Understanding God’s election

[Cameron143]

The error of the Calvinites:
They thought that God was evil (Satan's lie BTW). But He is not, never was never will be.
And BTW, the ultimate "type" of this wicked servant is Satan himself.
So I would urgently recommend for all to depart from this sort of nuttery.

[Mat 25:26 KJV]
His lord answered and said unto him, (SOOOOO) [Thou] wicked and slothful servant, (YOU THOUGHT) thou knewest that I reap where I sowed not, and gather where I have not strawed (DID YOU):???
(you thought that I was evil did you?)

[Mat 25:27 KJV]
Thou oughtest therefore to have put my money to the exchangers, and [then] at my coming I should have received mine own with usury.

[Mat 25:28 KJV]
Take therefore the talent from him, and give [it] unto him which hath ten talents.

[Mat 25:29 KJV]
For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath.

pfs...please show the post where someone has called God evil.

 

[Magenta]

pfs...please show the post where someone has called God evil.

Some have said God is unfair quite a few times. Now I know they say they only say He is unfair IF He acts a
certain way, but the Bible does in fact show Him acting in the very way it has been said would make Him unfair.

Then we are supposed to believe they understand the Bible and are a defender of truth. Obviously they do not, and are not.

Same as all their squawking about Calvin's "inabilty" when the truth is
that the Bible teaches it, as do other "isms," including Arminianism.

A bad tree cannot produce good fruit. The flesh profits nothing. So odd for some to insist that these hostile-to-
God people who live in the flesh can produce of their own free will the fruits of the Spirit without help from God.
They must overlook a plethora of Biblical truths and sweep them all aside to come to such a conclusion.
They don't just overlook them, either. They outright deny them.

 

[Pilgrimshope]

Ephesians 2:1-3 You were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you used to walk when you conformed to the ways of this world and of the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit who is now at work in the sons of disobedience. All of us also lived among them at one time, fulfilling the cravings of our flesh and indulging its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature children of wrath.

“I said therefore unto you, that ye shall die in your sins: for if ye believe not that I am he, ye shall die in your sins.”
‭‭John‬ ‭8:24‬ ‭KJV‬‬

“And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved;

but he that believeth not shall be damned.”
‭‭Mark‬ ‭16:15-16‬ ‭KJV‬‬


“in whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ: buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.

And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses;”( because they believed the gospel and were baptized which is the circumcision of the flesh promised in tbe ot
‭‭Colossians‬ ‭2:11-13‬ ‭KJV‬‬

 

[Jimbone]

If my ol' memory serves, yesterday Cameron (I believe) brought up the fact that God sovereignly and freely chose Abraham's descendants whom God called "Israel" to be his chosen nation and yet none of the free willers [oddly] complain about this fact.

But in response to that one of the more delusional free willers chimed in to basically tell us how all the surrounding Gentile nations in the ANE knew all about Israel's God, and how blessed Israel was and how Israel influenced these nations for good...yada, yada, yada. (I think the poster was either Genez or CV5 but I could be wrong.) In other words, the poster was desperately trying to put a good spin on the fact that none of the other nations were chosen by God to participate in his covenant! He, however, conveniently forgot Israel's dark, dismal checquered history of which I will bring some of that history back to our minds with a thumbnail sketch from the Psalms. But not only did he forget Israel's history, he forgot what God commanded Israel to do to those nations they were to drive from God's land! Let's go back to the past for a little while:

Ps 106:24-33
24 Then they despised the pleasant land;
they did not believe his promise.
25 They grumbled in their tents
and did not obey the LORD.
26 So he swore to them with uplifted hand
that he would make them fall in the desert,
27 make their descendants fall among the nations
and scatter them throughout the lands.

28 They yoked themselves to the Baal of Peor
and ate sacrifices offered to lifeless gods;
29 they provoked the LORD to anger by their wicked deeds,
and a plague broke out among them.
30 But Phinehas stood up and intervened,
and the plague was checked.
31 This was credited to him as righteousness
for endless generations to come.

32 By the waters of Meribah they angered the LORD,
and trouble came to Moses because of them;
33 for they rebelled against the Spirit of God,
and rash words came from Moses' lips.
NIV

It seems to me that Israel never lived up to its calling. They were supposed to be lights to the dark nations around them but instead they became as dark (if not worse) than those nations! So how did Israel get into all this hot water? Well...they disobeyed God. They didn't do what He commanded them from the very beginning. The Psalmist continues...

