Free Republic
Browse · Search
Religion
Topics · Post Article

To: cornelis; HarleyD; Forest Keeper; Frumanchu; Gamecock; Alex Murphy; AlbionGirl
It's a social thing.

Respectfully, it's not. It's a federal thing. What the Father determines, happens.

It's also a judicial thing. What has been found guilty of the crime has then been acquitted by Christ taking on the punishment due the sinner.

"(God) hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began" -- 2 Timothy 1:9

I think the foundation of this misunderstanding comes from the temporal world whispering in our ears that Trinitarian Christians are no different than the rest of the fallen world. But Trinitarian Christians have never been part of the world, not in the same sense as the condemned because they were redeemed before the foundation of the world by the "Lamb slain before the world began." And this distinction is born out of God's creative will, and not out of men's ability to discern "correctly."

I'm really fascinated lately by the way Zanchius articulated the distinctions, especially here, in his excellent REPROBATION

"Our Lord (in John 17) divides the whole human race into two great classes -- one He calls the world; the other, "the men who were given Him out of the world." The latter, it is said, the Father loved, even as He loved Christ Himself (ver. 23), but He loved Christ "before the foundation of the world" (ver. 24), i.e., from everlasting; therefore He loved the elect so too, and if He loved these from eternity, it follows, by all the rules of antithesis, that He rejected the others as early. So, "The children being not yet born, neither having done good or evil, that the purpose of God," etc. (Rom. 9). From the example of the two twins, Jacob and Esau, the apostle infers the eternal election of some men and the eternal rejection of all the rest..."

Now some think this impedes evangelism, and they would be wrong. We are to preach the Gospel to every ear on the planet. And those to whom God has given ears to hear and a new heart will hear and understand and believe, all by God's will and the work of the Holy Spirit alone.

Soli Deo Gloria.

772 posted on 11/29/2006 10:42:26 AM PST by Dr. Eckleburg ("I don't think they want my respect; I think they want my submission." - Flemming Rose)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 770 | View Replies ]


To: Dr. Eckleburg
It's a federal thing.

I disagree. Not all of God's actions are forceful. Love is a dance.

773 posted on 11/29/2006 10:48:11 AM PST by cornelis
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 772 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
Religion
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson