DO We Have Free Will?

[simonthezealot]

Explain if you will, how predestination (even hard determinism) doesn't shift responsibility off ourselves & onto God.
I'm not very good at it.

It's that we are given the freedom by which a human chooses from and does what he most wants to from the deepest desires of his heart and that very decision is compatible with God's; oversight, control, and ordination...
That God's purposes are accomplished through the persons actions and choices...It's the person doing the action not God.

I used this earlier...
[If I send my wife to the store to get something, I am not the one doing it -- she is. If I know that in the process she is going to speed and break the law, am I the one guilty for her speeding? Of course not, since she is exercising her free choice.]

 

[bling]

Man doesn't want the good things so it's not agaist the will of man if he doesn't want God. God creating the entire life plan of a single man isn’t forcing. It's called created bu His Own Pleasure. If you write a book, you planned it out in your head and you didn't force anything cause that is what you saw in your mind to write down on paper.

You are the author of your own book like God is the author of His Own wills.

So, man is like players on a stage are only following a script?

How is that different then creating a bunch of preprogrammed robots?

Would it be more Loving of God to save twice as many people as he scripted to save?

Where a third of the angels in heaven scripted to fall away and for what reason?

 

[bling]

No I would not say that. A & E became sinners the moment they sinned; it was one and the same moment. The same way we close our eyes when we blink, the one doesn't precede the other. Not so for you and me though. We are 'sinners' at the moment of conception and if delivered (after 9 months) will not only go on to sin, but to delight in it. That's our nature. And it explains why Christ said "Ye must be born again".

OK, “the moment they sinned” they become sinners, but prior to they were not sinners, the same as it can be for all of us prior to our first sin. Being a sinner prior to sinning is not required (since that happened with Adam and Eve)?

Was being a sinner a requirement for Adam and Eve to first sin?

The vessel that came fresh from the Potter's hands was not marred. It became marred when something from the outside was introduced (sin)...and the offspring from that vessel was marred as well.

The potter started over and made something else that the potter could still put his name on, but I do not see the potter intentionally making stuff damaged or clay pigeons that is not what you would see being made in the potter’s house. I would be happy to get into a long discussion of Rms. 9 with you if you want. Nothing leaves the potter’s shop worthless, but some is useful for common purposes and some is used for special purposes.

The simple answer is this: If God were to have a creature with whom He could commune while "walking in the garden in the cool of the day", He must give that creature the capacity to obey/disobey Him in and of himself; otherwise there could be no such true fellowship.

So all mature adults have that free will choice to make?

As I suggested before...do not make the mistake of building a doctrine around a parable...even the beautiful types such as Joseph and Isaac fall short of presenting the full picture alluded to. As to gaining Salvation, there is no possibility you or I could pay any of the great debt we owe.

We have only 36 good parables to interpret, but that is the main way Jesus verbally communicated with us, so since we just have these few out of the hundred Christ would have told they are important. No one parable covers everything, but Matt 18 does cover a lot of the subject of forgiveness on God’s part.

No, sin did not 'help', it hindered. It was the sin of wanton self-centeredness that got the young son into trouble; it was a troubled conscience, a repugnance of his current situation, and a pleasant memory of a loving father that brought him to repentence. Sin doesen't bring anyone to repentance; it is the realized terribleness of sin and a desire to be shed of it that brings one to seek for a deliverance.

Getting yourself into deep problems can bring you to your senses. God/Jesus came to help needy people (those that are sick and not those that are well) so does sinning make you needy. We are all needy, but some of us are too proud to admit it. The “choice” is still ours no matter

 

[Shiloh1-49-10]

OK, “the moment they sinned” they become sinners, but prior to that they were not sinners, the same as it can be for all of us prior to our first sin. Being a sinner prior to sinning is not required (since that happened with Adam and Eve)?

Was being a sinner a requirement for Adam and Eve to first sin?

No, A & E had no pre-disposition towards good or evil when presented with the forbidden fruit. Not so for you and me. They fell, sin came in, tainted their nature, gave them a disposition towards the evil (Satan spoke the truth about their knowing good and evil, just didn't tell them that once disobedient they would have no power to choose the good over the evil) and had to be sent out of the garden. And they passed on that 'gene' to you and I so that we're born 'sinners' with a pre-disposition towards sin. [Remember what Isaiah said about those "good things" we think we have: "All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags", 64:6].


The potter started over and made something else that the potter could still put his name on...

