How to become a Calvinist in 5 easy steps

[zoidar]

You are drawing up a narrative that is missing a few items. You are describing a minimalist first cause, without including all that makes him God.

I don't see what difference it makes. We can confuse the subject by adding lots of stuff, it just makes it harder to see it clearly, but it changes nothing.

You are describing him from a temporally bound, and human at that, viewpoint. The rule we make, that God can't be involved, or it is his responsibility and not ours, is not a valid argument.

That's not my argument. God can certainly be involved and we can still be responsible.

He operates both immediately and very remotely. He made us. So everything about us is made.


I appreciate your honesty there.

 

[zoidar]

It's ok. Google complicates a simple concept. By paraphrase, self-determinism is determining for self, what happens concerning self. An attitude of self-determinism would object to authority, for example. It is also endemic to the notion that man is his own, not the property of a higher being.

Thanks, that's doesn't sound like something I would by any means affirm.

 

[Mark Quayle]

I don't think John 1 includes facts. This is a bit like "all" doesn't always mean everyone. In John 1 "all things" doesn't mean everything. I think John is saying creation is from God, it's a wide concept, not specific.

While I grant you that faith need not answer our requests for logic, it is, nevertheless, logical. There is no warrant for building an extra-logical (i.e., non-logical —"creation is a wide-open concept, not specific") framework to allow for a construction that by all measures is illogical (self-contradictory —"uncaused freewill")

John 1 makes the claim 2 ways —I think for the purpose of eliminating all claims to the contrary of first reading: from the positive ("All things were made by him"), and from the negative ("and without him was nothing made that was made") —so that every particular thing is necessarily meant here.

 

[Mark Quayle]

Mark Quayle said:
You are describing him from a temporally bound, and human at that, viewpoint. The rule we make, that God can't be involved, or it is his responsibility and not ours, is not a valid argument.

That's not my argument. God can certainly be involved and we can still be responsible.

When you claim "uncaused choices" you are saying God is not involved. See post #2706, where you say:

zoidar said:
"I believe they are caused by our soul. Our soul, our innermost being, makes uncaused choices. It's not something to understand logically, it just is, for us to experience. It's like logically explaining consciousness."

 

[Mark Quayle]

Mark Quayle said:
"You are describing him from a temporally bound, and human at that, viewpoint. The rule we make, that God can't be involved, or it is his responsibility and not ours, is not a valid argument.

zoidar said:
"That's not my argument. God can certainly be involved and we can still be responsible."

When you claim "uncaused choices" you are saying God is not involved. See post #2706, where you say:

zoidar said:
"I believe they are caused by our soul. Our soul, our innermost being, makes uncaused choices. It's not something to understand logically, it just is, for us to experience. It's like logically explaining consciousness."

Concerning that last part above, from post #2706:
zoidar said:
"I believe they are caused by our soul. Our soul, our innermost being, makes uncaused choices. It's not something to understand logically, it just is, for us to experience. It's like logically explaining consciousness."

You here attempt to give 'uncaused choice' a break, by saying that we can't explain everything logically. The fact we can't explain everything logically doesn't mean it isn't logical. But further: We can explain consciousness, for example, by showing it is caused by God, without going into every detail about how God does it. But you can't do that with 'uncaused choice', because if you attempt to show that uncaused choice is caused by God, you run into self-contradiction.

 

[Mark Quayle]

Mark Quayle said:
Real choice is definitely in Scripture.

Agree! Real choice and responsibility.

Mark Quayle said:
Uncaused choice is not [in Scripture].

Neither does it say it's caused. Scripture is not dealing with the topic the way you suggest.

Proverbs 16:33
"The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the LORD."

Proverbs 21:1
"The heart of the king is like rivers of water in the hand of the Lord. He turns it where He wishes."

Romans 8:28
“And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God; to them who are the called according to His purpose”

Ecclesiastes 3:11
"He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end."

Romans 11:36
"For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things."

1 Corinthians 8:6
"yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live."

 

[Clare73]

What I wrote was hypothetical to show what God knows is not connected to His decrees. He knows everything from being the character of God. Whether He has decreed everything or not does not change the fact that God is all knowing.

Keeping in mind that God's omniscience is not by "reading tea leaves" (consulting something apart from himself) to see what will transpire.

God's omniscience (knows all things) is because he has determined all things; i.e., he knows what he has determined, which is all things.

 

[zoidar]

Keeping in mind that God's omniscience is not by "reading tea leaves" (consulting something apart from himself) to see what will transpire.

God's omniscience (knows all things) is because he has determined all things; i.e., he knows what he has determined, which is all things.

Is your stance that if God didn't determine all things, He wouldn't know all things?

 

[zoidar]

While I grant you that faith need not answer our requests for logic, it is, nevertheless, logical. There is no warrant for building an extra-logical (i.e., non-logical —"creation is a wide-open concept, not specific") framework to allow for a construction that by all measures is illogical (self-contradictory —"uncaused freewill")

John 1 makes the claim 2 ways —I think for the purpose of eliminating all claims to the contrary of first reading: from the positive ("All things were made by him"), and from the negative ("and without him was nothing made that was made") —so that every particular thing is necessarily meant here.

