Replies

“People go to hell for only one reason — rejecting God’s free gift of salvation in His Son Jesus Christ. “

Why do you continue to tell me this as if I disagree with it? Didn’t I complain previously that you were wasting your time in telling me such things? This is two huge posts now where you waste your time telling me over and over again how people believe, or they don’t believe, or that some work, and that some don’t. It is simply your misconception that supposes that because God chooses not to elect one person over another, that the person passed by is no longer responsible for their personal rejection of Christ. This was, in fact, the same objection that Paul himself anticipated when he wrote:

Rom 9:19-21 Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? (20) Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? (21) Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?

When I pointed out to you that this was Paul quoting an objection, and not himself speaking, you reply:

“Or... “o anthrope, menounge su tis ei o antapokrinomenos to theo”, or so I read. The subsequent statement is in contradiction to the first. Paul is not saying, “yes, but...”, he is rather saying, “no, not at all”.

This doesn’t answer anything at all! What does it even mean? Are you saying that you have a different translation than the KJV to offer that is superior and supports your view? that somehow Paul is affirming that people resist God’s will, that he was not quoting the very same objection to the doctrines of grace you yourself have made?

What does it mean to say “You will say to me, why does he yet find fault? for who has resisted his will?” Do you have an answer for that that doesn’t involve taking a single phrase out of context? Can you explain how it fits in with anything you have said? Unless your reading of the preceding passages leads you to object “why doth he yet find fault?”, then it’s false, no matter how long you beat around the bush.

It is also your misconception that supposes that because God ordains some to eternal life, that those ordained do not necessarily believe.”

Act_13:48 And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified the word of the Lord: and as many as were ordained to eternal life believed.

I simply read the scripture in its proper order. Those who are ordained, believe. Those who are quickened, are made to seek. I do not believe that no one believes in anything. I simply argue that the origin of the belief is in the “ordaining” or “appointing” of God, given to them before the world began. So what do I care if you quote a phrase that has someone seeking or believing, when I never denied that the elect seek and believe as a result of the working of God? How many times do I have to repeat this for you until you believe me and stop arguing with ghosts?

“Jacob and Esau, as we saw earlier, illustrate how that we must accept our lot in life because God will use us to accomplish whatever purpose He has designed us to fulfill. If we resist, He accomplishes His will through our destruction.”

This simply has no relation at all to the actual words of Romans 9. You say “as we saw earlier.” What I saw earlier was nothing more than unbiblical speculation without any specific address of the scripture.

Paul in this section is not talking about a moral illustration about free-will and how God regards our decisions to follow Him. Instead, Paul teaches that it is God’s decision made before “the children being... born, neither having done any good or evil,” so that “the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of Him that calleth” (Rom 9:11). This is why the reply to these passages from Paul’s hypothetical adversary is ‘Why doth he yet find fault?”, since they were elected by God to their fates before either had committed any faults to begin with! Therefore Paul’s adversary objects, “why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?”, because no one can resist the decree of God, so how can God blame them?

And instead of answering with some complicated nonsense explaining how it’s only a misconception based on perspective, like what you suggested, He replies with a rebuke for daring to talk back to God in the first place:

Rom 9:20 Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?

And instead of going into a man-exalting discussion of personal liberty, he declares God’s absolute sovereignty to “have mercy on whom [He] will have mercy, and... have compassion on whom [He] will have compassion” (Rom 9:15).

And instead of telling us how it is necessary for man to make that first step to believe in Christ, Paul tells you that it is NOT of Him who wills, nor of him who “runs,” but of God who has mercy:

Rom 9:16 So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.

Your nonsense about this being an illustration in favor of personal liberty simply cannot survive a line by line analysis of this text.

“The object lesson in the garden of Eden”

This is why your entire argument is false. It’s based on this absurd false premise. In the garden of Eden, man did not fall until he ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. After the fall, certain terrible changes occurred in mankind:

First, they are now spiritually dead.

Gen 2:16-17 And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

Because of this death, unless they are quickened, they cannot enter the Kingdom of God:

Joh 3:5-7 Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again.

Eph 2:1-3 And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins; Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience: Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.

Col 2:13 And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses;

And it is for this cause that it is necessary for the Holy Spirit to reveal that Jesus is the Christ:

1Co_12:3 ... no man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost.

Because, even in the presence of miraculous signs and wonders, it is impossible for the human mind to conceive of these things himself:

Mat 16:17 And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.

Your argument is essentially that we have the same freedom that we had before we were dead in sin. But the truth is that we are a utterly depraved and dead race due to the sin of Adam:

Job 15:14-16 What is man, that he should be clean? and he which is born of a woman, that he should be righteous? Behold, he putteth no trust in his saints; yea, the heavens are not clean in his sight. How much more abominable and filthy is man, which drinketh iniquity like water?

Psa 130:3 If thou, LORD, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand?

Psa 143:2 And enter not into judgment with thy servant: for in thy sight shall no man living be justified.

Pro 20:9 Who can say, I have made my heart clean, I am pure from my sin?

Ecc 7:20 For there is not a just man upon earth, that doeth good, and sinneth not.

