Posted on 08/19/2003 4:45:54 AM PDT by fortheDeclaration
I agree completely, except that we also need help to take the gift:
Eph. 2:8-9 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.In the above, the faith is also a gift! Were it not, it would be a work in itself.
I'll take a short scriptural stab at your question in 14, even though it is a bit of a straw man. Please bear with the long quote; I prefer to post the entire context. Here goes:
Rom. 8:10-24And not only this, but there was Rebekah also, when she had conceived twins by one man, our father Isaac; for though the twins were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad, so that God's purpose according to His choice would stand, not because of works but because of Him who calls, it was said to her, "THE OLDER WILL SERVE THE YOUNGER." Just as it is written, "JACOB I LOVED, BUT ESAU I HATED." What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be!
For He says to Moses, "I WILL HAVE MERCY ON WHOM I HAVE MERCY, AND I WILL HAVE COMPASSION ON WHOM I HAVE COMPASSION."So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy.
For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, "FOR THIS VERY PURPOSE I RAISED YOU UP, TO DEMONSTRATE MY POWER IN YOU, AND THAT MY NAME MIGHT BE PROCLAIMED THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE EARTH." So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.
You will say to me then, "Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?"
On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, "Why did you make me like this," will it?
Or does not the potter have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for common use?What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction?
And He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory, even us, whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles.
Regardless of the "reasons" they are taking an active role, in their Salvation.
Yes, each person is individually judged by his works.
My question is, WHY does God bother to judge, if God does all the work, and the person has no choice in the matter, what are they being judged for? Don't you judge someone on what decsions they made and acted upon? Is God going to judge Himself?
The key issue, however, is whether the person is in the book of life, as it says in v. 15.
See reply #18
Christ is drawing all men to Himself, it is man who refuses to come to the free water and partake of it!(Jn.12:32)
Yes, but doesn't this kind of reasoning merely place God in the same linear, restricted timeline that you and I live in?
I would seem to me that God is completely outside of time, which would enable Him to write names into the Book of Life at the same "moment" if you will that He sees a person in 2003 A.D. give his or her life to Christ. Thus, the fact that the names are written in the Book of Life before the foundation of the world, in our timeline, has little or no bearing on when God actually wrote those names.
Implies neither understanding nor seeking, it implies simply doing.
Thanks, but the Scripture's you mention (Rom 3:19-20) in no way explain how you or anyone else could ever arrive at this conclusion:
Instead, it is God alone, working through means, who saves the person. In the case of the "sinner's prayer," the only way that a person can pray it in faith is if God has already converted that person through means such as preaching or the written Word.
And if you still believe that, you still have not answered my question.
My question is, WHY does God bother to judge, if God does all the work, and the person has no choice in the matter, what are they being judged for? Don't you judge someone on what decsions they made and acted upon? Is God going to judge Himself?
This is a true statement. I have no quarrel with that. Genesis 1:1 says that God did something in the beginning. In other words, when He created time, He was already there. There are a number of things that He did before "the beginning." Writing your name and mine in the Lamb's Book of Life was certainly one of them.
Amen!
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