"THE" Doctrine of Grace

[Phat8594]

I can see why you don't like the question. The only possible answer is that God is in control and brings about that which He wills. Romans is still true:

"[God] said to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. So then it is not of him that wills, nor of him that runs, but of God that shows mercy. For the scripture said unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth. Therefore [God has] mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardens."

God is in control. If God wills to save Billy, then He will bring Billy to salvation. If God does not will to save Billyjean, then Billyjean is on her own to come to salvation of her own volition.

Yet another verse absolutely ripped out of original context. To say that this verse means that God unconditionally elects individuals to salvation is eisigesis at its best.

The verse (and context) in question shows that God has the prerogative to save whomever He wants. BUT it does not speak to HOW God uses that prerogative. So to say HOW God uses the prerogative from a text that only speaks to the fact that God has the prerogative and not how He excercises that prerogative is nothing less than twisting a text to suit a theology.

[Phat8594]

The only thing God does is come in after people have made their decision and seal all those who accept the offer and then save some who had foolishly rejected the offer.

So whatever happened to irresistable grace, and regeneration preceding faith???!!???

[Phat8594]

From John 6 where Jesus says: "All that the Father gives me shall come to me; and him that comes to me I will in no wise cast out."

Anywhere else you see this?

[Phat8594]

All that matters regardless what approach one takes to the Bible is that which the Bible says. Where did you get the idea that a theology decides what the Bible says apart from the Bible??

Its simple. Its called REALITY. People tend to filter what they read in the Bible through their theology. And unfortunately, many people would rather go beyond scripture in order to protect their theology. Sometimes this means interpreting a verse in a way that the original author intended, and sometimes it means going much further than the author intended. Often times you can spot this type of game when people (on either side of an argument) start lobbing "proof-texts" that "support" their theology.

And thats the problem...when you look for "proof" of your theology in the Bible, rather testing your theology against the Bible. This tends to lead to ignoring local context, and authors intent in order to "prove" a theology; this of course subjugates scripture to theology, rather than the other way around. A great example of this is the typical Calvinist interpretation of Romans 9...Calvinists use it to "prove" unconditional individual predestination to salvation..but it really has nothing to do with that AT ALL.


So in this case, you made a distinction between different types of grace, and I asked for Biblical support for this. In other words, I asked you to show me where the Bible makes this distinction. Of course, I am still waiting for you to show me this. I am always happy to be corrected (and I mean that with all sincerity).

Who does the stuff you are describing?? It is not Calvinism for sure

Well if thats true, I am sure you can show me where the Bible makes the distinction between different types of grace.

[Rdr. Arsenios]

If God can decide to intervene in the life of a person to save them,
then the only reason that all are not saved is because God has chosen not to save all. Correct?

God intervenes into EVERY person's life to save them...
Not all are saved...

You blame God...
I assign human responsibility...

Arsenios

[rhutchin]

If God can decide to intervene in the life of a person to save them, then the only reason that all are not saved is because God has chosen not to save all. Correct?

God intervenes into EVERY person's life to save them...
Not all are saved...

You blame God...
I assign human responsibility...

That's fine, but God is omnipotent and by virtue of being omnipotent, has the final choice in the final destination (salvation or death) of any person. It is God who has the final say to exercise His power to save a person who through "human responsibility" rejects salvation. The only reason that all are not saved is because God chooses not to exercise His power to save all. Correct??

[rhutchin]

So in this case, you made a distinction between different types of grace, and I asked for Biblical support for this. In other words, I asked you to show me where the Bible makes this distinction. Of course, I am still waiting for you to show me this. I am always happy to be corrected (and I mean that with all sincerity).

Well if thats true, I am sure you can show me where the Bible makes the distinction between different types of grace.

One type of grace:
"God makes his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust." Matthew 5

"Christ is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world." 1 John 2

Another type of grace:

"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." Acts 13

"And this is the record, that God hath given to [believers] eternal life, and this life is in his Son." 1 John 5

"No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day." John 6

Then of course, there is this from Hannah's prayer from 1 Samuel 2:

"The LORD killeth, and maketh alive: he bringeth down to the grave, and bringeth up.
The LORD maketh poor, and maketh rich: he bringeth low, and lifteth up.
He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth up the beggar from the dunghill, to set them among princes, and to make them inherit the throne of glory:
for the pillars of the earth are the LORD’S, and he hath set the world upon them.
He will keep the feet of his saints, and the wicked shall be silent in darkness; for by strength shall no man prevail."

[RBerman]

Yet another verse absolutely ripped out of original context. To say that this verse means that God unconditionally elects individuals to salvation is eisigesis at its best. The verse (and context) in question shows that God has the prerogative to save whomever He wants. BUT it does not speak to HOW God uses that prerogative. So to say HOW God uses the prerogative from a text that only speaks to the fact that God has the prerogative and not how He excercises that prerogative is nothing less than twisting a text to suit a theology.

The context of Romans 9:15-18 is Paul answering the question, "Is there injustice on God's part?" (v14). Paul anticipates that his interlocutor will ask this question after Paul points out how the destinies of Ishmael and Esau, who were both excluded from the people of God, unfolded according to a plan which God had set in place before either child was born. Those examples, in turn, are cited in response to an implied question about whether the general Jewish rejection of Jesus means that God's plan for the Jews has failed. (9:1-6) So this passage is not simply about the abstract concept of whether God has the prerogative to save whom He wishes. Rather, it's about how the actual situation (Jews rejecting the Jewish Messiah) is in fact an expression of God's prerogative to "harden whom [He] will harden" and "have mercy on whom [He] will have mercy." God has hardened most Jews against the gospel as part of his plan for gathering in the Gentiles. The existence of a Jewish remnant of faith, including Paul, is evidence that God's hardening of the Jews is not wholesale. Thus, within God's plan, Jews have been divided into "the elect" and "the hardened."

Romans 11:7

What then? Israel failed to obtain what it was seeking. The elect obtained it, but the rest were hardened...

Romans 11:25

Lest you be wise in your own sight, I do not want you to be unaware of this mystery, brothers: a partial hardening has come upon Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in.

[Rdr. Arsenios]

That's fine, but God is omnipotent and by virtue of being omnipotent, has the final choice in the final destination (salvation or death) of any person. It is God who has the final say to exercise His power to save a person who through "human responsibility" rejects salvation. The only reason that all are not saved is because God chooses not to exercise His power to save all. Correct??

God is indeed omnipotent and created us in His Image... We are icons of God... God does not have, as you are saying here, the final choice - He has the ONLY choice... Yet WE are icons of HIM, and it is not a question of God's "getting to choose" AFTER we make OUR choices, but it is a matter of OUR choices conforming to God's WILL, whether or not we even know there IS a God, or believe in some particular human person's fallen understanding of Him (such as yours)... Goodness is goodness, and is of God... Truthfulness is truthfulness, even when it is practiced by someone who does not believe in God... Creation is good, even after it is fallen, and man in creation is able to find salvation, as did Noah and his, and all the prophets and saints...

But here is the point: How is it that we are icons of God's omnipotence? How is it that we have all-power? Is it not in regard only to ourselves? Is it not this that God has given us, and then absolutely keeps us accountable?

You see, if man has no free will, he has no power over himself, and in that case, God has only Himself to name as the Author of sin and evil... But if it is true that God is ALL Light, and in him is no darkness found at all, then MAN is the author of his own evil, because being created in the Image of God, he freely chose evil, which is NOT of God at all... And it is FROM this freedom, in this fallen life in this fallen creation, that our Lord became man, and was crucified for us the thankless and ungrateful ones living in our sins... And in ascending the Cross, He overcame pain, suffering and death so that we who are IN HIM (by Baptism into Him, into His death), and in purity of heart, should live thereby in the Kingdom of God on earth... THAT IS SALVATION - To no longer be RULED by pride, vanity, sin, pain, suffering, death, lustings of the flesh, or ANY other worldly passion, but to become fellow-citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven, living spiritual, not worldly and carnal, lives, being not of, but still in, this fallen creation, having an EARNEST of the LIFE of the Age to Come...

And at each and every point in this life we are FREE to continue in it or not... We must begin again each day anew to take up our own cross of suffering in self-denial... Self denial is willful - And Christ Himself tells us that it is OUR will that willingly denies our SELF: "IF anyone is WILLING, after Me to be following, let him FIRST deny himself, and THEN take up his own cross each day, and be following Me..." Indeed, it is the DEGREE of one's willingness that determines his place in the kingdom of heaven, according to God's will, as Christ reveals in Revelation:

Rev 3:12 Him that is overcoming will I make a pillar in the temple of my God,
and he shall go no more out:
and I will write upon him the name of my God,
and the name of the city of my God,
which is new Jerusalem,
which cometh down out of heaven from my God:
and I will write upon him my new name.

Indeed, you have TWO actions taking place - The overcoming of one who is faithful, and GOD making him a PILLAR...
This is called SYNERGY...
We are ALWAYS ABLE to be overcoming at SOME level...
The PRODIGAL had to "Come to Himself" and HEAD HOME...
And THEN God came to him, RAN to him and embraced him...
But NOT while he remained with the aliens and their pigs...

It was a FAILURE of Adam's will that caused him to fall...
And it is ONLY by the RECOVERY of that very FAILURE that WE are to overcome ADAM's FAILURE in ourselves...
And as IMAGES of God, even though fallen, THAT FREEDOM is always there in us... Until we die...
YOU will find NO salvation without THAT restoration in YOU... Not in THIS life...
In the life to come, we will all be judged according to our deeds...

By your doctrinaire elimination of the human will in salvation
You have closed off the WAY of salvation to those who believe you...

Mat_16:24 Then said Jesus unto his disciples,
If any man is willing to follow Me,
let him deny himself,
and take up his cross,
and follow me.

Do you understand what a corollary is?

If ANY man is UN-willing to follow me,
Let him exalt himself
and embrace pleasures
and go his own way...

By affirming the first, you affirm the second necessarily...
And this for those who insist on logic and scorn the witness of Christ...

Here is a last question for you:

IF God created mankind with a sovereign will in His Holy Image...
THEN is God's sovereignty degraded in your mind?

Arsenios

[rhutchin]

That's fine, but God is omnipotent and by virtue of being omnipotent, has the final choice in the final destination (salvation or death) of any person. It is God who has the final say to exercise His power to save a person who through "human responsibility" rejects salvation. The only reason that all are not saved is because God chooses not to exercise His power to save all. Correct??

God does not have, as you are saying here, the final choice - He has the ONLY choice...

If you had stopped here, you would have done well. God does have the only choice and necessarily, God chooses whom to save and whom not to save. The problem is that you can't abide with God having the only choice so you have to say BUT, and qualify what you will allow God to do.

Yet WE are icons of HIM, and it is not a question of God's "getting to choose" AFTER we make OUR choices, but it is a matter of OUR choices conforming to God's WILL, whether or not we even know there IS a God, or believe in some particular human person's fallen understanding of Him... Goodness is goodness, and is of God... Truthfulness is truthfulness, even when it is practiced by someone who does not believe in God... Creation is good, even after it is fallen, and man in creation is able to find salvation, as did Noah and his, and all the prophets and saints...

First, you need to deny the corruption of man as a consequence of Adam's sin. Yes, you say, God is omnipotent and God has the only choice but man really has some good in him and does not need God to help him so let us leave man alone to decide for himself. However, Proverbs is still correct when it says, "There is a way that seems right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death." Your good man makes a decision that seems right or good but God says it leads to death. There is no avenue here to gain salvation through ways that seem right to men. It is only through Christ that a person can be freed from sin and thereby able to pursue salvation. It is God's grace that does this as Ephesians 2 says: "Even when we [believers] were dead in sins, God quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;)"

But here is the point: How is it that we are icons of God's omnipotence? How is it that we have all-power? Is it not in regard only to ourselves? Is it not this that God has given us, and then absolutely keeps us accountable?

You see, if man has no free will, he has no power over himself, and in that case, God has only Himself to name as the Author of sin and evil... But if it is true that God is ALL Light, and in him is no darkness found at all, then MAN is the author of his own evil, because being created in the Image of God, he freely chose evil, which is NOT of God at all... And it is FROM this freedom, in this fallen life in this fallen creation, that our Lord became man, and was crucified for us the thankless and ungrateful ones living in our sins... And in ascending the Cross, He overcame pain, suffering and death so that we who are IN HIM (by Baptism into Him, into His death), and in purity of heart, should live thereby in the Kingdom of God on earth... THAT IS SALVATION - To no longer be RULED by pride, vanity, sin, pain, suffering, death, lustings of the flesh, or ANY other worldly passion, but to become fellow-citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven, living spiritual, not worldly and carnal, lives, being not of, but still in, this fallen creation, having an EARNEST of the LIFE of the Age to Come...

And at each and every point in this life we are FREE to continue in it or not... We must begin again each day anew to take up our own cross of suffering in self-denial... Self denial is willful - And Christ Himself tells us that it is OUR will that willingly denies our SELF: "IF anyone is WILLING, after Me to be following, let him FIRST deny himself, and THEN take up his own cross each day, and be following Me..." Indeed, it is the DEGREE of one's willingness that determines his place in the kingdom of heaven, according to God's will, as Christ reveals in Revelation:

Rev 3:12 Him that is overcoming will I make a pillar in the temple of my God,
and he shall go no more out:
and I will write upon him the name of my God,
and the name of the city of my God,
which is new Jerusalem,
which cometh down out of heaven from my God:
and I will write upon him my new name.

