ECT What is Predestination?

Nanja

Well-known member
why did God make them that way?


To exhibit His Sovereign Power over all His Creation.
To make His Glory known.


Dan. 4:35 And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing:
and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among
the inhabitants of the earth
: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?

Rom. 9:22-23 What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known,
endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction:
And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy,
which he had afore prepared unto glory

God Purposed to deal with the non-elect vessels of wrath exclusively by their works,
excluding them from His Purpose for all those of the Election of Grace 2 Tim. 1:9!

~~~~~
 

Desert Reign

LIFETIME MEMBER
LIFETIME MEMBER
It’s just inviting God's voice back into the discussion of the nature of predestination.

If you want to ask God to be quiet so that you can answer the question based on your interpretation of your own experiences, without the voice of scripture interrupting your little exercise, then you are free to do so, knock yourself out.

As I previously said, I made the same statement about scripture. I stated that openness also conformed to scripture. Scripture doesn't interrupt 'my little exercise'.

This is subtly ad hominem. Appealing to what the bible says is clearly a more theocentric (or bibliocentric if you like) approach than appealing to experience and anyone can see that.

Only those who agree with your particular interpretation of scripture. Anyone reading the scripture at face value will see that God gave the Israelites a choice to accept the covenant or not and their future depended on that choice.

It’s no more conceited for a Christian to say that the bible is more reliable than our own fallible experiences than it is for a mechanic to say that the designer of the car has a more authoritative opinion on how the car works than a taxi driver.

Once again, you repeat the error of describing our experiences as fallible. Our experiences are simply what they are. But if you insist on this then your reading the Bible is as much an experience as anything else and therefore your argument is self-defeating. I tried to point this out to you gently before but obviously you didn't get it.

The superiority of God revealed word to human experience is a basic tenant of Christianity.

A tenant is somebody who pays rent to live in a house or other property. This makes no sense whatsoever.

It has absolutely nothing to do with me. It has to do with the primacy of God’s word. Whether I am closer to God or further from God than another is an irrelevancy.

Correction, it has everything to do with you because your interpretation of a lot of scripture is wrong. Also, your argument of the 'primacy of God's word' (by which I assume you mean the scriptures - which in the scriptures themselves are not called 'God's word' at all) is nowhere stated in the scriptures. Therefore your argument is totally self-defeating because that argument itself is not in the scriptures and therefore cannot have primacy.


Which entails what?

Does your assertion have any theological significance whatsoever?

Were you just making what you thought was an interesting observation or did you mean to suggest that OV was in some way substantiated by the fact that it (presumably) conforms to everyday experience?

My assertion has the significance I first gave to it.

First, I dispute that your observation matters even if it is true precisely because there is a far superior source of theological knowledge. Second, I dispute that your assertion is true in the first place.

Saying that you dispute my observation is of course fair comment. It's the first relevant response to what I said that you have made. However, I never claimed that this was the source of my 'theological knowledge'. Furthermore, I have actually never claimed to have 'theological knowledge'. This is not the kind of claim I would make.

This is the second time you have tried to deflect the conversation by calling me dishonest. If you feel that I am not accurately representing your argument then, please, feel free to clarify. I’ve no interested in pushing down straw men. If your observation wasn't meant to mean anything then please stop wasting everyone's time.

It was stated to mean that openness has that advantage whilst for Calvinism, it was a disadvantage. In my original post, you will perhaps have noticed that I was not making truth claims, just giving observations about the power of certain arguments. It was you who chose to blow it all up out of proportion by introducing irrelevant and biased ideas.

I haven't got the time right now to answer in detail to all your points but I am glad that you are starting to deal with what I actually said.


Openness only conforms to your interpretation of your own everyday experience.

Not everyone shares your experiences nor your interpretation.

Not quite correct. Openness conforms to everyday experience. Calvinism doesn't and requires an artificial layer of specific interpretations of everyday experience in order to maintain credibility.

Since you only have your own experiences to evaluate

That's so funny! Because if I only have my own experiences to evaluate then you only have yours to evaluate. That's just plain idiotic because human beings have collective memory and we can communicate to each other.

, you are wholly unqualified to speak on behalf of the entire human race when it comes to this matter and therefore your opinion shouldn’t be treated as a truism.

My qualifications are irrelevant to this matter. All that matters is whether my opinion is correct or not.

Second, even if you were right, it wouldn’t matter since good theology isn’t built on the shifting sand of human experience in the first place. Good theology is based on God’s revealed word, at least it is for Christians.

