Posted on 03/20/2014 7:47:22 AM PDT by Gamecock
Fourteen generations ago my ancestors got off the Mayflower carrying their Geneva Bibles and believing in predestination.
You did not see predestination in the old Soviet Union. You saw resignation. Fourteen generations of believing in predestination, not one generation or family member on welfare, about seven ancestors who fought in the American Revolution one of whom had his head blown off at the Battle of Bennington, an uncle who clawed his way to the top of Mount Suribachi as a USMC linesmen and watched them raise the flag twice. Myself a retired USAF intelligence officer who was in Germany when the wall came down plus a BA, an MA, an MDiv, and a DMin which all required a great deal of motivation and you say belief in predestination is “a killer of motivation” as it creates an attitude of “Why Bother.”
Predestination has enabled me to be a risk taker and put my life on the line for freedom because I have absolute confidence and trust that I belong to my faithful Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and not a hair on my head can fall without the will of my Father in Heaven.
God places limits upon mans choices leaving Himself Sovereign. It appears to man that he is sovereign over his choices and that there are no limits. But God has placed limits sufficient for His own purposes (Matthew 6:34).
God sometimes overrides man's choice as when the the leaders of Jericho came to kill the Hebrew spies. Or when David was with the Philistines. God is far more sovereign than one thinks. Are we not thankful for this?
If so, why?
Because even the elect commit sins using their free will to sin or not to sin and we need to repent. Repentance is an act whereby we acknowledge we can not justify or set ourselves right with God through our own merit. We need the blood and grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus calls us to repent.
You contradict your own argument.
Now that, my FRiend, is a sermon! Great citations and excellent hermeneutics. I would add, without trying to improve your post (it needs nothing), those wonderful remarks in Eph. 1:4 where Paul notes that, “...just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him.” And, you are absolutely right, we will be so grateful when this is all over that He would choose nothings like us. All glory will go to Him, and we will praise His Name...
1Pe 1:4 to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you,
1Pe 1:5 who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.
Hey I love your library but isn’t the cigar a bit PC incorrecto. (Er, perhaps that was too.)
BTW-Can I have a glass of lemonade?
No. It's the "U".
Yes, because it is part of the cleaning process. Turning away from our sin is good and He is a Gracious God to cleans us from all unrighteousness as we do.
Predestination does not absolve us from our duties the Word of God. But it makes it easier since He is so loving and kind towards folks like us.
Are those not part of God’s elect equally capable of being turned from their sin as the elect are, were God to decide to do so? Or is there something different about the elect?
If God decided to turn these, too from their sin, why wouldn't they also be part of God's elect?
Then all would be saved because no one can stay God's hand. But God did not do this.
The problem with most folks about predestination is that they don't believe mankind is 'dead in trespasses and sin'. They don't believe how bad Psalm 14 and 53 (and quoted by the Apostle Paul in Romans 3) is even though this is repeated 3 times in Scripture that None sought Him on their own, None Understood God on the own, and None did Good on their own.
Instead they believe mankind is spiritually sick and not dead and able to save themselves through their choice; man earninging His salvation through His choice. This gives man the glory and makes man the center of His faith (which is self centered and not good).
Whereas believing that mankind is dead in trespasses and sin means that God has to do major work before the new birth. He basically has to do a spiritual heart transplant and a reprogramming of the mind so that the person can love Him and hold faith in the persons brain (into which God gives a measure: See Romans 5:12).
God also gives 'ears to hear' and 'eyes to see' the things of God. So that when the preacher preaches the Word to him he will hear, and seeing such that he can see the Word for himself- be convicted of his sin (now that he has a heart and mind able to do so) and to confess the faith that God has planted inside him - going from Darkness into Life. Since God does this, the believer later can give him all the glory since there is no way he or she could have done it. With the doctrine of salvation by choice, man gets the glory and can unchoose God later on a whim and loose his Salvation.
Whereas if God has done everything necessary for faith and salvation then to Him belongs all the Glory and all the Praise.
Being 'Dead in Trespasses and Sin' they are not capable being spiritually 'Dead'. Dead means Dead.
The elect of God are quickened by God, out of the dead. Thus the believer says as in Ephesians 2:5 God... "made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions".
Here is a question, Did God make you Alive from deadness in trespasses and sin or did you? Which one is right, the Apostle Paul or man?
Again, did God call us all to repent, or only the elect?
“Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel” “All”, everyone is the key.
Predestination has more to do with God’s Omnipotence, than the Elect being some written list...in that God knows the future, so in advance who will accept Jesus, therefore they have a destiny. They are predestined to accept him....they become the elect by free will choice, one of the universal laws spoken into existence during the Big Bang (God spoke the world into existence...how could there not have been a loud noise aka big bang).
Why did Christ call us to repent?
Is he talking only to the elect?
If he's only speaking to the elect, by declaring that unless we repent we shall perish isn't he denying that God's grace is irresistible?
But my understanding is Calvinists would disagree that one can become 'elect' by an act of their own will.
Perhaps I misunderstand.
When we talk about the Elect, we are speaking of those who belong to God, and obviously all made that choice.
Omnipotence gives God the understanding of who will choose him, as well as many other things. That knowing of their destiny by choice, makes them God’s Elect by the Predestination of their choice.
Metaphor: “If I can look into the future and see that seven things are necessary for completion of a project, then I would surely buy those seven things...possibly make a list of those seven things. Predestined to buy those things. Would God list people who he knows will not accept him?
So those predestined have to be the ones he knows will accept, but that is just my humble opinion of how it works.
Yes, a Calvinist would probably disagree, however, Scripture interprets itself by the Holy Spirit. All denominations who accept Jesus as Savior will be represented in Heaven, not because they are Calvinists etc.
Man’s doctrine is obvious in the need for so many denominations, but Jesus is not religious, he’s personal.
‘Ye’ means you all - to the elect and the non-elect. To the non-elect so they can’t say they were not warned.
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