Why I cringe when people say it is all about choice

[childeye]

I am seeing many different descriptions of free will in this thread. For me, free will is the right to choose. It is no more and no less. As a child, I had the freedom to choose if I was going to steal 50¢ from my mothers purse. I chose to take the money and buy candy. Another time I chose not to. I exercised my free will both times to choose which path I was going to follow.

When I was a child I had the option to pet and caress a puppy or hit it with a hammer as hard as I could until it squeeled for my mercy. When I was a child I had the option of mowing the grass as I was told, or poisoning my Mother who had the nerve to tell me what to do with my life. Love is what restrains the wicked from complete depravity.

exaggeration

ex·ag·ger·a·tion [ig-zaj-uh-rey-shuhn]

noun

1. the act of exaggerating or overstating.

2. an instance of exaggerating; an overstatement: His statement concerning the size of his income is a gross exaggeration.

I didn't exaggerate. Those are viable options to the depraved mind. So what are you saying? That I did not have those options because I am not that depraved? If so, then I made my point. The depraved heart and mind is not a freewill.

[OneLight]

I am seeing many different descriptions of free will in this thread. For me, free will is the right to choose. It is no more and no less. As a child, I had the freedom to choose if I was going to steal 50¢ from my mothers purse. I chose to take the money and buy candy. Another time I chose not to. I exercised my free will both times to choose which path I was going to follow.

When I was a child I had the option to pet and caress a puppy or hit it with a hammer as hard as I could until it squeeled for my mercy. When I was a child I had the option of mowing the grass as I was told, or poisoning my Mother who had the nerve to tell me what to do with my life. Love is what restrains the wicked from complete depravity.

exaggeration

ex·ag·ger·a·tion [ig-zaj-uh-rey-shuhn]

noun

1. the act of exaggerating or overstating.

2. an instance of exaggerating; an overstatement: His statement concerning the size of his income is a gross exaggeration.

I didn't exaggerate. Those are viable options to the depraved mind. So what are you saying? That I did not have those options because I am not that depraved? If so, then I made my point. The depraved heart and mind is not a freewill.

What I gave you was a real piece of my past. Was what you replied a piece of your past? I think what you did was take it to the unrealistic limit to prove your point. People don't think that way, at least those with a sound mind.

[childeye]

So. if I read your post correctly, you don't think free will can be had before salvation? This I disagree with. We freely choose to accept Christ or not. We stand in judgment for what we have chosen freely.

I would say we had a freewill before the fall. It may appear to you that we freely choose, but that is not scriptural. Scripture says God chose, since he has mercy upon whom He will have mercy. He called the lowly things to put to nought the high things. They shall all be taught by God. No one comes to Christ unless it is given by the Father to come. And of all He has given they will come and he will not lose any. No one can confess jesus from the heart without the holy Spirit.

There are two judgments. One under the law and one under Christ. There are different standards for those under Christ than those under the law. I believe we will be according to how much was given us according to our different gifts and how we used them. We should not be seen beating the servants. That would be those under the law. Those under the law are judged by a different standard.

But the carnal mind cannot be subject to God. If it were as you say, then that scripture would make no sense. If what you say is true, we need no Christ except to crucify so that we may go on sinning in our God given freewill.

Again, I disagree. We may not be able to understand all God has written, but salvation is very simple. It has to be in order to draw sinners.

So the carnal mind can be subject to God? surely you are not disagreeing with that. Yet my response was originally to counter your claim that men can choose to obey God.

One must have the Word of God abiding in them to come to Christ. Those who are of God, hears God's words. To me it seems as simple so that a child could understand. To others the Gospel is veiled.

Such is the sin nature. Did you freely accept Christ and His salvation or were you somehow programmed to accept what He freely gave?

I know I see what some others cannot, and some see more than I. Christ was revealed to me according to God's measure of faith. And this divine Love that I see feels the need to intercede for those who do not see. Even because I know they cannot help it. Otherwise I must count myself wiser or more loving than they by my own volition, even as I am counting them as those who do not see because by their own volition they chose to be ignorant and without love. There is no boasting in Christ for I will look like a fool afterward in heaven when my Lord shows me lording my sight over them as if it were not by grace and I would be no different than Satan. Such is the vanity that does not glorify God.

