What do you believe in?

[98cwitr]

You're referencing Romans 3:28 and I agree...but....

Without eternal justification I can't conclude then there's eternal salvation :/

As Paul tells us:

Romans 8:30-32
New International Version (NIV)
30 And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.

I think your list of contents are all interdependent, including salvation on it's "contents."

I think justification via humility can be as well...see Luke 18.

 

[twin1954]

I understand what you're saying brother, but try to remember that "saved" is a broad term that contains many facets. Salvation is an experience that extends from eternity past to eternity future, and contains many things: election, predestination, calling, justification, sanctification, glorification, etc.

Technically speaking, justification is by faith alone. During our lives, in time, when we exercise faith in Christ, we are "justified". Justification is usually the thing people are referring to when they say the word "saved"

Justification is the act of being declared innocent before God's court. Since justification is by faith, we cannot be eternally justified.

making this distinction helps, I think. What do you say?

Reformed theology teaches justification by faith, the Bible teaches justification through faith. We are not justified when we believe but we lay hold on that justification that is already ours when we believe.

 

[Skala]

If the elect are eternally justified, why do they need to, in their lives, come to faith in Jesus Christ?

Rom 3:28 For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.

Gal 2:16 yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ,

Gal 3:11 ..."The righteous shall live by faith."

Gal 3:24 So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith.


In eternity past, I didn't exist, so I could not have exercised faith. How then could I be eternally justified?

@Twin1954: i'm not sure why you are trying to make a distinction between "justified BY faith" and "THROUGH faith", the Bible words it both ways. What difference does it make?

As Paul tells us:

Romans 8:30-32
New International Version (NIV)
30 And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.

Yes but aren't you presupposing that each "step" happened all at the same time? It seems that some of the steps happen at different times, for example, being "called" happens during our life when we are called by the gospel call/the Holy Spirit's call unto salvation. I believe the same is true of justification, it happens in time, not in eternity, and it happens via means of faith.

 

[98cwitr]

because God, the ONE that justified you, has known you before your existence! You're still focused on SELF, focus on GOD. But I've you this, you acknowledge that faith is from God, and I believe you're right on the money there.

 

[Jake255]

because God, the ONE that justified you, has known you before your existence! You're still focused on SELF, focus on GOD. But I've you this, you acknowledge that faith is from God, and I believe you're right on the money there.

Exactly!

Let no man boast!

Predestination puts focus on self, and that is the problem with it, even if predestinators don't believe they are, they must because they are "the chosen", you are NOT the chosen, Christ is the chosen one.

Galatians 2:20 - I am crucified with Christ, it is no longer I, but Christ in you.
Who has been crucified? Who is alive?

We are to lay our lives down, IN HIM, He is the elect, not us.

 

[Skala]

Predestination puts focus on self, and that is the problem with it, even if predestinators don't believe they are, they must because they are "the chosen", you are NOT the chosen, Christ is the chosen one.

This shows an ignorance about the doctrine of predestination. Predestination doesn't teach that you are chosen because you're special. It says you're chosen because you deserve hell, but God decided to have mercy, based on the good pleasure of his own will, all for his own glory.

Why bother with statements such as this, Jake? Anyways, here's some scripture to backup my assertions:


Eph 1:4-11
(4) even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love
(5) he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will,
(6) to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.
(7) In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace,
(8) which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight
(9) making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ
(10) as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.
(11) In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will,

Why would you conclude that such a doctrine results in us focusing on ourselves? That's not the conclusion the apostle makes, predestination is all about God and his mercy on us, though we don't deserve it, and it focuses on God's own glory.

I submit that the opposite is true, that "free will" salvation or "conditional election" (arminainism) puts the focus on self, because you were smart enough or spiritual enough to merit God's choice of you. You were able to believe when your unbelieving neighbor didn't. You're special, good for you! Etc...

 

[Skala]

because God, the ONE that justified you, has known you before your existence! You're still focused on SELF, focus on GOD. But I've you this, you acknowledge that faith is from God, and I believe you're right on the money there.

But the Apostle Paul / The Bible makes a distinction between predestination and justification, and we should too.

There is a distinction, they are different things (not the same thing), so we should view them as such

 

[DeaconDean]

We are to lay our lives down, IN HIM, He is the elect, not us.

So, according to your statement here, we must conclude that since Christ "is the elect":

"And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened." -Mt. 24:22 (KJV)

Those days would be shortened for Christ's sake not ours.

Uh huh.

God Bless

Till all are one.

 

[DeaconDean]

Here is an exerpt from an article I wrote entitled "Predestination, Foreknowledge, and Free Will What do these have to do with each other?"

Predestination: Some Definitions:

For the last five hundred years, the main differences in religion have been many, but one has caused more strife more so than any other has been the teachings and theology of John Calvin. No one man except Martin Luther has been hated and loathed more in the eyes of Catholicism than John Calvin. Even in the beliefs of Arminianism, there is utter hatred and loathing of John Calvin. And yet, no other theologian so defined the beliefs of Protestantism for the centuries to follow than John Calvin. But it should be noted here, that as stated previously, no one single man, no one single theologian, except our Lord Jesus Christ was ever 100 percent correct, 100 percent of the time. This rule of thumb applies as much to John Calvin as it does to so many others such as James Arminus, Augustine, all the Popes, Martin Luther, and anybody else you can think of. Having said that, let us proceed on.

John Calvin defined his doctrine of “predestination” as:

“The covenant of life is not preached equally to all, and among those to whom it is preached, does not always meet with the same reception. This diversity displays the unsearchable depth of the divine judgment, and is without a doubt subordinate to God’s eternal election. But if it is plainly owing to the mere pleasure of God that salvation is spontaneously offered to some, while others have no access to it,..To many this seems a perplexing subject, because they deem it most incongruous that of the great body of mankind some should be predestinated to salvation, and others to destruction.”[1]

These few sentences are what drive a wedge between most Christians. A wedge between Protestants and Catholics, even between Protestants themselves. Having shown what Calvin defined predestination as, lets proceed a little further and give a definition from a prominent dictionary.

One of the tools that have come to the surface in the last two hundred years for the student of Biblical Greek has been the introduction of, and subsequent translation of Gerhard Kittel’s “Theological Dictionary of the New Testament.” It is a shame that the Greek New Testament is lost to most who search the scriptures. The serious student of the Bible cannot go through this life without reading and seeing for themselves what the Greek text says and what the original writers intents were when they penned the words we hold so dear. When the student of the Bible begins to search the Greek texts, many of the scriptures become crystal clear. Having said that, let us look at the definition given in Kittel’s dictionary. From Rom. 8:29, we have the word: “prow'pise(v).” From the root word: “proorizw,” which means: to limit or mark out beforehand, predestine. According to the dictionary (Kittel’s), K. L. Schmidt comments:

“This comparatively rare and late word is used in the Greek Bible only six times in the NT in the sense “to foreordain” “to predestinate.” Since God is eternal and has ordained everything before time, proopi'zein is a stronger form of opi'zein (to set bounds to). The synonyms and textual history show that the reference in proginwskien is the same. Rom. 8:29; ouv proginw kai prowpisen summorfouv tnv eikonov tou niou autou, Rom. 8:30; ous...prowpisen (A: proegnw) toutov kai ekalesen. The omniscient God has determined everything in advance, both persons and things in salvation history, with Jesus Christ as the goal. When Herod and Pilate work together with the Gentiles and the mob against Christ, it may be said: “h ceir sou (God’s) kai h bolh prowpisen genesqai, Acts 4:28. Herein lies the hidden wisdom of God in a mystery, “hn prowpisen o qeov pro twn aiwnwn eiv doxan hmwn,” 1 Cor. 2:7, cf. IV, 819. The goal of our predestination is divine sonship through Jesus Christ: “proopisav hmav eis nioqesian dia ’Ihsou Cpistou,” Eph. 1:5. That we have our inheritance in Christ rests in the fact that we are proopisqentev kata proqesin tou ta panta energountov, Eph. 1:11.[2]

So there you have it, predestination is the mode by which God used to conform the elect to the image of His Son, by which we (the elect) are appointed to divine sonship.

Continued...



[1] John Calvin, Institutes of Christian Religion, Book III, The Mode of obtaining the Grace of Christ, Chapter 21, [book on-line] accessed 6/21/03, found on the world wide web at http://www.monergism.com/sys_theo/Calvin/Inst.html

[2] Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, Edited by: Gerhard Kittel, Translated by: Geoffery W. Bromiley, Vol. V, “proopizw”, p. 456, K. L. Schmidt.

 

[DeaconDean]

Some common misconceptions about Predestination:


A common misconception about predestination comes from Calvin’s statement: “and others to destruction.” If one would carefully read the texts that deal with predestination, one will see that in each case it deals with the “elect.” Note well that it never says one word about those outside election. Calvin’s theory about predestination seems to have come from studying Rom. 8; 11; and Eph. 1. Calvin’s comment about “and others to destruction” have been equated to “reprobation” and that this theory came from reading certain passages in Isaiah and Romans 9. But it is submitted that his observation on reprobation is incorrect. Those “vessels fitted for destruction” (Rom. 9:22) may very well be inclusive of those individuals in Biblical history who were used of God so that “his power known, endured with much long-suffering the vessels of wrath fitted for destruction.” (Rom. 9:22)

Some of which into this class may be classified: the antediluvians, Pharaoh, Esau, Goliath, Nebuchazzar, Belchazar, Judas, Herod Antepas, Pontius Pilate, Annas, and others at. al. It is submitted that these men were created in such manner, and in such way, that God, used them in His infinite wisdom, and according to His divine plan, so that His long-suffering with them, ultimately ended up proving the glory and power of Him through them. And it is further asserted that this is the case as in each instance God’s power and glory was made manifest to these individuals through the prophets.

Another misconception people have about predestination is as most commonly heard: “Predestination makes people nothing but robots, who can do nothing other than what God has ordained for them in their lives.” In other words, people have had their whole life foreordained by God, even down to the minute detail so that everything that happens in their lives was foreordained by God to happen. If they went left instead of right that was foreordained by God. This is the argument most commonly used by the supporters of Catholicism and Arminianism. Those poor misguided people, again, another misconception on their part. If one would take the time to carefully read and study the topic of predestination with an open mind, and not bring their preconceived notions and beliefs into the subject, they would rightly find that just the opposite is true. What the doctrine of predestination does teach, say, and mean is that at some point outside of our conception of time, God choose us to be His for no other reason than it was according to His good pleasure to do so. Predestination sets who the elect are, and the means by which they come to salvation (Jesus Christ), but it never sets when they will come to saving faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. For some, they come to saving faith early on their lives, some come during the peak of their lives, and some come to saving faith in the twilight of their lives.

Case in point, Noah. It is certain that Noah was predestinated to be among the elect. In the generations of man that followed Adam, the first mention of Noah is in Gen. 5: 29. And the next mention of Noah is when he is five hundred years old and begat sons. Now what happened during those first five hundred years the Bible never says, but it is very clear that around his five hundredth birthday, the Lord began to use Noah. Noah lived in a very wicked and evil world. (Gen. 6:5) And at five hundred years old, God: “…hath begun a good work.” (Phil. 1:6) See here, God predestinated Noah, that much is certain, but God never set a certain time as to when He would begin to use Noah. Noah came late in life.
Let us further illustrate by looking at another person who was certainly predestinated. This may come as a surprise to some, but the great patriarch of faith in the Bible, Abraham, came out of a country that was idol worshippers. We can safely say that because of what we know to be said in the scriptures of the account of Jacob and Rachel. Rachel goes to her father’s tent and steals an idol and then proceeds to hide it. (Gen. 31:19) This incident clearly shows that there were idols, they were cherished, and that Abraham’s cousins, who remained behind when he left the land of the Chaldees, had continued to follow the gods from which Abraham had been called.

Abraham was predestinated, elected to be one of God’s. What happened prior to God calling Abraham into service, we cannot say for sure, but we can say that at around fifty years old, God, “…hath began a good work” in Abraham, and He saw it through until it came to fruition. Abraham came in the peak of his life.

Another example would be King David. David was the youngest of eight sons born to Jessie. The prophet Samuel was sent to Jessie because the Lord told him that from one of the sons of Jessie there would be anointed a king. And this happened after all of Jessie’s sons were made to pass in front of Samuel. David was anointed as King when but a youth. And soon afterward, God: “…hath began a good work.” And furthermore, He seen it through until fruition. David was for certain predestinated.

So here in these three examples, we see predestination in what the scriptures say. Predestination simply says whom and how the elect are, but never places a time limit on when they would come to Him, only that they would. Noah was five hundred years old and a preacher of righteousness (Gen. 5:32; 2 Pet. 2:5) when he came into the Lord’s service. Abraham was about fifty years old and living among idol worshippers when God told him: “Get thee out” (Gen 12:1). David was but a youth when God began to use him as king (1 Sam. 16:13). Some come early, some come in the middle, and some come late, but God did not interfere with their lives before they came to Him.

God Bless

Till all are one.

 

[98cwitr]

But the Apostle Paul / The Bible makes a distinction between predestination and justification, and we should too.

There is a distinction, they are different things (not the same thing), so we should view them as such

No disagreement there

 

[Jake255]

So, according to your statement here, we must conclude that since Christ "is the elect":

"And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened." -Mt. 24:22 (KJV)

Those days would be shortened for Christ's sake not ours.

Uh huh.

God Bless

Till all are one.

I am trying to make the point that Jesus is the chosen ONE, He is the elect and those IN Christ are the elect, ONLY because of Christ IN us us, He is the One.
There is ONE BODY, HIS BODY - ONE.

 

[Jake255]

But the Apostle Paul / The Bible makes a distinction between predestination and justification, and we should too.

There is a distinction, they are different things (not the same thing), so we should view them as such

And did I say they were the same thing? NO.

We are justified IN Christ, we are ONLY the elect, IN Christ.

Man has nothing w/out Christ, who is the Chosen One.

 

[Texan40]

I really don't see that any of these are mutually exclusive. God's omniscience guarantees that everything is known before it happens. He knows when we will be presented with choices and the choices we will make but we still have to recognize opportunities and make them a reality through action. We make choices. God does not put us on like hand puppets and remove that.

 

[Jake255]

I really don't see that any of these are mutually exclusive. God's omniscience guarantees that everything is known before it happens. He knows when we will be presented with choices and the choices we will make but we still have to recognize opportunities and make them a reality through action. We make choices. God does not put us on like hand puppets and remove that.

Very nicely said. Amen!

Predestination and Free Will are both bibical, both are true, it is God offering and us accepting!

 

[GrayAngel]

Very nicely said. Amen!

Predestination and Free Will are both bibical, both are true, it is God offering and us accepting!

Problem is, your definition of predestination is wrong. What you believe in is free will, but you've changed what predestination is to fit your beliefs.

Predestination means that we were elected, according to God's own will, not ours. It's not a reaction to the faith God foreknew we would conjure up ourselves: that would be acknowledgement, not election.

If you believe that we have a choice in the matter, then you believe in free will, which is incompatible with predestination, which claims that we don't.

 

[histruth]

Once again, everything God does is according to His foreknowledge. God knew who would come to His Son, and He chose to save us. He could have chose to not send His Son, and not save us, but He didn't. He chose to save us. He also answers prayer, and He told us to pray for everyone including our enemies. I will ask the question, do you not care about all the other people? I truly wonder why God told us to pray for them if He wants nothing to do with them.(Mathew 5:44) I also wonder what Calvinists need preachers for since God will ultimately force Himself on those He wants anyway? I also ask the question, what glory do you think your bringing to God by declaring that He only loves certain individuals? Also, I seem to recall quite a few verses spoken by Jesus Himself who said, "Thy faith hath saved thee, and thy faith hath made thee well. There are too many to list. He said this almost everytime He healed someone. Also, I wonder why Jesus marvelled because of their unbelief in Mark 6:6. I also wonder why He said that the condemnation is, "that Light has come into the world, but men preferred darkness rather than Light"?

I will never understand why anyone would try to say that God creates certain people for no other reason than to send them to hell forever. I know that He knows who will and who won't, but to try and say that the God of love would pre-plan someone's eternal destruction before they are even born, and give them no chance whatsoever for salvation is one of the biggest heresies I've ever heard. I want you to remember that when your praying for your loved ones. Why are you even praying for them? If God wants them, He will force Himself on them anyway. That is false doctrine. God gave us the Gift of His Son, and it is up to us to accept or reject Him. Think on this for a while; if God condemns people to hell for not believing, but it is He Himself who causes them to not believe, than He is punishing them for something that He caused to happen. That would be like me punishing my daughter because I told her not to spill the paint, but then I knocked it out of her hand just so I could punish her. The God I serve is NOT LIKE THAT AT ALL. He is full of love and compassion, and it is His great pleasure to wash us in His blood and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. He gives everyone a chance for salvation, once again you cannot argue with Acts 17:26-30 or 1st Timothy 2:3-6

 

[Skala]

Once again, everything God does is according to His foreknowledge

Foreknowledge of what? The Bible never says that God foreknew our faith and then chose us on that basis. rather, it says that the reason we come to faith is because we are predestined for it:

Act 13:48 And when the Gentiles heard this, they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord, and as many as were appointed to eternal life believed.

So not only does the Bible not say that God's choice of us was based on our faith, it instead tells us what in fact his choice was based on:

Eph 1:4-6
(4) even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love
(5) he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will,
(6) to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.
Eph 1:11 In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will,

God's choice of us, which results in us coming to faith in Christ, is based on His own purpose, will, and grace, it is not based on our faith.

That would make faith into a work whereby it merits God's choice of us and merits our salvation because we were smart enough to "get ourselves saved" when unbelievers weren't

In other words that would make the believer himself the difference between believers and unbelievers, not God's grace. But the Bible says it is God's grace that makes us to differ.

God knew who would come to His Son

Of course he knows, because He himself is directly responsible for the fact that anynoe at all comes to His son! He doesn't sit back and passively discover who of their own will, with no input from God, comes to the Son:

"All that the Father gives me will come to me.." John 6:37

We come to Jesus because the Father gave us to Jesus. God tasked Jesus with the mission of saving His own chosen people to present a church to himself as pure, for his own glory, and Jesus accomplished that task, without fail.

The Triune God has a 100% success rate in salvation.

The reason anyone puts personal trust in Christ is because of God's gracious act in drawing us to the Son, not because of our supposed free will.

I also ask the question, what glory do you think your bringing to God by declaring that He only loves certain individuals?

I wonder if you truly understand the history of the OT in which God loved israel alone in a special way that differed from the other nations of the earth, whom he did not demonstrate his love to!!!

You only have I known among all the families of the earth Amos 3:2

If you told an OT hebrew that God loved them equally as he loved the other pagan nations, they would laugh in your face. Though God loves all people, he has a special love for his own people, this love is described as the special love a husband has for his wife in Eph 5:25

To say that God loves the saints in heaven as much as/no different than God's enemies in hell is ridiculous, and not Biblical.

I will never understand why anyone would try to say that God creates certain people for no other reason than to send them to hell forever.

All humans deserve hell, so for God to save any at all is pure grace. This type of argument only exists to draw on emotions and misses the elephant in the room known as "sinful criminals who deserve hell"

I know that He knows who will and who won't, but to try and say that the God of love would pre-plan someone's eternal destruction before they are even born, and give them no chance whatsoever for salvation is one of the biggest heresies I've ever heard.

Then your problem is with the Bible my friend for we hear all the time that God has blinded eyes and hardened hearts:

Joh 12:39 Therefore they could not believe. For again Isaiah said,
Joh 12:40 "He has blinded their eyes and hardened their heart, lest they see with their eyes, and understand with their heart, and turn, and I would heal them."