Amen...that's what's happening now. But it's not a make-over. In Christ we are a 'new creation'...He's not making the old over; that's condemned. He's starts fresh the moment we are 'born again'. First that which is natural; afterward that which is spiritual.


So all mature adults have that free will choice to make?

No, wouldn't say that. No unregenerate person has 'free will'...all have that 'towards the evil gene', all are viewed as in a 'sin' condition before God, and it's only after we come, are born again, receive that new nature...the very nature of Christ...have the Spirit dwelling within that we can in any way choose the good (but even then there must be prayerful dependence upon God for this...many believers have made disastrous mistakes).


Getting yourself into deep problems can bring you to your senses. God/Jesus came to help needy people so does sinning make you needy? We are all needy, but some of us are too proud to admit it. The “choice” is still ours no matter.

Sinners are needy, but sinning doesn't make one feel needy. The serial killer has no qualms about sinning again...something other than the crime must make him realize the awfulness of it and give him a desire to escape it...not the crime itself. The Hitlers, Mansons, Amins, Bin Ladens of the world are proof enough that 'greater the sin' is not 'greater the recipe' for repentance. Most who come to the Lord for salvation are those who come "through the east gate"; they come as children, but very few in comparison come via "the west gate" where the setting sun speaks of maturity of years. The longer man goes on in sin, the more seared he becomes to it, and he is least likely to desire it. Even then he must come "as a little child". In your hypothesis, little children would love little because they are forgiven little, I presume; but we both know this is hardly the case. There's a serious flaw in that theology.

 

[RisingSpirit]

So, man is like players on a stage are only following a script?

How is that different then creating a bunch of preprogrammed robots?

Would it be more Loving of God to save twice as many people as he scripted to save?

Where a third of the angels in heaven scripted to fall away and for what reason?

You must be careful how you listen to what others say what the Calvinist believes. They will tell you wrong and yet you believe in what they say about Calvinism. Unaware lies will only drive you into deeper spiritual trouble and makes one blind to the truths. Can't tell you Bling how the Lord, exactly, arranges circumstances. Because it varies for each event. But the Calvinist risingspirit can say it's the circumstance which God directly controls ...NOT the human. Then, the human responds in their own will to the circumstance ! Thus human volition makes a free choice within circumstances while the Most High arranges circumstance so intended results occur. Again: It's the circumstance God directly controls, not human will. In this manner our choice is 'free'. We are not robots or zombies. Now, regarding how the Lord arranges circumstances, it varies for
each instance. You have heard, though, the philosophical dictum that moving just one grain of sand on a beach eventually changes the course of entire history ? Same principle with Divine Providence. We start with God's foreknowledge of outcomes. He knows in advance what effect any given change would have. Next, the Most High alters some small thing. And that has the ripple effect to present the circumstance God intended. [ Almost sounds like Science Fiction ! ] The example risingspirit often gives is putting a bank within sight of a robber. That robber eventually robs the bank as the Supreme Being intended he would. Yet he does it out of his sin nature instead because of some kind of divine coercion

 

[bling]

You must be careful how you listen to what others say what the Calvinist believes. They will tell you wrong and yet you believe in what they say about Calvinism. Unaware lies will only drive you into deeper spiritual trouble and makes one blind to the truths. Can't tell you Bling how the Lord, exactly, arranges circumstances. Because it varies for each event. But the Calvinist risingspirit can say it's the circumstance which God directly controls ...NOT the human. Then, the human responds in their own will to the circumstance ! Thus human volition makes a free choice within circumstances while the Most High arranges circumstance so intended results occur. Again: It's the circumstance God directly controls, not human will. In this manner our choice is 'free'. We are not robots or zombies. Now, regarding how the Lord arranges circumstances, it varies for
each instance. You have heard, though, the philosophical dictum that moving just one grain of sand on a beach eventually changes the course of entire history ? Same principle with Divine Providence. We start with God's foreknowledge of outcomes. He knows in advance what effect any given change would have. Next, the Most High alters some small thing. And that has the ripple effect to present the circumstance God intended. [ Almost sounds like Science Fiction ! ] The example risingspirit often gives is putting a bank within sight of a robber. That robber eventually robs the bank as the Supreme Being intended he would. Yet he does it out of his sin nature instead because of some kind of divine coercion

I agree that God like any wonderful father is very much doing all He can to help us make the right choices, but the tragedies God sets up for us to go through can either soften or harden our hearts depending our acceptance.

 

[squint]

Is it God's will for me to sin?
Do I sin.

