cravescheese
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Predestination would mean you have no free will, right?
Texas Drownings Not Predestined
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Well said! :thumb:
If I hadn't been reading about your internally inconsisent views in Knight's "Calvinism makes me sick" thread, I would find what you just said encouraging. But from what I read, I know that the words, "even though God predestined them before before they ever existed" could be added to the end of your statement.
(Actually, I still find it a little bit encouraging.)
Similarly, I don't disagree with post 20 either, as it is written. But I know that we disagree on the extent to which events are predestined, and the means by which God brings to pass predestined events.
If I hadn't been reading about your internally inconsisent views in Knight's "Calvinism makes me sick" thread, I would find what you just said encouraging. But from what I read, I know that the words, "even though God predestined them before before they ever existed" could be added to the end of your statement.
(Actually, I still find it a little bit encouraging.)
Similarly, I don't disagree with post 20 either, as it is written. But I know that we disagree on the extent to which events are predestined, and the means by which God brings to pass predestined events.
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Z Man
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Why do you reject the doctrine of 'predestination'? What about it seems 'hard to swallow'?Originally posted by Turbo
Well said! :thumb:
If I hadn't been reading about your internally inconsisent views in Knight's "Calvinism makes me sick" thread, I would find what you just said encouraging. But from what I read, I know that the words, "even though God predestined them before before they ever existed" could be added to the end of your statement.
(Actually, I still find it a little bit encouraging.)
Similarly, I don't disagree with verse 20 either, as it is written. But I know that we disagree on the extent to which events are predestined, and the means by which God brings to pass predestined events.
A righteous God would not force people to torture, rape, and kill innocent people.
A just God would not punish someone for something He utterly forced them to do.
The doctrine that everything is pre-planned and predestined by an utterly immutable God flies in the face of what is revealed in Scripture of the living God, even in the first few pages.
And it an irrational, self-defeating doctrine.
Z Man
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God doesn't 'force' people to do anything; we do it of our own will. No one believes that there are innocent people running around, and God 'forces' them to become sinners. That's ludicris...
The Scriptures tell us of a God who ordains people to do things, and then punishes them for it. According to you, that makes God unjust. Are you sure you wanna say that?
You might wanna re-read your Bible...
The Bible was meant to 'blow your mind'...
Z Man
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Sure we can. It happens all the time. God ordained that Peter would deny Him three times.
- In Luke 22:31-34 Jesus not only predicts that Peter will deny him three times that very night, but treats the act with such certainty that he is already praying for Peter's future repentance and future ministry. "'Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded to sift you like wheat; but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail; and you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers.' But he said to Him, 'Lord, with You I am ready to go both to prison and to death!' And He said, 'I say to you, Peter, the rooster will not crow today until you have denied three times that you know Me.'"
This absolute knowledge that Peter would sin, how often he would sin, when he would sin, and that he would repent does not remove Peter's moral responsibility in the least, which is made plain by the fact that Peter weeps bitterly precisely when he remembers the words of Jesus' prediction. Peter does not say, "Well, you predicted this sin, and so it had to take place, and so it can't have been part of my free willing, and so I am not responsible for it." He wept bitterly. He was guilty and he knew it.
Jesus was glorious in the prediction, and Peter was guilty.
- John Piper
Want more proof? Check these out:
- God opposes hatred toward his people, yet ordained that his people be hated in Egypt (Genesis 12:3; Psalm 105:25 "He turned their hearts to hate his people.").
- He hardens Pharaoh's heart, but commands him to let his people go (Exodus 4:21; 5:1; 8:1).
- He makes plain that it is sin for David to take a military census of his people, but he ordains that he do it (2 Samuel 24:1; 24:10).
- He opposes adultery, but ordains that Absalom should lie with his father's wives (Exodus 20:14; 2 Samuel 12:11).
- He forbids rebellion and insubordination against the king, but ordained that Jeroboam and the ten tribes should rebel against Rehoboam (Romans 13:1; 1 Samuel 15:23; 1 Kings 12:15-16).
- He opposes murder, but ordains the murder of his Son (Exodus 20:13; Acts 4:28).
- He desires all men to be saved, but effectually calls only some (1 Timothy 2:4; 1 Corinthians 1:26-30; 2 Timothy 2:26)
I'm afraid it may take me a while to research and respond to these verses but I do have one observation for right now. If Christ knows everything that will happen, why did He pray that Peter's faith would not fail? Doesn't that seem to imply that Christ was not completely certain how things would turn out? If you don't think so, why did He bother to pray?
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