Can We Really Exercise Free Will?
- Thread starter LifelongLearner
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You are against the Biblical God based on reason, critical thinking and a sceptical mind.
I am not stupid. I know what that means.
Do you admit that there is a difference between "mocking" and posing serious quiestions ?
So, you’re a truth suppressor. Romans 1 is clear: all people know certain things about God because He's made sure they know Him. Claiming ‘I don’t know if God exists’ only denies what God has already revealed. I doubt you'll find many here that you can impress, which is saying a lot based upon some of these discussions.
- Why am I a truth suppressor?
- You wrote: "Romans 1 is clear: all people know certain things about God"
Do all people really know? Can you document your claim? I do not know anything about God.
- You wrote: "I doubt you'll find many here that you can impress."
So what? I am not here to impress, but to have a serious discussion and to learn things.
Why are you here Studier ?
I did not say you had said that. If you were following the line of convo (obviously
you were not) it is the non-believers' party line and you are toeing it.
But I have not claimed that you said that I said and so on.... we are not coming any further with this kind of "discussion". Instead, I am most curious to hear your opinion of a specific matter:
Who wrote the gospels ?
Life in His name is eternal life, not regeneration.
Jesus came to give eternal life...John 3:16.
Eternal life is knowing God and Christ...John 17:3.
John recorded what he did that people would believe and have life in His name...John 20:31.
John recorded these things that people might know they have eternal life...1 John 5:13.
Those verses all refer to eternal life; not regeneration.
The problem y'all have is the estate of the natural man. You have to ignore what is true of him to make a volitional choice unencumbered by his nature. And while some try to bypass this by saying God withholds his nature in order to make a choice, the Bible nowhere makes such a statement. Others simply act as though the things written about men aren't true and simply ignore them. God has simply dealt with them once and for all by giving them new hearts and His Spirit so that they love and obey Him. You have people obeying God from a natural estate. That simply isn't possible.
I don't have the documentation readily at hand. Would you assert that the gospels are not a scholarly work?
Actually it reads:
[Act 13:48 KJV] 48 And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified the word of the Lord: and as many as were ordained to eternal life believed.
More accurately stated as:
"When the Gentiles heard this, they began to rejoice and praise the word of the Lord, and the many believers were put in order and organized for eternal life."
Don't worry, we will get to why that faulty KJV translation is there ASAP.
But for now, the gist of it is that this verse is conveying an utterly mundane and entirely pedestrian idea.
And definitely not supercharged with Calvinist spoooooky razzle-dazzle incantations.
"On the other hand, if your goal is to best convey the meaning to the reader, this may not be the optimal translation. In other words, there is not always a one-to-one translation from English to Greek. We lose a lot of gray area and because of the way this verse is formatted, it can seem to imply that the gentiles were destined to salvation or eternal life. They always were, have been and will be. But the word Appoint or Ordained here has the equivalent of groceries being ordained to the correct shelf and area of your refrigerator. There is no rule other than the one you make that vegetables go in this crisper drawer and fruits go in that crisper drawer other than the convention you might make. But this doesn't come through in English.
It isn't ordained in the sense that it was fated or predestined at creation the way a Calvinist would interpret it and this isn't obvious when the word is translated to English. This is especially backed by the fact that the texts states that "When the Gentiles heard this" then they rejoiced, and as many as were ordained (to the correct eternal crisper drawer) believed."
I haven't said that my beliefs aren't reformed. I told you explicitly that they were. But reformed beliefs didn't inform my doctrine. My doctrine informed that my beliefs were reformed. The great thing about getting saved later in life is that you don't have any preconceived ideas. You come in as basically a blank slate. So you can approach the Bible with far fewer presumptions.
You desperately seek a definition of that which you wield moment by moment as a consequence of simply being alive?
Glad I don't have that problem.....
I perceived it as implied within your inquiry, assuming that you had already looked into some preliminary research and concluded that there was none found.