Free will vs Predestination

SayaOtonashi

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What’s the point of trying to save people if people’s fate is decided?

than again God had allowed his choice people to looked into sodom to see if any good people in there or stopped to allow his people to change. Even those God doesn’t change his mind. So I’m a little confused
 

yeshuaslavejeff

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What’s the point of trying to save people if people’s fate is decided?

than again God had allowed his choice people to looked into sodom to see if any good people in there or stopped to allow his people to change. Even those God doesn’t change his mind. So I’m a little confused
He watches/ knows already/ what everyone will do. His Judgment is Perfect, Complete, with complete and perfect wisdom and understanding and righteousness and mercy.

It was not His choice people who looked into sodom to see if any righteous people were there.
 
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What’s the point of trying to save people if people’s fate is decided?

than again God had allowed his choice people to looked into sodom to see if any good people in there or stopped to allow his people to change. Even those God doesn’t change his mind. So I’m a little confused
The bottom line is that 1 John 1:9 is the promise that takes priority over everything else. The fact that we are able to take hold of the promise settles the question of predestination and election. So if you confess your sin, then God is faithful and just to forgive you your sin and cleanse you from all unrighteousness. Once putting your faith in that promise, you can know that you are elected.
 
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Dave G.

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The bottom line is that 1 John 1:9 is the promise that takes priority over everything else. The fact that we are able to take hold of the promise settles the question of predestination and election. So if you confess your sin, then God is faithful and just to forgive you your sin and cleanse you from all unrighteousness. Once putting your faith in that promise, you can know that you are elected.
Amen Amen !! You saved me a two paragraph letter lol !
 
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BrotherDave

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What’s the point of trying to save people if people’s fate is decided?

It is confusing, but as mentioned we do not try to save people (Psalm 3:8, Ro 9:15).

The points are:
1. God commands us to bring his word to the world (Mark 16:15).
2. Our desire to share God’s word and his message of salvation is a direct indicator (1 Cor 9:16, Ro 6:18) of the condition of our own heart. (So it should not matter what the outcome will be. There is nothing better in life than sharing His word).

So, while its true that peoples fate has been decided (Eph 1:4-13), no one knows who are saved and who are not. If we truly are saved we should have a strong desire to spread the good news of the gospel and glorify God (Gal 4:18). God reaches His people through the hearing of his word (Ro 10:17, 2 Thes 2:14) and we are the ones who are to bring the word to them so they may hear if that is God’s will for them.

If we have verbally accepted Christ and think we are saved but keep living life according to standards of the world and have no concern for the spiritual condition of our neighbor then that is an indication we are not truly saved. A saved person puts Jesus first. Has an inner drive and desire to learn more scripture and love his neighbor by having a loving concern for their spiritual health.
 
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renniks

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What’s the point of trying to save people if people’s fate is decided?

than again God had allowed his choice people to looked into sodom to see if any good people in there or stopped to allow his people to change. Even those God doesn’t change his mind. So I’m a little confused
Why do you think that people's fate is decided? According to scripture God was planning to destroy the Ninivites, but when they repented he changed his mind.
 
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If we have verbally accepted Christ and think we are saved but keep living life according to standards of the world and have no concern for the spiritual condition of our neighbor then that is an indication we are not truly saved. A saved person puts Jesus first. Has an inner drive and desire to learn more scripture and love his neighbor by having a loving concern for their spiritual health.
I totally agree! Although the Mosaic Law with its observances, ceremonies, holy days, and rituals no longer apply, God's moral law always does, and a truly saved person will have the strong desire, fuelled by the indwelling Holy Spirit to do everything he can to comply with it, but, although he mourns and groans within himself when he cannot be perfect as his heart wants to be, he is not discouraged or condemned by his failures and shortcomings. When he trips and falls, he gets right up and carries on in the race.

A person who has just religion and nothing more, will give up and walk away from Christ, saying that "this religion thing doesn't work for me". A truly converted Christian will run to Christ and take hold of Him when he fails in any aspect of God's moral law because he knows that Christ is his only hope.
 
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What’s the point of trying to save people if people’s fate is decided?

than again God had allowed his choice people to looked into sodom to see if any good people in there or stopped to allow his people to change. Even those God doesn’t change his mind. So I’m a little confused
Whether you think you have free will or not, you are not supposed to swear oaths. God did not predetermine that people should stop trying to live better lives.

Matthew 5:36 (WEB)
36 Neither shall you swear by your head, for you can’t make one hair white or black.
 
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SayaOtonashi

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But if God knows all. Doesn't that mean he plans everything out?

Why do you think that people's fate is decided? According to scripture God was planning to destroy the Ninivites, but when they repented he changed his mind.
But doesn't God not change but always stay the same?
 
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renniks

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But if God knows all. Doesn't that mean he plans everything out?


But doesn't God not change but always stay the same?
Does knowing equal causation? Depends what you mean by God planning. God knows what he will do in reaction to what people do, in fact, you could say he has always known, because as far as we know, time doesn't exist for him. But, we have to go with what scripture says, instead of our speculations about how God operates, and he says he regrets things, he says he changes his mind and he says that what we do changes things. There is mystery involved, for sure, but foreknowing doesn't mean our fates are deciding without our input. That's fatalism, not Christianity.
 
