Posted on 01/01/2006 4:48:03 PM PST by HarleyD
We are to "work out our salvation". That doesn't imply our refusal but that we need to humble ourselves to God. How otherwise would you say that God is at work in you?
We can hop around the scriptures all day long but I believe I asked you to just consider for a moment what Augustine concluded; there is not anything that you have that hasn't been given you. Be it your intellect, your faith, your grace, or the knowledge that allowed you to make the correct choice. Anything that you state that allowed you to make some sort of decision even in the "cooperation" with God is the Pelagius heresy.
It doesn't say we are permanently so.
The scriptures state that we are sealed with the Holy Spirit as our pledge (2 Cor 1:22, Eph 1:13, Eph 4:30) in addition to God's promise in Ezekiel 36. It states it's permanent.
It wasn't real??? That is very interesting... So God allows us to participate in His work, but not really? Do you realize what you are saying? That God's love is phony. Sure, the daughter wasn't needed. But you miss the point. When we are allowed to participate, it IS real. What exactly is the problem with God being magnanimous, allowing us to REALLY do things?
God's love is not phony. :) God's real love for us lets us experience participation, so for us, it seems real. In terms of credit, though, it isn't real, all credit goes to God. The problem with God allowing us to REALLY do things on our own is that it would lead to our doom. God loves us too much, for REAL, to allow that to happen. This is like the mother not allowing the daughter to take the hot cookie sheet out of the oven.
The Church doesn't say we can't read Scriptures. But to get the meaning that God intended, we are to follow her [Church's] lead and the lead of those who have gone before us.
Oh, I know you have said that you are encouraged to read scripture within the lens of the Church. I was talking about seekers. A seeker wouldn't have a chance of correct interpretation within that lens if he doesn't know it. Therefore, I was suggesting that your approach to seekers would have to be to teach the Church's teachings first, and the Bible would have to wait until later.
Otherwise, brother, you are relying totally on your own personal knowledge and abilities to determine God's Will and Word - and you have already agreed that man is quite incapable of doing that alone, since we are depraved (according to you).
I suppose we will always disagree on whether the Spirit living within me will ever condescend to give me the time of day. :) I believe in original sin, so I believe we are born depraved.
Apostolic Tradition + Scripture = Revelation from God. They cannot disagree, if you believe God is Truth. I still don't understand what contradictions (180 degrees different?) you see within Apostolic Tradition to keep bringing this up.
I think I was talking about what are apparent contradictions by any plain reading of the text of scripture, such as a sinless Mary ("all" doesn't mean "all"), Mary as a perpetual virgin thus Jesus had no siblings, and priests forgiving sin. I know we have already discussed all of these. Here you say that tradition must agree with scripture, therefore they are equal in authority. (Maybe I did not earlier put together that the legs of the stool were of equal strength. :)
So, if they must agree then the interpretation of the Bible must be made to agree with the writings of the Fathers. This eliminates any sense of the Bible being a readable book outside of the contortions necessary to match the Fathers.
First of all, the Scriptures were not written as one book, but as individual letters. Secondly, ANYONE can write a book and put within it "Thus says God". Does that prove it is really the Word of God? I am sorry, but the Bible is not self-authenticating.
Well, on a previous post I gave a list of reasons we can know the Bible is authentic without the say so of the Fathers. We're just going to have to disagree. If you believe that "anyone" could come up with a book like the Bible, then I don't know what to say. I don't believe anyone could.
FK: "I do not give credit to the Church for the Bible, I give all credit to God."
And if you were raised in Iran, you'd say the same thing about the Koran. So how does an unbiased person know who is correct?