Further, your argument assumes that creatures deserve a chance at salvation, therefore you argue that it is injustice to withhold from them what they deserve. This is not biblical, as nobody deserves salvation. You cannot be owed what is gracious, or else the definition of "grace" is destroyed. Grace by definition means "not owed, but given freely". It's almost like these basic concepts go flying out the window when someone decides to bolster an attack against God's predestinating grace.

I want you to remember that when your praying for your loved ones. Why are you even praying for them? If God wants them, He will force Himself on them anyway.

What you don't understand is that your own argument here backfires against you my friend. If salvation is ultimately up to mans' will, and not God's, why are you praying to God for your lost friends to be saved? God can't/won't do anything about it, right? So why are you praying for them?

On the contrary, each Christian knows deep down that only God can convert that person and change their heart, which is precisely why we pray to God when we feel helpless (which we are). Only God can bring someone to the knowledge of the truth, that's why we pray to God to save our lost friends. If God had nothing to do with it, why would we pray to him as if He did?

So you see your argument isn't well thought out

Think on this for a while; if God condemns people to hell for not believing, but it is He Himself who causes them to not believe, than He is punishing them for something that He caused to happen. That would be like me punishing my daughter because I told her not to spill the paint, but then I knocked it out of her hand just so I could punish her.

First of all, God doesn't condemn people to hell solely for their lack of belief, he condemns them to hell for their sins. As always, the doctrine of sin seems to be conveniently left out in these anti-predestination analogies. This results in a watered down, shallow analogy that misses the real picture and doesn't represent the Biblical understanding at all.

Further, God never forced anyone to sin, much like your "father" in your analogy who forced the bucket of point out of the hand. So right off the bat this analogy falls short. Here's a better, Biblical analogy:

You are the king of a small kingdom, and you go away on a trip. While you're gone, 10 men murder and rape your wife and daughter.

Upon your return you hold a trial, and you sentence 9 of the men to death because it's what their crimes deserve. However, you decide to have mercy on 1 of the men, because it's within your right and power to do so. You pardon the 1 man. No injustice was done to the other 9 men because they had no claims upon your mercy to begin with.

He gives everyone a chance for salvation, once again you cannot argue with Acts 17:26-30 or 1st Timothy 2:3-6

Yet again, this leaves man's sinful nature and condition and enslavement to sin out of the picture. Yes, God commands all men to come to Christ. But no man will naturally do that because they are rebels of God and are spiritually dead, and unable to understand spiritual things. No man can come to christ without the Father' enabling them (John 6). It takes God's direct intervention and grace for anyone at all to come to Christ.

God doesn't just sit back and chill and wait and see if sinners will suddenly embrace the God they hate so much and forsake the sin they love so much. In my Bible, God pursues people, he chooses people, he changes hearts, he converts, he elects, he predestines, he makes sure that billions of people are saved.

In your view, it seems God doesn't' do any such thing. He doesn't make sure a single person is ever saved. This is likened to taking a blind man to an art show and saying "pick your favorite picture". You can't expect a blind man to see without first giving him sight. Yet your argument is that God simply offers salvation to sinners with stony hearts - but doesn't actually change those stony hearts and take off the blindfold so that they respond positively to the gospel.

 

[Robs07M6S]

I have two responses Robert:

1) assuming what you say is true, that God doesn't look "forward" into time, but rather, simply already knows, and has always known who has faith in him (and so elects on that basis), why do "Free will" salvation people (aka arminians and such) use verses in the Bible that speak of Gods "foreknowledge" as prooftexts for that very idea?

Im not defending the free willer's idea of what foreknowlege is, in fact im arguing against it and I think its possible you may have misunderstood my post all together.

Please read my post again, I explained how God is everywhere all at the same time including the past, present and future because God exist outside of time. This would explain how he could still have foreknowledge of his elect while giving them the choice to respond to his call. Its hard for me to explain things in text but if you really think about what im saying you will get it.