Thank you for your thoughtful and entertaining posts on this thread. I have enjoyed immensely having discourse with you.

[Floatingaxe]

This is nonsense. When we are convinced of the truth by Holy Spirit and choose Christ, we are free to renounce Him, but it is not something many Christians do when we know the truth and have experienced Jesus Christ.

I knew you couldn't do it. Go ahead admit it and get it over with. If not, then you are a very persistent person Foatingaxe. It could also be called stubborness. But God loves you anyway and so do I.

I stand firm on the truth. I cannot be persuaded to believe something that God says is not true.

I am stubborn also. So you say you can choose to denounce Jesus as a fraud at anytime of your choosing with complete conviction, but you choose not to because you presently have the conviction that you know he is the Truth and power of God. Respectfully, that would be called a duality of mind. It's like saying, I completely trust God with my soul and life, but tommorrow I might choose not to. With as much modesty as grace allows, I will say that when any reasoning is built upon a lie, it ends in hypocrisy.

We are saved by God's great grace through our faith, and the only way we can lose our standing with God is to renounce our faith in Jesus Christ, thereby becoming apostatic and reprobate. People do it, and you can call it what you like, but it is all down to that sovereign will God has given us. However, most Christians do not reject their salvation because most of us know what we have been saved from and we are sensitive to Holy Spirit's voice. those who turn against God are those who have seared their consciences by partaking in sin WILLFULLY without repentance.

Our freedom of choice and our free will is not changed once we come to Christ, but what we choose and what we will to do does because we have been regenerated by the power of God.

Fine. But that is no different than me saying the will is not free since the desire to sin is a corrupting force that causes a man to do what he knows is wrong and it is even because the mind reasons differently than after receiving the Truth. Even the pigs ran off a cliff after Jesus sent the legion of demons into them, and the man in chains stopped throwing himself into the fire... I would point out that just because I can step on a bug does not mean I have the power over life and death. Likewise, Satan only has the power of death and that is why the deceived count it their freedom to sin.

I think you speak in order to confuse people, really. Our will is free.

So let me ask you another question. Did God choose the lowly things over the high things to be called by the Gospel or not?

Why don't you find that passage and read it in context? Your answer is there.

[Openly Curious]

Hello childeye, I can't help but to ask if you believe in the doctrine of predestination? Because to me it sure sounds like it. If one takes away man's freewill of choice then one cannot receive salvation through faith because that is an action we must choose if we want to inherit the kingdom of God. Without freewill man is nothing more than a puppet on a string. There is no need for man to exercise any faith on his part because his outcome has already predetermind beforehand who'd be good going to heaven and who'd be evil going to hell without any choice. God did not make us slaves in order for us to serve him. But on the other side it was the serpent (satan) through deceit that caused man to fall and the result all of mankind was born into sin a slave before their birth. Satan is the one who held mankind in captivity a slave in the kingdom of darkness. Mankind thus did not have any choice in having a sin nature and held in bondage to it. When Christ came to this world and conquered death, hell and the grave then whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord would be saved. It is through the blood of Jesus believers have been set free from the bondage of sin and translated into the kingdom of light. Whenever a sinner calls on the name of the Lord they are made a "new creature" in Christ a "partaker" of the "divine nature" of God. The saints are no longer the same they have to contend with the old sinful nature as well as the new nature in Christ and they both war against one another causing us to choose to walk according to the old man or the new man created in Christ Jesus. It will be by faith we will either choose to walk in the flesh (death) or walk in the Spirit (life) making us a whole "new creature" in Christ.

The sinners have not been set free from the sin nature and have not been made new creatures in Christ remaining a slave to sin having no other choice. Whenever sinners come and repent of their sins they are set free from the slavery of sin and as a result believers have been given a "choice" at that time to serve the sin nature(walking in the flesh) or to choose to walk in the Spirit (where there is no law) thus having two natures thus we are made "new creatures" in Christ where unbeievers are not new creatures. God did not make the saints a slave to him but set us free to choose of our freewill whom we want to serve as again mankind did not have that choice before salvation as we were held captive a slave to sin having no choice. Christ came and died on the cross while we were "yet" sinners so that grace would much more abound (spread or grow throughout the world). Just as sin abounded (spread and began to grow throughout the world) from the very beginning from Cain up unto this present time both sin and grace are growing in the world and the saints have been granted a choice to walk in the Spirit (the divine nature of God) or to walk in the flesh (according to our sinful carnal nature).

The doctrine of pre-destination takes "out" the whosoever "will" (freewill choice) call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Pre-destination doctrine says God creates us either "good" or "bad" having no choice because God has already pre-destined some people to heaven and others to hell thus leaving mankind without any choice in the destiny of his own soul. Mankind was not fashioned or created in the mothers womb either to be "good" or "evil". The doctrine of pre-destination in the Word of God has nothing to do with mankind having no freewill choices in our lives because our salvation or doom has already been predestined and set beforehand without any choices on our part. When the Word speaks of predistination it is referring to the Jews the nation of Israel (circumcision) and all of the other Gentile nations (uncircumcision) in the world. It has nothing to do with having freewill to make our own choices concerning our salvation. If we "Choose" the right then there's no room for the wrong.

[other one]

you know, I also know that if I hit my thumb really hard with a hammer it will hurt..... would you really expect me to wack it to prove it.

Since I am saying I cannot deny Christ, I wouldn't expect you to be able to do it either. I think your hammer on the thumb analogy is trivial in comparison to inheriting eternal damnation. This is quite serious. Even as the son of God dying on a cross for us is very serious. Your comparison diminishes his sacrifice as if he merely stubbed his toe for us. And the contrasts have everything to do with a persons depth of conviction that what we are discussing is a conviction that is able to move men's wills. The Apostles were hiding in the upper room in fear for their lives whereas afte the Holy Spirit came upon them, they were boldly out preaching the Gospel with power and signs and wonders, willing to be killed for doing so. God can make children out of stones.

To prove it I'd have to wack your thumb for I could just be faking the pain so to prove it I'd have to whack yours. Same here, for to prove it you'd have to be the one to denounce Jesus yourself. but like the pain in the thumb, you'd have to be crazy to do that

Honestly, this makes no sense. I am not the one saying men have the freewill to deny Christ after truly believing. In essence you are saying I would have to deny the Christ to prove to you that I cannot deny the Christ. Now how silly is that? By the way, for those who know the Truth and have feelings such as myself, when you hit your thumb with a hammer really hard, the pain is real.

then let me just say that I know more than one person who I know were believers and live for many years following Christ who have since denied Christ both as the son of God and as their Lord. My example of a thumb smash is not a comparison of what the Lord has done for us, it is an example of a concept of how to prove something and it seems to be only you comparing it to Jesus.

So will you take my testimony as to the truthfulness of the possibility of doing so, or do you need it proven by doing so yourself If I did so you could easily say that I was never really saved in the first place...... so it has to be you that exercises free will to prove it to yourself that it is still there. and from there I don't see how any discussion can progress

[OneLight]

So. if I read your post correctly, you don't think free will can be had before salvation? This I disagree with. We freely choose to accept Christ or not. We stand in judgment for what we have chosen freely.

I would say we had a freewill before the fall. It may appear to you that we freely choose, but that is not scriptural. Scripture says God chose, since he has mercy upon whom He will have mercy. He called the lowly things to put to nought the high things. They shall all be taught by God. No one comes to Christ unless it is given by the Father to come. And of all He has given they will come and he will not lose any. No one can confess jesus from the heart without the holy Spirit.

I disagree. Romans 8:29 "For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren." If you agree that God is omnipresent, then you would also agree that He looked down through time and foreknew who would accept salvation through Christ Jesus, where He then predestined them to be conformed to the image of His Son. Otherwise, we become no more then a puppet or computer program where we no longer have a choice. I do not agree that everything that happens was preassigned to us before we were born. We have a choice; therefore, we have a free will.

There are two judgments. One under the law and one under Christ. There are different standards for those under Christ than those under the law. I believe we will be according to how much was given us according to our different gifts and how we used them. We should not be seen beating the servants. That would be those under the law. Those under the law are judged by a different standard.

I believe God has the same standards for everyone, saved or not. The difference is that the saved go onto receive rewards and the lost do not. We all start off seeing if our name is in the Book of Life.

But the carnal mind cannot be subject to God. If it were as you say, then that scripture would make no sense. If what you say is true, we need no Christ except to crucify so that we may go on sinning in our God given freewill.

