God made man, gave man dominion over the earth, then later regretted making man and determined to destroy mankind from the face of the earth.
That doesn't sound like a change in God's mind to you?
The text does not merely say man changed. It says God was sorry that He made man.
You can explain that away if you want, but don’t pretend the text itself doesn’t say it.
we're still here , God didn't change his mind
The far simpler explanation is that God can build contingency plans into His creation in case men rebel against Him.
God is wise. He can prepare for possible rebellion without making rebellion inevitable.
And having the means to judge the earth does not mean the judgment was inevitable.
God likes using physical means to bring judgement upon His physical universe.
foreknowledge
(Genesis 3:15) And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He will bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.
(Revelation of John 13:8) And all dwelling on the earth will worship it, those whose names have not been written in the Book of Life of the Lamb slain, from the foundation of the world
Yes, of course God had a plan of redemption.
God is wise enough to know what men might do and powerful enough to provide for it before it happens.
But having a plan of redemption does not prove man’s rebellion was inevitable.
It proves God was prepared in case man rebelled.
A contingency plan does not make the contingency necessary.
redemption was always the plan
(I Peter 1:19-20) [19] but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot; [20] indeed having been foreknown before the foundation of the world, but revealed in the last times for you,
Did God already know what Adam would call the animals?
yes, why nothing from the sea ?
(Genesis 2:18) And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him
If God already eternally knew exactly what Adam would call each animal, then Genesis 2:19 does not mean what it says on its face. Adam would not be naming the animals in any meaningful sense. He would merely be acting out names already settled beforehand.
But Genesis 2:19 says God brought the animals to Adam “to see what he would call them.”
The text presents Adam’s naming as open, not as a scripted exercise.
God gives Adam a teachable moment followed immediately by the creation of his wife and
the creation of his wife was predetermined , you think God didn't know the future
Nineveh will be destroyed, God will destroy them, prophesied by God Himself. Either you believe it or you don't... Then Nineveh repented, and God did not destroy them.
Nineveh will be destroyed , is that where it ended or was there more to the book
would Nineveh repented without being told , no , God's foreknowledge
(Jonah 3:4-5) [4] And Jonah began to enter into the city a day's journey, and he cried and said, Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be overthrown! [5] And the people of Nineveh believed God. And they called a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them.
That is why your handling of prophecy does not work.
Prophecy is not prewritten history.
Sometimes prophecy is warning, judgment, promise, or declaration of intent. And in the case of judgment prophecy, the point is often repentance, not fulfillment.
Honestly! You sound like Jonah! Except Jonah understood the point of judgment prophecy better than you do. He believed they WOULD repent, and that is why he went the other direction.
And they did not repent of their deeds.
(Revelation of John 16:9-11) [9] And men were burned with great heat. And they blasphemed the name of God, He having authority over these plagues. And they did not repent in order to give Him glory. [10] And the fifth angel poured out his vial on the throne of the beast, and its kingdom became darkened. And they gnawed their tongues from the pain. [11] And they blasphemed the God of Heaven because of their pains and their sores. And they did not repent of their deeds.
No one is trying to change scripture here but you.
Then they do not have a choice in the matter.
The Greek is aorist active indicative: “they did not repent.”
So yes, it is written as a completed action... within the vision.
But that does not prove the future is exhaustively settled.
John is describing what he saw in the vision. Prophetic visions are often narrated as events seen and reported, not as proof that every free choice involved was eternally fixed beforehand.
So once again, you are taking “they did not repent” and turning it into “they could not repent.”
The Greek does not say that. The text says what they did.
What it does not say is that they had no ability to do otherwise.
they will not do otherwise
you guys brought up the phone challenge , I just applied it to this :
(Revelation of John 9:20-21) [20] And the rest of the men who were not killed by these plagues still did not repent of the works of their hands, that they should not worship demons, and golden, and silver, and bronze, and stone, and wooden idols (which neither can see, nor hear, nor walk). [21] And they did not repent of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts.
