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free will versus absolute predestination

 
ob
02/15/2005 05:39 PM
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free will versus absolute predestination
i would appreciate some comments on the topic. i believe in absolute predestination and i am a christian,..
chrisitanity is known for being a freewill religion. my question is absolute predestination a christian doctrine?

from my discernment my life looking back in retrospect, absolute predestination is the truth.
leia
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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i would be happy to discuss this topic with you.
SizeMatters
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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so god knew you were going to post this thread, and you didnt choose to do it?

or if you had not posted it that also would have been predertimined and not a choice of yours?



this is an unanswerable question by its nature. you cant know the mind of God and you were never meant to.
ob
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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i would like to think that i am on my journey..do you think we it is in our free will to choose salvation or is salvation a work of absolute election.

if this is the case. why the need to teach the gospel because those predestined to know the truth will have had to live a life that
would mirror christ in order to see it to be the truth.
SizeMatters
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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I think you´re too tied up in your Christian beliefs to answer those questions. you need to forget ´salvation´. it is just a word.

it is not the end all for all seekers on Earth.
ob
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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i dont deny christ as my savior or me being a christian for it is my last name but what i know is very different from what is taught by my christian friends who have gone through bible studies. i have yet set my ft in church.

i know that me accepting christ was not of my choice or freewill. i was lead and was heartbroken.. only when i had enough knowledge and understanding at a certain age, i was able to see that i was wrong before..

when i let myself go, i had to. i dont think it is of my free will.

however i have a hard time explaining this to pple because it doesnt make sense to my other atheist friends.

that is why i am here hoping to learn more from pple who are wiser and are better at explaining this intriguing concept.
SizeMatters
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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you didnt choose christ as your savior?
Anonymous Coward
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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Re: free will versus absolute predestination
:dubya:blairgwdancealien16:zkk_exanis:
we´re all stars now in the dopeshow
SizeMatters
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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horrible song. bad album too.

it all went downhill after antichrist superstar
ob
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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if i wanted to choose christ as my savior out of my own will, i would have done it a long time ago but at the time i didnt understand, i dont think i was ready. i heard of jesus, i heard of christians. the last 2 years i´ve been through a lot, and i became christian because i had to. it happened so fast that im not sure it was continuous. it was hard to deny christ because i felt like i was witnessing the truth, walking the path jesus walked to the point where it´s not a choice of yes or no but something i had to do.. in a sense i became a new person. if i said that i chose christ out of my free will i feel like this is wrong because anyone would choose christ. the reason pple dont choose christ i think is because they are not in the position to do so.. well not yet..
Thessa
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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Re: free will versus absolute predestination
Free will and free choice.

Not so easy to see from our earthly point of view thought...


:)

Thessa
SizeMatters
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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not a bad point.
ob
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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thessa: would you comment on absolute predestination?

im a growing young man and i like to read and learn especially from pple who might have experienced more than i have..

i believe that i have the choice to discern things but what comes my way is not of my choice.

things would just happen that is out of my control to make me think about certain things

in the end i have a better understanding of things.
Man
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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yes, it is a doctrine of calvinism, i believe it is.


free will is the standard
ob
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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is calvinism a heresy of christianity then?
SizeMatters
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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"i believe that i have the choice to discern things but what comes my way is not of my choice."


every thing you do helps to determine what comes your way next. is that not free will? is that not all of your choices dictating what comes your way.



"but what if it was determined that I made all those choices before I made them?"

etc. etc. etc.
Arizona
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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Our individuality was predestined to exist if you will. Within that "bubble" we have free-will to express and grow in the possibilities and examine the potentials of what that bubble contains.

Free-will by no means implies mocking Father.

Blessings !
Man
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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no, ob it is not a heresy, simply one of the many sects.
Anonymous Coward
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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your life is on one path

the decisions you make will alter your path, but you will still only continue on one path
observer1
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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Re: free will versus absolute predestination
like this morning, i didnt will a car to hit me but it did and now im here.

imma share the story.

this morning i was walking to my car and as i stepped foward i was hit from my left side by a car. it strck me on my right ankle which´s been broken badly before, even got a metal plate in there. i was knocked down but was not mawled over. i felt the force of the impact and the next thing i knew i was getting up, brushing myself because it was raining.

thinking what the heck because i didnt expect anything like this to happen. the guy braked hard and came out to check if i am okay. he was a nice young man and clearly shooked up. i inspected myself and asked him how fast he´s going. he said 35 miles per hour. i didnt feel any pain at the moment and since i was in a rush to class, i didnt think much of it at all. i didnt want to get the guy in trouble and was jsut happy that it wasnt worst.


i had thoughts of sueing the guy but at the moment i was jsut too happy to care. i didnt want to be an opportunist at the expense of making someone life more miserable. i have faith that i´ll be okay. i knew that it was a blessing and i didnt want to get anyone else in trouble considering the guy was shooked up and it was an accident.


right now i still dont feel anything. no pain. just a good feeling.

the guy left and thanked me and as he departed, he gave his praises to GOD.

I also said Thank GOD in unison.

the last though on my mind at all time and before i got hit was of GOD.

i do believe in miracle.
Thessa
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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Re: free will versus absolute predestination
Ob, I’ll try to explain in a few words...

If we believe our life is just the period of time from the moment we are born till our death and if we assume our knowledge is just what we are able to grasp between those two milestones it really seems we have not much to say to whatever happens in our life. Most things seem to happen by chance without much control from our part.

Only if we are able to broader the way we see Life we can start to have another perspective. Like...

Our life starts somewhere else and once it starts we live forever. We just keep changing bodies but that is not exactly who we are. Bodies are made from the elements of the environments we are in; if we change environments (planets, worlds) we also need to change our body (birth/death). But we keep our memories, our feelings, our personality, our loves, and so on.

Before we incarnate on Earth we plan every single detail of our life including potential turning points during our life where we can made decisions about the path to choose from that point on. Before we incarnate on this planet we have the knowledge and understanding why we want to be here and all the planning about our life is made by us in the best way to guaranty the most successful life according to the objectives we want to reach with our earthly life.

Earth is a special place so anyone who wants to be born here must agree to forget about all this before we incarnate. That is the condition to be born and to live here but after death we may recover all our knowledge and our true nature.


From this point of view, from the point of view of a free, independent, knowledgeable and eternal sentient entity we have complete free will to decide what kind of life we want to have on Earth: the events we want to happen, the people we want to meet... and also free choice to choose exactly how all that will happen.



This is a spiritual approach to the meaning of our life and there’s so much more about this... but basically this is it, with some nuances.


If you feel the need to know I can add that I don’t have any religion nor do I need one but I try the best I can to follow the true teachings as revealed by The Lord Jesus Christ.


:)

Thessa
Anonymous Coward
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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well put T!

Plato said as much
Anonymous Coward
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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neti
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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The only predestination is to awaken. What happens in our life, or our lives, is a result of our choices and that results from our predispositions and decisionmaking; these things - our choices - might be very well predictable, but by our choices can the predictions of our future vary, imo.

Maybe someone can do very well at predicting, but we are still alive, and in some ways still spontaneous people.
daleth
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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I have always felt that, as I walk through life, I discover pieces of a grand puzzle.
Some Thoughts
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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I try to think about it this way. Predestination exists in the manner that GOD knows exactly what will do and where we will end up at any given time, however we as humans do not.

That is where free will comes in. We have it to make our own choices. That way, come judgement day, we will have no excuses. As GOD is a completey righteous and just GOD he will judge us accordingly. If we have the free will to make our own decisions, and choose to live without GOD and JESUS we will really have no excuse come that great day. I think maybe the following conversation could take place.

Human "But GOD, how can you judge me if you knew I was going to end up this way, if I was predestined to?"

GOD "You are right, I did know, however you did not. You made your own choices with your own free will and will be judged accordingly."
Anonymous Coward
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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Re: free will versus absolute predestination
my question is absolute predestination a christian doctrine?



No it was not taught by the early Christians nor Jesus. It is a latter day development.

Jewish Antiquities, XVIII, 13, 14 [i, 3]) The New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge says: “Previous to Augustine [of the fourth and fifth centuries A.D.] there was no serious development in Christianity of a theory of predestination.”

