Word-of-Faith versus God is the One in Control

[Rescued One]

Suppose you did everything in your power to meet a person's approval and you prayed for that person's salvation. Then the person died without having faith and you never met with their approval. You're sad when yet another loved one is unsaved or treats you poorly. So you tell people that sometimes we have to bite the bullet and accept the things we cannot change. Does this mean that I'm being fatalistic? Does it mean that I haven't surrendered all to Christ?

Why would another person assume that I haven't surrendered all? If I(or we) can do all things through Christ, why can't everyone graduate from college? Can people with Downs' Syndrome graduate from college?

 

[Anoetos]

I would argue that acceptance of events, after you have done and prayed all that you can, IS true surrender to the will of God.


A confident rest in the truth that all things work together for good to those who love God and are the called according to His purpose, carries with it the corresponding truth that all things end up as they should for those who don't and aren't, as well, I think.

Suppose you did everything in your power to meet a person's approval and you prayed for that person's salvation. Then the person died without having faith and you never met with their approval. You're sad when yet another loved one is unsaved or treats you poorly. So you tell people that sometimes we have to bite the bullet and accept the things we cannot change. Does this mean that I'm being fatalistic? Does it mean that I haven't surrendered all to Christ?

Why would another person assume that I haven't surrendered all? If I(or we) can do all things through Christ, why can't everyone graduate from college? Can people with Downs' Syndrome graduate from college?

 

[epistemaniac]

"According to the doctrine of Predestination the freedom and responsibility of man are fully preserved. In the midst of certainty God has ordained human liberty. But Fatalism allows no power of choice, no self-determination. It makes the acts of man to be as utterly beyond his control as are the laws of nature. Fatalism, with its idea of irresistible, impersonal, abstract power, has no room for moral ideas, while Predestination makes these the rule of action for God and man. Fatalism has no place for and offers no incentives to religion, love, mercy, holiness, justice, or wisdom, while Predestination gives these the strongest conceivable basis. And lastly, Fatalism leads to skepticism and despair, while Predestination sets forth the glories of God and of His kingdom in all their splendor and gives an assurance which nothing can shake.​

Predestination therefore differs from Fatalism as much as the acts of a man differ from those of a machine, or as much as the unfailing love of the heavenly Father differs from the force of gravitation. “It reveals to us,” says Smith, “the glorious truth that our lives and our sensitive hearts are held, not in the iron cog-wheels of a vast and pitiless Fate, nor in the whirling loom of a crazy Chance, but in the almighty hands of an infinitely good and wise God.”1​

Calvin emphatically repudiated the charge that his doctrine was Fatalism. “Fate,” says he, “is a term given by the Stoics to their doctrine of necessity, which they had formed out of a labyrinth of contradictory reasonings; a doctrine calculated to call God Himself to order, and to set Him laws whereby to work. Predestination I define to be, according to the Holy Scriptures, that free and unfettered counsel of God by which He rules all mankind, and all men and things, and also all parts and particles of the world by His infinite wisdom and incomprehensible justice.” And again, “… had you but been willing to look into my books, you would have been convinced at once how offensive to me is the profane term fate; nay, you would have learned that this same abhorrent term was cast in the teeth of Augustine by his opponents.”2​

http://www.christianforums.com/#_ftn3 1 The Creed of Presbyterians, p. 167.

2 The Secret Providence of God, reprinted in Calvin’s Calvinism, pp. 261, 262.

http://www.christianforums.com/#_ftnref3Boettner, L. (1932). The Reformed doctrine of predestination (205). Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company.

 

[Rescued One]

Many thanks to everyone! Seriously.

 

[BrotherBob]

Fatalism emphasizes only ends, and makes chance, not God, the governing power. I like what Luther says in his second sermon in his Invocavit sermons (1522):

"for it should be left to God, and His word should be allowed to work, without our work or interference. Because it is not in my power or hand to fashion the hearts of men as the potter molds the clay and fashions them at my pleasure (Eccles. 33:13). I can get no farther than their ears; their hearts I cannot reach. And since I cannot pour faith into their hearts, I cannot, nor should I, force any one to have faith. Therefore we should give free course to the word and not add our works to it. We have the jus verbi (right to speak) but not the executio (power to accomplish). We should preach the word, but the results must be left solely to God's good pleasure.

 

[Rescued One]

Fatalism emphasizes only ends, and makes chance, not God, the governing power. I like what Luther says in his second sermon in his Invocavit sermons (1522):

"for it should be left to God, and His word should be allowed to work, without our work or interference. Because it is not in my power or hand to fashion the hearts of men as the potter molds the clay and fashions them at my pleasure (Eccles. 33:13). I can get no farther than their ears; their hearts I cannot reach. And since I cannot pour faith into their hearts, I cannot, nor should I, force any one to have faith. Therefore we should give free course to the word and not add our works to it. We have the jus verbi (right to speak) but not the executio (power to accomplish). We should preach the word, but the results must be left solely to God's good pleasure.

Thank you, BrotherBob.

 

[GrinningDwarf]

If I(or we) can do all things through Christ, why can't everyone graduate from college? Can people with Downs' Syndrome graduate from college?

Can we really do all things through Christ? So if I have enough faith, I can lay an ostrich egg?

Seriously...the verse you quoted is Philipians 4:13. Go back and read the verse in context. (Verses 10 through 19 or 20.) You will see that the "all things" Paul is referring to is the grace to persevere in all kinds of trials and hardships.