The unbiased person looks at the claims of each book and who wrote it. The tomb of the author of the Koran is full of mouldering bones. The tomb of the author of the Bible is empty. The books are completely different in claim and scope. God brought me to the Bible, not the Koran. Besides, I obviously did come to the conclusion that the Bible is real without any help or knowledge of the Fathers or any Catholic tradition. Was I just lucky? :)
"It sounds like for the Catholics, this might be the confirmation. After the classes and the rite are completed the person then knows enough of the basics and is able to give a reason for his faith, etc. Is that right? Is there anything like that for the Orthodox?"
Most Confirmations, what we call Chrismation, take place in infancy at baptism so clearly a child is not expected to be able to vebalize and defend The Faith. When an adult is chrismated, however, as at conversion, they are indeed expected to be able to verbalize and defend The Faith. Usually converts have gone through at least six months and usually a year or more of catechesis before receiving the sacrament.
"Perhaps another way to come at it is would you say there is any "need" for the sinner's prayer?"
Oh my, absolutely...many, many times a day. You know, I wasn't sure what this "sinner's prayer" of yours so I looked it up. Its a good prayer and completely in tune with the continual Kyrie Eleisons (Lord have mercy) and "Soson emas" (Save us) etc. etc. etc. which form not only a continual antiphon in our Liturgies and services but even in our daily prayer life. Most any Orthodox Christian will tell you about the "Jesus Prayer", "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.". This is the prayer we are instructed to "pray unceasingly". What that means is that with practice it becomes a "prayer of the heart", or noetic prayer, which means that it is going on, nearly unconsciously, all our waking hours, like right now, for example, or when I am in the midst of a trial, or simply reading...in other words, all the time. FK, there isn't enough bandwidth on FR to even scratch the surface of Orthodox theology on prayer like what you call the "sinner's prayer". FK, theosis is all but impossible without a continual "sinner's prayer" on our parts!
"The Church doesn't say we can't read Scriptures. But to get the meaning that God intended, we are to follow her [Church's] lead and the lead of those who have gone before us."
FK:
"Oh, I know you have said that you are encouraged to read scripture within the lens of the Church. I was talking about seekers. A seeker wouldn't have a chance of correct interpretation within that lens if he doesn't know it. Therefore, I was suggesting that your approach to seekers would have to be to teach the Church's teachings first, and the Bible would have to wait until later."
Funny thing about that, at least with Orthodoxy. We seldom see completely "unchurched" people showing up at our parish. Like I have said before, the majority are what we call fundamentalist or evangelical Christians who have "read themselves into Orthodoxy". These are people who are very well versed in scripture, but who went beyond sola scriptura into a reading of the Fathers and the early ecclesiastical histories of The Church. As I understand it, in mission territories, the people are evangelized with the Bible and the interpretation given to the various passages come from the Fathers, or as we might also say, Holy Tradition.
I think you are confusing resepct as something one "earns" in human terms. In those terms, we are unworthy of God's love, as I am sure we all agree. But God doesn't follow our style or logic! Lucky for us!
Although you said you didn't respect your children, but loved them nonetheless, I say you are deceiving yourself because you did respect their humanity, their space, and their rights.
The whole concept of human rights -- universal respect for all human beings as equals -- is grounded in love for your neighbor as for yourself, in the idea that God gave each and every human bieng this earth and that we all have wqual right to this world.
I repeat: you cannot separate respect from love; where there is love, there is respect. Now, you speak of "different kinds" of love and I gree. Conditional love is based on conditional respect. But unconditional love is inseparable from unconditional respect.
God's love for humanity is unievrsal and unconditional, because nothing we can do can "justify" or "earn" His love for us. As such, His respect for his creation is equally unconditional.
So, my "are highly favored" has the tense wrong? The actual words were equivalent to: "was filled with special grace, that no one else has ever had, from before birth"? That does seem like a pretty radical difference.
How is it that we as believers have grace, but yet the remnant of sin remains and we still sin? Grace only abounded in Mary? You are disagreeing then, that the word used here is the same as in Eph. 1:6 which describes all believers as being equivalently "filled with grace"?
Finally, if Mary was so filled with perfect grace that she was sinless her whole life, she had the most surprising reaction to being told that she would be the mother of Jesus. Why would she need to be told? Why would she have been afraid? Also, wouldn't someone filled with grace from before birth know who she was? She even asked questions. For someone who was sinless, she sure didn't seem to understand that she was different from any other human who had ever yet lived.
Yes, the FOOL says that! Please look at ALL of Psalm 14 or 53. The FOOL... Context! The wicked does no good. This is not refering to the righteous!
Paul qoutes from this Psalm, for example... For [there is] no uprightness in their (WICKED!) mouth; their inward part [is] very wickedness; their throat [is] an open sepulchre; they flatter with their tongue. Declare them guilty, O God; let them fall by their own counsels; cast them out for the multitude of their rebellions; for they have rebelled against thee. And all those that put their trust in thee shall rejoice: they shall ever be in jubilee, for thou shalt cover them; and all that love thy name shall be joyful in thee. For thou, LORD, wilt bless the righteous; with favour wilt thou compass him as [with] a shield. Psalm 5:9-11
Nowhere do the Psalms say that the righteous are fools or that they do not seek out God!!!
The righteousness of Zechariah, Elizabeth, Joseph, David, you, me, Paul, anyone, it is all the same righteousness -- the imputed righteousness of Christ upon our sinning hearts.
I find that nowhere in Scriptures. Please point out where the righteous of the OT or even those of Jesus' youth were imputed righteousness of Christ. That is, again, theology that twists the Scripture to say something that is plainly not there.
You must think Lazarus was just sleeping and not four days putrified until Christ caused him to live again. Christ went so far as to say He was "glad" He had waited so long to visit Lazarus that he had died in order to prove to His disciples that He was their only salvation.
You are confused, I think. Christ brought Lazarus from the dead, but there is no mention of being born "from above" or "from water and Spirit". Lazarus was healed of his "affliction", but this doesn't mean he was eternally saved. Lazarus was not "born again". He was raised from the dead.
Baptism and the sinner's prayer have nothing to do with God predestining salvation on whomever He chooses, ordained by Him from before the foundation of the world.
Baptism is the visible means by which it is made known to us that we are "born from above". How on earth would you know you are "saved" otherwise? God works through visible means. That is what people do who love. They SHOW their love for the other. Since God's graces are invisible, He works through the material world - isn't that clear enough in the Gospels?
Of course? Then how can you change it (our elect status)?
Who said anything about changing anything with God. The problem is that you continue to ignore this one fact - YOU DON'T KNOW YOU ARE OF THE ELECT. Simple as that. God knows, you don't. You can wish all you want, but quite frankly, if you honor God's sovereignty, you must admit that we, even Paul, don't know this ultimate status between us and God until the day of our judgment.
many as were ordained to eternal life believed.
We who receive Baptism have all been "ordained" to eternal life, IN OUR EYES. IF we continue in Christ Jesus, our salvation will be complete. However, if we fall away, we will lose our salvation. Some of the writers of Scripture are assuming that people will continue in Christ and not fall away - what they OUGHT to do, but this doesn't take into account the reality that people DO fall away, as Scripture mentions elsewhere.
Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost" -- Titus 3:4-5
Yes, a good baptism verse.
And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then it is no more grace: otherwise work is no more work.
Catholics don't believe in salvation by works, but by grace. Grace is a free gift from God, both seen in our faith and our works of love. Nothing we do can earn salvation. We agree with Paul - no one can earn salvation. But it doesn't follow that we don't have to DO anything - consider 1 Cor 13:3. "...and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing." This agrees with James 2, which says we must add love to our faith. Otherwise, our faith is "nothing". If you say that faith saves, I say faith without love doesn't save - it is nothing.
But now we are off topic. Can you show me in the Gospels ANYWHERE about Jesus teaching imputed justification to the Apostles? Perhaps you should look to Matthew 5:20 "For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed [the righteousness] of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of the heavens". Please note, Jesus didn't say "MY righteousness", but "YOUR righteousness". Matthew then goes on for over TWO FULL CHAPTERS explaining how WE can be righteous and exceed the Pharisees' righteousness! We understand, then, that Christ abides within us, enabling us to achieve this righteousness within us. But nowhere are we "covered" and are no longer responsible for becoming more holy.
Regards
I agree, and have before, on St. Augustine's conclusion above. However, St. Augustine ALSO understood that men cooperated in salvation, that men were secondary causes, and that men were expected to return God's good gift to Him. By the way, you should know by now that Pelagius heresy refers to doing things WITHOUT GRACE! Clearly, I or ANY Catholic on this very long thread have never even implied that we can do anything without God. So please drop the accusation of Pelagianism... It is tiring to be falsely accused of it. The Scripture states that men are expected to work with Christ within them to "achieve" salvation - to bring it to conclusion.
The scriptures state that we are sealed with the Holy Spirit as our pledge
A seal is permanent, but we can turn away from God, giving up our birth right. We can disinherit ourselves. God's PROMISE is permanent - but it doesn't follow that WE will continue in Christ. WE CAN grieve the Holy Spirit, as I shown in 1 Cor 3:17 and other places.
Regards
You make God out to be a meglomaniac who can't stand it if someone is exalted (doesn't Scriptures say that the lowly will be exalted?). Really, who takes away from the Creator by complementing the creation? When I build a chair, and someone says, "that's a nice chair", do I get upset, demanding that I get all of the credit, or is it understood that I am being praised THROUGH the chair? It is the same thing with humans. God is praised and glorified through others who trust in Him, despite the lacking of evidence, such as Job. God is praised by the lowly person who perseveres, trusting in God. Really, you have a misplaced idea of God's sovereignty. You seem to believe that because we PARTICIPATE, that means that God does 98% and we do 2% on our own! Hardly! I and God do "x" together. There is no division of tasks. I do nothing good alone. Thus, it is my work - and God is the driving force behind it. With God, ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE.
Therefore, I was suggesting that your approach to seekers would have to be to teach the Church's teachings first, and the Bible would have to wait until later.
I teach "seekers" using the Scripture to show that the Church's teachings are there. Coupled with the Apostolic Tradition, a seeker is given a window into what the early Christians believed on something. We are part of the Body, not only in space, but in time. There is no reason to "wait until later" for the Bible! When I give a class, that is the first thing we do (after an opening prayer and review of last week's topic). We read several passages that pertain to the subject at hand, preferably something from both Testaments. We discuss it. Then, I show them what the Church teaches on these and parallel passages and develop the Church's dogmatic teaching. It is not necessary to dispense with the Bible to teach the Church's dogma! It's all there.
I suppose we will always disagree on whether the Spirit living within me will ever condescend to give me the time of day. :)
I had thought that common sense - having thousands of different denominations that all equally claim to be led by the Spirit - would be enough for you to determine that the Spirit does not lead on the dogmatic front to individuals.
I think I was talking about what are apparent contradictions by any plain reading of the text of scripture, such as a sinless Mary ("all" doesn't mean "all"), Mary as a perpetual virgin thus Jesus had no siblings, and priests forgiving sin. I know we have already discussed all of these. Here you say that tradition must agree with scripture, therefore they are equal in authority. (Maybe I did not earlier put together that the legs of the stool were of equal strength. :)
EVERYONE reads a book through a particular lense, and that includes the Bible. You must be aware by now that the Christians did not first have Scriptures and THEN determine what the Traditions they had learned meant to them. It was the other way around! The oral teachings and practice of the communities determined HOW to read Scritpure when Scripture was not so clear - or even when it seemed so to many people. For example...Eucharist - Real Presence. Seems pretty clear what is said. Seems pretty clear what the early Church thought - for 1500 years. Seems pretty clear that a book must be properly read to understand the author's intent. I find it difficult to ignore the unanimous teachings of 2000 years of Christians who preceded me.
So, if they must agree then the interpretation of the Bible must be made to agree with the writings of the Fathers. This eliminates any sense of the Bible being a readable book outside of the contortions necessary to match the Fathers.
WHO wrote the Scriptures? You seem to have a problem remembering that the Apostles wrote it AFTER they had been teaching people for YEARS! Of course the Bible is to be read through these conditions.
If you believe that "anyone" could come up with a book like the Bible, then I don't know what to say. I don't believe anyone could.
Really? A lot of people are absolutely convinced that the Koran is the Word of God. A lot of people believe that the Book of Mormons is from God. I could write a letter, sprinkle some "thus says the Lord" with some general prophesies (some of which are bound to come true), and I'd have a so-called inspired book from God! However, WE know that couldn't be the case BECAUSE a writing cannot PROVE ITSELF. Just because a writing says "The history of Alexander the Great" doesn't mean it is. And just because a book says "The Bible" on the front cover doesn't mean the entire book is from God. Only external proofs - which you mention, for example, when you talk about the bones of Mohemmed, can PROVE decisively one way or the other!!! You are using external proves to disregard other books as NOT being from God, but you don't seem to realize it!
The tomb of the author of the Bible is empty.
Jesus didn't write the Bible! See what I mean? You are drilled so heavily on this stuff that you can't identify for yourself that the Bible takes outside verification to prove its claim! Anyone can write a book with "thus says the Lord". Only people on the ground can determine the truth of it or not.
Besides, I obviously did come to the conclusion that the Bible is real without any help or knowledge of the Fathers or any Catholic tradition. Was I just lucky? :)
No, you fail to realize that you DID come to that conclusion BASED on the CATHOLIC TRADITION. You think the Protestants figured out for themselves that the Scriptures were from God? The NT was identified as Scriptures one thousand years before Luther came on the scene. The reason why you know the Bible is from God is because the Catholic Church says it is and the Protestants unwittingly follow in step to that claim, not realizing the irony that they rely on the Church's determination of authority, while casting aside its authority to teach that very same book! Go figure.
Regards
Pelagianism, Semi-Pelagianism, Arminianism...they are all one in the same. They take different forms and different structure but they all have the same belief backing them; man has to 1) cooperate or 2) have faith to be saved. Man has to do something. If it looks like a duck and quack like a duck it must be a .....
A seal is permanent, but we can turn away from God, giving up our birth right.
If we're sealed with His Holy Spirit there is no way we'll ever turn away. This is the promise of Ezekiel 36, "I will put my spirit in them and CAUSE them to walk in my statues...".
WE CAN grieve the Holy Spirit, as I shown in 1 Cor 3:17 and other places.
Sure, we can grieve the Holy Spirit. We can also quench the Holy Spirit. How long do you think we will do that before God bops us on the head to get our attention? Do you think we can withstand God's chastisement?
I responded to all of your questions with an answer. What I didn't give you was the answer you wanted. But if things are as you stated, that was "As God wills."
It is not just the tense that is wrong. King James translates "charis" most everywhere as "grace". But this verse, for no reason that I can understand, the "charis" in "kecharitomene" becomes "favor". The difference is, of course, that grace is not just favor but unmerited favor. King James dilutes the meaning with the choice of "favor" over more precise "grace". "Highly" is another strange qualifier there. How highly? It suggests that a measure or a comparison is implied but it is not in the original. The sense of completeness is not conveyed by this translation.
Jerome's Latin translation, "gratia plena" -- "full of grace" has all the elements of "kecharotomene": reference to divine grace and completeness. The Greek church teaches that meaning as it always has.
The original in Ephesians 1 is different, as is, of course, the meaning. The word there is simply "echaritosen", "graced" or "gave grace". King James has this verse "To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved". Douay Rheims has it "Unto the praise of the glory of his grace, in which he hath graced us in his beloved son". The verb is correctly translated in the Douay, however, "son" is an extrapolation. In any event, Ephesians describes us as graced, but not filled with grace. "Kecharitomeme" does not appear anywhere elese in the New Testament. and that is consistent with what the Church teaches, that while we are all given the divine grace, Mary was uniquely filled with it by Christ since her conception as the perfect ark of the Word.
Why would she need to be told? Why would she have been afraid? Also, wouldn't someone filled with grace from before birth know who she was? She even asked questions. For someone who was sinless, she sure didn't seem to understand that she was different from any other human who had ever yet lived.
The real answer is that we don't know. We don't have an everyday experience of fullness of grace. It would be wise not to go beyond what the gospel tells us. Liek everyone else, I am not particularly wise, so I will speculate a bit.
Let us not forget that Mary is human. Her is in fact the proximity to God that humans are designed for (this in fact should be enough to explain the importance of Mary in theology, and importance of her example to us). So, to expect foreknowledge, or absence of human passion from her is misplaced. There is, however, a deep meaning in her querying the Angel: she knows that Eve was deceived by an angel and she does not want to be similarly deceived. There is this difference: Eve observes the fruit and trusts her own perception. Mary, instead, waits till the angel makes it clear that he comes as a messenger from God and trusts God's will. Eve relies on what she experientially observes and disregards the word of God. Mary relies on the word of God despite the experiential knowledge that virgins don't give births. Mary's faith reverses Eve's deception.
FK, I still believe that you have a chronological issue with Apostolic Tradition. There wasn't the need to filter the Apostles' teachings through the Scripture at the time. There wasn't a confusion - people knew that oral and written teachings from the Apostles were equally valid. It is only during the Reformation that we really see people suddenly questioning the orally given teachings. However, it is important to realize that the Church DID write down the Apostles teachings that didn't make the Scriptures explicitly - they just are not considered inspired works because they were not actually written by Apostles.
I hear what you are saying. We just disagree that a non-inspired work can be inerrant. You use the argument all the time: "How can you be sure?" You believe that the Church wrote down all non-Biblical Apostolic teachings perfectly because you declare they did. You might even rely on a particularly massaged Bible verse interpreted by the Church to give the Church the only authority to know scripture. You have to admit that is pretty convenient. :) The RCC establishes the authority of the RCC in its exclusivity. It goes back to interpretation of the Bible being forced to conform with the teachings of the Church.
You believe the Bible gives this transferability of divine power to men because otherwise tradition would have to be thrown out. God transfers the job of protecting His children away from Himself and into the hands of a few men. Yes, you say that God guides them, but God does not do the job Himself. When Jesus says His sheep follow His voice, it really means the sheep follow His voice as translated through the Church. We can't hear the voice of Jesus, we only hear the Church. And so on, and so on with a thousand Biblical teachings. Under this view Jesus is not a personal God at all, He is the executive who only speaks to middle management. :)
FK: "I believe the scripture was preserved by God. Nothing circular about that."
I think we need to tackle this problem. You know it is God's book based on internal evidence? So if I wrote "Thus says the Lord your God, I have a new commandment for my people. You shall follow the Book of Mormon with all of your heart - it is my message to the people of America", what would you say? How would you know that this is not from God? As you said, "what does timing have to do with God's plan"?
I'm no Bible scholar, but I have read every word, as doubtless you have. So, I would say that if you can come up with a writing that even approaches the Bible in completeness, wisdom, consistency, love, doctrine, historical accuracy, (add ten more adjectives that are the Bible), then maybe I would look into Mormonism. But, that's what it would take. :) Based only the merit of the book by itself, without anyone else vouching for it, do you believe there is an equal to the Bible on earth? Without the Church saying the Bible is OK, would you equate it with the Koran or the LDS bible?
Of course not! But God created man in His image and likeness so that he may be in perfect communion with God. By God's Design, man's nature is in perfect harmony with God's nature. By man's fall (from grace), it is no longer so.
I was responding to your statement:
Trumping His own will would be unthinkable in a perfect union of two natures in one Person of our Savior.
It just sounded to me like you were equating the natures. If I understand you, Adam's originally created nature was much less than Christ's? If so, that's why I said that, in Christ, the divine nature overrode the human nature that included the capacity to sin.
Here is the porblem you predestinationists don't seem to comprehend: the "slippage" is really God's will in your theology, so why resist it? Not only that, how can you when God compels you?
If after all these posts this is still your view of our theology, then I don't know what else to say. :) I don't demand that you agree, but you don't even want to understand it. Just on this thread, you're still stuck with the same stereotypes you started with weeks ago.
Thanks, Kolo, will do.
So, now you are saying that man accepts God on his own accord? I wish you would make up your mind.
My mind is made up just fine, and man does not accept God on his own accord. :) Just as Harley is saying, once the elect are shown the light, we WILL accept God. Part of that light is knowing who Christ is and why we need Him. From our human POV we do experience a free choosing, even though God has already chosen and preordained the names of the elect.
I think it has been clearly stated here that once saved you cannot sin because you are on God's tractor beam, and He doesn't make mistakes. Your theological cousins on the predestination side of the divide say that Judas was simply doing God's will. Then so must satan! If God allows it, it is good.
God doesn't make mistakes, and if God allows it, then it is for God's greater good. As for the rest of it, the only person on this thread who has been arguing it has been you. You have only been reading your own "clear statements". :)
Rom 2:4 Or do you think lightly of the riches of His kindness and tolerance and patience, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance?
2Co 7:9 I now rejoice, not that you were made sorrowful, but that you were made sorrowful to the point of repentance; for you were made sorrowful according to the will of God, so that you might not suffer loss in anything through us.
2Co 7:10 For the sorrow that is according to the will of God produces a repentance without regret, leading to salvation, but the sorrow of the world produces death.
2Ti 2:24-25 The Lord's bond-servant must not be quarrelsome, but be kind to all, able to teach, patient when wronged, with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth,
Act 11:17-18 "Therefore if God gave to them the same gift as He gave to us also after believing in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could stand in God's way?" When they heard this, they quieted down and glorified God, saying, "Well then, God has granted to the Gentiles also the repentance that leads to life."
Negative! His two natures are never in conflict with each other, so there is no need for the divine to "override" the human. Human nature was created to be in berfect harmony with God.
What you are preaching is not Christianity.
So, it is my fault? has it ever occurred to you that perhaps you are not explaining your dogma well enough? I will repeat: if everything is God's will then what's the point of prayer, redemption, repentance and salvation? To this day, weeks after you chose to profess this theology of yours, along with Harley D, not one of you have shown any rationale as to why are prayers efficacious, or for that matter why we need to do anything.
All you did was throw a bunch of disconnected and disjointed verses in rainbow colors on the thread with just the "right words" you were looking for on your search engine, but not one sentence that makes sense.
EXPLAIN, not by prooftexting, in your own words why why, why do you pray if God does not change His mind! Explain why we need to be redeemed if God makes us sin. Explain why Christ came to redeem us when we did nothing of our own to warrant condemnation. Explain why we need to do anything if God has already pre-choreographed everything for us, and nothing is our own doing, our own will, our own guilt, our own decision. If we are, as Harley D says, exactly the way we are because God made us exactly this way, then what is our role as intelligent beings. Why even be conscious?
So far I have seen no explanations, not one, that made any sense from either one of you.
IF you CAN explain this, then I may change my opinion of Calvinism as anything but a dooms-day cult. Until then, I will continue to ask the same questions, over and over.
If not, I will assume that you simple can't explain anything, which is what I believe now.
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