WOW ! you have really drunk deep the kool-aid!
Is an insult really necessary or effective do you think?
Romans 8:8
So then they that are in the flesh
cannot please God.
Those who are obeying their fleshly desires rather than God's commands, cannot please God. This says nothing at all against free will. In fact it implies free will. It doesn't say here that nobody can please God. Paul specifies a certain class of people, "
they that are in the flesh."
That's a limiting statement and you are totally ignoring that grammatical limitation. It doesn't mean "all men" and it isn't talking about just people who have flesh. Were this the case, then Jesus couldn't have pleased God because he was also made of flesh. That isn't what he means there. He means people who are submitting to their own fleshly desires.
What part of cannot do you not understand? Anyone who is unsaved can not do 1 thing that pleases God! It does not say not want, or don't feel like obeying, it says they CANNOT!
That's not what it says. It doesn't say that they have no ability in and of themselves to obey. It says that when they're performing to their own standard of flesh, that they cannot please God.
That means they are incapapble of pleasing God! Th elost have no free will. They are spiritually dead,and slaves to sin.
They are sinning. Disobedient to God. They, of their own free will are being disobedient.
Correct and those in the flesh are inescapable (cannot) please God. They have no choice. Works do not save anyway! or keep us saved, if one believes Gods' Word.
Works do save as Jesus himself said.
28 Then they inquired, “What must we
do to
perform the
works of God?” 29 Jesus replied, “The
work of God is this:
to believe in the One He has sent.”
So, Jesus tells them in response to the question "What must we
do," that they must believe. Belief itself is a work. If we're not saved by work, then Jesus was either lying or it is impossible to be saved.
And it is foreknowledge through pre-arrangement . Not God knowing in advance whether someone will accept or reject Christ.
Foreknowledge is knowing in advance, it is not arranging in advance. You are re-defining words.
But let me ask you a question. If those in the human nature cannot please god- how can they choose of their own "free will" to accept Christ as Savior? That is something that pleases God. And God says those in the flesh cannot please Him!
Because they were in their "human nature" - obedience to their own desires, not obeying God. They chose to obey the flesh rather than God. That's what Paul is saying.
But they can't please god! So how can they choose Jesus which pleases God when they are incapable of pleasing Him? Did God lie to us when He said the lost cannot please Him? or is accepting Christ something that doesn't please God?
They are not restrained from pleasing God by God, but by their choice to please themselves.
6 For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.
The very proof that they have made a choice. "Carnally minded." So what you set your mind on is what determines whether or not you will please God or yourself.
7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.
To choose your own pleasure is to reject God.
8 So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.
Those who refuse God's commands cannot please God. There's a grammatical limitation placed there which you totally ignore.
2 And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins;
He's referring to baptism here, a work which they did, the result of which caused them to be born again and put in Christ. (See Romans 6 where he used the very same language to explain baptism)
2 Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:
3 Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.
We were once disobedient to God.
Its just as true in the new as well! Humans cannot please God by any work while they are unsaved.
You have modified the text here and inserted the word "any" where it isn't used. Paul was making a comparison here between works "of yourselves," works of merit that are assumed to be pleasing to God as opposed to the commands he gave which result in salvation.
That is no twhat the Scriptures say and you know that! Or are you totally uneducated in basic grammar and word understanding!
Again with the insults as if this is a productive method of convincing somebody of something.
14 What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid.
15 For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.
So God makes the rules. And if he has mercy on the vessels that have been adjusted for destruction, then that is proof of his righteousness. It isn't proof that he causes people to disobey and then punishes them. Your reading of this is so blasphemous to God, I'm surprised you can have a good conscience after concluding that God is so unjust as to make arbitrary rules and then mock people for thinking he is unjust for doing so.
16 So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.
We don't make the rules, God does. That's what he's saying. This is not saying that God made people sinners or faithful. He demanded faith and even after people disobeyed he showed them mercy by sending his son. Paul is comparing Jews to Gentiles here and it is the Jews which were "adjusted for destruction."
17 For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth.
So even Pharaoh was created for honor, not destruction.
18 Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.
God offended Pharaoh with his words. Pharaoh chose to be offended. Had Pharaoh obeyed God, God's glory would still have been magnified, Pharaoh would have been honorable, and the Israelites would still have been made free.
19 Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?
Pharaoh resisted God's will. Paul's question there is rhetorical. The answer to it is: "everyone." Yet in spite of people resisting his will, what God planned to accomplish was accomplished.
20 Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?
So does a man tell God that God made him disobedient? "Preposterous," Paul says. You choose of your own free will to disobey and placing the blame on God is ridiculous.
21 Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?
He just told us that God created Pharaoh for honor and Pharaoh disobeyed God. So the lump is made for honor but it decides of its own free will to obey or disobey. A disobedient lump can never please God. God didn't make him disobey and then punish him for the disobedience that he caused. That would be unjust by any standard.
God hardens and God forms a lump to dishonor! Not God making a decision based onthe decision of the lump!
God offends with his words. He doesn't make people disobey.
Stop butchering grammar to try to defend a false idea handed down to you.
You are twisting God's words and in your twisting are claiming that God is an arbitrary unjust God who blames people for disobedience that he caused. That's blasphemy and you don't seem to see it. God claims to be just and righteous and he teaches us in the Old Testament that false allegations are anathema to justice.
If God made people to disobey him, and then charged them with "sin," he's an unjust God. They're were not being disobedient at all. They are actually obeying him. And you're saying that they're bad people, when in fact, by doing "his will," they were "good." Talk about twisting of scripture!
You should take God at His word instead of retranslating it. You cannot even show me one verse where it says the lost have free will to choose to obey God, while I have shown you God saying the lost cannot please (obey) Him.
You might try some common sense and reconciling what Paul said there with other scriptures.
15 Consider also that our Lord’s patience brings salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote you with the wisdom God gave him. 16 He writes this way in all his letters, speaking in them about such matters. Some parts of his letters are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction.
You've bought into the distorted view of people who preach that God is a tyrant, not a merciful God.
