Can We Really Exercise Free Will?

[cv5]

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Indeed. A truth never so poignantly portrayed as here.....

And just look at that @Blain .......Jesus says that this outcast Canaanite woman with an horrible demon problem innately possesses both WILL and FAITH.

Oh yes, lest the Calvinists fail to inform you, the FREE WILL mechanism of action being expressed by the Canaanite woman was.....simply (key word simply) ASKING. And asking profusely at that. Which of course is EXACTLY what Jesus commands us to do in Luke 11:9-13!

[Mat 15:22-28 KJV]
22 And, behold, a woman of Canaan came out of the same coasts, and cried unto him, saying, Have mercy on me, O Lord, [thou] Son of David; my daughter is grievously vexed with a devil.

23 But he answered her not a word. And his disciples came and besought him, saying, Send her away; for she crieth after us.

24 But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

25 Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me.

26 But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast [it] to dogs.

27 And she said, Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters' table.

28 Then Jesus answered and said unto her, O woman, great [is] THY faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt. And her daughter was made whole from that very hour.

 

[cv5]

Speaking of free, what could be more free than asking?

An innate capacity the super-determinists think impossible. Which is a direct assault against the very words of our Savior.

Ask yourself who in their right mind could possibly fail to rightly comprehend these passages @Blain. As you can see, the Holy Spirit is absolutely responsive to the WILL of the petitioner.

[Luk 11:9-13 KJV] 9 And I say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.

10 For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.

11 If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if [he ask] a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent?

12 Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion?

13 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall [your] heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?

Yea @NightTwister .........the super-determinists are getting their clock cleaned. This work is vital to be sure. We carry on the legacy of those saints who preceded us.

Care to assist? There is no glory to be found in the peanut gallery buddy. But of course you are FREE to decline. Just as anyone is FREE to decline God's offer of salvation.

 

[Magenta]

Luke 9 v 58 / Matthew 8 v 20, plus 2 Corinthians 8 v 9 “Foxes have dens and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay His head.” For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich.

 

[sawdust]

As far as I am aware there is no scripture to support it

Then how is the Spirit convicting people of righteousness, sin and judgement? That's not after they are saved, but before they are saved.

John 16:8
And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment:

 

[Genez]

Yes I had a feeling you would go to that but note he did not say get behind me Peter he said get behind me satan he was speaking to satan not Peter himself

He was telling Peter who he was representing in how he was thinking.

Don't you get it?
Peter was being a bleeding heart, trying to convince Jesus to avoid the Cross!

Not to mention...
Paul also was at times sarcastic and would mentally clobber certain ones, especially in Corinth.

 

[Genez]

Actually this is not found anywhere in scripture either, lets say our flesh is shut up it would not be before we are regenerated because only when we are born again do we die to ourselves

Grace works in that way to give us space for our soul to sort things out.
If not?

You must believe, then?
That God forces us to believe against our will.

 

[Genez]

Scripture please.

You were saved by Grace.

You need chapter and verse at this point in your walk for that one?

 

[Magenta]

Are you saying that women can't preach the gospel? The gospel of life is relegated to just the "good ol' boys"?

It's weird. What is he seeing? I have no panels of women teaching men.

Maybe I should make one. It could be like a teacher at a blackboard with a pointer or chalk.

That way it will obviously be a teacher, and a man can be in front of her who she is teaching.

 

[Hakawaka]

LOL @ universal axioms being taken out of context. The free will crowd have zero verses to support their heresy.

Adam had one thing he was not to do and he did it. Then all creation was corrupted but the FWer says man is good.

That is called Pelagian heresy. Some of you think you are so special that what the Bible says of humanity does not apply to you.


Pelagian heretics insist man is inherently good. From within the hearts of men come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, wickedness, deceit, debauchery, envy, slander, arrogance, and foolishness. Mark 7 verses 21-22 Every inclination of man's heart is evil from his youth. Genesis 8 verse 21b Who can bring out clean from unclean? No one! Job 14 verse 4 A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Matthew 7 verse 18

There are a lot of verses that support free will. I can't think of a single page that doesn't prove free will. Open up your Bible to a random spot and there will be some verse talking about "do this, do that, dont do this, dont do that, strive, obey, seek Me, follow Me, love Me, keep my commandments" and all of these are evidence of free will. If you give these commands and man has no ability to obey, God is simply angry at His own decree and its God's fault man does not obey because He refuses to decree otherwise.

Oh and as for proof that the "keep my commandments" is actually something that humans can respond to, the Bible has 100% proof of that too, looky here:

Deuteronomy 30:
11 This commandment that I give you today is not too difficult for you, nor is it too distant from you. 12 It is not in the heavens that you should say, “Who will go up into the heavens to bring it down to us so that we might hear it and observe it?” 13 Nor is it beyond the sea that you should say, “Who will cross over the sea to bring it to us so that we might hear it and observe it?” 14 No, the word is very near to you, it is in your heart and in your mouth, so that you might do it.


15 See, I have set before you today life and good, and death and evil. 16 If you obey the command that I give you today, to love the Lord, your God, and to walk in his ways, and to observe his commandments, statutes, and decrees, then you will live and multiply, and the Lord, your God, will bless you in the land that you are entering to possess.

