rocking chair in heaven replaced His throne upon which He is supposed to rule the universe has a broken leg and He can't always see straight.

I go back to Jonah where his so-called free will ran out as God had him cast overboard, swallowed by a great fish and spit out on his mission field to preach God's word.

Cheers,

Jim

 

So Jonah didn't repent?

Silly me, I thought Jonah said "I am cast out of thy sight; yet I will look again toward thy holy temple."

Or is it that his repentance was predetermined?

Haven't you ever wondered how many prophets were called that never responded? Or that responded and turned back? Or responded, began preaching, and then gave up? Oops, that is starting to sound like a parable I once heard.

 

I think we can paraphrase Jonah's remark as "I am dead meat. Okay, Lord, you and me, right? You want me to preach? No problem. It's just that nobody explained it to me like you did."

 

I'll refer you back to my post #3 and my comments on Acts 2:23. That's where Peter described the people who put the Lord Jesus to death as wicked.

That's where Peter also said that same crucifixion was the result of the determinate counsel of God. The crucifixion was necessary, but its perpetration was an immoral act by immoral people.

 

Say what?

I am not sure what you are saying. If I get it right you are saying God forced Jonah into going. I assume you also figure that all of Nineveh was forced into changing.

I guess that is what Jesus does when he says "Except ye repent ye shall all perish."

And why is it everybody doesn't repent?

 

trustit! my tongue was somewhat in my cheek. It was one of those irresistible moments when I visualized Jonah, having been spit up by the big fish onto the seasore, stumbling along, covered with seaweed, his skin bleached white by the fish's digestive juices. We know he knows this was God's doing.

So, in my mind, I hear God saying, "Jonah."

And Jonah responded "I am dead meat. Okay, Lord, you and me, right? You want me to preach? No problem. It's just that nobody explained it to me like you did."

Did God get his way? You bet.

Did Jonah go willingly? Eventually.

 

HP, before we can continue a fruitful discussion, I am going to have to stop letting you define all the terms for me. I have allowed you to get me into a discussion of necessity and morality. But rather than necessity, I define what we're talking about as certainty or inevitability.

I have tried to point out that all of us believe in election. Non-Calvinists base it on foreseen faith, but call it foreknowledge. God does foresee, but his foreknowledge is related to "whom" he foreknows, not "what." Calvinists believe that God chooses based on his own will and purpose. Non-Cals say God foresees faith in a person and elects him in response.

Either way, the salvation of the object of God's election is inevitable and certain. What God chooses he has always chosen. What he decrees today, he has always decreed. What he knows today he has always known. Whom he savingly knows today he has always known. To suggest that whom God chooses for salvation might not, in fact, exercise saving faith, is to deny God's immutability. It is to deny God's omniscience. It also denies God's omnipotence, the power to arrange the circumstances, the illumination, the conviction of sins, the drawing----the means, to accomplish his will.

We can argue all day long over whether the foreseen faith of a person makes his salvation necessary. I will no longer use that term. But I will argue this: whom God intends to save today, he has always intended to save. Therefore, his salvation is a certainty. God will send a preacher or someone with the gospel. That person will repent and trust Christ for salvation. Freely and without coercion.

In John 10, Jesus described people as sheep, who were not yet saved. He was referring to Gentiles whose salvation was a certainty, in time.

 

HP, you are more than kind to me in your remarks. And I wish to extend to you the same compliment regarding the tone of your posts.

I reached the point where I felt we were talking past each other rather than to each other. If I let you define the terms in our discussion, more power to you. But where we have different definitions of the same term, such as foreknowledge, then we both need to either agree on the definition or make sure that those who read our posts understand that our definitions are different.

I don't quarrel with your trying to seize the definitions. I just was not alert enough to to recognize that you had done it, and I was debating your terms, not mine. If my arguments are going to be accurate and effect, I have to insist on my own definitions.

As far as I can tell, you have not misrepresented my views, although you have challenged them. You even forced me to back away for several hours so I could think about your posts and consider a response. All this thinking wears me out!