Does God Need Your Permission in Order to Save You?

[Hammster]

Maybe it is to Him.

Then I await your argument.

 

[jahel]

Then I await your argument.

The plan of salvation is personal to Him because it involves gaining knowledge of Him, yet it can only be done from a spiritual p.o.v. Historicity or even morality doesn’t quite cover it.

 

[Hammster]

The plan of salvation is personal to Him because it involves gaining knowledge of Him, yet it can only be done from a spiritual p.o.v. Historicity or even morality doesn’t quite cover it.

That still doesn’t make the atonement personal. With this view, I can’t say that Christ died for me.

 

[public hermit]

It's a simple question, which requires a simple, Yes or No, answer.

No

 

[renniks]

In what way did He die for all? What did His death secure for all?

Righteousness.

 

[Hammster]

Righteousness.

Everyone isn’t righteous.

 

[renniks]

Not everyone accepts Gods gift of righteousness.

Everyone isn’t righteous.

 

[expos4ever]

How is it personal?

You appear to believe that salvation is only personal if it is limited in scope.

Suppose there are 2 human beings, John and Jill, and that, on the predestination model, God has predestined John to salvation and Jill to loss. How is God’s salvific action made any less personal for John if it turns out that the Calvinist take turns out to be incorrect?

I will be interested to read your response.

 

[Hammster]

Not everyone accepts Gods gift of righteousness.

Then He doesn’t secure righteousness for everyone. That was the question.

 

[expos4ever]

I find it decidedly odd how those of a Calvinist bent will take the claim that we need to freely accept the gift of salvation and morph that into the understandably objectionable claim that we then become the agents of our salvation.

No one would think that way in analogous scenarios. If a firefighter risks his life to get to your room and then asks your “permission” before carrying you to safety, does that, in any reasonable sense, detract from the obvious fact that it is the firefighter, not you, who deserves the credit for your rescue?

Of course not.

 

[jahel]

That still doesn’t make the atonement personal. With this view, I can’t say that Christ died for me.

Shall we count your loss as our gain? No, because that is personal between Him and you.

 

[Hammster]

You appear to believe that salvation is only personal if it is limited in scope.

Suppose there are 2 human beings, John and Jill, and that, on the predestination model, God has predestined John to salvation and Jill to loss. How is God’s salvific action made any less personal for John if it turns out that the Calvinist take turns out to be incorrect?

I will be interested to read your response.

I’ve started to answer this a few times, but the question isn’t really clear to me. Could you reword it?

 

[Hammster]

I find it decidedly odd how those of a Calvinist bent will take the claim that we need to freely accept the gift of salvation and morph that into the understandably objectionable claim that we then become the agents of our salvation.

No one would think that way in analogous scenarios. If a firefighter risks his life to get to your room and then asks your “permission” before carrying you to safety, does that, in any reasonable sense, detract from the obvious fact that it is the firefighter, not you, who deserves the credit for your rescue?

Of course not.

You’d be correct if your analogy reflected what scripture teaches.

 

[Hammster]

Shall we count your loss as our gain? No, because that is personal between Him and you.

I don’t understand your point.

 

[jahel]

I don’t understand your point.

I probably don’t understand yours either. Again is that loss or gain? Do opinions really matter? Because that does seem to be all this thread contains. The readers loss for wasting their time I suppose.

 

[jahel]

Boys are nuts, so aptly named. As a dog returns to his vomit so is duplicity of mind or something like that.

 

[BBAS 64]

It's a simple question, which requires a simple, Yes or No, answer.

Nope...

All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, But He does according to His will in the host of heaven And among the inhabitants of earth; And no one can ward off His hand Or say to Him, 'What have You done?'

 

[expos4ever]

You’d be correct if your analogy reflected what scripture teaches.

Then please make the relevant argument - how, exactly, does Scripture give us full, or even large, credit for accepting an offer of salvation? That will be a challenge since, per my post, it really does not make sense to credit the recipient of an open offer of salvation for such salvation.

The substantial credit surely belongs to God even if we have to accept the offer.

 

[expos4ever]

The idea that salvation is not “personal” unless offered only to some really does not make sense. However, I think I understand the misplaced appeal of this argument. And it is this: given our self-centredness, we value attention and love that is directed our way to the exclusion of others. But this is clearly unhealthy and selfish- there is no rational reason to believe that someone loves us any the less if that person also loves others.

But our minds do not work this way- we want to be special.

There may be scriptural arguments in defence of predestination, but there is no coherent sense in which the Calvinist take makes salvation any more “personal”.

 

[Hammster]

Then please make the relevant argument - how, exactly, does Scripture give us full, or even large, credit for accepting an offer of salvation? That will be a challenge since, per my post, it really does not make sense to credit the recipient of an open offer of salvation for such salvation.

The substantial credit surely belongs to God even if we have to accept the offer.

We were dead. God made us alive. Ephesians 2.