I think the point made is that Creation has it's beginning in God, and without creation nothing would exist.

 

[Mark Quayle]

Keeping in mind that God's omniscience is not by "reading tea leaves" (consulting something apart from himself) to see what will transpire.

God's omniscience (knows all things) is because he has determined all things; i.e., he knows what he has determined, which is all things.

YES! Nothing in Creation just happens in a vacuum. (Ha! In fact, according to threads concerning cosmology and quantum physics I've been in, of late, there isn't even such a thing as total nothingness, anywhere. What we call vacuum, is not empty after all.)

 

[Mark Quayle]

Is your stance that if God didn't determine all things, He wouldn't know all things?

We see everything backwards, from the POV of a result, rather than of The Cause.

 

[zoidar]

Mark Quayle said:
You are describing him from a temporally bound, and human at that, viewpoint. The rule we make, that God can't be involved, or it is his responsibility and not ours, is not a valid argument.

When you claim "uncaused choices" you are saying God is not involved. See post #2706, where you say:

zoidar said:
"I believe they are caused by our soul. Our soul, our innermost being, makes uncaused choices. It's not something to understand logically, it just is, for us to experience. It's like logically explaining consciousness."

God can be indirect involved in our choices and we can still have libertarian free will. For an example God can give me a dream about getting a new car. And He can keep giving me that dream until I decide to buy a new car. The argument is that predetermination can't be the cause of my willed choice for me to be responsible.

 

[zoidar]

Concerning that last part above, from post #2706:
zoidar said:
"I believe they are caused by our soul. Our soul, our innermost being, makes uncaused choices. It's not something to understand logically, it just is, for us to experience. It's like logically explaining consciousness."

You here attempt to give 'uncaused choice' a break, by saying that we can't explain everything logically. The fact we can't explain everything logically doesn't mean it isn't logical. But further: We can explain consciousness, for example, by showing it is caused by God, without going into every detail about how God does it. But you can't do that with 'uncaused choice', because if you attempt to show that uncaused choice is caused by God, you run into self-contradiction.

You are correct that something can be logical, even if we fail to explain it logically. I'm not sure that everything that exist (or is true) is logical or can be explained by logical means.

 

[Mark Quayle]

God can be indirect involved in our choices and we can still have libertarian free will. For an example God can give me a dream about getting a new car. And He can keep giving me that dream until I decide to buy a new car. The argument is that predetermination can't be the cause of my willed choice for me to be responsible.

Ah! Finally, yes. As I've been saying, if by no other way, God has caused all things by being First Cause. Thus, he is causal in every decision, even if only indirectly (i.e. "through means").

 

[zoidar]

Mark Quayle said:
Real choice is definitely in Scripture.

Mark Quayle said:
Uncaused choice is not [in Scripture].

Proverbs 16:33
"The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the LORD."

Proverbs 21:1
"The heart of the king is like rivers of water in the hand of the Lord. He turns it where He wishes."

Romans 8:28
“And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God; to them who are the called according to His purpose”

Ecclesiastes 3:11
"He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end."

Romans 11:36
"For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things."

1 Corinthians 8:6
"yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live."

Non of the passages you have quoted from deal with the issue of caused or uncaused choices.

 

[Clare73]

Is your stance that if God didn't determine all things, He wouldn't know all things?

No more than if he couldn't make a rock too heavy for him to lift, he is not God.

 

[Mark Quayle]

@zoidar said:
God can be indirect involved in our choices and we can still have libertarian free will. For an example God can give me a dream about getting a new car. And He can keep giving me that dream until I decide to buy a new car. The argument is that predetermination can't be the cause of my willed choice for me to be responsible.

Ah! Finally, yes. As I've been saying, if by no other way, God has caused all things by being First Cause. Thus, he is causal in every decision, even if only indirectly (i.e. "through means").

It appears I jumped the gun, so pleased as I was at hearing you say, "God can be indirect involved in our choices...".

So, if that fact —that God can be indirectly involved in our choices— is endemic to your definition of 'libertarian free will', then libertarian freewill is not without cause. Now to define "predetermination".

—Or am I jumping the gun again? Are you saying the he merely CAN be, but is not always involved in our choices in some way?

 

[Mark Quayle]

Non of the passages you have quoted from deal with the issue of caused or uncaused choices.

Oh boy.... lol, I love you, brother.

 

[zoidar]

Ah! Finally, yes. As I've been saying, if by no other way, God has caused all things by being First Cause. Thus, he is causal in every decision, even if only indirectly (i.e. "through means").

No Christian is denying indirect cause. I can also cause a person to do something with indirect means. If I give a boy an ice-cream I bet he'll eat it. So I have indirectly caused him to eat it. But it's not by any means denying the choice of the free agent, in this case the boy and his libertarian free will. The boy has the last say, to eat it or not.

 

[zoidar]

Oh boy.... lol, I love you, brother.

I don't understand how you can find things in Scripture that aren't there. Sorry but I don't understand it or I do, because you have your fixed theology.