Is freewill real or just something we invented it ?

[grumix8]

We start from the beggining when Adam was giving the power to name the animals G-d gave him freewill to choose Genesis 2:20.
20 The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him.

Here G-d gives Adam gives him ability to think for himself and he decide the animals name.

There is difference from the freewill Hebrew people back in the days of Noah and Moses when the law was directed to G-d's people they had freewill to decide. Their decision is under the law because they did not know other religions or ways they were narrowminded but still the decision from good and evil existed. Did the errors of their fathers before them I mean the fall of Adam stopped them making decisions in their life. Israel did what they want based still of need of surviving. Killing, eating, proceating needs of humanity but no matter what the error of Adam did not take freewill from them.

Romans 7:19 “For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want.”

Ezekiel 18:20 “The person who sins will die. The son will not bear the punishment for the father’s iniquity, nor will the father bear the punishment for the son’s iniquity; the righteousness of the righteous will be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked will be upon himself.”

Psalm 110:2 "Your people will volunteer freely in the day of Your power; In holy array, from the womb of the dawn, Your youth are to You as the dew."



From the day pagans evolved into modern world and establish their own way. Even thou they seperated from their pagan worhsip Rome forced them to mix their deities and influence with christianism and robbed the followers of Christ of Jesus and they painted him white. Named the G-d of Israel to Zeus and change their panteon.

Hebrew law or mosaic law reminds people to obey but G-d has taken prophets to save and do the will of G-d in wars, missions, and choosing good and evil. They break the law in disobeying G-d, prophets like Jeremiah who chose G-d disobey tradition and his father and told Israel their errors and love for the temple forgotten the temple inside they are made of. Kick Jeremiah out of their circle rejected from society he continued, we have Elijah who many don't talk about but he change the words of G-d and sentence Jezabel but G-d only wanted to punish Jezabel but Elijah added her family as punishment. G-d was angry at Elijah but forgave him. Still G-d's plan was only Jezabel but he made an exception for Elijah and freewill existed and changed yes G-d allows it.

People can change their course in life but what is the promblem from today. Is how the Greek way of thinking of liberalism was popular in the time of Jesus.

James 2:12 "So speak and so act as those who are to be judged by the law of liberty."

2 Corinthians 3:17 "Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty."


And Greeks influence the time of jesus that people like Luke wrote his book in the bible and later Catholic church not knowing fully Hebrew culture copied things from greeks and influence the bible. Remember they were not G-d's people but A country that stoled and wrote their intrepretation of G-d and took Jesus as an emblema that is not real.

Greek theology is freedom and rationalist thought, Hebrew people is Law and Relation with the one G-d. Greeks have influence the modernworld and gives them right, the western world copies Greek and Roman culture and their diffinity in their laws have given the modern topic freewill. So freewill clashes with freewill in the old times. That is why everything has to do with predestination, Calvanism go ahead and read see all our versions of choosing good and evil have consequences but still you decide your future.


There are 2 fields :indeterminism and determinism explain modern freewill and both give notion of control. Indeterminism means free acts are not determine in other words what you do with works does not foretold your future and the path you have chosen. Determinism says everything you do has already decided your future and you have no career. Nothing can change your destiny but G-d can.

Matthew 12:37 “For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.”

God's general sovereignty- says god is in charge of everything but doesn't control everything
God's specific sovereignty- says that He not only has ordained everything, but He also controls everything.

Proverbs 16:9 “The mind of the man plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps.

Proverbs 3:5-6"Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight."

 

[grumix8]

What aspect of the life of Jacob ... starting with his birth and ending with his burial in Egypt ... was "simple"?

• being born younger and chosen by God to obtain the inheritance?
• purchasing his brother's birthright?
• Obeying his mother to trick his blind father to steal the blessing?
• Fleeing to avoid being murdered by his brother?
• Being tricked into marrying the sister of the woman he fell in love with?
• Being cheated by his father in law for 14 years?
• Having a household divided between the children from 4 different women that were all born and named as part of a life long power play in the ultimate dysfunctional home?
• Having your children start to murder their brother, sell him into slavery instead, and cover it up with evidence of Joseph being torn apart by wild animals?
• Was Joseph's time in slavery, then prison then the palace simple?
• Was God's plan to reunite and heal the relationship among the sons of Israel simple?
• Was God's plan to save Israel from starvation, only to enslave them in Egypt and raise up Moses to deliver them as a preview of Christ through the Passover and the Exodus also simple?

All of this is just the "simple" life of one man (Jacob/Israel) from Birth to Death.
That was the point.

Put verses from the bible -_-.

 

[wandering misfit]

If man didn’t have free will he could not be justly punished for failing to meet God’s expectations. In order for God’s judgement upon man to be just God has to make His expectations of man achievable otherwise He would be imposing impossible expectations on man and punishing man for all eternity for failing to meet impossible expectations. This would contradict the very definition of the word “just” meaning moral, fair and impartial.