I'm looking for Scripture., but more than that, I'm looking for the Scripture
to be "rightly divided" as well.


I do sometimes sin, much as I hate to, much as it makes me sad.
It makes me sad because I don't believe my Father is blessed or glorified when I sin...

If the 'will' of mankind were alone freewillers would have a point.

That is not the scriptural case.

Here is what Jesus said happens where the Word is sown:

Mark 4:15
And these are they by the way side, where the word is sown; but when they have heard, Satan cometh immediately, and taketh away the word that was sown in their hearts.

The above fact categorically places the will of another entity in the person.

This fact is shown in the scriptures in many ways.

Yet the fact of that party keeps the fact from being seen, perceived and even resisted in everyone who hears of it.

Why?

Because it's a fact.

It's a quite interesting phenomenon, once seen, personally.

Not every thought is our own.

Some can confront this matter honestly. Even discuss the fact of it personally.

Most can't. And these remain partly cloudy and are the essence of what captivity points to simply because they don't know.

Romans 11:32


32 For God has bound everyone over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all.


and how was that done again?


You see the dots are and will remain purposefully hard to connect, simple as they are.


s

 

[Giver]

Personally it seems to me stupid that people are willing to believe some on born fifteen hundred, and nine years after Jesus, could come up with an understanding of Jesus’ teaching that differed from all those Christians that came before Calvin.

How can one believe that Jesus waited all those years to set his people on the right road? I believe one has to be looking for an easy way to be a Christian, a way that does not mean one has to totally give up the world, to believe what Calvin preached.

People trying to figure out God, what nonsense that is, trying to figure out a God who created all things with a human mind that has trouble figuring out how to stop a virus.

 

[RisingSpirit]

I agree that God like any wonderful father is very much doing all He can to help us make the right choices, but the tragedies God sets up for us to go through can either soften or harden our hearts depending our acceptance.

If you don't accept and God had already made you the Elect in the future, then God WILL arrange circumstances to make sure and guareet that you will accept.
The unregenerate will believe they are able to reject cause others told them how to as blind leads the blind

 

[RisingSpirit]

Personally it seems to me stupid that people are willing to believe some on born fifteen hundred, and nine years after Jesus, could come up with an understanding of Jesus’ teaching that differed from all those Christians that came before Calvin.

How can one believe that Jesus waited all those years to set his people on the right road? I believe one has to be looking for an easy way to be a Christian, a way that does not mean one has to totally give up the world, to believe what Calvin preached.

People trying to figure out God, what nonsense that is, trying to figure out a God who created all things with a human mind that has trouble figuring out how to stop a virus.

Jesus never waited since God had already drawn the Elects to Jesus before the foundation of the Earth

 

[Giver]

Jesus never waited since God had already drawn the Elects to Jesus before the foundation of the Earth

So says Calvin, and you want to believe it took God fifteen hundred years to let man know that: what a laugh.

 

[RisingSpirit]

So says Calvin, and you want to believe it took God fifteen hundred years to let man know that: what a laugh.

No idea how Calvin got into the picture.

 

[Giver]

No idea how Calvin got into the picture.

The Christian Church up until Calvin never preached such nonsense. In fact the largest Christian Church has never taught anything nearly as wrong as what Calvin taught.

 

[stevenfrancis]

Yes. Man has free will. It has been the teaching of our Jewish ancestors. It was the teaching of Jesus Christ. It was the teaching of the Apostles, the Church Fathers, the Doctors and Saints, and is still the teaching in the catechism of the Catholic Church. See 1730 - 1742 for full explanation:

IN BRIEF:

1743 "God willed that man should be left in the hand of his own counsel (cf. Sir 15:14), so that he might of his own accord seek his creator and freely attain his full and blessed perfection by cleaving to him" (GS 17 § 1).

1744 Freedom is the power to act or not to act, and so to perform deliberate acts of one's own. Freedom attains perfection in its acts when directed toward God, the sovereign Good.

1745 Freedom characterizes properly human acts. It makes the human being responsible for acts of which he is the voluntary agent. His deliberate acts properly belong to him.

1746 The imputability or responsibility for an action can be diminished or nullified by ignorance, duress, fear, and other psychological or social factors.

1747 The right to the exercise of freedom, especially in religious and moral matters, is an inalienable requirement of the dignity of man. But the exercise of freedom does not entail the putative right to say or do anything.

1748 "For freedom Christ has set us free" (Gal 5:1).