Before Augustine, earlier so-called “Church Fathers” such as Justin, Origen, and Irenaeus “know nothing of unconditional predestination; they teach free will.” (Hastings’ Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics, 1919, Vol. X, p. 231)

In their refutation of Gnosticism, they are described as regularly expressing their belief in the free moral agency of man as “the distinguishing characteristic of human personality, the basis of moral responsibility, a divine gift whereby man might choose that which was well-pleasing to God,” and as speaking of “the autonomy of man and the counsel of God who constraineth not.”—The New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, edited by S. Jackson, 1957, Vol. IX, pp. 192, 193.
Anonymous Coward
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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Has God already foreseen the choices you will make in life? Some who preach the doctrine of predestination insist that the answer is yes. However, that notion actually undermines God´s wisdom, for it implies that he cannot control his ability to look into the future. To illustrate: If you had a singing voice of unparalleled beauty, would you then have no choice but to sing all the time? The notion is absurd! Likewise, Our Creator has the ability to foreknow the future, but he does not use it all the time. To do so might infringe upon our own free will, a precious gift that God will never revoke.—Deuteronomy 30:19, 20.

Worse yet, the very notion of predestination suggests that God’s wisdom is cold, devoid of heart, feeling, or compassion. But nothing could be further from the truth! The Bible teaches that God is “wise in heart.” (Job 9:4) Not that he has a literal heart, but the Bible often uses that term in connection with the innermost self, which includes motivations and feelings, such as love. So God’s wisdom, like his other qualities, is governed by love.—1 John 4:8.

Naturally, God’s wisdom is perfectly trustworthy. It is so far above our own wisdom that God’s Word lovingly urges us: “Trust in God with all your heart and do not lean upon your own understanding. In all your ways take notice of him, and he himself will make your paths straight.” (Proverbs 3:5, 6)
Anonymous Coward
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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If God foreknew and decreed Adam’s fall into sin, then God became the author of sin when he made man and he would be responsible for all human wickedness and suffering. This cannot be reconciled with the fact that our Creator is a God of love who hates wickedness. (Psalm 33:5; Proverbs 15:9; 1 John 4:8)
Anonymous Coward
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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Re: free will versus absolute predestination
Can Predestination Be Reconciled With God’s Love?

“WE DEFINE predestination as the eternal design of God, whereby he determined what he wanted to do with each man. For he did not create them all in the same condition, but foreordains some to everlasting life and others to eternal damnation.”

That is how Protestant Reformer John Calvin defined his concept of predestination in the book Institutes of the Christian Religion. This concept is based on the idea that God is omniscient and that his creatures’ actions cannot call his purposes into question or oblige him to make changes.

But is this really what the Bible implies concerning God? More important, is such an explanation compatible with God’s qualities, especially his foremost quality—love?

A God Capable of Foretelling the Future

God is able to foretell the future. He describes himself as “the One telling from the beginning the finale, and from long ago the things that have not been done; the One saying, ‘My own counsel will stand, and everything that is my delight I shall do.’” (Isaiah 46:10) Down through human history, God has had his prophecies recorded to show that he can exercise his foreknowledge and foretell events before they take place.

Thus, in the days of Belshazzar, king of Babylon, when the prophet Daniel had a dream about two wild beasts, one supplanting the other, God gave him its interpretation: “The ram that you saw possessing the two horns stands for the kings of Media and Persia. And the hairy he-goat stands for the king of Greece.” (Daniel 8:20, 21) Obviously, God exercised his foreknowledge to reveal the succession of world powers. The then prevailing Babylonian Empire would be succeeded by Medo-Persia and then by Greece.

Prophecies can also concern one individual. For instance, the prophet Micah declared that the Messiah was to be born in Bethlehem. (Micah 5:2) Again, in this case God exercised his foreknowledge. However, this event was announced with a particular purpose—the identification of the Messiah. This instance does not justify generalizing a doctrine of predestination that includes each individual.

On the contrary, the Scriptures reveal that there are situations in which God chooses not to foreknow the outcome. Just before the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, he declared: “I am quite determined to go down that I may see whether they act altogether according to the outcry over it that has come to me, and, if not, I can get to know it.” (Genesis 18:21) This text clearly shows us that God did not foreknow the extent of the depravity in those cities before he investigated matters.