Hmmm, you may call unjust, others see the importance of the judgment of Eve and Adam's sin and why the OT fathers believed Yahveh's promises (prophets) and looked towards the cross and why we Chrisitians look back at it. Both covenants have to be given proper perspective in God's purpose, not why can't all just say hey I have saving faith, I chose it.

 

[atpollard]

Put verses from the bible -_-.

Genesis 25:19 to Genesis 49:33

setting the stage for Genesis 50:1 to Exodus 40:38

 

[Landon Caeli]

It's real, but limited by our sin nature.

So true...

Do We Have Free Will?

Mental illnesses are common in the United States. Nearly one in five U.S. adults live with a mental illness (51.5 million in 2019)

 

[disciple Clint]

What aspect of the life of Jacob ... starting with his birth and ending with his burial in Egypt ... was "simple"?

• being born younger and chosen by God to obtain the inheritance?
• purchasing his brother's birthright?
• Obeying his mother to trick his blind father to steal the blessing?
• Fleeing to avoid being murdered by his brother?
• Being tricked into marrying the sister of the woman he fell in love with?
• Being cheated by his father in law for 14 years?
• Having a household divided between the children from 4 different women that were all born and named as part of a life long power play in the ultimate dysfunctional home?
• Having your children start to murder their brother, sell him into slavery instead, and cover it up with evidence of Joseph being torn apart by wild animals?
• Was Joseph's time in slavery, then prison then the palace simple?
• Was God's plan to reunite and heal the relationship among the sons of Israel simple?
• Was God's plan to save Israel from starvation, only to enslave them in Egypt and raise up Moses to deliver them as a preview of Christ through the Passover and the Exodus also simple?

All of this is just the "simple" life of one man (Jacob/Israel) from Birth to Death.
That was the point.

My thought would be that all these problems were caused by man and not by God.

 

[Cormack]

1 Corinthians 10:12-14

So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall! No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it. Therefore, my dear friends, flee from idolatry.
​

1. Christians are threatened and even overtaken by sins brought about through temptations.

2. God never allows us to be tempted beyond what we can bear, but rather provides an escape so that we don’t give in and fall into the sin action that the temptation prompts in us.

3. Yet Christians sin, not only are they “overtaken” in the above quote, but also in 1 John 1:8 there’s the clear report that Christians sin. Most people agree Christians are sinners too.

Conclusion: Every time a Christian sins, the Bible says God provided a way to “escape” falling into that sin. Christians have the freewill to either use that escape route or to reject the God given means to avoid yielding to temptation.

Christians have proper freewill, meaning the ability to do otherwise in any given situation. Freewill isn’t simply “a belief” but an experience, something we can confirm with our own facilities as easily as we confirm light, heat, sound and sights.

Posters who use their counter causal freedom to deny counter causal freedom are deeply confused.

 

[Cormack]

There are only two things Christians can do about temptation, @grumix8. Christians can either bear with the temptation or give in and satisfy the temptation.

The Bible says God prepares a way to abstain from sin every single time Christians give in to temptation and sin, but we know for a fact that Christians do sin and will continue to sin.

The Bible confirms both our God given freedom to avoid sin and the fact that we defer from Gods good way and give into temptation and sin.

Freedom exists in exactly the way you experience it, not in some counter intuitive, fruity double dipping way you’ll read about in the Westminster confession or the London baptist confession of faith. Those things are so removed from the real world it’s terrible.

 

[Direct Driver]

I think the only thing that actually exists is my consciousness. My body, this world, and all you guys are just a projection God put on my consciousness.

Prove me wrong.

Obviously I'm joking. My point is that we don't know what we don't know regarding so much. One puts faith in the "ultimate" intellect of man at their own peril. Rather, I see us as an ant farm. You may be the smartest ant in the farm, but you still have the intellectual capacity of an ant. And we are more removed from God's ways than that ant is from ours.

And don't bother to try to explain to the and the difference between the functionality of a gasoline engine and a diesel engine.

Free will? As far as we're concerned, yes, we have one, just as ants do. And they do - up to a point.

 

[Cormack]

You may be the smartest ant in the farm, but you still have the intellectual capacity of an ant.

We are made in Gods image and the Word became truly human, taking on “the intellectual capacity of an ant,” as you’ve shared.

So, however different we are from our Heavenly Father, stressing those differences (while He’s gone so far to remove them) seems to result more in confounding conversation, not improving it.

