Why do I like ketchup on my hamburger? Why? Why!
Why do I believe in political freedom? Why do I reject church-states?
We can talk about me, but lets look at scripture:
2And he was teaching them many things in parables, and in his teaching he said to them: 3”Listen! A sower went out to sow. 4And as he sowed, some seed fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured it. 5Other seed fell on rocky ground, where it did not have much soil, and immediately it sprang up, since it had no depth of soil. 6And when the sun rose, it was scorched, and since it had no root, it withered away. 7Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no grain. 8And other seeds fell into good soil and produced grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.” 9And he said, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”
...14 The sower sows the word. 15And these are the ones along the path, where the word is sown: when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them. 16And these are the ones sown on rocky ground: the ones who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy. 17And they have no root in themselves, but endure for a while; then, when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away. 18And others are the ones sown among thorns. They are those who hear the word, 19but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful. 20But those that were sown on the good soil are the ones who hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.” - Mark 4
Jesus does NOT say the word is only given to those destined by God to believe. He says the soil is different. Some hear, are ecstatic, but then fall away when persecution comes. Others pay more attention to the world - wealth and the praise of man.
We see that here:
“39 You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, 40yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life. 41 I do not receive glory from people. 42But I know that you do not have the love of God within you. 43I have come in my Father’s name, and you do not receive me. If another comes in his own name, you will receive him. 44How can you believe, when you receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the only God?” - John 5
In some cases, people believe because of something:
39Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me all that I ever did.” 40So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. 41And many more believed because of his word. 42They said to the woman, “It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Savior of the world.”
Now some say this is boastful of me, because I’m claiming my goodness is what saves me. But John Calvin himself called that argument sophistry (a subtle, tricky, superficially plausible, but generally fallacious method of reasoning):
“That you believe in him whom he hath sent. What is the import of the word believe, we have explained under the Third Chapter. It ought always to be remembered that, in order to have a full perception of the power of faith, we must understand what Christ is, in whom we believe, and why he was given to us by the Father. It is idle sophistry, under the pretext of this passage, to maintain that we are justified by works, if faith justifies, because it is likewise called a work First, it is plain enough that Christ does not speak with strict accuracy, when he calls faith a work, just as Paul makes a comparison between the law of faith and the law of works, (Romans 3:27.) Secondly, when we affirm that men are not justified by works, we mean works by the merit of which men may obtain favor with God. Now faith brings nothing to God, but, on the contrary, places man before God as empty and poor, that he may be filled with Christ and with his grace. It is, therefore, if we may be allowed the expression, a passive work, to which no reward can be paid, and it bestows on man no other righteousness than that which he receives from Christ.”
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/calvin/calcom34.xii.iv.html
A Calvinist is so wrapped up with a mechanical world that he cannot conceive of someone choosing to follow Jesus.
Why did I?
As a military brat in Iceland in the 7th grade, my best friend wanted to join the youth group at the Chapel for the incredibly spiritual reason that there were some great looking girls in it. He dragged me along. There I met kids who accepted me and loved me and who were honest in a way I had never even conceived of being. And when asked why they did what they did, they said it was because they didn’t like the way they had been living, and had asked Jesus to forgive them and change them. I knew that whatever it was they had, I wanted - so I asked Jesus to forgive me, and to change me, and to take over my life and do with it as he pleased. And God kept his promises...
Did that make me better than anyone else? How about hungrier. How about needier. How about more desperate in my life. How about more miserable.
But if you pray, “Jesus, I don’t like what I am. Forgive me and change me. Make me into what you want me to be.” - well, it is a powerful prayer. Not because of the human, but because of the power and person of God.
“And at Capernaum there was an official whose son was ill. 47When this man heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went to him and asked him to come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death. 48So Jesus said to him, “Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe.” 49The official said to him, “Sir, come down before my child dies.” 50Jesus said to him, “Go; your son will live.” The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and went on his way. 51As he was going down, his servants met him and told him that his son was recovering. 52So he asked them the hour when he began to get better, and they said to him, “Yesterday at the seventh hour the fever left him.” 53The father knew that was the hour when Jesus had said to him, “Your son will live.” And he himself believed, and all his household. 54 This was now the second sign that Jesus did when he had come from Judea to Galilee.” - John 4
Why did the man believe?
Still trying to take credit I see.
In your posts you have the cause and effect backwards. Re-read Augustine in HarleyD's #157:
"Many hear the word of truth; but some believe, while others contradict. Therefore, the former will to believe; the latter do not will." Who does not know this? Who can deny this? But since in some the will is prepared by the Lord, in others it is not prepared, we must assuredly be able to distinguish what comes from God's mercy, and what from His judgment. "What Israel sought for," says the apostle, "he hath not obtained, but the election hath obtained it; and the rest were blinded, as it is written, God gave to them the spirit of compunction,—eyes that they should not see, and ears that they should not hear, even to this day. And David said, Let their table be made a snare, a retribution, and a stumblingblock to them; let their eyes be darkened, that they may not see; and bow down their back always." [Rom. 11.7.] Here is mercy and judgment,—mercy towards the election which has obtained the righteousness of God, but judgment to the rest which have been blinded.....
