Posted on 06/21/2012 8:24:00 AM PDT by fishtank
“It’s not at odds.
The baby would be born to Mary whatever she said/did. This was not up to her.
One cannot choose or un-choose God’s will.
The irresistable grace worked on her will.”
~ ~ ~
Reject Calvinism, it’s not true. Calvin uses “his” new
term “irresistable” grace to cover his rejection of free will.
I wish I could convince you. We are not robots. You can’t force someone to love you, that’s not true love. God desires our true love.
Eve was without sin like Mary until she freely chose to sin. Mary was/is without sin. Why would God give Eve a choice -free will- and not Mary? Mary decides once she ponders and asks the archangel, how could this happen? Mary then gives her fiat.
Luke 1:38
And Mary said: Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to thy word. And the angel departed from her.
Now, that's just silly.
God wouldn't have waited until someone chose to accept his Son into her womb.
He knew who He would choose well before Mary had an inkling of what was going on. The angel told her what God was going to do and she believed the miracle would occur.
That's not "rape".
Then you should start talking to Calvinists. Even though we know that God has determined who will be in heaven, we do not know the means by which He chooses to do it, therefore, we MUST be dilegent in telling others about Jesus. It is what we are called to do. To not do so would be sinful.
Many a man, for example, has wooed a woman into loving him.
Not forced, but wooed.
Large difference.
Mary believed.
Was it a choice for her to believe or did God first do the convincing by sending her an Angel?
The sun is shining today. I believe the rain is not falling not because I chose to believe it but because the sun convinced me this was so.
Mary was not presented with a choice in whether or not Jesus would be born through her. This was up to God and through the Angel He told her what was about to take place.
“Many a man, for example, has wooed a woman into loving him.
Not forced, but wooed.”
~ ~ ~
Calvin’s “irresistable” grace is amount to wooing? And, only a select are wooed?
Those two words do not mean the same.
One heresy will mess up other areas of belief. I’ll show you how it goes back to the robot business. I am speaking about Martin Luther’s “faith alone.”
We are not robots, it is always our choice, our cooperation
with God’s grace to do a good or not to do one. I marked
the CAPs in the quote. Yes, we choose Heaven or Hell.
_ _ _
“Some Protestants insist that it is the faith that does the work in us not we ourselves.
Faith (God’s gift to man through His Word / Eph 2:8; Rom 10: 17) is a necessary motivation for us to obey but it DOES NOT make us obey. Man has a choice to resist or yield, therefore the obedience is our responsibility. It is our obedience in response to faith that brings justification (and Eternal Life). Justification then brings “perfect” or “complete” faith, the proof we have that Eternal Life (See John 3:36!). Further, Eternal Life is something we possess in degrees and that corresponds to how close we have grown to Christ. It is Eternal Life we are given NOT a promise of the eternal possession of that life. That Life, however, is so powerful that nothing in all the universe, but one’s own SELF WILL and SIN, can remove us from Christ’s hand (Romans 8:35-39).
It doesn't mean the 2nd party is a "robot" as you put it.
It means the 1st party knows how to convince and create belief in the other.
And if she had said 'no'? No choice?
Is the parallel here with 'irresistible grace'? Some can only say yes, some can only say no?
Those who can only say no, doomed to eternal hell. As determined before they/we are born.
Again, if one cannot choose otherwise, there is no choice in reality. And what we 'choose' becomes meaningless.
“It doesn’t mean the 2nd party is a “robot” as you put it.
It means the 1st party knows how to convince and create belief in the other.”
~ ~ ~
Hi, thanks for your kind reply.
Show me how Calvinism is not amount to being a robot? God
has already chosen who is in and who isn’t.
Love isn’t love unless it is true. Why would anyone wish
to reject the gift of free will?
And that’s another thing, when did this man come up with his teaching? That should stop you. Run from Calvinism, it’s not of Christ. Calvinism was never passed on from the Apostles.
Do you think Moses had a choice? God told him that He had selected Moses and over-ruled Moses' objections.
Jeremiah was not given a choice. Despite his objections, God had selected him and that was how the plan unfolded.
The baby was going to be born from Mary's womb. That was God's plan.
Mary believed and submitted to the plan as Moses and Jeremiah also had done.
Faith comes because God creates it. Sometimes He has to work to convince. Others don't need a whole lot of convincing. That God brings faith doesn't mean we're robots. It means we in ourselves are set against His will (robotic if you will in purusing a sinful path) and it is He who moves to convince us otherwise.
Faith comes because God creates it.
Hmm. Ok. Does God choose to give this faith to some and withhold it from others - before we/they are born?
Sometimes He has to work to convince.
Hard, easy, that's just a dance isn't it? The outcome is the same either way, yes?
The idea of "convince" becomes moot here. They get the faith and the grace, it's all irresistable - no matter what, yes?
That God brings faith doesn't mean we're robots.
That we have no choice or our choices do not matter, or our choices are all predetermined before we're born - that makes us robots.
Robots are not the cursed decendants of an original robot who was once free, but freely choose to enter the curse for himself and all his progeny.
I used to be Arminian. The robot argument was my favorite rejoinder to Calvinists I knew. But one day I realized it was not an argument from divine wisdom, but from fleshly wisdom. So of course it makes sense to the mind of fallen man. But it doesn’t account for Scripture. What God reveals surely trumps any human analogy I can concoct. I should expect God to know more than I do about how he works. If I don’t like it, well, too bad so sad. So I gave up my “winning analogies” and went back to my Bible. And from that time to this, I have believed the doctrines of grace, as they are sometimes called, with no regrets.
I'm not trying to be silly or obtuse. I am trying to discuss the implications of predestination as opposed to foreknowledge. Mary was not a victim or a divine broodmare. She was preserved sinless because God knew she would cooperate perfectly with Grace.
Peace be to you.
You won't find that he has much choice in the matter.
Our choices are for sin. We in ourselves are against God. So they matter, yes.
But due to God's grace which was in operation even before the foundation of the earth (Eph 1:8) we are steered to a different path.
I would like to know your theological or denominational context because it is amazing that two people can read the same scripture and come to such completely different fundamental interpretations. I am a Latin Rite Catholic. For me Faith is the response to God's universal call to Salvation and is therefore an act of the will. It does not spring from premise, reason, or intuition, nor is it imposed by God. Faith is the belief in things not seen, not known and often not knowable.
Peace be with you.
Even if she had said "no" and God put His plan in place despite her defiance she would not have been either a victim or "broodmare" as you put it.
You can't be a victim of God. And she would not have been a broodmare (no sex act involved) but a receptacle of Salvation to mankind.
Do you not understand omniscience? God leaves nothing nothing to chance. He knew before the beginning of time that Mary would cooperate fully and unconditionally. That is why He preserved her sinless.
Peace be with you.
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