26 GS 17; Sir 15:14.
27 St. Irenaeus, Adv. haeres. 4,4,3G 7/1,983.
28 Cf. Rom 6:17.
29 Gen 3:13.
30 Cf. Gen 4:10.
31 Cf. 2 Sam 12:7-15.
32 Cf. DH 2 § 7.
33 CDF, instruction, Libertatis conscientia 13.
34 Gal 5:1.
35 Cf. Jn 8:32.
36 2 Cor 17.
37 Rom 8:21.
38 Roman Missal, 32nd Sunday, Opening Prayer: Omnipotens et misericors Deus, universa nobis adversantia propitiatus exclude, ut, mente et corpore pariter expediti, quæ tua sunt liberis mentibus exsequamur.

 

[RisingSpirit]

So says Calvin, and you want to believe it took God fifteen hundred years to let man know that: what a laugh.

No idea how Calvin got into the picture.

 

[RisingSpirit]

The Christian Church up until Calvin never preached such nonsense. In fact the largest Christian Church has never taught anything nearly as wrong as what Calvin taught.

Let's back up a bit. Nonsense about what and what is the largest group of people in buildings are you talking about?

 

[bling]

[

No, A & E had no pre-disposition towards good or evil when presented with the forbidden fruit. Not so for you and me. They fell, sin came in, tainted their nature, gave them a disposition towards the evil (Satan spoke the truth about their knowing good and evil, just didn't tell them that once disobedient they would have no power to choose the good over the evil) and had to be sent out of the garden. And they passed on that 'gene' to you and I so that we're born 'sinners' with a pre-disposition towards sin. [Remember what Isaiah said about those "good things" we think we have: "All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags", 64:6].

What I am initially trying to establish is sinning does not “require” any different nature than Adam and Eve had prior to their sinning, since Adam and Eve sinned without a sinful nature.

The Bible does not say “sin tainted theirs or our “nature”.

The Bible does not say we have any greater “disposition toward sinning” then Adam and Eve had.

God tells Adam and Eve what would and did happen, but does not say: “yours and your decedent’s nature would change.

Christ certainly did not have this “sinful nature”.

How would it be fair and just for some humans to be born without this sinful nature (Adam and Eve) and others born with this sinful nature? (Can we get away with blaming Adam and Eve for part of our problem?)

When quoting scripture you have to keep it in context:

Is. 64: All of us have become like one who is unclean,
and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags;
we all shrivel up like a leaf,
and like the wind our sins sweep us away.
Isaiah is poetically talking about Israel at that time and how bad they have gotten and not all humans all the time.

Amen...that's what's happening now. But it's not a make-over. In Christ we are a 'new creation'...He's not making the old over; that's condemned. He's starts fresh the moment we are 'born again'. First that which is natural; afterward that which is spiritual.

Jer. 18: 4 But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him.

The potter illustrations used in scripture do not suggest changes made to the pot after it has been former, but changes before it is formed. When the formed pot leaves the potter’s house it is worthy of the potter’s signature, the same as all babies at birth. The “born again” scenario does not reference the potter?

No, wouldn't say that. No unregenerate person has 'free will'...all have that 'towards the evil gene', all are viewed as in a 'sin' condition before God, and it's only after we come, are born again, receive that new nature...the very nature of Christ...have the Spirit dwelling within that we can in any way choose the good (but even then there must be prayerful dependence upon God for this...many believers have made disastrous mistakes).

You said: “He must give that creature the capacity to obey/disobey Him in and of himself; otherwise there could be no such true fellowship”, so was Adam and Eve regenerated people?

I am not suggesting the nonbeliever can “do” anything worthy since He does not have Godly type Love so everything he does is worthless (1 Cor 13: 1-4). The question is can the nonbeliever, wimp out of being a good soldier thus turn toward his enemy and surrender even though he knows he should be tried and found totally guilty and destroyed. This good soldier of satan by surrendering is unwittingly allowing God to be merciful with him. Look at the Prodigal son story (Luke 15: 11-32), Jesus could have used any words to describe the younger son and yet had the father calls the son “dead” even though the father new he was physically alive. So even in a dead state a person can come to their senses (because of what they got themselves into) and turn to the Father. So according the Jesus’ definition of “dead”, can a dead person can still turn?