But let me ask you, why does it take away the Glory of God in salvation if when God calls a sinner the sinner then chooses to either say yes or no to Gods call? If the sinner chooses to say yes to Gods call and is then saved does that some how negate the fact that God called and because he called the person was saved? Doesnt God still get all the glory? I would say yes, he does, because if it were not for God extending grace and mercy to that individual then he would never have been saved.

 

[Skala]

I think I understood your post Rob.

You were countering my argument that Arminians try to say that God foresees faith, by asserting that God doesn't "foresee" anything, but rather, simply knows, and always has. (aka, God isn't in linear time)

My response was: for the sake of the argument, lets say that God does in fact "know" who believes, and then chooses on that basis. If that is true, why do Arminians point to verses that speak of "foreknowledge" as part of their argument?

In actuality, obviously God does know who believes, and always has, but no where does the Bible say that His choice of us is based on this knowledge. Instead, the Bible says that God based his choice of us on his own purpose and grace (Eph 1), and we believe because of God's appointing us to eternal life (Acts 13:48). That's the whole point. It doesn't matter how God knows about our faith, the fact remains that the Bible never says that faith is the basis of His choice of us, contrary to the arguments of Arminian theology.

I'm convinced that the only reason God could possibly know who has faith is precisely because God himself gave that faith to us as a gift, as the Bible teaches that faith is a gift from God. So it really doesn't do any good to make an argument that speaks of God "knowing about our faith" and then choosing us on that basis.

In other words, God's knowledge is based on his decree. He doesn't just simply gather intellectual information apart from his own decree. God knows something precisely because He himself is sovereign and ruling creation as He sees fit.

As for your next question:

But let me ask you, why does it take away the Glory of God in salvation if when God calls a sinner the sinner then chooses to either say yes or no to Gods call? If the sinner chooses to say yes to Gods call and is then saved does that some how negate the fact that God called and because he called the person was saved? Doesnt God still get all the glory? I would say yes, he does, because if it were not for God extending grace and mercy to that individual then he would never have been save

The problem I have is that sometimes being saved/converted is watered down or oversimplified. The bible teaches that is God who converts us, God changes our hearts, God removes the blindfold, God calls us out of darkness into light, God brings us to Jesus, etc.

In short, God is directly responsible for the fact that any sinner answers positively to God's call in the first place.

To say that this whole thing is credited to man's will does rob God's glory, because the Bible pins the whole thing on God's grace for His own glorification, not on man's will.

So, it's not robbing God's glory to say that sinners answer God's call.

But it is wrong to not attribute the sinner's act of answering God's call to God himself and his work of penetrating our hearts and changing us and granting us spiritual eyes to see and ears to hear, etc.

The rub:

Can God be credited for the fact that a person response to the gospel call? Does God have anything to do with it at all? What is God's role in salvation/conversion, if anything?

Did God just send Jesus to die, and then leave the rest up to humans? Or is God active in bringing sinners to salvation, for his own glory and so he can present a church to his Son?

It seems, for many here, God does no more other than send Jesus, then he sits back and sees what happens. He doesn't actually enter the human situation to ensure that anyone at all is saved. That's not how God works as I see it in the Bible:

"...Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy has caused us to be born again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead"
(1 Pet 1:3)

Why are we born again? Because of a decision? Or because God caused it?

"...Christ Jesus has made me his own" - Philippians 3:12

Who made me Christs'? Myself with my smart decision? Or was God at work behind the scenes, so to speak, the whole time? For his own purposes and glory?

"But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions – it is by grace you have been saved." - Ephesians 2:4-5

We were made alive, while we were dead. By God. We didn't make ourselves alive.

1Pe 2:9 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

God translated us from darkness to light. Not us.

1Co 1:30 And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption,

It's because of God we are in Christ, not because of our "Free will decision"

Rom 8:30 And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.

Salvation is completely by God. We are the recipients of God's action of saving us. Salvation is not a negotiation. Notice, God justifies whom he calls. So when we are called and respond by faith, and are thus justified, its because "God justifies whom he calls". He doesn't fail. Nobody falls through the cracks, whom God calls. God has a 100% success rate.