Adding other external factors? I want to be clear on this. Do you think that external factors, such as childhood experience, church experience, emotional problems, substance abuse, etc. influence man's salvific decision at all? I know that the will makes the decision, I'm just trying to understand what you think that decision is derived from.
I never saw an Arminian appeal to a 'secret will'!
You've appealed to one in just about every post. You just don't see it for what it is. That's what I'm trying to get at:)
Now, according to your view, man is choosing since he is acting according to how he wants, yet it is really God who is 'pulling the strings' so to speak. Still, despite that, man is to be held responsible for something he has no control of.
WRONG! Man is condemned for his sinfulness. This is his state BY DEFAULT. He is incapable of not sinning. Man is not condemned because he didn't make some one-time choice the right way. He's born already condemned!
Now, as for my positon, the choices a man makes are based on a mydrid of factors with the final decider being his own will which judges all the factors and makes a decision. It is his decision to make, based on evalution of the facts.
So, does everyone receive all the facts they need? And if so, again why do some not come to the correct conclusion?
There are many factors which influence choices, both physical and cultural. Yet these only influence the choices, they are not their determinates, the will is.
If they do not affect the outcome, then they do not influence. Period.
Adding all kinds of factors, including evaluation of those various factors, both external and internal.
I know that the will makes the decision, I'm just trying to understand what you think that decision is derived from.
As Thiessen states,
Man's part and God's part seem to be brought together in Jn.1:12-13...Man has the grace to accept Him or reject Him ....God's grace enables man to accept Christ, but it does not constrain man to accept Christ.... As a man shows the least willingless to obey God, He gives man repentence and faith. Jesus asked the man with the withered hand to stretch it forth; and as he attempted to do that which Christ asked him to do, he received the power to do it (Matt.12:13). This view of the will upholds the soverignity of God, and the same time leaves a man personally responsible creature for his perdition,if he does not 'will to do his will' (Lectures in Systematic Theology, p.231)
Thus, the content of the 'will' is the persons own view of reality and truth, he must want the truth, which is what the laws of Nature are suppose to lead one to. (Psa.19, Rom.1).
I never saw an Arminian appeal to a 'secret will'! You've appealed to one in just about every post. You just don't see it for what it is. That's what I'm trying to get at:)
No, an evaulation of reality by an individual who God has given a will to, a will strong enough to reject Him, despite grace, is not a 'secret will' but one that the Bible constantly makes reference to, (Ps.10, Rom.10:21, Acts 7:51, Matt.23:37)
Or, those 'will's weren't really resisting God, He just said that! :>)
Now, according to your view, man is choosing since he is acting according to how he wants, yet it is really God who is 'pulling the strings' so to speak. Still, despite that, man is to be held responsible for something he has no control of. WRONG! Man is condemned for his sinfulness. This is his state BY DEFAULT. He is incapable of not sinning. Man is not condemned because he didn't make some one-time choice the right way. He's born already condemned!
Read Rom.5:18 and tell me how that condemnation was handled.
Now the only thing that keeps a man out of heaven is rejection of God by not accepting the free gift by faith (Jn.14:6)
Moreover, no one denies that all men deserve death, however, the question is why some are saved when all could be saved but aren't (despite what God states in Scripture).
This is what makes the Calvinists run to the Secret Will, the Scriptures!
Now, as for my positon, the choices a man makes are based on a mydrid of factors with the final decider being his own will which judges all the factors and makes a decision. It is his decision to make, based on evalution of the facts. So, does everyone receive all the facts they need? And if so, again why do some not come to the correct conclusion?
Yes, all do receive enough revelation to make fair choice to have desire to know God, even though they must wait for God to reveal Himself to them.
Some come to correct conclusions because they see the truth as the truth.
Thus, if one wants to know the truth, God will get it to him.
If he for his own reasons, does not want to know God (Ps.10) God will not force Himself on him.
There are many factors which influence choices, both physical and cultural. Yet these only influence the choices, they are not their determinates, the will is. If they do not affect the outcome, then they do not influence. Period.
No, an influence is just a power, one that can be resisted if one is influenced by something else.
Thus, our flesh is one influence, while the Power of the Holy Spirit is another.
Sometimes one wins, sometimes the other, which is decided by our own will choosing between the two.
So, let us get to the nitty-gritty, when you sin, whose will are you doing, God's or your own?