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To: Dr. Eckleburg
ok, simple question: when you sin, is it YOUR choice to sin? Do you decide to sin? Are you responsible for that sin?
1,302 posted on 01/13/2006 1:00:49 AM PST by Cronos (Never forget 9/11. Restore Hagia Sophia!)
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To: Cronos
ok, simple question: when you sin, is it YOUR choice to sin? Do you decide to sin? Are you responsible for that sin?

Yes, it is my choice to sin, my decision to sin, my responsibility that I sin. I own every sin I commit and I deserve God's wrath for each one.

And every sin, like everything else in existence, was ordained from before the foundation of the world by God for His glory.

Does this puzzle you?

It puzzled Nicodemus, too. But Christ rebuked him, saying "Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit." (John 3:7-8)

I find it far more puzzling to believe God created all life and then sat back to merely watch it unfold. God's omniscience is not defined like that. God's sovereign knowledge of His creation includes every jot and tittle of existence. And if it exists in the mind of God as reality, then it is reality, will become reality, cannot become anything but this reality.

Further, to say God's foreknowledge is non-determinate is absurd. God knew Judas would betray Christ, yet He made Him anyway. Did Judas have a "choice" not to betray Christ?

Paul tells us because of Adam's fall, all men sin. In fact, they have no choice BUT to sin.

"Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:

(For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law.

Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come.

But not as the offence, so also is the free gift. For if through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many.

And not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift: for the judgment was by one to condemnation, but the free gift is of many offences unto justification.

For if by one man's offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ.)

Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life.

For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous." -- Romans 5:12-19

The question you're really asking is why did God make us in the first place if we're all simply living out the lives He's written for us.

Paul answers that in Romans. Our responsibility is not to ask "why" other than to know everything occurs for His glory.

"Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.

Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?

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?

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:

And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory,

Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?" -- Romans 9:18-24

All men sin and deserve God's wrath. The miracle is that God decided from before the foundation of the world to save some wretched sinners and bring them to His side by paying the terrible price of Christ's death and resurrection.

After answering questions like yours for several years now on this forum I realize that to think anything less than this is to challenge the very nature of God as He has revealed Himself in Scripture. The God of Moses and Jacob and Isaiah and Job and David and Solomon and John and Paul and Luke and Calvin and Luther and Wesley and Pope Benedict and you and me is not passive, unaware, uncertain, variable, imprecise, nonspecific, inattentive, indecisive or glib. He is the rock of our existence; the marrow in our bones; the blood in our veins.

Scripture tells us if we have Trinitarian faith in Jesus Christ we will see heaven. That faith is the evidence of our regeneration by God who has re-birthed our stone hearts and lifted us from death to eternal life. That faith is the evidence of God's gracious choosing, a choice He made from before the foundation of the world, for His glory.

The story of God's creation was finished the moment He decreed it from before the foundation of the world. Within its pages are to be found all sins, all victories, all pain, all joy, all foolish wisdom, all righteousness, and most especially, Jesus Christ's perfect redemption of His flock.

As written. No blue pages allowed. No co-authors permitted. Only God's will; His name above the title.

Rejoice, Cronos, Christ has risen. God abides. Life is unfolding exactly as He wills, for His glory and the joy of those who love Him.

1,344 posted on 01/13/2006 11:36:02 AM PST by Dr. Eckleburg (an ambassador in bonds)
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