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Posted on 03/10/2004 9:37:27 PM PST by malakhi
| Statesmen may plan and speculate for liberty, but it is religion and morality alone which can establish the principles upon which freedom can securely stand. The only foundation of a free constitution is pure virtue. - John Adams |
Rejoice, heavenly powers! Sing, choirs of angels!
Exult, all creation around God's throne!
Jesus Christ, our King, is risen!
Sound the trumpet of salvation!
Rejoice, O earth, in shining splendor,
radiant in brightness of your King!
Christ has conquered! Glory fills you!
Darkness vanishes for ever!
Rejoice, O Mother Church! Exult in glory!
The risen Saviour shines upon you!
Let this place resound with joy,
echoing the mighty song of all God's people!
My dearest friends, standing with me in this holy light,
join me in asking God for mercy,
that he may give his unworthy minister
grace to sing his Easter praises.
It is truly right
that with full hearts and minds and voices
we should praise the unseen God, the all-powerful Father,
and his only Son, our Lord Jesus Christ.
For Christ has ransomed us with his blood,
and paid for us the price of Adam's sin
to our eternal Father!
This is our passover feast,
when Christ, the true Lamb, is slain,
whose blood consecrates the homes of all believers.
This is the night when first you saved our fathers:
you freed the people of Israel from their slavery
and led them dry-shod through the sea.
This is the night when the pillar of fire
destroyed the darkness of sin.
This is the night when Christians everywhere,
washed clean of sin
and freed from all defilement,
are restored to grace and grow together in holiness.
This is the night when Jesus Christ
broke the chains of death
and rose triumphant from the grave.
What good would life have been to us,
had Christ not come as our Redeemer?
Father, how wonderful your care for us!
How boundless your merciful love!
To ransom a slave
you gave away your Son.
O Happy fault, O necessary sin of Adam,
which gained for us so great a Redeemer!
Most blessed of all nights, chosen by God
to see Christ rising from the dead!
Of this night scripture says:
"The night will be as clear as day:
it will become my light, my joy."
The power of this holy night
dispels all evil, washes guilt away,
restores lost innocence, brings mourners joy;
it casts out hatred, brings us peace, and humbles earthly pride.
Night truly blessed when heaven is wedded to earth
and man is reconciled with God!
Therefore, heavenly Father, in the joy of this night,
receive our evening sacrifice of praise,
your Church's solemn offering.
Accept this Easter candle,
a flame divided but undimmed,
a pillar of fire that glows to the honor of God.
Let it mingle with the lights of heaven
and continue bravely burning
to dispel the darkness of this night!
May the Morning Star which never sets find this flame still burning:
Christ, that Morning Star, who came back from the dead,
and shed his peaceful light on all mankind,
your Son who lives and reigns for ever and ever.
Amen.
When you were finally woken up to your condition and confronted with what Jesus did for you, did you want to refuse?
The problem here is that you can't tell the difference between a resistable drawing by God and an irresistable drawing by God.
It's clear from the scriptures that men can resist God, ... but that same men don't always (or often) resist God (Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Jacob, etc.).
However, even those men who don't always resist God ... resist Him at times. David is a prime example of such a man.
One could posit that, if you respond to God drawing, ... that, for you, His drawing was irresistable, ... for you certainly didn't successfully resist it.
However, the question is ... would that same drawing by God have been irresistable to someone else.
There were two twin brothers who grew up in the church I grew up in.
One of these twin brothers came to Christ at an early age (say 10 years old), while the other had still not accepted Christ at least 10 years later. (I don't know what his current salvation status is).
I should also mention that these two brothers experienced tragedy in their early lives (age 6 or younger) where their father killed their mother and then, killed himself. (They were, ultimately raised by a loving older sister and her husband).
I relate the prior just for thought material regarding this subject.
I happen to think that the issue is complex, given what we, legitimately, are presented with in the scripture.
Therefore, I am hesitant to be doctrinaire on the subject.
I'll have to find the verse a little later but the New Testament talks about those who come to Christ were dragged there by the Father.
I think that you are thinking of where the scripture that " ... everyone which comes to Christ is drawn by the Father ... ".
That would be John 6:44.
Consider, ... along with that, how God speaks of " ... drawing Israel with bonds of love ... " and how Israel resisted that drawing.
How about them Bruins?
I knew it was in John 6. :-)
My favorite Communion hymn relates this as the Father "beckoning."
SD
God told Noah what to build, and how to build it. He also told Noah when to get in and when to get out. God did not leave any decisions to Noah.
If you look at it that way ... then, God does the very same thing with us (and all of our unsaved co-dwellers).
He commands us to "Come, ... Believe, ... etc."
... and some of us obey, ... and some of us don't.
They showed us Nashville and Detriot, then Dallas/Colorado.
I'm just happy you guys aren't whining about Cam Neely anymore. ;-)
If I take off my glasses, I just see black and gold and can be happy. And why in the heck is everybody wearing white uniforms on the road this year? I don't like it.
SD
I don't have much time, so I'll quickly respond to this part first and get back to you with your other questions.
Calvinists accept both concepts of "God's sovereign and complete control of His creation" and human "free will" within the constraints that are naturally a part of human existence, i.e. man cannot become invisible; jump off a building and fly away; work his own salvation, etc.
However, a Calvinist does not see these two concepts as equal. Rather, the very acknowledgment of the vastness of God's being necessitates that the concept of God's sovereignty trump everything man knows about existence. It is the motivating reality of all time and space. Accurate words to describe God's complete orchestration of His creation cannot be found in human vocabulary.
"And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you." -- Exodus 3:14.
This is the realization that motivated the Reformation and compelled Augustine, Calvin, Luther, Knox to restate the obvious -- "Salvation is of the Lord" and God's plan of creation was put into place from before the foundation of the world. He has always known the End from the Beginning.
If God is truly omniscient, then reality as God has structured it is not as man understands it in his daily life. The feelings of our unfettered abilities are part of our fallen, human natures.
We struggle to reconcile our grasp of God's sovereignty with our "feelings" of freedom.
And we generally miss the comfort that comes with this understanding.
I never said they were equal, just that it is not knowable by us how they work together. You try to present as cut-and-dried what is in essence a mystery.
The feelings of our unfettered abilities are part of our fallen, human natures.
We are free. It is not an illusion, it is not a consequence of our fallen nature. It is a gift from God. On this we will simply never agree.
what does it benefit you to know that all is orchestrated by God? Apart from your assurance of salvation. To what aim is this insistence?
When you roll out of bed in the morning, do you strive to try to serve God's will by doing good or do you realize that your philosophy makes this a ridiculous notion? Whatever you do, whether it be kiss the wife or kill the children, is exactly what God decided that you should do. I see where this is a comforting thought, but it is an insult to the gift of awareness that God has given us.
We struggle to reconcile our grasp of God's sovereignty with our "feelings" of freedom.
What does that mean? And how can you do it? I would say we struggle to have our will be God's, to do what God wants of us with our lives. It's not an intellectual exercise of trying to reconcile the "apparent" reality of your freedom with God's iron-clad control over your actions.
SD
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