 

[BobRyan]

We have freewill God lets us decide to do good or bad and our purpose in life is when we make that decision. it's easy to not know that purpose because we are different. But freewill God gives it but he also gives us the law and the law is not wrong and niether is freewill just soceity itself is wrong and we have forgotten what is the normal back in those days. Society mistakes and thinks G-d is against freewill but gave freewill the right to choose and they have invented freewill is voting, paying taxes, and civics duties. No people those things are the mistake modern society makes because they think they have evolved in such A way they surpass all of Israel back in those day but truth G-d is fair and gave us all. We have lost what is important love because human society is wrong and it's foundation is false and invented by masons.

G-d created it all the rocks, the atmosphere, everything has been giving and from all that we have built buildings and empires everything we have built has come from him modern world is our work and act but we do not acknowledge them we take the glory and everything for we are sinful. The concept of government we have created but we emulated it from G-d and his kingdom the order G-d has it first, the structure he establish since the dawn of the universe. We have created rights but we cannot use our rights agaisnt G-d and say he has violated them or civic manner say our freedom and establishment of our democracy hits against G-d and his kingdom. For he has the kingdom and the law. The law of his word and we do not have that for G-d gave us words but we are babylon the law is only his. Nor it belongs to hebrew people, eunuchs, or angels it only belongs to him to judge.

Our own system is flaw because we copy from each empire that has been establish Babylon, Rome, Greece, Britian, and Nazi Germany. Each has given its concept of right and law and all have copied each other and failed. Because again bible has establish that G-d and his system works and we with our notion of democracy and rights have copied on Rome and Babylon and they are wrong. The most important things that because we have technology which has help us after world war 2 we think we have surpass it all and enter the digitla world and we circumvalent our promblems of family, corruption, and normal things we had before the 1950's and think we are gods. And we want to be eternal and to be like powerful like G-d because it is what we have always been thinking because all of it is copy. When we are original and have the right system like he does everything works but our government and system does not because we are with flaws and our own boundaries aren't the solutions they are A reminder that we will never have A perfect system thus our rights and belief in them cannot be the truth. The freewill is revealed that there is A difference from freewill with G-d on accepting the right and wrong and succeeding in that way and from freewill from our modern concept which has failed and clashes with G-d's law which is right and truth and unless we do not use our rights against G-d freewill is that what we make only A lie and it existence false.

Freewill from that point of view is that of society and since society has masonry in it and all foundations of masonery is babylon and Dagon it compells people to make G-d like unfair despotism but you cannot apply that to G-d for he is G-d and he is God of Gods those words are just feeble people who make laws copying the old empires and fallacy arrives in it's policy. There is A way government can follow G-d's politics but that will be another day. But people and society will always collapse confronting and using thier rights and saying there is no freewill when you have to one understand things from G-d's point of view understand what serveth the law, how the law is completed thru love and how faith as A tool helps you make A better realtionship with G-d. When you find the truth and love in his way that G-d establish thru Jesus Christ you understand A secret way which freewill co-exist with G-d and love is what that bound unites it and makes freewill work but not under modern society but thru G-d mosaic law and know that is true freewill has been given to you but from the stance of modern world and republics establish go into error. I will explain more but have did A lot.

Certainly it is true that we live in flawed sinful world. Satan tells Jesus in Luke 4:6 "the world is mine and I give it to whomever I wish". So then our sinful nature and the flawed world are certainly a "problem". But God has influence both on the heart of man and in the world holding back the tide of evil. So despotism is of the evil one but a "checks and balances" system where government is designed under the assumption that "people even in government , are prone to having bad ideas and need checks and balances" - is better then just ruling via a handful of despots. Its like placing some band aids and patches on a failing system rather than just letting it all fall apart.

 

[Direct Driver]

We are made in Gods image and the Word became truly human, taking on “the intellectual capacity of an ant,” as you’ve shared.

So, however different we are from our Heavenly Father, stressing those differences (while He’s gone so far to remove them) seems to result more in confounding conversation, not improving it.

I think of us as "in God's image" in the same way a manager of a Wal-Mart is the company's "image". i.e. as far as the employees of the store and the customers are concerned, the manager IS Wal Mart.

That is, God has given us dominion over the earth. As far as the earth is concerned, we ARE God. That's why, IMO, it is completely proper to "play god" regarding how you treat everything around you and the lives of animals. But we certainly don't have anything close to His knowledge and understanding of this universe he created. That's why we can't explain quantum entanglement or this.

BTW, the "store manager" is Jesus. And I don't think this is the only Wal Mart...

 

[BNR32FAN]

Hmmm, you may call unjust, others see the importance of the judgment of Eve and Adam's sin and why the OT fathers believed Yahveh's promises (prophets) and looked towards the cross and why we Chrisitians look back at it. Both covenants have to be given proper perspective in God's purpose, not why can't all just say hey I have saving faith, I chose it.