Indeed, you have TWO actions taking place - The overcoming of one who is faithful, and GOD making him a PILLAR...
This is called SYNERGY...
We are ALWAYS ABLE to be overcoming at SOME level...
The PRODIGAL had to "Come to Himself" and HEAD HOME...
And THEN God came to him, RAN to him and embraced him...
But NOT while he remained with the aliens and their pigs...

It was a FAILURE of Adam's will that caused him to fall...
And it is ONLY by the RECOVERY of that very FAILURE that WE are to overcome ADAM's FAILURE in ourselves...
And as IMAGES of God, even though fallen, THAT FREEDOM is always there in us... Until we die...
YOU will find NO salvation without THAT restoration in YOU... Not in THIS life...
In the life to come, we will all be judged according to our deeds...

By your doctrinaire elimination of the human will in salvation
You have closed off the WAY of salvation to those who believe you...

Mat_16:24 Then said Jesus unto his disciples,
If any man is willing to follow Me,
let him deny himself,
and take up his cross,
and follow me.

Do you understand what a corollary is?

If ANY man is UN-willing to follow me,
Let him exalt himself
and embrace pleasures
and go his own way...

By affirming the first, you affirm the second necessarily...
And this for those who insist on logic and scorn the witness of Christ...

This is goobblygook. Man does not have all-power even with respect to himself. Your false premise leads to an active imagination and nothign else.

Here is a last question for you:

IF God created mankind with a sovereign will in His Holy Image...
THEN is God's sovereignty degraded in your mind?s

Man has a will, corrupted by sin, but it is false to say that it is "sovereign" in any sense of the word. Where in the Scriptures do you find this stuff?

[rhutchin]

I can see why you don't like the question. The only possible answer is that God is in control and brings about that which He wills. Romans is still true:

"[God] said to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. So then it is not of him that wills, nor of him that runs, but of God that shows mercy. For the scripture said unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth. Therefore [God has] mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardens."

God is in control. If God wills to save Billy, then He will bring Billy to salvation. If God does not will to save Billyjean, then Billyjean is on her own to come to salvation of her own volition.

Yet another verse absolutely ripped out of original context. To say that this verse means that God unconditionally elects individuals to salvation is eisigesis at its best.

The verse (and context) in question shows that God has the prerogative to save whomever He wants. BUT it does not speak to HOW God uses that prerogative. So to say HOW God uses the prerogative from a text that only speaks to the fact that God has the prerogative and not how He exercises that prerogative is nothing less than twisting a text to suit a theology.

The context of Romans 9:15-18 is Paul answering the question, "Is there injustice on God's part?" (v14). Paul anticipates that his interlocutor will ask this question after Paul points out how the destinies of Ishmael and Esau, who were both excluded from the people of God, unfolded according to a plan which God had set in place before either child was born. Those examples, in turn, are cited in response to an implied question about whether the general Jewish rejection of Jesus means that God's plan for the Jews has failed. (9:1-6) So this passage is not simply about the abstract concept of whether God has the prerogative to save whom He wishes. Rather, it's about how the actual situation (Jews rejecting the Jewish Messiah) is in fact an expression of God's prerogative to "harden whom [He] will harden" and "have mercy on whom [He] will have mercy." God has hardened most Jews against the gospel as part of his plan for gathering in the Gentiles. The existence of a Jewish remnant of faith, including Paul, is evidence that God's hardening of the Jews is not wholesale. Thus, within God's plan, Jews have been divided into "the elect" and "the hardened."

Romans 11:7

What then? Israel failed to obtain what it was seeking. The elect obtained it, but the rest were hardened...

Romans 11:25

Lest you be wise in your own sight, I do not want you to be unaware of this mystery, brothers: a partial hardening has come upon Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in.

You do well to conclude that "God has the prerogative to save whomever He wants." But agreeing with RBerman's comment, we see that Paul argues God's prerogative in response to the question, "Is there injustice on God's part?" If Paul only means to say that God has the prerogative, what does this add to the point he seeks to make. Additionally, look at the follow-up question Paul poses, "Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?" How could this flow from your contention that Paul only means to argue that God has the prerogative to save. The issue in Romans 9 is that God does exercise His prerogative with results that people (such as you) object to.