True, God can foresee certain events, but in many cases, he has chosen not to use his foreknowledge. Because God is almighty, he is free to exercise his abilities as he wishes, not according to the wishes of imperfect humans.

A God Who Can Set Matters Straight

As did Calvin, some say that God predetermined man’s fall before his creation and that he had predestinated the ‘chosen ones’ before that fall. But if this were true, would it not have been hypocritical for God to offer the prospect of everlasting life to Adam and Eve, fully aware that they would be unable to realize it? Moreover, the Scriptures nowhere deny that the first human couple were given a choice: either to follow divine directions and live forever or to reject them and die.—Genesis, chapter 2.

But did Adam and Eve’s sin really thwart God’s purpose? No, for immediately after their sinning, God announced that he would raise up a “seed” to destroy Satan and his agents and that he would again set matters straight on earth. Just as a few insects cannot stop a gardener from producing good yields, so Adam and Eve’s disobedience will not prevent God from making the earth into a paradise.—Genesis, chapter 3.

God later revealed that there would be a Kingdom government entrusted to a descendant of King David and that others would be associated in this Kingdom. These others are called “the holy ones of the Supreme One.”—Daniel 7:18; 2 Samuel 7:12; 1 Chronicles 17:11.

To Foretell Is Not to Predestine

The fact that God did not choose to know which course mankind would take did not prevent him from prophesying the consequences of man’s good or bad actions. A mechanic who warns a driver of the poor condition of his vehicle cannot be held responsible if an accident occurs or be accused of predestining it. Likewise, God cannot be accused of predestining the sad consequences of individuals’ actions.

The same was true with the descendants of the first human couple. Before Cain killed his brother, God put a choice before Cain. Would he master sin, or would sin get mastery over him? Nothing in the account indicates that God predetermined that Cain would make the bad choice and murder his brother.—Genesis 4:3-7.

Later, the Mosaic Law warned the Israelites about what would happen if they turned away from God, for instance, by taking wives from among the pagan nations. What was foretold did happen. This can be seen from the example of King Solomon, who in his later years was influenced by his foreign wives to practice idolatry. (1 Kings 11:7, 8) Yes, God warned his people, but he did not predestine what their individual actions would be.

The Christian elect, or chosen ones, are encouraged to persevere if they do not wish to be deprived of the promised reward of reigning in the heavens with Christ. (2 Peter 1:10; Revelation 2:5, 10, 16; 3:11) As some theologians of the past have asked, Why were such reminders given if the calling of the chosen ones was final?

Predestination and God’s Love

Man was given free will, being created “in God’s image.” (Genesis 1:27) Free will was indispensable if humans were to honor and serve God out of love, not as robots with every movement determined beforehand. Love displayed by intelligent, free creatures would enable God to refute unjust accusations. He says: “Be wise, my son, and make my heart rejoice, that I may make a reply to him that is taunting me.”—Proverbs 27:11.

If God’s servants were predestined—or programmed, so to speak—could not the genuineness of their love for their Creator be called into question? Also, would it not be contrary to God’s impartiality for him to make a predetermined choice of persons destined to glory and happiness without taking their individual merits into account? Moreover, if some receive such preferential treatment, while others are destined to eternal punishment, this would hardly arouse sincere feelings of gratitude in the “elect,” or “chosen ones.”—Genesis 1:27; Job 1:8; Acts 10:34, 35.

Finally, Christ told his disciples to preach the good news to all mankind. If God has already chosen the ones to be saved, would this not dampen the zeal Christians show in evangelizing? Would it not make the preaching work essentially pointless?

Impartial love from God is the strongest force that can move men to love him in return. The greatest expression of God’s love was to sacrifice his Son in behalf of imperfect, sinful mankind. God’s foreknowledge respecting his Son is a special case, but it assures us that the restoration promises resting on Jesus will indeed be fulfilled. So may we put faith in that Son and draw close to God. Let us show our appreciation by accepting God’s invitation to come into a fine relationship with our Creator. Today, God addresses this invitation to all who want to exercise their free will and show their love for him.
Anonymous Coward
12/08/2005 10:11 AM
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love your Self





GLP