(Revelation of John 16:9-11) [9] And men were burned with great heat. And they blasphemed the name of God, He having authority over these plagues. And they did not repent in order to give Him glory. [10] And the fifth angel poured out his vial on the throne of the beast, and its kingdom became darkened. And they gnawed their tongues from the pain. [11] And they blasphemed the God of Heaven because of their pains and their sores. And they did not repent of their deeds.
Again, prophecy is not prewritten history.
Just because something is written down beforehand doesn't mean that the future is exhaustively settled.
In case the analogy wasn't given yet in this thread, Delta Airlines knows that its scheduled flights will go from Dallas to Atlanta.
Does Delta have exhaustive divine foreknowledge? No, of course not.
It is possible to know that certain things will happen before they happen without knowing every future free action involved.
Delta can know those flights will happen without knowing, days or weeks beforehand, exactly who will board, who will miss the flight, who will cancel, who will get bumped, who will change seats, and so on.
So pointing to Revelation and saying, “God said they did not repent,” does not prove exhaustive foreknowledge of every future free choice.
yes it does prove exhaustive foreknowledge of every future free choice.
It proves God can know and declare future events.
No one denies that.
The amount of time beforehand is irrelevant.
Whether a prophecy is given 20 minutes beforehand or 2,000 years beforehand, the question is still the same:
Does the prophecy prove that every future free choice involved was exhaustively settled before it happened?
No.
Length of time does not change the nature of prophecy.
God can declare, warn, promise, judge, plan, and bring things to pass without every future choice being eternally fixed.
Yes, I accept that Revelation says they will not repent.
The issue is what you are trying to smuggle into that statement.
You are interpreting “they will not repent” as though it means every future free choice involved was exhaustively settled from eternity.
That does not follow.
it was settled when God wrote it that they would not repent
God’s belief does not cause the choice, God simply knows it certainly.
“Yesterday, God infallibly believed T.”
God can know that certain groups of people will not repent in a given circumstance, because God made man, he knows how men operate. He knows, even from experience, that when some men are confronted with His power directly, they harden their hearts and rebel even more. Pharaoh is an obvious example.
It does not require that every individual decision was exhaustively settled from eternity. God can prophesy a corporate response, a judgment, or an outcome without every free act being eternally fixed.
And that is what much of Revelation is about, a corporate response to Christ's return.
open theism seeks to make God in their image , really good guesser
So what?
Yes, John describes what he saw in the vision. He says they did not repent. That's not in dispute.
But you're still leaping from “they did not repent” to “they could not repent.”
The past tense does not prove that their refusal was eternally fixed before they existed.
It proves that, in the vision John saw, they did not repent.
What's in dispute is whether their non-repentance was necessary.
The text says they did not repent. It does not say they had no ability to repent.
“Yesterday, God infallibly believed T.”
That doesn't follow.
We know Jesus is God from scripture because scripture teaches the concept.
It does not need to use the exact phrase “I am God” for the doctrine to be taught.
But the concept still has to actually be there.
kinda like exhaustive foreknowledge is taught in the bible
And that is the problem with your position.
What Scripture does not teach is that every future free choice already exists as a settled truth claim before it is made.
You are not deriving that from the text.
You are assuming it, then reading it back into the text.
Classical Theism , its there you just don't like it
Saying it doesn't make the problem go away, w2g.
Again, because you missed it, my claim is that they have a will, and they will not repent.
That wording is intentional.
"They WILL NOT repent."
Their will is to not repent.
If they have no ability to choose, then they do not have a will. They are merely acting out an inevitability. If they do not have a will, then punishing them for what they do is unjust, because they had no choice in the matter.
So yes, exhaustive infallible foreknowledge is still the problem.
You are trying to say they “will not” repent while also saying they “cannot” repent.
Those are not the same claim.
“Yesterday, God infallibly believed T.”
you paint Classical Theism makes us all robots
You are mixing different kinds of passages together.
In Genesis 3, God is confronting Adam.
A judge can ask a guilty man, “What have you done?” without being ignorant. That is not the issue.
But Genesis 18:21 is different. God does not merely ask a question there.
God knew the answer to all 3 questions
God knew where Adam was
God knew they ate from the tree
God knew the all the sin of sodom
teachable moment questions