No it’s not that I call it unjust it’s that God’s judgement without free will would contradict the very definition of the word just. If man is incapable of meeting God’s expectations then His judgement is not impartial or fair. God would be showing partiality towards some but not towards others which would by definition make His judgement unjust. It’s not a matter of opinion of what is just and what isn’t, it’s a matter of is God showing partiality towards some and not towards others? If there is no free will then God is showing partiality, that would not be an opinion but a fact. Therefore if God is showing partiality then His judgement defies the definition of the word just.

 

[Cormack]

Mmhmm, but none of that helps so far as painting the subject of freewill as some kind of super elite level knowledge problem that only God in heaven can know of or speak authoritatively on. Freedom (as I’ve shared) isn’t simply believed but rather experienced.

The reason people would find your fictional solipsist funny is because he’s just arguing with himself if his beliefs are true (he’s challenging himself to debunk himself,) but his beliefs are disproven by having naturally experienced other beings besides himself. About solipsism people chide “you’d have to have a PHD to believe something like that,” it’s just so silly and not worth considering.

The same goes for playing hide and seek with freewill as if we’re not having the freewill experience daily. Freewill isn’t a knowledge problem nor would it be something hidden in the otherness of God, God communicates to us in ways we can understand, not in ways we can’t. Jesus is part of that communication, becoming ant man was good enough for Him.

I don’t think anyone will find verses explicitly arguing for a definition of freedom, freedom limited by nature or determinism because that’s not what Israel or the church was debating back in those days.

The freewill debate occurred after Christ’s resurrection between the church fathers and the Gnostics, it’s the church fathers who were on the side of freedom of the will in those early days when the debate was relevant.

 

[Cormack]

The fact that people still think the freewill debate is relevant when it was in fact settled by the early church in favour of proper freedom to choose otherwise, that shows a telling victory for Gnostics, indoctrinators and just a lack of common sense overall.

If we want to know if freedom of choice is truly possible, just stop, think, decide whether or not you’d like to continue reading this message, then choose. It’s not a divine mystery, it’s real life.

@Direct Driver (because I carelessly didn’t tag or quote you on #34)

 

[Direct Driver]

Mmhmm, but none of that helps so far as painting the subject of freewill as some kind of super elite level knowledge problem that only God in heaven can know of or speak authoritatively on. Freedom (as I’ve shared) isn’t simply believed but rather experienced.

The reason people would find your fictional solipsist funny is because he’s just arguing with himself if his beliefs are true (he’s challenging himself to debunk himself,) but his beliefs are disproven by having naturally experienced other beings besides himself. About solipsism people chide “you’d have to have a PHD to believe something like that,” it’s just so silly and not worth considering.

The same goes for playing hide and seek with freewill as if we’re not having the freewill experience daily. Freewill isn’t a knowledge problem nor would it be something hidden in the otherness of God, God communicates to us in ways we can understand, not in ways we can’t. Jesus is part of that communication, becoming ant man was good enough for Him.

I don’t think anyone will find verses explicitly arguing for a definition of freedom, freedom limited by nature or determinism because that’s not what Israel or the church was debating back in those days.

The freewill debate occurred after Christ’s resurrection between the church fathers and the Gnostics, it’s the church fathers who were on the side of freedom of the will in those early days when the debate was relevant.

I think of "free will" as was demonstrated by the bad guy in "The vanishing" (the european version). He had a permanently disfigured couple of fingers because, as a child, he stood on an upper floor balcony and noticed he could not bring himself to jump off, for the obvious reason. So, to PROVE to himself that he truly had free will, he jumped.

That is, we may have "free will", but sometimes it is very hard to exercise if we fear the outcome. The "risk averse" have less free will than those that are willing to take chances.

But at the end of the day, yes, we have free will within the constraints of the meat bodies we occupy.

 

[Cormack]

I think of "free will" as was demonstrated by the bad guy in "The vanishing" (the european version). He had a permanently disfigured couple of fingers because, as a child, he stood on an upper floor balcony and noticed he could not bring himself to jump off, for the obvious reason. So, to PROVE to himself that he truly had free will, he jumped.

Sounds like a cool movie, I’ll have to watch it.

 

[Direct Driver]

Sounds like a cool movie, I’ll have to watch it.

Well, it was a long time ago and I thought it was rather creepy and, well, dumb. But that one takeaway did stick with me.

Obviously the bad guy was nuts.

 

[atpollard]

My thought would be that all these problems were caused by man and not by God.

[Genesis 50:20 NKJV] 20 "But as for you, you meant evil against me; [but] God meant it for good, in order to bring it about as [it is] this day, to save many people alive.

[Isaiah 45:7 KJV] 7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these [things].

 

[Cormack]

[Isaiah 45:7 KJV] 7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these [things].

Which is a well known false rendering. God doesn’t create “evil,” the translators simply bungled that word and every modern committee knows it. The correct translation is calamity, notice it’s supposed to be in contrast to peace, the opposite of peace isn’t evil. God brings calamity upon wicked cities for example.