Ps 106:34-41
34 They did not destroy the peoples
as the LORD had commanded them,
35 but they mingled with the nations
and adopted their customs.
36 They worshiped their idols,
which became a snare to them.
37 They sacrificed their sons
and their daughters to demons.
38 They shed innocent blood,
the blood of their sons and daughters,
whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan,
and the land was desecrated by their blood.
39 They defiled themselves by what they did;
by their deeds they prostituted themselves.

40 Therefore the LORD was angry with his people
and abhorred his inheritance.
41 He handed them over to the nations,
and their foes ruled over them.
NIV

So God, who supposedly intends to save all men -- who wants "all" men to be saved -- instead put a "contract" out on all the occupants of the Land; yet, Israel who was supposed to carry out the contract failed to do so. As the text says, they instead "mingled" or befriended those pagan nations and wound up becoming ensnared by their customs and gods, which proved to be their downfall -- twice over I might add! The free willer spinmeisters got it all backwards. Israel had little positive impact on the surronding nations; conversely, those nations greatly influenced Israel.

So, free willers, go spin some more this Psalm and God's election of Israel!

You know what I really hate about THIS argument? This specific argument on CC between the people here having it? The fact that it's possible to have this disagreement and the perspective we look at it from, and still be brothers and sisters. We can even talk about this together in a way that glorifies the one and only TRUE God and His Son Jesus, the ONLY way ANYONE gets To God. We really can be saved in truth and see this different ways.

That's just not at all what's going on here, and it's sadly not even possible when half the conversation is on a Holy mission to destroy the other without ever even knowing what they believe. When that half refuses to listen or consider anything the other says, and ALL they do is attack this list of "bad beliefs" they carry around and tell themselves and others that the others believe this and are therefore wrong because-goes on to destroy the list of "bad beliefs", they just provided, that no one has ever said they believe in the conversation. Then high five each other for teaching the other group how wrong they are for the "bad beliefs" that they say you have. That you clearly tell them you don't, but they don't care what you have to say about it.

This is completely impossible to handle at all. You can't convince people like this. There does NOT AT ALL have to be this unbridgeable chasm between these two different ways of seeing the same thing that they insist there is, but there will never be an understanding when half the conversation completely ignores what you say and paints every one of your beliefs with lies. Bottom line.

 

[GWH]

This is another example of your dishonesty. The whole post has many good points, it just never addressed the content of my post. It was posited that God is love and that every action on His part is a demonstration of His love. So I asked how is the casting of someone into the Lake of Fire a manifestation of God's love? In reply @Inquisitor responds that Jesus on the cross is a demonstration of God's love. Well, of course it is. But how does that answer my question?
Now you repost his nonsequitor response as if I disagree with all its content. I do not, but like so many people here, he doesn't actually answer the questions asked.
So perhaps you can tell me: how is casting someone into the Lake of Fire a demonstration of God's love?

I can.

MFW only exists when there is the possibility of choosing between two qualitatively opposite moral options that we call good and evil. These options are opposites because of essentially different consequences for choosing them. Choosing good results in blessing, life and heaven; and choosing evil results in cursing, death and hell (DT 30:19). This is why hell as well as heaven exists. It is the just consequence for choosing evil rather than God. The Spirit of God is good: love, peace and joy (GL 5:22-23). Therefore, whoever rejects the Lord is spiritually separated from Him (IS 59:2) and thereby chooses the evil or satanic spirit of hatred, strife and misery and reaps the just consequence called “hell” in the afterlife (GL 6:7-9, HB 9:27-28). These options were presented by Moses to the Israelites (DT 30:19), and Jesus referred to this fundamental choice in terms of a fish or egg versus a snake or scorpion (LK 11:11-13). Life… or Curse? (GN 3:24, RV 22:1-2)

God created theoretical evil or the possibility of rejecting Him as an option that actualizes MFW/free human personality. As such it is necessary and even good (GN 1:31). Of course, it was wrong for Satan (1JN 3:8) and humanity (RM 5:12) to make evil actual by choosing to Sin or reject Faith in God’s Lordship. Sin: ignoring God/God’s Word.

God loves a cheerful giver (2CR 9:7), which means He desires people to cooperate with Him happily because of love and gratitude for His grace rather than to cower before Him because of fear of hell. Love must be evoked; it cannot be coerced. And again, when souls sin or do NOT choose to love God freely, it is perfectly just (loving and logical) for them to reap the appropriate consequence (GL 6:7-9) or hell.

Why would anyone choose to believe otherwise? Only God knows why people choose atheism. It is a mystery stated by Isaiah, which is cited by Jesus (in MT 13:14-15): “You will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but never perceiving. For this people’s heart has become calloused.” Apparently, this callous attitude demands God to nullify faith/MFW and thereby abrogate the essence of humanness by performing miracles in order to prove He exists (MT 12:39, 24:24, JN 20:29 & 1CR 1:22). In other words, atheists presume to know better than God; they want to usurp divine authority to determine what is best or good, but they may one day (at the eschaton per RV 20:15) wish they had admitted the possibility that God has ordained this mortal life on earth for the purpose of people proving to Him who is worthy of (qualified for) eternal life in heaven (cf. RM 2:5-8 & 2CR 13:5; heart/mind: hard or open?).

Such evil people punish/torture themselves by experiencing delayed karma, just as those who experience appropriate justice during this earthly existence also punish themselves or reap what they have sown and send themselves to jail. This view makes souls responsible for breaking the rules rather than blaming evil on the judges (or Judge) who enforce the rules. The purpose of earthly punishment is to promote repentance, but the reason for retribution in hell is to attain justice. It is difficult to imagine, but somehow even someone as evil as Hitler will receive perfect justice, perhaps experiencing the agony of the millions of deaths he caused in accordance with the principal of “eye for eye” (MT 5:38), after which their souls are destroyed forever (per JN 17:12, RM 9:22, GL 6:8, PHP 3:19, 2THS 1:9, 2PT 3:7 & RV 20:13-14).

 

[Magenta]

“I said therefore unto you, that ye shall die in your sins: for if ye believe not that I am he, ye shall die in your sins.”
‭‭John‬ ‭8:24‬ ‭KJV‬‬

“And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved;

but he that believeth not shall be damned.”
‭‭Mark‬ ‭16:15-16‬ ‭KJV‬‬


“in whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ: buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.

And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses;”( because they believed the gospel and were baptized which is the circumcision of the flesh promised in tbe ot
‭‭Colossians‬ ‭2:11-13‬ ‭KJV‬‬

Because of His great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ
even when we were dead in our trespasses. It is by grace you have been saved!

Praise the Lord, for He is good, His love endures forever!

He saved us, not by the righteous deeds we had done, but according to His
mercy, through the washing of new birth and renewal by the Holy Spirit.

Praise the Lord, for He is good, His love endures forever!

Once you were alienated from God and were hostile in your minds, engaging in evil
deeds. But now He has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death.

Praise the Lord, for He is good, His love endures forever!

For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous,
to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive in the Spirit,

Praise the Lord, for He is good, His love endures forever!

 

[Cameron143]

I can.

MFW only exists when there is the possibility of choosing between two qualitatively opposite moral options that we call good and evil. These options are opposites because of essentially different consequences for choosing them. Choosing good results in blessing, life and heaven; and choosing evil results in cursing, death and hell (DT 30:19). This is why hell as well as heaven exists. It is the just consequence for choosing evil rather than God. The Spirit of God is good: love, peace and joy (GL 5:22-23). Therefore, whoever rejects the Lord is spiritually separated from Him (IS 59:2) and thereby chooses the evil or satanic spirit of hatred, strife and misery and reaps the just consequence called “hell” in the afterlife (GL 6:7-9, HB 9:27-28). These options were presented by Moses to the Israelites (DT 30:19), and Jesus referred to this fundamental choice in terms of a fish or egg versus a snake or scorpion (LK 11:11-13). Life… or Curse? (GN 3:24, RV 22:1-2)

God created theoretical evil or the possibility of rejecting Him as an option that actualizes MFW/free human personality. As such it is necessary and even good (GN 1:31). Of course, it was wrong for Satan (1JN 3:8) and humanity (RM 5:12) to make evil actual by choosing to Sin or reject Faith in God’s Lordship. Sin: ignoring God/God’s Word.

God loves a cheerful giver (2CR 9:7), which means He desires people to cooperate with Him happily because of love and gratitude for His grace rather than to cower before Him because of fear of hell. Love must be evoked; it cannot be coerced. And again, when souls sin or do NOT choose to love God freely, it is perfectly just (loving and logical) for them to reap the appropriate consequence (GL 6:7-9) or hell.

Why would anyone choose to believe otherwise? Only God knows why people choose atheism. It is a mystery stated by Isaiah, which is cited by Jesus (in MT 13:14-15): “You will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but never perceiving. For this people’s heart has become calloused.” Apparently, this callous attitude demands God to nullify faith/MFW and thereby abrogate the essence of humanness by performing miracles in order to prove He exists (MT 12:39, 24:24, JN 20:29 & 1CR 1:22). In other words, atheists presume to know better than God; they want to usurp divine authority to determine what is best or good, but they may one day (at the eschaton per RV 20:15) wish they had admitted the possibility that God has ordained this mortal life on earth for the purpose of people proving to Him who is worthy of (qualified for) eternal life in heaven (cf. RM 2:5-8 & 2CR 13:5; heart/mind: hard or open?).

Such evil people punish/torture themselves by experiencing delayed karma, just as those who experience appropriate justice during this earthly existence also punish themselves or reap what they have sown and send themselves to jail. This view makes souls responsible for breaking the rules rather than blaming evil on the judges (or Judge) who enforce the rules. The purpose of earthly punishment is to promote repentance, but the reason for retribution in hell is to attain justice. It is difficult to imagine, but somehow even someone as evil as Hitler will receive perfect justice, perhaps experiencing the agony of the millions of deaths he caused in accordance with the principal of “eye for eye” (MT 5:38), after which their souls are destroyed forever (per JN 17:12, RM 9:22, GL 6:8, PHP 3:19, 2THS 1:9, 2PT 3:7 & RV 20:13-14).

Let's begin with your premise concerning freewill. Can you define freewill?

 

[Kroogz]

Deuteronomy 30:6~ The LORD your God will circumcise your hearts and the hearts of your descendants, so that you may love Him with all your heart and with all your soul, and live.
@Kroogz do you agree with the order of events as presented in this Scripture?

Also Ezekiel 36:26-27; Romans 2:29; Jeremiah 32:39-40; Colossians 2:11; Philippians 3:3...

Whether you realize it or not sis, you're trying to pit scripture with scripture.

John 10:28 is a clear and straight forward verse. We will NEVER perish. The Armins try to find/make a verse say ," Well, we can perish." So go back to the very clear verse.....We will NEVER perish. So the more ambiguous verse must mean something other than loss of salvation.

Acts 16:31. Clear and straight forward. Believe and then you shall be saved.

Same as .....commit things worthy of stripes THEN shall be beaten.

 

[Magenta]

Let's begin with your premise concerning freewill. Can you define freewill?

The natural man is a slave to sin. Cue the denials.

 

[Pilgrimshope]

The truth is hard for some to accept so they make up lies instead.

They've exchanged the truth about God for a lie...

Yes people exchange the truth of God

“Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed; and ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”
‭‭John‬ ‭8:31-32‬ ‭KJV‬‬

and so this happens because people dont want truth because of thier lists they adore Satan doesn’t want anyone knowing truth

“I charge thee therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom;

preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.”
‭‭2 Timothy‬ ‭4:1-4‬ ‭KJV‬‬

many Christian’s are very easily turned from truth to fables when they are taken away from the words Christ promised salvation in to believers

The truth people reject

“I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.”
‭‭Luke‬ ‭13:3‬ ‭KJV‬‬

The thing people reject

“For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you:

but if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”
‭‭Matthew‬ ‭6:14-15‬ ‭KJV‬‬

These things are truths bit people already assume it’s not true they’re already forgiven , they’ll never be judged ect ect we turn from truth to fables through false doctrine . In other words people explaining why Jesus teachings arent true or don’t apply to them because “they believe “

Jesus was teaching those who believes in him how to be saved which is the truth people reject and in the end will condemn them because of rejecting it

“He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day.

( This is a warning to people )

For I have not spoken of myself; but the Father which sent me, he gave me a commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak. ( the truth )

And I know that his commandment is life everlasting: whatsoever I speak therefore, even as the Father said unto me, so I speak.”
‭‭John‬ ‭12:48-50‬ ‭KJV‬‬

awe do t want anyone to take us away from the truth spoken by the lord Jesus who is himself the way truth and life but many work hard to do that to take one’s ears away from Jesus word and to thier own

 

[Magenta]

Whether you realize it or not sis, you're trying to pit scripture with scripture.