The entire chapter is full of free will verses. So much for no proof. How about Matthew 23:37, Jesus wanted to gather the children of Jerusalem but they were NOT WILLING. God wanted to gather, they did not want it, once again synergism. You have to co-operate with God's grace or you will not be saved.

 

[Hakawaka]

Make this make sense.
We are close to 6000 responses in this thread.

We are inundated with..... Total inability, total darkness,total depravity, mankind cannot choose to believe, the natural man cannot understand the things of God.

How do you "reach" people with this kind of witness?

It's ALL a WASTE OF TIME....none can understand.

You could say its bad news all around lol.

"Hear ye hear ye, you are totally depraved with no hope in the world. But have no fear the good news is here: Christ has come and you MAYBE have a hope in the world if you happen to be one of the elect chosen from before the foundation of the world. If not, tough luck son"

 

[Hakawaka]

I would like to say that if free will does exist it should be that it is not our will be done but the Lords, so whether it is important to have it or not doesn't matter in the end
I am on a personal journey of dying to my self and the more I go deeper on this journey the more I see that my will doesn't matter

It is important to note that before we come to salvation I do not believe one can choose God by their own will as it is stated that we must first be drawen to him in scripture

Brother man dont get pulled into the calvinist swamp.

If you want to see all the calvinist proof texts answered check out This link

Stay blessed

 

[Hakawaka]

From what I really see coming from both viewpoints is one group says God determined who goes to Heaven and who goes to Hell so humans aren't obeying anything but what God set forth until they reach their destination.

The other group says God awakens humanity one by one revealing Himself and their need for God and humanity then can decide to choose God or ultimately choose Hell.

So don't let soft explanations fool you because ultimately the 2 views I describe is what they're really saying.

So you will have to decide which view you believe.

You will either believe that God sends people to Hell to show how Sovereign He is and it's His Plan and Will that will be done
Or
That God gives man the ability to choose if he wants to follow God or not just like Romans 1, Corinthians, and Ephesians explains.

Amen and remember that hell wasn't even created for humans to begin with

Matthew 25:41 Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:

 

[Hakawaka]

This may be the case but when we arte born are not born into sin? do we not do as the flesh desires? if this is to be the case then are we not slaves to our own sinful desires? the bible never mentions man as free until we are free in Christ but it does mention man as being slaves to sin

If in fact we are free to choose as we please why is it that we still sin no matter how hard we try before we are born again? I ask this as an actual question because many have tried to not sin in the past but only Jesus was able to pull this off.

Genesis 4:7 If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it.”

Ecclesiastes 7:29 See, this alone I found, that God made man upright, but they have sought out many schemes.

What takes place is you grow up and you see everyone else sin and you are lured into it from infancy. The wicked go astray from the womb as the Bible says.

Have you read the story of the child raised by wolves? He acts like a wolf, because thats what he knew and learned.

 

[Hevosmies]

If you're old enough, do you remember a popular bumper sticker of a few decades ago that read: "God is my co-pilot"? This clearly implied that the pilot is man. Man is in control of "his" ship, "his" life, "his" destiny, etc. (God is second in command!) Of course, the very sad reality here is none of those things belong to man. What does mankind have that God has not given to us?

Sin

 

[Hakawaka]

Even though the scriptures clearly say otherwise? Do they not read their bibles? how is it a legally blind person like me can read and understand but not those who have their sight and yet do not see?

I would like to know how a legally blind person can read? Is blind not blind anymore? OR do you use audio bibles?

 

[Hakawaka]

When Lazarus was in the grave, was he made alive, heard the command, and came forth, or heard the word, came to life, and came forth?

This story has nothing to do with salvation. Jesus brought forth a man from the dead. Dont know why calvinists keep using this.

 

[Hakawaka]

God makes foolish the wisdom of the wise. HeIsHere is very wise in her own eyes.

You really dont like this person do you? Often taking passive aggresive shots at her. I have been hit as well. Is this the type of sanctification that predeterminism causes?

Why do you dislike us so much? I dont get it. What did she ever do to you. Disagree on an internet forum?

 

[Hakawaka]

I guess she never read that God gives grace only to the humble.

Hold up now. I thought no one is humble? So reinterpret those verses with your calvinistic grid:

God gives grace to those whom He has predestined to give humbleness to* There ya go.

 

[Hakawaka]

This is saying that only when I do these things will I become a child of God, thus making God's actions dependent on yours! How ridiculous!

Is it ridicilous?

Acts 16:31 They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved—you and your household.”

John 20:31 But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.

John 1:12-13 Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.

1 Cor 5:20 We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.


Galatians 3:26 You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.

John 3:16 For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that everyone who believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.


Romans 10:9 That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved

There are so many more. This is literally the message of the Bible. How can you make such a statement when Peter is asked "what must we do" just like Paul is asked.

 

[NightTwister]

Yea @NightTwister .........the super-determinists are getting their clock cleaned. This work is vital to be sure. We carry on the legacy of those saints who preceded us.

Care to assist? There is no glory to be found in the peanut gallery buddy. But of course you are FREE to decline. Just as anyone is FREE to decline God's offer of salvation.

You have certainly defeated every strawman that you have created.