I'm saying that Paul reveals that God imputes Adam's sin to mankind, for which men are thereby responsible (Romans 5:16a, Romans 5:18a, Romans 5:19a).
"Responsible" means that they have a choice, that they can do otherwise even if a divine hand reaching down first of all and offering to pull us up is essential.
Paul reveals that God imputes Adam's guilt to man (Romans 5:12-14), by which guilt all mankind is condemned (Romans 5:18).
Well, it doesn't say God imputes it, but He obviously allows the consequences of Adams' sin to be shared by all, the main consequence being spiritual separation from God, aka the "death of the soul", aka original sin. We're born into that state of ignorance of God along with a tacit desire to keep things that way, born of our own pride. This is why faith is so critical, as the means by which man humbly turns back to God, and is reconciled with Him.
Paul also reveals that God imputes Christ's own righteousness to man (Romans 5:16b, Romans 5:18b, Romans 5:19b) through faith.
This is why Jesus is called the second Adam. His righteousness is imputed to us just as Adam's guilt is imputed to us.
You’re failing to understand that Jesus’s righteousness is not merely imputed to us, which Rom 5:16-19 doesn’t say anyway, and is concept which at best reflects the truth that we’re freely and gratuitously
forgiven and cleansed at justification. But said righteousness is actually
given; we’re
made just at justification, indicated in the same chapter in Romans by passages such as:
"
And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us." Rom 5:5
"For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God’s abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ!" Rom 5:17
And so, since justice/righteousness is actually possessed by us now, at least in seedling form in need of being professed, expressed, exercised, nurtured, and grown, it can also be compromised and lost by the way we live our lives, by living very
unjustly. Sin can still earn a believer
death IOW: separation from God as a branch cut back off.
How is that any different from God loving Jacob and hating Esau before they were even born (Romans 9:10-13), so that Jacob was the puppet who received God's blessing, and Esau was the puppet who was rejected. . .before they were even born?
What kind of “God” would torture His
puppets eternally? And we don't even know if Esau is now and forever
being tormented for that matter.
See Paul's answer to this, which meaning is unmistakable, in Romans 9:14-21.
You must reckon with this if you are going to understand God's will and God's way, which human wisdom finds inscrutable, complicated and foolish (1 Corinthians 1:20-21, 1 Corinthians 2:12-14).
Nah. Especially in the light of
all Scripture being considered, it’s obvious that Paul isn’t endeavoring in Rom 9 to put forth some kind of precisely conceived and worded theological doctrine on predestination, but seeks to answer some lingering questions, even asking “What if…?” in verse 22. There are simply
way too many verses and passages that place an onus on
man to do his part in order to gain eternal life. This is why there have been a great deal of differing positions on this matter over the centuries. Scripture was never intended to serve as a clear and systematic catechism which is why it can seem vague, ambiguous, and even contradictory at times-and why there’s often so much disagreement over its interpretation among Sola Scriptura adherents. And either way we can’t know with absolute certainty that
we’re numbered among the elect to begin with, or able to predict whether we’ll persevere to the end, IOW.
And you know he wants it involved, how?
The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. 2 Pet 3:9
This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. 1 Tim 2:3
Does that sound like someone who
knows that all people, even those called, will necessarily repent? If He wants all to be saved, then why are not all saved? So, yes, He deems that the will of man be involved. This is why, when Jesus says in Matt 16,
“If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me.”
Or this in Rev 3,
“If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me”,
He doesn’t follow up with,
“But, come to think of it, you will come no matter what so those words aren’t really necessary, theologically speaking. Don’t worry about it, I got you covered. And no one else really needs to hear them either since they’re destined to die in their sins anyway.”
One real criteria for salvation is
not dying in our sins. And this is why Jesus came to
take away sins, to conquer sin in us so that we’ll “go, and sin no more”, as He instructed the woman caught in adultery. Because,
"But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." Rom 6:22-23
So then,
Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For in Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set you free from the law of sin and death. For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful man, as an offering for sin. He thus condemned sin in the flesh, so that the righteous standard of the law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. Rom 8:1-4
And then we must
continue to walk according to the Sprit, as our
option:
“Therefore, brothers and sisters, we have an obligation—but it is not to the flesh, to live according to it. For if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live.” Rom 8:12-13
Now in partnership with God, equipped by the Spirit, we can work out our salvation.
That’s what we can know for sure. Similarly, the reason that God is so
pleased in Heb 11:6 by our faith isn’t because he
made us believe, which would be rather absurd, but because we believe
without that faith being strictly caused, because we could do
otherwise; we can reject the gift of faith, IOW.
And then we have the multitude of verses instructing, exhorting, warning, admonishing, and encouraging
believers to strive, to endure to the end, to be vigilant, to be holy, to obey the law, to love, to forgive others their sins, to remain in Christ, to refrain from sin, etc, all with eternal life at stake.
See Nevertheless, man's will is involved, just not according to man's wisdom, but according to God's wisdom; i.e., God works in the disposition (heart) of man disposing him to prefer God, and then man freely and willingly chooses to believe and obey God.
Again, a distinction without a difference. The will of man is
uninvolved in any meaningfully sense here.
See We have no righteousness that justifies (removes guilt), it is Christ's righteousness imputed to us through faith which justifies (justification, Romans 4:5), and then we grow in the righteousness of sanctification.
We have no justice or righteousness
apart from God-that's the basis of the New Covenant. Man’s first step is to turn to Him in faith, then He begins to ‘place His law in our minds and write it on our hearts’-Jer 31:33. We agree that God
can make man personally righteous. In Catholicism justified man, now on track
with God, a partnership which, itself, constitutes the right and just order of things for man, is finally able to fulfill the destiny he was made for, maintaining and growing in the righteousness now sown in him, growing in love to put it most accurately. He can also turn back away. The will remains involved throughout this life. So, again, God's Church can wisely and rightly teach,
"At the evening of life we shall be judged on our love."