***Agreed it can’t be earned. But it seems to me it can be either accepted or rejected.***
This puts man ahead of God. In your scenario, God offers the bait and man can grab it or not. This means that man can, to use a fishing reference, skunk God. God is fishing for converts and either the fish (us) take the bait or not.
I think that God NEVER fails in what he sets out to do. God is not on a fishing trip, he knows exactly who his children are, and he knew it before the beginning of time.
Uhm, let's reverse the role of man and God in this situation: Supposing God was a creature trapped in sin, unable to escape on His own, and we offered Him a gift of salvation but we, being infinantly just, wise, and powerful decided to yield to Him the choice of accepting or declining, that last bit would put Him above us?
Look there ain't much danger of God ever being below us, excepting in a manner He chooses. Which He has indeed done. For instance, hanging on a cross wasn't exactly a place of honor now was it? He washed the feet of the disciples to make a point, didn't He?
I think that God NEVER fails in what he sets out to do.
Thus if anything ever displeases Him, He must have chosen to endow it with the power to do so. And, boy oh boy has He been displeased in the past. Wrathful even. Odd that God would get mad at a thing for doing what He meant it to do.
God is not on a fishing trip,...
Ironic choice of words considering the time Christ said "Come let me make you fishers of men."
...he knows exactly who his children are, and he knew it before the beginning of time.
We don't disagree that He knew it before the beginning of time. And my suspicion is that reflection on this fact was the motivation behind the Calvinist doctrines. I simply hold that this does not imply He could not have given us choice in the matter of trusting Him, anymore than it means we didn't have choice in other matters, including trivial ones. Presumably you do not think we are automatons?