ARGH!!! Open Theism makes me furious!!!

[Swordsman]

OK? I gotta vent.

I try to be calm and I try to be patient with those that attribute their free will to how they were saved, but there are some times I simply can't be patient or cordial because this twisted sick, perverted ideology is sometimes too much to handle.

A so-called "Christian" friend of mine thinks when he was saved, that it was his own initiative and that God responded by saving him. He utilized his "free will" to choose God?!?!? Where in the world did he come up with this idea?

That is just plain unscriptural!

What ever happened to understanding that man is sinful? He does not seek after God. His mind is at enmity against God. No man is righteous. He was born into sin via the fall of man. He is a slave to sin.

How can one then jump from his wretchedness into complete salvation on his own?

IMPOSSIBLE! How dare one deny the power of God to have complete control of whom He chooses unto salvation. How prideful is man to think that he can take credit for his salvation?

This whole ideology of open theism/arminism/freewillism really proves man's downfallenness. It lessens God down to our puny platform of thinking. It makes God more humanistic and dilutes His power and grace.

 

[jjjg]

God calls to all of us. Catholics call this actual grace and as Christ says no one can come to to unless the Father calls him to me.

At the same time it takes an act of will for us to accept Christ. Lots of people deny Christ. If it didn't take an act of will on our part then everybody would accept him and all would be saved.

Once we accept Christ we recieve sacramental grace at baptism.

 

[Nathon Detroit]

Re: ARGH!!! Open Theism makes me furious!!!

Originally posted by Swordsman
A so-called "Christian" friend of mine thinks when he was saved, that it was his own initiative and that God responded by saving him. He utilized his "free will" to choose God?!?!? Where in the world did he come up with this idea?

That is just plain unscriptural!

“And if it seems evil to you to serve the LORD, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.� - Joshua 24:15

Romans 10:9 that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. 11 For the Scripture says, “Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.�

That was easy.

Next?

 

[Lucky]

Originally posted by Swordsman

A so-called "Christian" friend of mine thinks when he was saved, that it was his own initiative and that God responded by saving him. He utilized his "free will" to choose God?!?!? Where in the world did he come up with this idea?

Probably from Scripture. I'm going to point out you said/he said "God responded by saving him."

What ever happened to understanding that man is sinful? He does not seek after God. His mind is at enmity against God. No man is righteous. He was born into sin via the fall of man. He is a slave to sin.

Before salvation, I'd say yeah, that's a pretty good description of our state.

How can one then jump from his wretchedness into complete salvation on his own?

On his own? We are saved by grace through faith. You didn't say your friend said he saved himself, but that God saved him. (See bold words earlier in post.) Make up your mind, will you?

 

[Nathon Detroit]

:up: :lucky:

No open theist would say we "save ourselves" God is the only one that can do that. However we must choose for ourselves if we want to be saved.

We are responsible for our own eternal decision.

It's pretty simple really.

 

[Nathon Detroit]

Swordsman, you argue that we are not responsible for our own decision regarding salvation. Yet my guess is you would also argue that it IS our responsibility if we chose NOT to be saved. True???

So... answer this question....

Who is responsible for a man's decision to receive eternal damnation?

A. Man
B. God

 

[elected4ever]

The call to salvation is a universal call.Jesus died for the sins of the whole world. The Holy Spirit convicts of sin. of righteousness and of Judgment. This is also universal. We could never come to Christ without first believing that we are just exactly what the Holy Spirit says we are.

Man has no knowledge of sin with out the seeking of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit seeks and saves man. The universal call to man is the Holy Spirit's seeking. The saving is the Holy Spirit's response to the responsive man. That is why confession and belief is required of man. Man must choose to respond to the Holy Spirit in order to be saved. Man cannot save himself. He has no means to do so. That is why we love God because He first loved us.

There is, however, no predetermination of salvation for a select few and the rest are predetermined to remain lost. Wither a person is saved or unsaved is basted on the response of the individual to the conviction of sin by the Holy Spirit. The choice to accept or reject salvation is an individual choice and the choice cannot be made by a surrogate. No One can make the choice for you. You are responsible for your personal choice.

:E4E:

 

[kidd94]

God never intended that man, on the day of judgement, can ever stand before Him and say, "it's not my fault, you wired me this way"...

