Wondering Why?

No Wes,
You haven't even ANSWERED one of my points.. you are not learning AT ALL... I told you to find an IMPERATIVE verse stating man has ability and you give me NOTHING.. you don't say "RC, I'VE found one OR you are right, I can't find one, that's interesting"... Every time you give me something I answer it saying "No, this is why or HEY you where right on this point because this verse is imperative.... The problem is that my answers you don't take because they don't fit your biased presupositions and you can't answer my question. So... FIND A FLIPPING IMPERATIVE VERSE or say you can't find one! NOT to hard to do! But don't act like a child and take your ball and go home...

 

How about "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved..." (ability Imperative implied)! You must have the ability to do the what one is told to do!

How about "Whosoever believeth in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life" (ability Imperative implied) One must have the ability, else God the Son would be in error for telling us to do it!

 

WES.. YOUR DOING IT AGAIN!!!!!!!!!

Your doing the exact OPPOSITE of what the grammer says!!! PLease! You can't do what the grammer says YOU CAN NOT DO! ABILITY CAN NOT be implied!! I guess if I tell you ... "Wes, flap your arms and fly". That's an imperative. Well, can you fly? NO !

Jesus is simply stating a fact... those who believe will go to heaven, those that don't won't... it doesn't imply AT ALL and CAN NOT imply and you are grammatically FOOLISH if you do imply that ALL men can believe becasue of an imperative statement!

Your are castorating the work of the Holy Spirit if you think that imperatives imply ability !

The ten commandments along with the other 360 commands of God were all imperative... So.. I guess you want to go along with Pelegius that you can follow ALL the commandments because you have the ability to follow them because God wouldn't command you to do something you couldn't do! So... who needs the H.S. when you have good ol' free willin' man with the ability to be PERFECT... right "Be ye perfect as your father in heaven is perfect?... Guess you can do that one too?

The law (imperatives) are to show that YOU DO NOT HAVE the ability not ability! DOWN RIGHT sad! Why do you think that Pelagius and Arminius where heretics? Because of this very reason you are spewing!

 

rc,

You said,

The difference between you and Wes and I is we believe that God has a vast love toward sinners as John 3:16 speaks about. Ability is a reality because God says that we can believe and be saved, because the Holy Spirit guides people toward the Lord.

Your problem with us is not semantics but the Lord's truth to His people and also in relation to all lost souls. 'He who has the Son has life; and he who has not the Son of God has not life.' God the Spirit brings sinners to the point where they can repent of their sins. You and I either have the Son or we do not own Him as Lord and Savior.

 

rc,

I’m sorry that you do not like the Lord’s narrative of the centurion and his servant.

The facts that Jesus is relating to us is that not every person that our Lord came in contact with had the degree of faith that the centurion man had toward Him.

As far as the centurion being regenerated by the Holy Spirit, you are going to be hard pressed to prove this.

This miracle was probably two years before Jesus crucifixion and in 16:18 Jesus says that He shall build His church, meaning in the future. The Day of Pentecost had not even happened where the Spirit was outpoured on believers.

Even the disciples believed on Him at the Marriage of Cana, but were not indwelled by the Spirit of God. [John 2:11] They were followers of the Lamb and even among these elite, if you will, Jesus did not minister the Holy Spirit to them until the evening of the resurrection when He appear to them. Only then 'Jesus breathed on them and said to them, Receive ye the Holy Spirit.' [John 20:22]

If you knew your Bible, you would know that the Holy Spirit was not released into the hearts and lives of God's people until the Day of Pentecost. The promise of the Father and the power to live victoriously for the Lord took place first in Jerusalem. [Luke 24:49]

This being said, the centurion had no understanding or experience with the mighty power of the Holy Spirit.

The lack of the Holy Spirit in the lives of the twelve disciples is obvious because all but John the Apostle and the women followers of Christ fled from the scene of the crucifixion.

You wrongfully think that the eleven disciples fled with the Holy Spirit in tow. You err not knowing the Scripture.

With all due respect, you think you know the English language thoroughly, but as to understanding the Word of truth, you have a long way to go as far as being enlightened to the truth.

 

rc,
If all mankind did not have the ability to believe in God, Salvation would be a total myth because the lack of ability on the part some IMPLIES that God created two different categories of humans, those with the ability and those without the ability.

The CLAY must have THE ABILITY to be used in the manner that clay is used, else it is not CLAY! The Potter can do nothing with a lump he thinks to be clay when it turn out to be iron ore!

All mankind are made to be the divine potters clay! Therefore all mankind has the innate ability to believe.

 

I weep for you two...
To have such a shallow understanding of God and lack of understanding of His word speaks volumes of why the visible church is in the wicked God foresaken stae it is in now.

