It was God's Will and purpose that Adam would sin.

[Almost there]

I don't see Romans 9:17 pertaining at all to Adam and Eve.

First, Adam and Eve were created with no sin and walked with God. They knew for a fact God existed because God walked WITH them in the garden before the fall. So Adam and Eve were never separated from God, because of sin. So Adam and Eve were the only humans that ever began as Children of God and not sinful human beings.

Pharoah on the other hand, was given chance after chance by God. God sent plague after plague, sign after sign and Pharoah was never God's because he worshipped Egyptian idols. It was only after every warning was given.

So two totally unrelated situations and I see nothing in Romans 9:17 that gives me any insight to Adam and Eve.

The context of 9:17 describes a God that, though he gives us free choice, he knows what we are going to do. Pharaoh is the example here. So if God is the same, yesterday, today and forever, then he had this same skill when Adam was created. i.e. he raised him up for a purpose. And that purpose was fulfilled just as His purpose for raising up Pharaoh was fulfilled. And the same goes for you and me.

There are actually fun time travel movies that work with this paradox. il.e. people go back in time, try to make sure nothing changes, and end up having all sorts of impacts on the progression of events, only to find out that those things were actually a part of the timeline all along and they had to go back in time to do those things.

We are kinda like that. What we have not yet done is already written, but we don't know what choices we are going to make until we make them. But God knew before even our grandparents were born.

But I can't grasp it correctly, but only in a "see through a glass darkly" sort of way.

 

[Soar Like and Eagle]

I believe our free will is, in fact, limited, but only in ways like this: I'm free to, while driving down a two lane road, veer into the oncoming lane on purpose to smack head on into a semi. Or, as passing another car on said road, slam into the side of them on purpose to run them off the road.

But you'll find that that is a very difficult choice to make, even though you are free to make it.

But I can choose to sin or not sin, and make both choices often on a daily basis. Sometimes I choose Mexican, and sometimes I choose Thai.

But ultimately I compare all of it to what he said about his creation of Pharaoh.

Choosing sin or not is what the carnal man does it is his nature. But Carnal man cannot choose his own salvation that is a religious myth.

 

[Almost there]

I think God tries to speak to us on a human level if He can, but God is held to Holiness and therefore perfect Truth. So God cannot just tell us something that is not perfect in Holiness and Truth.

So it all has to jive together in Truth. Perfectly.

This is one of the reason's I think Jesus spoke in parables, because He was perfect and Holy and held to truth.

Jesus could have been like "so, if Mark did so and so to Peter and then Peter responded like so and so then ..." but since it never happened and would be hypothetical it would be confusing. So Jesus chose parables about things they would understand. Like wheat and fields, shepherds and sheep, fig trees and their growth and harvest, ect

It also says that he spoke in parables so that they wouldn't get it.

But I agree with what you are saying there. I'll add that the great thing about Christianity is that it is the religion of the spirit of the law, not the letter of the law. Good parents don't try to teach their children the correct thing to do in every single specific situation. Rather, they teach the child to "think correctly" about the world they live in so that they can understand the correct course of action as a situation presents itself. And at that point, you could say that it is not what they did that saved them from calamity. Rather, it is the thought process they had acquired that enabled them to make the correct decision.

And the perfect example of this as it applies to saving faith vs works is Abraham's willingness to kill his son. His worldview (faith) is what rendered him righteous, not the activity that faith enabled him to choose to do.

 

[Almost there]

Choosing sin or not is what the carnal man does it is his nature. But Carnal man cannot choose his own salvation that is a religious myth.

This is where the bible gets rather confusing. After all, Romans 10 says,

9If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved. 11 As Scripture says, “Anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame.”

 

[Almost there]

Choosing sin or not is what the carnal man does it is his nature. But Carnal man cannot choose his own salvation that is a religious myth.

For me, "carnal" man means "natural" man. And one that is saved (has been born again) now also has spiritual man. So, like Jesus, they are both natural (they occupy a human body) and spirit (they have been born into immortality). So we are all "carnal" man, even if saved. It's one of those leaven things. We are fully man and fully spirit, just as Jesus is fully man and fully God.

It means we are still tempted to sin. And the new testament makes that point extremely clear, all over the place. That is why there are warnings all over the place to fight the good fight, etc. but also calls to forgive. And frankly, if I start saying to myself, "I need to start being better or I'm not saved", I've fallen into works.

A Christian works to do what he knows is the right thing to do because he wants to please his father, not because he's afraid of getting written out of the will. He trusts that the words of his father are faithful and true and his father's faith trumps his lack of faith.

 

[Soar Like and Eagle]

For me, "carnal" man means "natural" man. And one that is saved (has been born again) now also has spiritual man. So, like Jesus, they are both natural (they occupy a human body) and spirit (they have been born into immortality). So we are all "carnal" man, even if saved. It's one of those leaven things. We are fully man and fully spirit, just as Jesus is fully man and fully God.

It means we are still tempted to sin. And the new testament makes that point extremely clear, all over the place. That is why there are warnings all over the place to fight the good fight, etc. but also calls to forgive. And frankly, if I start saying to myself, "I need to start being better or I'm not saved", I've fallen into works.

A Christian works to do what he knows is the right thing to do because he wants to please his father, not because he's afraid of getting written out of the will. He trusts that the words of his father are faithful and true and his father's faith trumps his lack of faith.

Not all people who claim to be born again are born again. I wish with all my heart that Christians would stop believing that they are born again the moment they believe. This doctrine, taught almost universally among evangelical people, has been an enormous hindrance in the progress of Christians, for they, thinking they have reached sonship, fail to press toward the mark of full sonship in Him. If men could only see that "that which is born of God cannot sin, for His seed remaineth in him and he cannot sin because he is born of God," (1 Jno. 3:9) then they would not be in such a hurry to declare that they are born again and thus full sons of God. There is a universe of difference between being justified by faith and being born again. Both the thief on the cross and the Philippian jailor believed on Christ and were justified from their sins, but I think we would be very wrong to imagine that they had done any more than "receive Him" and, because they had received Him, power was given to them to become sons of God.

There is a spiritual man and there is a carnal man yes we are all men of the flesh and have our carnality but there is a difference. many believes do not hear the spirit they hear only there preach, system or pope and the Holy Spirit is but another word in the bible they claim they have.

1 Corinthians 2:

14But the natural, nonspiritual man does not accept or welcome or admit into his heart the gifts and teachings and revelations of the Spirit of God, for they are folly (meaningless nonsense) to him; and he is incapable of knowing them [of progressively recognizing, understanding, and becoming better acquainted with them] because they are spiritually discerned and estimated and appreciated.

 

[Soar Like and Eagle]

This is where the bible gets rather confusing. After all, Romans 10 says,

9If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved. 11 As Scripture says, “Anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame.”

Impossible? This verse does not address how a man is saved there is no drawing from the Father, there is no quickening of the Spirit.


John 6:44 No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw (Gk(drag) him: and I will raise him up at the last day.


John 12:32 And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw (Gk(drag) all men unto me.


1670 helkuo (hel-koo'-o);or helko (hel'-ko); probably akin to 138; to drag (literally or figuratively):


There is no choice for the person when God draws you, drags you or forces you to come; it is God choice.

Eph 2:1-8 gives a clear view in context how the salvation process is accomplished in carnal man. God’s Spirit has to quicken us out of our dead spiritual state. Being dead spiritually is so easy to understand. Have you ever see some one dead? Well a spiritual man is dead to hearing seeing, receiving God and all the man made doctrine of freewill or choice cannot and will not waken carnal man out of that dead spiritual state.


"QUICK ."Quick means living and active — LIFE-GIVING! making it active, operative, energizing and effective, notice the context of Ephesians which shows us step by step how the salvation process works.

Eph, 2:1 And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins;
2Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:
3Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.
4But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us,
5Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved
6And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus:
7That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.
8For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
9Not of works, lest any man should boast

 

[ToBeLoved]

The context of 9:17 describes a God that, though he gives us free choice, he knows what we are going to do. Pharaoh is the example here. So if God is the same, yesterday, today and forever, then he had this same skill when Adam was created. i.e. he raised him up for a purpose. And that purpose was fulfilled just as His purpose for raising up Pharaoh was fulfilled. And the same goes for you and me.

That is a big jump. There are times when God intervened but not all that many considering the amount of time that passed during the timeline of the Old Testament. God was particular in mentioning when and if He intervened and in most situations He did not.

For instance, Abraham when he offered to sacrifice Isaac, God doesn't call Abraham the father of all those with faith because God caused Abraham or made him do it. God says it WAS ABRAHAM who showed God his great faith in God's promise.

I think your thinking is very off with this one. God did these things as exceptions, they were not the rule. God let Israel disobey and then they were punished for that disobedience because it was their choice. Same thing with the generation with Moses who would not enter the promised land.

 

[ToBeLoved]

How come the topic of this thread is changing?

 

[JackRT]

I see God as sovereign of all things and the idea that little Adam could cause all mankind for hundreds of generation fall under the curse of sin and death. Without God's total purpose a major part of it makes God in not control of all things? Before there was a sinner there was a savior for the Lamb was slain from the foundation of the earth.

It was God’s choose Adam to sin because God has a greater plan. If God did not ordain Adam and Eves sin; then He is not all knowing. It was God lowered Adam from a spirit to a loving soul, a dust man. It was God who made Adam and Eve innocent; they did not do it them selves. It was God who put the tree of good and evil in the garden. It was God who put the devil, a man slayer, a murderer, a liar in the garden; God totally knew what he was doing with Adam and Eve.

Against its will, all creation was subjected to God’s curse.

If God chose Adam to sin then Adam had no choice. If Adam had no choice then there was no sin. If there was no sin then there is no curse, If there was no curse then Original Sin is meaningless. This is monumentally poor theology.

 

[Soar Like and Eagle]

If God chose Adam to sin then Adam had no choice. If Adam had no choice then there was no sin. If there was no sin then there is no curse, If there was no curse then Original Sin is meaningless. This is monumentally poor theology.

If that is what you believe so be it. The facts are the facts and i am the one quoting scriptures not religious dogma or bias.

 

[Almost there]

Not all people who claim to be born again are born again. I wish with all my heart that Christians would stop believing that they are born again the moment they believe. This doctrine, taught almost universally among evangelical people, has been an enormous hindrance in the progress of Christians, for they, thinking they have reached sonship, fail to press toward the mark of full sonship in Him. If men could only see that "that which is born of God cannot sin, for His seed remaineth in him and he cannot sin because he is born of God," (1 Jno. 3:9) then they would not be in such a hurry to declare that they are born again and thus full sons of God. There is a universe of difference between being justified by faith and being born again. Both the thief on the cross and the Philippian jailor believed on Christ and were justified from their sins, but I think we would be very wrong to imagine that they had done any more than "receive Him" and, because they had received Him, power was given to them to become sons of God.

There is a spiritual man and there is a carnal man yes we are all men of the flesh and have our carnality but there is a difference. many believes do not hear the spirit they hear only there preach, system or pope and the Holy Spirit is but another word in the bible they claim they have.

1 Corinthians 2:

14But the natural, nonspiritual man does not accept or welcome or admit into his heart the gifts and teachings and revelations of the Spirit of God, for they are folly (meaningless nonsense) to him; and he is incapable of knowing them [of progressively recognizing, understanding, and becoming better acquainted with them] because they are spiritually discerned and estimated and appreciated.

This lays it out pretty well:

32 Bible verses about Being Born Again

 

[ToBeLoved]

John 6:44 No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw (Gk(drag) him: and I will raise him up at the last day.

If you look at Thayers Greek Lexicon it is not 'draw' / drag literally.

metaphorically, to draw by inward power, lead, impel: John 6:44

I think this verse proves God draws all mankind through knowledge.

Romans 1:18-24
18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness. 19 For what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood from His workmanship, so that men are without excuse.

21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified Him as God nor gave thanks to Him, but they became futile in their thinking and darkened in their foolish hearts. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools, 23and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images of mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

24 Therefore God gave them up in the desires of their hearts to impurity for the dishonoring of their bodies with one another. 25 They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator, who is forever worthy of praise!

 

[JackRT]

If that is what you believe so be it. The facts are the facts and i am the one quoting scriptures not religious dogma or bias.

Scripture can and has been approached in many ways with many different conclusions. You may not admit religious dogma or bias but it is there nonetheless. So be it.

 

[Almost there]

Impossible? This verse does not address how a man is saved there is no drawing from the Father, there is no quickening of the Spirit.

That's because it's not KJV.

This clarifies it (from Blueletterbible.com): [Eph 2:1 KJV] 1 And you [hath he quickened], who were dead in trespasses and sins;

It was added by human beings trying to add context that was not in the original greek. Not that that is a problem for me. But it is important to call out where it is done.

Have you checked out Greek lexicons regarding Ephesians 2:1?

 

[Almost there]

That is a big jump. There are times when God intervened but not all that many considering the amount of time that passed during the timeline of the Old Testament. God was particular in mentioning when and if He intervened and in most situations He did not.

For instance, Abraham when he offered to sacrifice Isaac, God doesn't call Abraham the father of all those with faith because God caused Abraham or made him do it. God says it WAS ABRAHAM who showed God his great faith in God's promise.