You seem unable to grasp the context of Paul's argument in Romans 9. If you think you do, can you explain Paul's argument through your eyes?

[Rdr. Arsenios]

If you had stopped here, you would have done well. God does have the only choice and necessarily, God chooses whom to save and whom not to save. The problem is that you can't abide with God having the only choice so you have to say BUT, and qualify what you will allow God to do.

You are mind-reading again, my brother... Telling me what I cannot abide...

God has the ONLY choice because ONLY God can IMPART HIMSELF to man...
Man as well has HIS only choice, for ONLY man can choose good and evil...
God only chooses good... For He IS good...

First, you need to deny the corruption of man as a consequence of Adam's sin.

I affirm this corruption

Yes, you say, God is omnipotent and God has the only choice but man really has some good in him and does not need God to help him so let us leave man alone to decide for himself.

I am saying that man has good AND evil in him, for all have sinned, yet are created in the Image of God... And Adam ate of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good AND evil, did he not? THEREFORE he has BOTH good and evil in him... As do we in him...

Your false understanding DENIES that Adam ate of the tree of Good AND evil, and cannot see past the EVIL, thinking Adam to be ONLY evil, when he and we in him are BOTH...

However, Proverbs is still correct when it says, "There is a way that seems right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death." Your good man makes a decision that seems right or good but God says it leads to death. There is no avenue here to gain salvation through ways that seem right to men. It is only through Christ that a person can be freed from sin and thereby able to pursue salvation. It is God's grace that does this as Ephesians 2 says: "Even when we [believers] were dead in sins, God quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;)"

Yes, we are Baptized into Christ, into His Death that overcame death, remember?

This is goobblygook. Man does not have all-power even with respect to himself. Your false premise leads to an active imagination and nothign else.

You need only look at yourself to know that you alone can choose to do good and evil, and that God compels neither... Or else you are saying that God compels us to do EVIL????????

Man has a will, corrupted by sin, but it is false to say that it is "sovereign" in any sense of the word. Where in the Scriptures do you find this stuff?

Christ Himself, as I already quoted for you in Matthew, where He proclaims: "If ANYONE IS WILLING, after Me to be following, let him first deny himself, and take up his own cross, and follow Me."

Do you DENY that Christ SAID this?

Arsenios

[Rdr. Arsenios]

You do well to conclude that "God has the prerogative to save whomever He wants."

Speaking of God's prerogatives is wrong - God has given man salvation, and has shown what man needs to do to attain it FROM God, and this is the Ekonomia of Salvation, and involves man desiring and willing to follow Christ... IF man is unwilling, God will honor his unwillingness, as he did Pharoah and the Jews in their hardness of heart... He finally gave them their desire and hardened their hearts...

Arsenios

[Phat8594]

The context of Romans 9:15-18 is Paul answering the question, "Is there injustice on God's part?"

Yep, and the context also shows that the Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness by the law, have attained what the Jews have not (by pursuing righteousness by the law). So in other words is it fair for God would save a people who do not do the law, and who are not Jews (by ancestry)? To which Paul says, its God's prerogative to do as He pleases. Of course we also know the rest of Romans (and the end of ch. 9 ) tells us how people are saved: by faith, and not by works of the law, and not by ancestry.

Paul anticipates that his interlocutor will ask this question after Paul points out how the destinies of Ishmael and Esau

Except that both Esau and Ishmael are represntative of a people (children of the flesh). Paul is not talking about the individuals. Context, as well as what Paul writes, makes that incredibly clear.

Thus, within God's plan, Jews have been divided into "the elect" and "the hardened."

Or you could say they have been divided into physical Israel and spiritual Israel, or children of the flesh, and children of promise (as Paul describes it in Romans 9)

The existence of a Jewish remnant of faith, including Paul, is evidence that God's hardening of the Jews is not wholesale.

Sure, but also, what does Paul say about those who have been "hardened":

11 So I ask, did they stumble in order that they might fall? By no means!

and

23 And even they, if they do not continue in their unbelief, will be grafted in, for God has the power to graft them in again.

[Phat8594]

Paul poses, "Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?"

Typical...using the question of the interlocutor to establish doctrine...rather than Paul's answer. What would happen if we did this with the rest of Romans?

If you think you do, can you explain Paul's argument through your eyes?

Paul is showing that God can save whomever He wants. He doesn't owe it to the Jews for the ancestry, or for their works. Rather, we know from the context that God saves through faith.