Why I am No Longer a Dispensationalist

Credo House ^ | May 21, 2015 | C. Michael Patton

[MHGinTN]

In your own words, ‘so that they may turn to Him and be saved.’ Why write it thus when you are insisting that they have no choice?

[xzins]

Their response to Him has nothing to do with His genuine concern for them. Genuine.

[HarleyD]

We agree that God is concerned for His people. What you don’t seem to want to acknowledge is that people are not concerned about knowing God.

[xzins]

That doesn’t matter. God was concerned about them before they responded to Him in Ninevah.

“While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”

God’s concern is either real or it is feigned.

[HarleyD]

Do you not yet see the contradiction in your reasoning? If the saved have no choice, being forced to love God and thus no choice in open the door to The Lord, again “Why does Jesus stand at the door and knock?”

Because God doesn't interfer with our will. We have to acknowledge Christ, repent of our sins, and ask Christ to come into our lives. That isn't an issue. The real issue is whether God opens up the eyes and ears of everyone to know enough to open that door. As pointed out in the verses in my last point to you, He does not.

Please think about this for a moment. Do you think you were more clever than someone else in asking Christ into your life? You don't have to answer that question because I already know you don't. There is not a believer here on this site or elsewhere that wouldn't give God the credit for their salvation.

And, let me ask you this; if God COULD force you to love Him, would you want Him to do so?

We do agree that we're in the end times. I believe the evidence is all around. Beyond that I'm not sure how it will all happen. Eschatology is not my thing.

[MHGinTN]

Gd chose Israel to be a witness to all the nations. He gave them the choice to do the job or it would be given to another. We Gentiles are now doing it. Did the Israelites choose to feel smug and chosen toward the nations around them? Yes. Was that what God expected of them? No. Were they choosing to do or not to do or was God pretending that they had a choice when he didn't expect them to do what he told them to do as His elect?

The entire of our disagreement hangs upon the reality of Love, can it be forced or not. I am convinced that God so Loved that He gave His only begotten Son, that WHOMSOEVER may choose the salvation by substitution that The Grace of God in Christ offers. If there is no choice then the Grace is not Grace and the Gift of eternal Life is not a gift it is the game played as the inventor of the game arranged it ONLY. Perhaps we shall have an opportunity to discuss this further after we meet int he clouds. Pax vobiscum

[HarleyD]

We must have a "failure to communicate". I believe the way people respond to God DOES matter. Our thought process is such that we feel people are basically good. This is post-Renaissance thinking. Man is really evil. This is pre-Renaissance thinking.

God constantly pours His riches out on us day after day after day. The truth people don't care. Rom 1:21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.

As Dr. E used to say, "If God wanted everyone saved, they would be saved." Do you think it is loving of God to send people to hell? From my perspective, there are many that would rather reign in hell then serve in heaven. As such, as difficult as it is to fathom, there is not one person who will be misplace or regret where they end up. This is the wisdom, love, grace, and justice of God.

[MHGinTN]

When Paul wrote 'faithful is He that calleth you, he answered this question to my understanding ... God seeks us out but we have the sovereign right to reject and it is that which sends men to Hell, not their sins. That they choose to reject God's Grace is what sends them to Hell. The result of their rejection is what is predestined, not their sins but the result of not believing God and God's Promises in Christ Jesus. BUT if they have no choice to make it is neither their sins nor their rejection of the Promises but the game being run according to prearranged outcome. As Xzins has so skillfully illustrated, God cares, not because He likes His game but because we actually have the sovereign ability to suffer for not believing God's Promises, not accepting His love as offered on the Cross.

We have much to agree on, but the perspective is not aligned between us. Genuine love is very different from feigned affection. God's forfeits none of His Sovereignty over His creation when He makes the gift of sovereignty for each individual. Loving adds to the lover as it can add to the loved. But love not accepted or returned adds nothing to the loved nor does it diminish the lover. Love is that mysterious thing which adds to the one loving even if the love is no accepted. But if accepted and returned, it builds up both without subtracting from something else.

[xzins]

Justice sends them to hell. I’m fine with that. However, there is a difference between a death penalty for someone you actually cared about and a death penalty for someone you designed never to have a chance.

For the first, you make an actual provision for them to turn.

For the second, you don’t.

[Seven_0]

i>All our pitiful little analogies break under scrutiny.

There are two sides here and they seem to by mutually exclusive. I see lots of scripture that says God does it all but in my experience, I make choices all the time. Analogies are different than the original or they wouldn't be analogies and while man's analogies may break down under scrutiny, God's analogies blossom as you look closer.

MHGinTN's tagline reminds me of one analogy that may fit here. We say that distance = velocity x time and we say that the speed of light is constant. The contradiction may not be apparent but Einstein spent a lot of time trying to explain it. He called it the theory of relativity and if true it means that distance and time are subject to the absolute properties of light. We would describe events differently depending on our perspective and our relative speed.

The reason this analogy is significant is because God is light and the reason it works well is because God designed it to work well. How many times in the book of Revelation does John use the past tense to describe something that has not yet happened? From God's perspective things may already be finished from the beginning. I saw a new heaven and a new earth for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away. Isn't it possible that God created the past, present and the future all at once?

Yet we are forced to make choices all the time. Shall we accuse God of making them for us because he knows what decisions we will make? I don't like the analogy of a puzzle, but for me there are still some pieces missing.

[HarleyD]

However, there is a difference between a death penalty for someone you actually cared about and a death penalty for someone you designed never to have a chance.

Ah....here is the issue. God did not designed us "never to have a chance". God designed us to have fellowship with Him. However, we WILLFULLY do not want to have fellowship with God. Notice what it states in Romans:

Rom 1:21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him...

We know God. We make a choice. We do not want to honor Him or give thanks to Him. That is our choice. We have a chance; we just choose to reject that chance. Just like Adam in the garden.

But God wants to have fellowship with us despite our wickedness. He wants to make us holy. It is God who has to do something about our wickedness. Please note Ephesians 2:

Eph 2:1-5 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—

We're no different than those fellows in Romans. But God, for some unknown reason, saved us from our willful and wicked behavior. This is what grace is all about.

The real question isn't why doesn't give everyone a "chance" to go to heaven. He does. But people, knowing God, reject wanting to go to heaven.

The real question that should be asked is why does God impose His grace to changes the hearts of some want to seek after Him? Why does God save a remnant? That is where the mystery lies.

[HarleyD]

Because God doesn't interfer with our will.

God interfers with our will all the time. He certainly did with Paul on the Damascus Road. He did when He flooded the world during the time of Noah. He did in Egypt. There is a whole Bible full of examples of God "interferring" in our lives. God isn't a "hands-off" God. He is very involved in our lives.

[HarleyD]

There are two sides here and they seem to by mutually exclusive.

They are mutually exclusive. There is monergism which believes God does the work. This is usually identified by Reformers and was the view of the early church. And there is synergism which believes that it takes man's cooperation to some degree. This is probably 90% of what the churches believe to day to varying degrees. Synergism is wrong.

[MHGinTN]

Jesus speaking ... Matthew 23:37 O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!

There is no reasonable way to read that except Jesus saying those who had a choice over and over again would not choose God's way. Not because they had no choice but to defy God but because they chose contrary to what God wanted for them.

[HarleyD]

Jesus saying those who had a choice over and over again would not choose God's way

Absolutely agree.

Not because they had no choice but to defy God but because they chose contrary to what God wanted for them.

Absolutely agree.

That is precisely what I've been saying.