The Holy Spirit has ALWAYS been active in men's hearts LONG before Christ are you kidding me?

Psalm 51:11 11 Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me. Just because He "indwells" in us now and in the O.T. He was "epi" or upon man dosn't mean the H.S. intentions where not the same... don't even think you can say anything different on THAT issue.

Wes... PLEASE using Romans 9 are we ! I didn't know you knew that there was such a book! The clay doesn't have the ability to make itself into anything! That's the whole point! It's the sovereignty of God that HE decided : Who will be chosen for salvation and those who HE PREDESTINED FOR WRATH!

 

rc,

Your quote said, ‘I weep for you two...

To have such a shallow understanding of God and lack of understanding of His word speaks volumes of why the visible church is in the wicked God foresaken stae it is in now.

The Holy Spirit has ALWAYS been active in men's hearts LONG before Christ are you kidding me?

Psalm 51:11 11 Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me. Just because He "indwells" in us now and in the O.T. He was "epi" or upon man dosn't mean the H.S. intentions where not the same... don't even think you can say anything different on THAT issue.

Wes... PLEASE using Romans 9 are we ! I didn't know you knew that there was such a book! The clay doesn't have the ability to make itself into anything! That's the whole point! It's the sovereignty of God that HE decided : Who will be chosen for salvation and those who HE PREDESTINED FOR WRATH! [/quote]

Don’t cry my friend until you have studied for as many years as I have in a formal theological classroom, in a pastor’s study for twenty-five years and now daily in my study.

You are right that the Spirit of God has been active back in eternity past, when He created the Heaven and the earth. [Genesis 1:1] and back in Noah’s era of time. [Genesis 6:3]

You must learn that God did not indwell, baptize into the Holy Spirit the laity of the former covenant, with the exception of the priests, prophets, pastors, kings of Israel and some of the artisans who built the Temple. The inner Advocate of the Spirit only came after Pentecost and is referred to in John 14:16.

In Psalm 51:11 King David is speaking only about himself and is not referring to any of the people of God, meaning the laity. This being true, this is why the O.T. covenant people had a proclivity toward backsliding.

As for Romans chapter nine, Calvin built, for the most part, his view of God’s saving and damning sinners from this chapter, albeit on a totally hypothetical concept. Start with “What if God . . . ” and the Lord might illumine you to understand that this is merely a theoretical and imaginary explanation showing God’s Almighty power to do all that His Divine Attributes will allow Him to perform and accomplish in His world.

The New International Versions says:

‘What if God, choosing to show His wrath and make His power known, bore with great patience the objects of His wrath prepared for destruction? What if He did this to make the riches of His glory known to the objects of His mercy, whom He prepared in advance for glory—even us, whom He also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles? He did not autocratically save and damn people, but He is saying what if I did do this.

If God predestined some for Heaven and Hell, He would have created them for Hell by ordaining their sins, which at death would have guaranteed their lost destiny. The whole point of the Bible, God’s Word, is to keep people from sinning against Him. But, to the Calvinist mindset--God makes men and women sin against Christ. What you are inadvertantly thinking and expounding is that Satan and God are co-conspirators who are acting on the same side. Thus the thrice holy God becomes the Author of sin--to those who are fitted to eternal destruction. This is, of course, an impossibility because He has love for the lost, He is clothed with an exacting justice, and the attribute of His Divine holiness would eternally insure us that He is not a participant in making men sin against His Divine Being. He is not it; it is not He.

Rev. Dr. Berrian

Calvinists are strong on Romans nine in their theorizing about it, but are ill equipped to understand and deal with the myriad attributes of Almighty God.

 

But the Holy Spirit did not die on a cross to remove the penalty of sin from mankind!

It was not until Jesus' ATONEMENT FOR SIN, that man was able to have everlasting life through faith in Jesus, God the Son!

No, you're right, clay cannot alter itself under its own power. But it does have the innate ability to be formed into other shapes and to take heat that causes it to retain that shape, and to be painted which makes it attractive to the eye. Yes clay does have all of those abilities! So, Clay is not totally depraved! It has abilities to retain what it is given!

 

Hi RC;
No one is saying the Holy Spirit wasn't there he just was not with in. This verse or chapter doesn't say one word that says He lives with in. Did you toot your horn a little to soon.

And while were at it since Salvation means to deliver what do you suppose David was asking to be delivered from? He was asking God. Did God answer His prayer? Sure He did but it wasn't until after Christ died on the cross.
May Christ Shine His light On Us All;
Mike

 

Hi Wes;
Did you know that clay like anyother material has a resistance as well. There are some things that clay can't be made to do. Everyone who has ever worked with there hands knows that eventually your going to run into material that fight's back. It just won't do what you want it to.
May Christ Shine His Light On Us all;
Mike

 

Yes, resistance, though a notable property of clay, is but one of clay's properties! I suppose that I was trying to look at the good properties.