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SayaOtonashi

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Does knowing equal causation? Depends what you mean by God planning. God knows what he will do in reaction to what people do, in fact, you could say he has always known, because as far as we know, time doesn't exist for him. But, we have to go with what scripture says, instead of our speculations about how God operates, and he says he regrets things, he says he changes his mind and he says that what we do changes things. There is mystery involved, for sure, but foreknowing doesn't mean our fates are deciding without our input. That's fatalism, not Christianity.
That with all his wisdom he decided everything in advance. We also have Romans and the fact Jesus known Judas would betray him. King David was picked
 
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renniks

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That with all his wisdom he decided everything in advance. We also have Romans and the fact Jesus known Judas would betray him. King David was picked
What do you mean he decided everything in advance? If God isn't within time, what does that even mean? Yes, lots of people were picked for certain tasks, so what? That doesn't mean their actions don't affect the world in a real way. Ever hear of the butterfly effect? Everything we do or don't do has real effects on the world. You're going to have to flesh out "We have Romans." because Romans doesn't teach individual election or fatalism.
 
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SayaOtonashi

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What do you mean he decided everything in advance? If God isn't within time, what does that even mean? Yes, lots of people were picked for certain tasks, so what? That doesn't mean their actions don't affect the world in a real way. Ever hear of the butterfly effect? Everything we do or don't do has real effects on the world. You're going to have to flesh out "We have Romans." because Romans doesn't teach individual election or fatalism.
That we all are predestined. That from the moment we are born it's decided if we go to heaven or hell

Romans 8:29-30
 
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renniks

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That we all are predestined. That from the moment we are born it's decided if we go to heaven or hell

Romans 8:29-30
Hogwash. This is a reference to the old testament saints who God called and justified and glorified, it has nothing to do with go picking individual people for salvation and not others. It speaks of those who God " knew" in the past. Why did he know them? Because of their faith.

What is predestined is not who will be in the faith or out, but what will happen to all who are in. They will eventually be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ and glorified. God predestines the consequence of the choice to be in Christ or not, but he doesn’t predestine the choice itself. Scripture is clear that God wants every person to put their trust in his Son, and through his Spirit God empowers us toward this end (2 Pet. 3:9).
 
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What’s the point of trying to save people if people’s fate is decided?

than again God had allowed his choice people to looked into sodom to see if any good people in there or stopped to allow his people to change. Even those God doesn’t change his mind. So I’m a little confused

God sees our future actions, but He doesn't make us carry them out.

If He sees a thief break into your house five years in the future, complete with the key the thief had copied and manufactured at the local locksmith, along with the discussion he might have had with a few of his mates about his intention, that doesn't mean God made him do it.

The thief still made his own choice. It's just that God sees him doing it in five years time (what we might these days call virtual reality I suppose), and when the real time rolls around, He sees Him doing it in actuality.

I have a personal issue with the business of predestination, but ultimately it's more a question of God's love, rather than a philosophical discussion of whether we're predestined or not.

I've made the claim ad infinitum, and I'm sticking to it, that the night my father died, he appeared in my bedroom at the same time. During our discussion, he blurted out at one stage, "I always was doomed! I didn't really have any choice!"

I was an atheist at the time, but I argued back "That can't be right!". Even as an atheist, I thought this was unjust. He replied, "Oh, it's right, all right. You can see that from here!" I presume he had some sort of insight I lacked - all I could see was him, but he spent most of the time looking at something over my head and behind me. His appearance varied from a look of awe, to sometimes hiding his face behind his hands and seeming quite distraught when he did so. Then the look of awe would resume. At the very end of the whole episode, he gave this blood curdling scream and just disappeared. It was obvious something was coming for him.

When I turned around to see what he was looking at, all I saw was the bedroom wall. So I was blocked from seeing what he could see. Nor was I able to see what came for him that terrified him so much. I could only see him at all times.

But ... later in the same conversation, he said "I was WILLING..." (to do the things that condemned him, including a lifetime of deliberate cruelty as he admitted. He deliberately destroyed my confidence for example, as he admitted viz. "I did it deliberately...").

Since as a child himself he'd had a very austere childhood in the depression years, including having whooping cough; then fought in the Second World War in Papua New Guinea (getting Malaria into the bargain), and never had a great job in his life (although he nearly always had some sort of work), then I wonder how God justifies His claim (or is it merely our claim) that He is "LOVE"?

I also think my father's relations with his own father weren't the best, although I suspect that he was very rebellious.

My argument is not a philosophical bun fight about whether we're predestined in the sense that God can see all the future in His unbounded "Now" (which is a by-product of His omnipotence), but if we're predestined in the sense of "I didn't really have any choice!"

That's my beef about it. If so, what does His "LOVE" really mean, and is it true? As my old pastor once said to me when I was still Presbyterian, "I sometimes wonder if it's true (that God is Love). He seems to write people off pretty easily".
 
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What’s the point of trying to save people if people’s fate is decided?

than again God had allowed his choice people to looked into sodom to see if any good people in there or stopped to allow his people to change. Even those God doesn’t change his mind. So I’m a little confused

There is no point at all, but if everything is predestined, the little puppets who go through the empty motions of attempting to "save people" have no choice but to go through those empty motions. Everything is empty. Everything is meaningless. Nothing matters, everything is pointless. We are just cartoon characters in a scripted panel. There is no choice. Thus, the cartoon characters scripted to try to "save people" will go through their cartoonish motions, and the cartoon characters scripted to ask why one should bother are scripted to go through their own cartoonish motions. We don't even have a choice in how we feel about such things. Just a set of Barbie dolls to be played with. Some will be put on a shelf, some will be shredded, nothing the dolls can do at all, they just are passive victims of the owner.
 
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