Recent content by Fervent

There's something often missed regarding the poor widow, which is that right before calling attention to her putting all she had into the coffers Jesus talked about the scribes and pharisee's devouring widow's houses. So it seems to me there's something else going on there than simply praising...

This is one of the more interesting points in OT guidelines for the tithe, since it makes it clear that it wasn't a sacrifice in the way sacrifice tends to mean to moderns but was at least in part a matter of worship through celebration. Especially because the "whatever your heart desires" is...

In the OT, where the tithe comes from, it was only the fruits of the ground that could be given as a tithe. It was done for a number of reasons, and giving time at a homeless shelter would be in the spirit of many of those. But what Christ revealed, in elevating the law, is that obedience is not...

The tithe was never a monetary offering, and was specific in what was to be given. New testament giving, actually new testament living in general, is not a matter of following clearly defined guidelines, because those things only lead to a bare minimum effort and often with resentment.. New...

I'm familiar with this sort of reasoning, but it's not true. There's no ability to boast in receiving a gift, it remains charity. A beggar who accepts a meal remains a beggar even after accepting the meal and has nothing to boast over the one who refuses the meal. While Paul was confronted in...

Those verses don't contradict a need for receiving the gift. Grace and faith don't negate the action of the will, nor does a passive reception of the gift of salvation negate it being of grace and faith. As for support of such a need, it's threaded throughout the whole Bible from Joshua...

Justification is not all there is to salvation, justification is freely given to all but salvation must be received willingly.

It's clear at this point we're not going to get anywhere in this discussion, so I wish you the best and God bless.

There are other final causes than God, at least in the Aristotlean sense of final cause. A hairbrushes final cause is brushing hair, a bananas final cause is human consumption. So while the ultimate final cause would be God, final cause is not just God. Is there some kind of hive mind that...

It's not that everyone means the wrong thing by the word "why," but that common usage isn't the best starting point for a discussion such as this. While common usage can allow "why" to have a broader sense and does include "how" and "what," there is a clear aspect of "why" that is unique to the...

Nope, final cause is the purpose or telos of an object. The end to which it is directed. Certainly, but that's a bit irrelevant to our conversation. The issue is, it's not just a method. In principal, it is. But in reality, no method of inquiry can be isolated from the human being who is...

There's nothing arbitrary in my restriction, because the ordinary usage of the word is sloppy and leads to semantic confusion since people often use "why" when they mean "how" or "what." There's nothing uncommon about restricting the usage of a word to a particular aspect, and nothing arbitrary...

I understand your point, but it shows a twisted way of thinking. On top of that, you're not drawing your point from the Bible but using the verse to prop up your opinion. That's quite a twist you're putting on the passage, but it doesn't imply that their will to do as their father desires is...

Romans 3:10-12 is completely out of context there, and has nothing to do with what you've written in addition to it.

It's not, it's only when passages are ripped out as proof texts that they may be forced into support of being against free will. For example, the passage you quoted in the OP has nothing to do with free will or a lack thereof, it was addressing Jewish complaints that God wasn't punishing the...