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To: armydoc; Iscool
Read my response again. I am fascinated that YOU would be repulsed by God's total sovereignty.

God gave dominion of the earth top man.

It hasn't been rescinded as of yet.

If God is totally sovereign, then HE is responsible for every act of evil and sin in the world and we are all no more than puppets on a string some programmed to *love* God and others programmed to *reject* God.

45 posted on 04/12/2018 12:22:16 PM PDT by metmom ( ...fixing our eyes on Jesus, the Author and Perfecter of our faith..)
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To: metmom
God gave dominion of the earth top man. It hasn't been rescinded as of yet.

I'm not sure how that is relevant to the discussion. Man's dominion on the earth is stewardship delegated by God; He still has ultimate sovereignty. Man's dominion has nothing to do with salvation

If God is totally sovereign, then HE is responsible for every act of evil and sin in the world

Everything that happens, good or evil, is ordained by God. God allows evil for His purposes, but He is never the author of evil. Evil is always carried out by secondary means. Read Job. God allows evil to befall Job, specifically allowing Satan to carry it out. As far as responsibility for evil and sin, man still is responsible for his sin. How can man still be responsible for his sin if the sinful act was ultimately ordained by God, you may ask? You would be asking the same hypothetical question that Paul presents in Romans 9:19:

You will say to me then, “Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?” 20 But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, “Why have you made me like this?” 21 Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use? 22 What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, 23 in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory— 24 even us whom he has called, not from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles?

Notice that the question regarding the apparent conflict God's sovereignty and man's responsibility is never answered. It is a mystery that just needs to be accepted. As Charles Spurgeon put it:

“That God predestines, and yet that man is responsible, are two facts that few can see clearly. They are believed to be inconsistent and contradictory, but they are not. The fault is in our weak judgment. Two truths cannot be contradictory to each other. If, then, I find taught in one part of the Bible that everything is fore-ordained, that is true; and I find that in another Scripture, that man is responsible for all his actions, that is true; and it is only my folly that leads me to imagine that these two truths can ever contradict each other. I do not believe they can ever be welded into one upon any earthly anvil, but they certainly shall be one in eternity. They are two lines that so nearly parallel, that the human mind which pursues them farthest will never discover that they converge, but they do converge, and they will meet somewhere in eternity, close to the throne of God, whence all truth doth spring.”

It takes a big view of God to believe in His total sovereignty. That is my view because it is scripture's view.

and we are all no more than puppets on a string some programmed to *love* God and others programmed to *reject* God

Again, God is not "programming" a morally neutral group of people. We are all "programmed" by the fall to be God-haters. A deficiency in the understanding of the doctrine of total depravity inevitably leads to this error.
46 posted on 04/16/2018 8:49:30 AM PDT by armydoc
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