Let us, then, understand the calling whereby they become elected,—not those who are elected because they have believed, but who are elected that they may believe. For the Lord Himself also sufficiently explains this calling when He says, "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you." [John 15.16.] For if they had been elected because they had believed, they themselves would certainly have first chosen Him by believing in Him, so that they should deserve to be elected. But He takes away this supposition altogether when He says, "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you." And yet they themselves, beyond a doubt, chose Him when they believed on Him. Whence it is not for any other reason that He says, "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you," than because they did not choose Him that He should choose them, but He chose them that they might choose Him; because His mercy preceded them according to grace, not according to debt. Therefore He chose them out of the world while He was wearing flesh, but as those who were already chosen in Himself before the foundation of the world. This is the changeless truth concerning predestination and grace. For what is it that the apostle says, "As He hath chosen us in Himself before the foundation of the world"? [Eph. 1.4.] And assuredly, if this were said because God foreknew that they would believe, not because He Himself would make them believers, the Son is speaking against such a foreknowledge as that when He says, "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you;" when God should rather have foreknown this very thing, that they themselves would have chosen Him, so that they might deserve to be chosen by Him. Therefore they were elected before the foundation of the world with that predestination in which God foreknew what He Himself would do; but they were elected out of the world with that calling whereby God fulfilled that which He predestinated. For whom He predestinated, them He also called, with that calling, to wit, which is according to the purpose. Not others, therefore, but those whom He predestinated, them He also called; nor others, but those whom He so called, them He also justified; nor others, but those whom He predestinated, called, and justified, them He also glorified; assuredly to that end which has no end. Therefore God elected believers; but He chose them that they might be so, not because they were already so. The Apostle James says: "Has not God chosen the poor in this world, rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which God hath promised to them that love Him?" [James 2.5.] By choosing them, therefore; He makes them rich in faith, as He makes them heirs of the kingdom; because He is rightly said to choose that in them, in order to make which in them He chose them. I ask, who can hear the Lord saying, "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you," and can dare to say that men believe in order to be elected, when they are rather elected to believe; lest against the judgment of truth they be found to have first chosen Christ to whom Christ says, "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you"? [John 15.16.]
Why did I?
As a military brat in Iceland in the 7th grade, my best friend wanted to join the youth group at the Chapel for the incredibly spiritual reason that there were some great looking girls in it. He dragged me along. There I met kids who accepted me and loved me and who were honest in a way I had never even conceived of being. And when asked why they did what they did, they said it was because they didn’t like the way they had been living, and had asked Jesus to forgive them and change them. I knew that whatever it was they had, I wanted - so I asked Jesus to forgive me, and to change me, and to take over my life and do with it as he pleased. And God kept his promises...
Did that make me better than anyone else? How about hungrier. How about needier. How about more desperate in my life. How about more miserable.
So, in the "soil parable" terms that you quoted, your best friend who went to the Chapel youth group for the great-looking chics and heard the same word that you did was just hardened path or thorn-infested soil, but you were good soil?
“He who has ears to hear, let him hear”, it says. When you went to that youth group in your fallen, unregenerate condition you had good ears and he in the same condition didn't?
Why do you think you realized at that meeting that you were hungry, needy. desperate and miserable, and your friend in the same exact unregenerate state as you didn't? You say, "I knew that whatever it was they had, I wanted - so I asked Jesus to forgive me, and to change me, and to take over my life and do with it as he pleased."
You have said that faith "comes from us". So you think that in your and your friend's unregenerate condition that your want or desire, or repentent faith - "came from you" (to paraphrase your words) - the originating source being your corrupt, God-hating, sin -loving nature by you were an enemy of God and alienated from Him, but it didn't come from your friend in the same exact condition? Why?
To borrow a George W. Bush malapropism, you grossly misunderestimate the FALL of man, his sinful nature, and his depravity. The only reason you had ears to hear is BECAUSE you are of God.
"Why do you not understand what I am saying? It is because you cannot hear My word. You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father.""He who is of God hears the words of God; for this reason you do not hear them, because you are not of God.
Acting out of his native wants, all that a natural man ever wants to do is select whichever choice in any situation is a God-hating choice. At the moment we fell, the entire race became spiritually depraved hate-filled enemies of God, desiring only to spite Him with every choice over which we have any power or decision, ever.
And btw, don't say that we don't believe in free will. Your allegation that we're all wrapped up with our "mechanical world" is misplaced. Our free will is intact and totatly operative in all this.
The natural man hates God with all his heart, and so he freely wills to spite God. Hating God is exactly what the natural man wants to do. It's all he wants to do. His free will is the means by which he is able to turn his God-hating desires into willful acts and thereby store up more wrath for himself.
If you underestimate the impact of this fact, you completely misunderstand the entire nature of man and God's relation to him. Without exception. The fact is that if your God-hatred had not been first unilaterally re-engineered into a want to repent, then you never would have wanted to perform any God-pleasing choices -- including the God-pleasing choice to reach out to the Son.
No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day..You have not chosen me, but I have chosen you
Cordially,