It's still ultimately OUR choice...

 

[kidd94]

Re: ARGH!!! Open Theism makes me furious!!!

Originally posted by Swordsman

OK? I gotta vent.

I try to be calm and I try to be patient with those that attribute their free will to how they were saved, but there are some times I simply can't be patient or cordial because this twisted sick, perverted ideology is sometimes too much to handle.

A so-called "Christian" friend of mine thinks when he was saved, that it was his own initiative and that God responded by saving him. He utilized his "free will" to choose God?!?!? Where in the world did he come up with this idea?

That is just plain unscriptural!

What ever happened to understanding that man is sinful? He does not seek after God. His mind is at enmity against God. No man is righteous. He was born into sin via the fall of man. He is a slave to sin.

How can one then jump from his wretchedness into complete salvation on his own?

IMPOSSIBLE! How dare one deny the power of God to have complete control of whom He chooses unto salvation. How prideful is man to think that he can take credit for his salvation?

This whole ideology of open theism/arminism/freewillism really proves man's downfallenness. It lessens God down to our puny platform of thinking. It makes God more humanistic and dilutes His power and grace.

How does one then know that they are saved vs. someone hobo walking the street...?

 

[Clete]

Re: ARGH!!! Open Theism makes me furious!!!

Originally posted by Swordsman
A so-called "Christian" friend of mine thinks when he was saved, that it was his own initiative and that God responded by saving him. He utilized his "free will" to choose God?!?!? Where in the world did he come up with this idea?

Swordsman! Welcome back! I haven't seen anything from you in a while.

First of all, are you suggesting that people who do not beleive in Calvinism do not believe the gospel and are therefore not "Christian"?

Secondly, if Calvinism is right and your "friend" has no free will, then wouldn't he have "come up with this idea" because God predestined that he would? Wouldn't you have to say, in order to be consistant, that your friend had been predestined to believe in free will?

Resting in Him,
Clete

 

[cellist]

Our conversion is totally of God and not ourselves. This is basic Augustinian as well as Reformation theology. We are born into this world spiritually dead and so we will always reject Christ unless, by the power of the Holy Spirit working through the Gospel, God creates faith and the new birth in us. I didn't decide to have faith. God gave me faith as a gift. Our salvation from first to last is a gift from him. It does not arise from us. And for the record, I'm not a Calvinist.

 

[God_Is_Truth]

Re: Re: ARGH!!! Open Theism makes me furious!!!

Re: Re: ARGH!!! Open Theism makes me furious!!!

Originally posted by Clete Pfeiffer

Swordsman! Welcome back! I haven't seen anything from you in a while.

First of all, are you suggesting that people who do not beleive in Calvinism do not believe the gospel and are therefore not "Christian"?

Secondly, if Calvinism is right and your "friend" has no free will, then wouldn't he have "come up with this idea" because God predestined that he would? Wouldn't you have to say, in order to be consistant, that your friend had been predestined to believe in free will?

Resting in Him,
Clete

of course, but he'd also have to say that he was predestined to be furious about it and predestined to vent about it and that you also were predestined to point out that consistency and that i was predestined to make this point as well :dizzy:

 

[kidd94]

Originally posted by cellist

Our conversion is totally of God and not ourselves. This is basic Augustinian as well as Reformation theology. We are born into this world spiritually dead and so we will always reject Christ unless, by the power of the Holy Spirit working through the Gospel, God creates faith and the new birth in us. I didn't decide to have faith. God gave me faith as a gift. Our salvation from first to last is a gift from him. It does not arise from us. And for the record, I'm not a Calvinist.

When you accepted this gift, what did you do then?

 

[Swordsman]

Originally posted by Knight

Swordsman, you argue that we are not responsible for our own decision regarding salvation. Yet my guess is you would also argue that it IS our responsibility if we chose NOT to be saved. True???

So... answer this question....

Who is responsible for a man's decision to receive eternal damnation?

A. Man
B. God

Well, it was never man's decision to be damned. It is man's nature to love darkness and hate light. He didn't wake up one day and say "I think I wanna go to hell."