I think your thinking is very off with this one. God did these things as exceptions, they were not the rule. God let Israel disobey and then they were punished for that disobedience because it was their choice. Same thing with the generation with Moses who would not enter the promised land.

I'm using the teaching about the event from the new testament. Specifically Romans 4:3

 

[Almost there]

That is a big jump. There are times when God intervened but not all that many considering the amount of time that passed during the timeline of the Old Testament. God was particular in mentioning when and if He intervened and in most situations He did not.

For instance, Abraham when he offered to sacrifice Isaac, God doesn't call Abraham the father of all those with faith because God caused Abraham or made him do it. God says it WAS ABRAHAM who showed God his great faith in God's promise.

I think your thinking is very off with this one. God did these things as exceptions, they were not the rule. God let Israel disobey and then they were punished for that disobedience because it was their choice. Same thing with the generation with Moses who would not enter the promised land.

C.S. Lewis mentions that he believes that God only sometimes intervenes, and suggests that may be what happened ad Dunkirk (a very relevant thing at the time he said it). This is one of the few things I disagree with him on. Jesus asks us to pray for intervention. I have three bonafide miracles in my life that were God intervening in my life. I believe the teaching of the new testament is clear on this. He is the personal God of every individual, not of a group of people called "a nation". However, that group of people with whom he has a personal relationship is called "the church". And it is scattered across many nations.

 

[YouAreAwesome]

First you say this:

Yes man has a freewill to do evil but he does not have a freewill to save himself.

Then you say this:

Show me freewill when it come to the Garden of Eden and Adam?

Can you explain? Because these seem in contradiction.

God cannot be omnipotent, omniscience, omniscient, omnipotence, omnipresent if He only controls good.

Why is that? Maybe we have different definitions of what each these mean. Let's see...

That was omnipotent means having virtually unlimited authority or influence

Yes and no. Omnipotence means God is all-powerful but that doesn't mean He exerts His Power in every situation. He is not making us have this discussion for example, we are choosing to discuss this. If He so wanted He could break the laws that govern this world and ruin the entire point of making us, but the goal of free-creatures Who freely love Him is worth more to Him than all the suffering we cause to each other. It's a big cost revealing how valuable we are to Him. So by creating this world He has placed boundaries on His own involvement that are a function of our desire for Him to be here.

om·ni·scient having infinite awareness, understanding, and insight possessed of universal or complete knowledge.

Yes. He has complete knowledge of all there is to know. There are parts of the future that are "unknowable" because they are a function of our free-will, and so the future is unknowable. He is omniscient of the past and the present in its entirety. He also knows the settled future, that is, there are some events that will happen in the future that will definitely happen either by Him making it happen, or because it is will occur in every possible future scenario.

According to your belief some unknown agent has all this power and God is totally helpless when it comes to evil.

God is not insecure. He is not a control freak. He delegates responsibility. Not pretend responsibility but real responsibility. As I explained earlier, He gave authority for the earth to humanity. Humanity forfeited their authority and handed it over to the devil (hence why Jesus called the devil the ruler of the world). But Jesus won this authority back and handed it back to humanity. Now it's humanities job to establish the kingdom of God just as it was initially, because much of the earth is still under the kingdom of the devil, even though he can be cast down (this is called Christus Victor atonement theory and was the only way the early church understood Jesus' work on the earth--for the first 1000 years of church history it's the only understanding of the gospel). So God is not helpless in the sense that He is not powerful enough, He waits for us to work with Him because He has delegated real responsibility over to us. He is helpless in the sense that He won't override our authority to invite Him into the earth. Our prayers matter. Our work on earth matters.

 

[ToBeLoved]

C.S. Lewis mentions that he believes that God only sometimes intervenes, and suggests that may be what happened ad Dunkirk (a very relevant thing at the time he said it). This is one of the few things I disagree with him on. Jesus asks us to pray for intervention. I have three bonafide miracles in my life that were God intervening in my life. I believe the teaching of the new testament is clear on this. He is the personal God of every individual, not of a group of people called "a nation". However, that group of people with whom he has a personal relationship is called "the church". And it is scattered across many nations.

I think He intervenes much more in the lives of His Children, who pray that His will be done.

However, Pharoah was not one of God's Children.

 

[YouAreAwesome]

I personally disagree that the Tree of Knowlede was a metaphor.

Can you explain why you believe that?

I don't want to derail the thread so I'll just quickly say, I believe the book of Genesis is allegorical for the most part, it's the only book of the bible where the writer was not an eye-witness to the events written down, unless the writer saw in vision--if the writer did see in vision then there is even more reason to believe it is not a factual account but a teaching device.