Sinners are needy, but sinning doesn't make one feel needy. The serial killer has no qualms about sinning again...something other than the crime must make him realize the awfulness of it and give him a desire to escape it...not the crime itself. The Hitlers, Mansons, Amins, Bin Ladens of the world are proof enough that 'greater the sin' is not 'greater the recipe' for repentance. Most who come to the Lord for salvation are those who come "through the east gate"; they come as children, but very few in comparison come via "the west gate" where the setting sun speaks of maturity of years. The longer man goes on in sin, the more seared he becomes to it, and he is least likely to desire it. Even then he must come "as a little child". In your hypothesis, little children would love little because they are forgiven little, I presume; but we both know this is hardly the case. There's a serious flaw in that theology.

Sin (the hurting of others) weighs on your conscience and grows with time. This increasing burden makes you increasingly needy and can bring you to your knees. The problem is you can allow these sins to harden you and you can continue to refuse God’s help in the form of forgiveness to the point you will never accept God’s help (Forgiveness/charity/grace/mercy/Love). So, yes a harden heart will not humbly accept God’s charity.

You say: “they come as children”, yet the New Testament only has provable examples of adults becoming Christians (old enough to become a believer) and there are lot of example of adults becoming Christian believers. We are to come “like children”, but it does not say “children are to come”, so what likeness are we needing? (I know about Biblical households being baptized, but we do not know if any children were included in those “households”.)

The Pharisees thought they had little to be forgiven of, so is that the way some people should feel about their sins?

As we mature and become more aware of what all we have been forgiven of and the huge debt that had to be paid, will we not come to Love all the more? The problem I see coming with blaming our sins in part or totally on the sinful “nature” we inherited form Adam and Eve, so who can really blame us for creating a huge debt of sin, the debt really lies with our ancestors.

 

[Giver]

Yes the elect will be the only ones who will enter the kingdom of God. The elect are those who live the Word of God, and that mean also they do not sin. So yes it is the elect we will see in Heaven.
(John 14:23) “Jesus replied: Anyone who loves me will keep my word and my Father will love him, and we shall come to him and make a home in him.”

The kingdom of God is God’s home, which someone who lives God’s Word is.

(1 Corinthians 6:9-19) “You know perfectly well that people who do wrong will not inherit the Kingdom of God: people of immoral lives, idolaters, adulterers, catamites, sodomites, thieves, usurers, drunkards, slanders and swindlers will never inherit the kingdom of God.”

Yes Paul tells us a sinner will never enter the kingdom of God, so then the Elect are those who do not sin right?

 

[RisingSpirit]

Yes the elect will be the only ones who will enter the kingdom of God. The elect are those who live the Word of God, and that mean also they do not sin. So yes it is the elect we will see in Heaven.
(John 14:23) “Jesus replied: Anyone who loves me will keep my word and my Father will love him, and we shall come to him and make a home in him.”

The kingdom of God is God’s home, which someone who lives God’s Word is.

(1 Corinthians 6:9-19) “You know perfectly well that people who do wrong will not inherit the Kingdom of God: people of immoral lives, idolaters, adulterers, catamites, sodomites, thieves, usurers, drunkards, slanders and swindlers will never inherit the kingdom of God.”

Yes Paul tells us a sinner will never enter the kingdom of God, so then the Elect are those who do not sin right?

People of immoral lives, idolaters, adulterers, catamites, sodomites, thieves, usurers, drunkards, slanders and swindlers are not the Elects at the time they are people of immoral lives, idolaters, adulterers, catamites, sodomites, thieves, usurers, drunkards, slanders and swindlers.

When they get out to this list, they will enter Heaven.

 

[sunlover1]

If the 'will' of mankind were alone freewillers would have a point.

That is not the scriptural case.

Here is what Jesus said happens where the Word is sown:

Mark 4:15
And these are they by the way side, where the word is sown; but when they have heard, Satan cometh immediately, and taketh away the word that was sown in their hearts.

The above fact categorically places the will of another entity in the person.

This fact is shown in the scriptures in many ways.

Yet the fact of that party keeps the fact from being seen, perceived and even resisted in everyone who hears of it.

Why?

Because it's a fact.

It's a quite interesting phenomenon, once seen, personally.

Not every thought is our own.

Hi Squint.
Great to see you as always

I agree that not every thought is our own.
And I believe that it's our responsibility to take captive
every thought to make it obedient to Christ.

Some can confront this matter honestly. Even discuss the fact of it personally.

Most can't. And these remain partly cloudy and are the essence of what captivity points to simply because they don't know.

Romans 11:32


32 For God has bound everyone over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all.


and how was that done again?

Because we deserved it.



Always enjoy your posts.