Isa 64:6 But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.

Jer 13:23 Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard its spots? Then may you also do good who are accustomed to do evil.

Joh 3:19 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.

Now to Romans 3:

Rom 3:9-12 What then? are we better than they? No, in no wise: for we have before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin; As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one.

In objection to this above passage, you wrote that Paul was not speaking permanently. That no man “seeks” God, until they eventually do (so why did Paul even bother to say it in his indictment of ALL mankind?). So then it follows that all men sin, until they choose to stop sinning. All men are wicked, until they choose to be righteous. Or, that all men are wicked, until they become righteous. But the scriptural response is, it is God who works in us both to will and to do, contrary to our nature, and therefore our righteousness is not our own, but God’s:

Php_2:13 For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.

Isa_26:12 LORD, thou wilt ordain peace for us: for thou also hast wrought all our works in us.

And in this way there is no contradiction to the passage with other scriptures, and the passage again has a rational purpose in its demonstration of man’s total depravity without God, which your reading steals from it.

“But again, Christ is using a figure of speech for emphasis. We are not saved because we a smart enough, wise enough, clever enough, righteous enough, or some other enough to CHOOSE. We are saved because He chose to save us. He did not have to. He chose to”

What is the figure of speech? You haven’t actually bothered to explain it. You just say it’s a “figure of speech” because you can’t explain it. You then assert, without addressing the actual words of the scripture, that it is about God’s general decision to die for our sins. But the words of the scripture show it is a personal decision on Christ’s part on behalf of the individual saint, to ordain them to faith and good works (fruit).

“Ye have not chosen me,” Christ declares. You, personally, have not chosen Jesus Christ. He corrects them from falsely believing that they came to Him of their own accord, that they believed through their own “flesh and blood.” This is the same point Christ makes when He responds to Peter’s confession in Matt 16:17. “Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.”

Christ goes on, “but I have chosen you.” He emphasizes the fact that they did not really choose Him. It was Christ who chose them, which directly led to their following. Because “the sheep hear my voice, and follow me.”

“And ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain.” How can anything man do remain? Our total depravity makes it impossible for us to to any good work that can remain eternally:

Isa 64:6 But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.

Therefore, if our work is to remain, it is necessary that the work comes from God, and not of ourselves. It is “ordained... that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, He may give it to you” (John 15:16). We are reconciled to God, by God’s own sovereign choice, so that we should Be His people, and He our God.

“They could not believe at that time and onward. This is the result of their hardening their hearts to the truth.”

As is usual, you wrest the scripture, giving only one sentence in reply to a passage that is fatal to your long-winded post, and then going off on with endless paragraphs about things I have neither argued for or against in a vain attempt to escape it.

This is not a case of someone receiving it from the Father, and then rejecting it, and therefore they become hardened. They simply weren’t given it at all:

“But there are some of you that believe not,” says Christ, “Therefore,” as a result, because of, an explanation for their unbelief, “said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.” Unless God gives it to Him, He cannot believe. He does not say “my Father gave it to them and they resisted it.” He says that it was never given to them at all, and that is the reason they do not believe.

It is because of these scriptures that your endless paragraphs, your random arguments against things that I never said in the first place, simply cannot stand.

“Who does the Holy Spirit convict of sin? Just the elect? No. The world is convicted. This is a spiritual revelation to the natural realm.”

Joh 16:8-10 And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: (9) Of sin, because they believe not on me; (10) Of righteousness, because I go to my Father, and ye see me no more;

Your arguments here, as usual, don’t actually even touch upon the doctrines of grace. It says nothing about election. It says “of sin, because they believe not on me.” This is their great sin, their unbelief in Jesus Christ despite His many works and wonders, the Prophets, and His righteousness. Light has come “into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.” But it does not follow that because they are in condemnation for their own sins, that suddenly the elect elect themselves, rather than by the will of God:

Joh 1:13 Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

“We do not read of hell being prepared for the Devil, his angels, AND the non-elect humans.”

Rom 9:21-22 Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour? What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction:

Jud_1:4 For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.

1Pe 2:7-8 Unto you therefore which believe he is precious: but unto them which be disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner, (8) And a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to them which stumble at the word, being disobedient: whereunto also they were appointed.

“He doesn’t create them to be destroyed.”

Rom 9:17 For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth.

Rom 9:20-21 Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?

“It is a result of uncooperative clay. “

Completely ridiculous! Why would Paul use the metaphor of the clay to begin with? The purpose of likening us to clay is to demonstrate the power and sovereign right of the potter to “form” us for whatever purpose He desires. Either, in the case of the damned, to make them vessels “fitted for destruction.” Or in the case of the elect, to make them “vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory.” The “afore prepared,” really, is the only real difference between the elect and those who are not elect. The elect are chosen before the world began; the damned are merely fitted for destruction, “prepared” for it, as they need no particular work on God’s part to make them sinners. They are, by nature, the enemies of God, by their own sinful choices.

“If you go back and read what I said carefully,”

Suppose I read everything you wrote very carefully, and took the time to write up a reply to every little thing you wrote, what would be the purpose? It is only because you misunderstand my argument that your posts are so long.