As I said, I am glad you are starting to recognise that my simple statement is or might even be true. However, you continue to straw man my position. As I have said before I do not derive openness theory from experiences, nor do I get them from the Bible. All I am saying is that both everyday experiences and the Bible are compatible with openness. Neither our experiences nor a normal reading of the Bible require any additional layer of explanations or excuses. They are already both, at face value, compatible with openness. They are not compatible at face value with Calvinism and both our everyday experiences and a good many passages of scripture require some kind of additional layer of interpretation to make them compatible with Calvinism. This fact is a strong point in favour of openness and against Calvinism.
 

Desert Reign

LIFETIME MEMBER
LIFETIME MEMBER
this is tao

we should attempt to answer all questions

even the insincere ones

Indeed. Did you know that the logos is so similar to the tao that the chinese translation of logos is tao? But then of course you knew that! I think it is a blow to those who equate Christianity with Platonism, failing to recognise that true Christianity can be expressed through more than one world view.
 

Puppet

BANNED
Banned
is that true with reason and logic?

so you have never experienced it?

If I exist, I experience things but you denied my explanations and called it non sense cause you're the everyday person with no time to pray that prevents you from casting out demons .
 

chrysostom

Well-known member
Hall of Fame
If I exist, I experience things but you denied my explanations and called it non sense cause you're the everyday person with no time to pray that prevents you from casting out demons .

what explanations?

try thinking
then
you will know that you exist
 

Puppet

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Banned
what explanations?

try thinking
then
you will know that you exist

When I trace the source of my thought, I find God running it. You don't see far enough into your thought cause your imagined freewill blinds you, making you common among your friends who are also regular people who don't pray.
 

Puppet

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Banned
do you test the spirits?

do you have that word
test
in you bible?

didn't think so

how would you test the spirits?

The fields around me repels certain elements. You don't care to cultivate your fields and you can't cast out the unfamiliar spirits. You have a repetitive questioning demons you enjoy company with. He looks like a spirit of trolls and lives in everyday people and produces agony and bitterness. You must cultivate yourself to rid of it. Your freewill keeps the demons hanging around like a party in your dens of your soul. You must surrender to the Spirit. You seek, track, follow and orbit. You orbit God's wills. His force makes you willing. You're like, "I have free will to levitate and I'm levitating". You deny that gravity is keeping you from doing what you think you're doing. God has more control over you than you think but you want control over yourself. Some of your posts are flamming questions just to keep the flamming going.
 

chrysostom

Well-known member
Hall of Fame
The fields around me repels certain elements. You don't care to cultivate your fields and you can't cast out the unfamiliar spirits. You have a repetitive questioning demons you enjoy company with. He looks like a spirit of trolls and lives in everyday people and produces agony and bitterness. You must cultivate yourself to rid of it. Your freewill keeps the demons hanging around like a party in your dens of your soul. You must surrender to the Spirit. You seek, track, follow and orbit. You orbit God's wills. His force makes you willing. You're like, "I have free will to levitate and I'm levitating". You deny that gravity is keeping you from doing what you think you're doing. God has more control over you than you think but you want control over yourself. Some of your posts are flamming questions just to keep the flamming going.

all that to say my choices are limited?
I have already agreed to that
my job is to keep on asking questions
until they are answered
your job is to use you ability to think
 

Puppet

BANNED
Banned
all that to say my choices are limited?
I have already agreed to that
my job is to keep on asking questions
until they are answered
your job is to use you ability to think

The breath is the rider and the horse is the mind. Extreme concentration on the breath causes the mind to calm and with a calm mind, things are clear. You're not in the clear cause you're afriad of the empty the mind concept. You might loose your fake free will. You're trying to hold on to it so you can make your choices according to your unclear busymindeness. The key is "undo". You gotta lot of things to undo and let go. You got to let the pope go. Let go of him. Flee from your boss
 

chrysostom

Well-known member
Hall of Fame
The breath is the rider and the horse is the mind. Extreme concentration on the breath causes the mind to calm and with a calm mind, things are clear. You're not in the clear cause you're afriad of the empty the mind concept. You might loose your fake free will. You're trying to hold on to it so you can make your choices according to your unclear busymindeness. The key is "undo". You gotta lot of things to undo and let go. You got to let the pope go. Let go of him. Flee from your boss

we use reason and logic to establish what we think is truth

so do you have reason to believe that you are one of the saved?
 

Puppet

BANNED
Banned
we use reason and logic to establish what we think is truth

so do you have reason to believe that you are one of the saved?

While going into the source before reason and logic where it comes from, I use the ancient arts of the 3 wise men along with the Bible and my actions are my own personal built-in instinct reason I'm on the straight narrow path God leads me on. Being on the proper path nothing matters to me as a sinner including if you believe me or not. You must cultivate your being to understand but youre a cool everyday guy anyway. Our conversations has been fun. Your rituals in your early denomination might give you a slight clue what I'm talking about. The fringe monks of RCC say the same thing. I think "Rose" is one of them.
 
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