John 10:28 is a clear and straight forward verse. We will NEVER perish. The Armins try to find/make a verse say ," Well, we can perish." So go back to the very clear verse.....We will NEVER perish. So the more ambiguous verse must mean something other than loss of salvation.

Acts 16:31. Clear and straight forward. Believe and then you shall be saved.

Same as .....commit things worthy of stripes THEN shall be beaten.

You avoided answering and instead falsely accuse me. I reconcile Scripture, not pit.

What are you even going on about? It has nothing to do with the question.

You simply refuse to address it. But thanks for finally not answering, after my three attempts.

 

[Pilgrimshope]

The natural man is a slave to sin. Cue the denials.

“Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey;


whether of sin unto death,

or of obedience unto righteousness?”
‭‭Romans‬ ‭6:16‬ ‭KJV‬‬

 

[Pilgrimshope]

Because of His great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ
even when we were dead in our trespasses. It is by grace you have been saved!

Praise the Lord, for He is good, His love endures forever!

He saved us, not by the righteous deeds we had done, but according to His
mercy, through the washing of new birth and renewal by the Holy Spirit.

Praise the Lord, for He is good, His love endures forever!

Once you were alienated from God and were hostile in your minds, engaging in evil
deeds. But now He has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death.

Praise the Lord, for He is good, His love endures forever!

For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous,
to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive in the Spirit,

Praise the Lord, for He is good, His love endures forever!

Yes he’s good and did all that he doesn’t forbid one man from believing and make another man incapable of refusing though ….he’s done his part for all mankind

about part is to believe it or reject it

 

[Magenta]

“Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey;

whether of sin unto death,

or of obedience unto righteousness?”
‭‭Romans‬ ‭6:16‬ ‭KJV‬‬

From Romans 6:19-21 You used to offer your body in slavery to impurity and to escalating wickedness when you were slaves to sin. What fruit did you reap at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? The outcome of those things is death.

 

[Magenta]

Yes he’s good and did all that he doesn’t forbid one man from believing and make another man incapable of refusing though ….he’s done his part for all mankind

about part is to believe it or reject it

I have never said God forbids anyone from believing. Are you trying to say I have?

 

[Cameron143]

The natural man is a slave to sin. Cue the denials.

We're coming to this. Just laying some groundwork so people can come to conclusions themselves.

 

[Cameron143]

You avoided answering and instead falsely accuse me. I reconcile Scripture, not pit.

What are you even going on about? It has nothing to do with the question.

You simply refuse to address it. But thanks for finally not answering, after my three attempts.

Typical answer. You are doing something wrong, nonsequitor response, and restatement of original premise.
Rinse and repeat.

 

[keepingthingsreal]

Well, I am not about to read what appears to be 212 pages of bickering, but I will simply say this:

Isa 42:1
Behold my servant, whom I uphold; mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth; I have put my spirit upon him: he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.
Isa 42:2
He shall not cry, nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be heard in the street.
Isa 42:3
A bruised reed shall he not break, and the smoking flax shall he not quench: he shall bring forth judgment unto truth.
Isa 42:4
He shall not fail nor be discouraged, till he have set judgment in the earth: and the isles shall wait for his law.

Mat 12:15
But when Jesus knew it, he withdrew himself from thence: and great multitudes followed him, and he healed them all;
Mat 12:16
And charged them that they should not make him known:
Mat 12:17
That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying,
Mat 12:18
Behold my servant, whom I have chosen; my beloved, in whom my soul is well pleased: I will put my spirit upon him, and he shall shew judgment to the Gentiles.
Mat 12:19
He shall not strive, nor cry; neither shall any man hear his voice in the streets.
Mat 12:20
A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not quench, till he send forth judgment unto victory.
Mat 12:21
And in his name shall the Gentiles trust.

Jesus Christ is God's elect or the one whom God has chosen. Whoever is in Christ is similarly elected or chosen in him, and that is based upon whether or not we willfully receive the gospel. It really is that simple.

Jos 24:15
And if it seem evil unto you to serve the LORD, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.

 

[Magenta]

Typical answer. You are doing something wrong, nonsequitor response, and restatement of original premise.
Rinse and repeat.

Apparently reflecting his methodology back to him makes me wrong in his eyes.

Too funny that he then repeats his methodology! It is only good/right when he does it, eh?

 

[cv5]

I have never said God forbids anyone from believing. Are you trying to say I have?

Would a Calvinite lie about such things?
Oh yea.
Lots of moving targets too.