 

The property of the clay? God uses as he sees fit with the clay that's the whole point ... and guess what, HE forms it before time FOR salvation and FORM IT FOR WRATH ! The clay ..... you are so blind you can't even see your own theology has you focused on the clay and "whether it is pliable or not" and stupid childish analogies instead of on the SOVEREIGN God who does what He wills....
Keep on focusing on your God gentlemen... MAN !
And I will on my God... The soveriegn king.

 

Your personally crafted sovereign King is one who tells we Christians to love our enemies, while He is free to hate some of the sons and daughters of His own created beings. See any problem here?

Your view of God is that He is dictatoral and is an amoral Being, because while He asks us to love our enemies, He has the liberty to hate some of His enemies within human creation.

Your God is one who is not concerned with loving all the sons and daughter of Adam, nor is He--God of justice who treats all persons fairly, nor is He God of holiness who distains sin, in that you profile Him as the Author of sin in the non-elect.

 

Your problem Ray is that your judging God by "mans" standards of love and justice on not what God calls love and justice Biblically.

He loves all. The ones who hate Him? What do they deserve ? .. instant death, right from the womb.. but by His love, and grace He allows them to live, to hate him, to mock him, until their end and then He gives them what they deserve and what they WANT, an eternity away from Him.

If He chooses to love others in a way He gives effectual grace to He can, and is not under OBLIGATION to give it to all. He doesn't OWE it to everyone, else it's not grace.

Your problem is your humanistic understanding of justice is FAIRNESS... you even use that in your description Ray... but IT IS NOT ! God rarely deals with people equally! But He always is just.

God the author of sin. Go to theology and study concurrance. God can do something in man that is good and that same act by man is evil. God is just in the action and man is evil for it... Why? Intention. God is also a little more complex than you also Ray. He can love and hate the same situation or people at the same time...

 

Hi RC;
You don't get along with anyone here do you?

Your accusing God of being satan; You can go crawl back into your pit we know who you are! :rolleyes:
Mike

 

rc,

You said,

The onus to prove your above statement is in your court.

What you detest is that all sinners are made in the image of the true God, and this means we are a lot like Him. We are like Him and He is like us, especially the saints who are being ‘conformed to His image.’ [Romans 8:29] James tells the saints not to curse men. Why? Because they are created after the similitude of the Lord Himself. [James 3:9] God speaking through James is hardly thinking in the vein of Total Depravity of soul. He tells us to love even our enemies because He is God Who loves people, even those who are yet in their sins.

The true God does not have a disposition of favoritism toward some sinners. His atonement is for all lost souls. [I John 2:2] Those caught in their sins will, as you rightly say, will end up in Hell.

Your erring view of Effectual Grace is a man made scheme to patch up John Calvin’s poor thinking and understanding of Scripture. Free grace is offered to all; at least this is what Jesus said to Nicodemus in John 3:16. You take your problems to Him and He just might open your eyes to His truth.

Our concept as human beings about justice comes only because of our Judeo-Christian heritage coming from the Lord God. I am sure your concept of God’s justice would be a twisted from of concept to help fix the bad vehicle of Calvinism.

Do you believe that God is the Author of sin? God is smarter than Einstein; what is your point. Believe me, He has humbled me many times and I have a more than healthy idea as to who the true God really is as I see Him in the Scripture and in our natural world.

You may want to give us an example as to how God can love and hate the same situation or people at the same time. I’m not sure we all understand your conceptualization.

If you believe that our Lord can Author sin, then God and Satan are wearing masks and are messing with our minds and hearts. Again, if you believe that Jesus can Author sin in even some people, He and the Devil are corhorts. If this were even the truth, who can be the most evil?

Of course, this is a non-Christian concept and is very sacrilegious to say the least.

Jesus and the Evil one will forever remain poles apart. In case you have not figured it out yet, they are adversaries. :mad:

 

Go to school and study concurrance...If you say He can't do both then I guess He does not love all... Since God HATES the evil doer as it says in the Psalms...ILL pure ignorance... My people parrish for a lack of knowledge...get out of hicktown and find a college to attend. Even a fool is considered wise if he keeps his mouth shut.

 

Just as God's love is for the World according to His Son, His hate for evil stands true and strong. God loves his created man, but hates the evil that seduces them away from Him. For those who remain so seduced, he will cast them away at judgment, love or not! He does not retain the evil or those defiled with/by it! He does retain those who have cleansed themselves from evil (another capability that the man who has Faith in God possesses, because they willfully put aside the evil in order to please the object of their faith!

 

Wes,
God doesn't say He hates the evil men do in that verse, but the doer himself!