The doctrine of Total Depravity is vital to understand if a believer wants to grow to know the power and sovereignty of the Almighty God. And since man is depraved, he is unable to accept or understand God.

But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised. 1 Corinthians 2:14

...both Jews and Greeks are all under sin as it is written, 'There is none righteous, not even one; there is none who understands, there is none who seeks for God; all have turned aside, together they have become useless; there is none who does good, there is not even one'. Romans 3:9-12

So I think that explains very well who is responsible for our salvation. And you can only deduce that it is not man.

 

[Swordsman]

Originally posted by kidd94

God never intended that man, on the day of judgement, can ever stand before Him and say, "it's not my fault, you wired me this way"...

It's still ultimately OUR choice...

For your sake, I hope God chose you.

 

[kidd94]

How do you know you are elected then??

 

[Swordsman]

Re: Re: ARGH!!! Open Theism makes me furious!!!

Re: Re: ARGH!!! Open Theism makes me furious!!!

Originally posted by Clete Pfeiffer

Swordsman! Welcome back! I haven't seen anything from you in a while.

:wave: Howdy Clete!

First of all, are you suggesting that people who do not beleive in Calvinism do not believe the gospel and are therefore not "Christian"?

No, I am not suggesting that. I didn't go into further detail about my friend. He comes from a unitarian background and is currently being misled by the writings of Boyd and Sanders.

Secondly, if Calvinism is right and your "friend" has no free will, then wouldn't he have "come up with this idea" because God predestined that he would? Wouldn't you have to say, in order to be consistant, that your friend had been predestined to believe in free will?

Resting in Him,
Clete

I would have to agree with you on this.

To some people God doesn't grant the truth and blinds them so they may believe in false doctrine. In John 12, Christ tells why the people did not believe and he quotes from Isaiah, 39 Therefore they could not believe, because Isaiah said again: 40 He has blinded their eyes and hardened their hearts, lest they should see with their eyes, lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, so that I should heal them.

 

[Swordsman]

Originally posted by kidd94

How do you know you are elected then??

I believe that I was dead to my sins and unable to come to Christ on my own. (Ephesians 2, Romans 8) I believe that God provided a way of salvation from my sins through the blood of His only Son Jesus Christ. And I believe I have been united to Christ by faith, a faith I did not develop, but received as a gift of God's saving grace. I believe my sins are paid for and that righteousness has been imputed upon me as though I had never sinned (Galatians 2).

And that is what unconditional election is all about. He chose me. He plucked me out of the fire. A damnation I fully deserve. But God saved me. And I owe every facet of my life to Him.

That one word - grace. If only modern-day believers really understood what it really means.....

 

[cellist]

Originally posted by kidd94

When you accepted this gift, what did you do then?

Faith is trusting in the work of Christ for my salvation. I do not ever remember saying to myself; "OK, now I am deciding to believe." I was simply listening to preaching and I was overwhelmed by the the love God had shown me in Christ and I found I was trusting in that for my salvation and had a new desire to obey him. I new very little theologically, but I had a new trust and love for God. I think if we are all honest with ourselves, we will admit that we never actually "decided" we would have faith. This also squares with what the Scriptures say about us being dead in sin, and God making us alive (Eph), comparing our conversion to raising us from the dead. Or in John where it says that those who received him were born not of the will of man, nor of the flesh but of God (Jhn).

 

[kidd94]

Originally posted by Swordsman

I believe that I was dead to my sins and unable to come to Christ on my own. (Ephesians 2, Romans 8) I believe that God provided a way of salvation from my sins through the blood of His only Son Jesus Christ. And I believe I have been united to Christ by faith, a faith I did not develop, but received as a gift of God's saving grace. I believe my sins are paid for and that righteousness has been imputed upon me as though I had never sinned (Galatians 2).

And that is what unconditional election is all about. He chose me. He plucked me out of the fire. A damnation I fully deserve. But God saved me. And I owe every facet of my life to Him.

That one word - grace. If only modern-day believers really understood what it really means.....

Ok.

So your "pre-belief" state was what? A sinner who knew nothing of God. A sinner that did not know he was a sinner?

You had to have had some type of "belief" system before you "Believed", right?

So how did you know that you went from a "sin" state of belief to a "saved/elected" state of belief