Again, I disagree. We may not be able to understand all God has written, but salvation is very simple. It has to be in order to draw sinners.

So the carnal mind can be subject to God? surely you are not disagreeing with that. Yet my response was originally to counter your claim that men can choose to obey God.

One must have the Word of God abiding in them to come to Christ. Those who are of God, hears God's words. To me it seems as simple so that a child could understand. To others the Gospel is veiled.

Surely I am. His word does not return to Him void. Through what we have been told, the Holy Spirit works convicting us of sin unto salvation and repentance. It is through this process that we are saved. I also agree that the Holy Spirit convicts people of sin unto repentance who have not heard His words. The problem begins when we place God in a box of our own understanding. He is greater then we can ever imagine.

Such is the sin nature. Did you freely accept Christ and His salvation or were you somehow programmed to accept what He freely gave?

I know I see what some others cannot, and some see more than I. Christ was revealed to me according to God's measure of faith. And this divine Love that I see feels the need to intercede for those who do not see. Even because I know they cannot help it. Otherwise I must count myself wiser or more loving than they by my own volition, even as I am counting them as those who do not see because by their own volition they chose to be ignorant and without love. There is no boasting in Christ for I will look like a fool afterward in heaven when my Lord shows me lording my sight over them as if it were not by grace and I would be no different than Satan. Such is the vanity that does not glorify God.

Thank you for your thoughtful and entertaining posts on this thread. I have enjoyed immensely having discourse with you.

I do not see an answer in your reply here. I will agree that we all are shown according to our personal position in life where you are shown something and I am shown something else, according to what we need.

I also enjoy thoughtful discussions.

[childeye]

I stand firm on the truth. I cannot be persuaded to believe something that God says is not true.

But Paul said God chose the lowly, to put to nought the high and mighty wherein God said I will have mercy where I will have mercy. Subsequently Paul concludes that it is not by the power of any mans will or desire to endeavour. For God knows the spoiled rotten don't appreciate what is good by their freewill. Respectfully, because you believe a man is sovereign, you are already believing something God says is not true.

For Isaiah says, God is the potter and we are the clay and no man can disobey God to follow his own ways. To fight against this Truth is to die and end up proving it true. Your defense is that God cannot make somebody do what they don't want to do. But then you contradict yourself by saying God can change what a man wants to do.

name=Floatingaxe]Our freedom of choice and our free will is not changed once we come to Christ, but what we choose and what we will to do does because we have been regenerated by the power of God.

You are protecting the lie of vanity, although you can't see this yet because you cannot yet recognize the subtle differences between a will and a freewill. So in your mind, having a freewill is simply the same as being alive. That's why I said one would end up dead proving they are free in their will which is hypocrisy since freewill is supposedly being alive.

I think you speak in order to confuse people, really.

You should consider. Either I am spending this time trying to confuse people who know better than me because I am jealous they know better than me. Or I am speaking a Truth that was sent by God to the deceived and it is confusing to those who are deceived since they think they are not deceived. Oh what a joke on humanity. The blind end up seeing and the seeing end up blind.

Our will is free.

Sin is not freedom.

So let me ask you another question. Did God choose the lowly things over the high things to be called by the Gospel or not?

Why don't you find that passage and read it in context? Your answer is there.

Enlighten me if you love me.

[childeye]

Hello childeye, I can't help but to ask if you believe in the doctrine of predestination? Because to me it sure sounds like it. If one takes away man's freewill of choice then one cannot receive salvation through faith because that is an action we must choose if we want to inherit the kingdom of God. Without freewill man is nothing more than a puppet on a string. There is no need for man to exercise any faith on his part because his outcome has already predetermind beforehand who'd be good going to heaven and who'd be evil going to hell without any choice. God did not make us slaves in order for us to serve him. But on the other side it was the serpent (satan) through deceit that caused man to fall and the result all of mankind was born into sin a slave before their birth. Satan is the one who held mankind in captivity a slave in the kingdom of darkness. Mankind thus did not have any choice in having a sin nature and held in bondage to it. When Christ came to this world and conquered death, hell and the grave then whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord would be saved. It is through the blood of Jesus believers have been set free from the bondage of sin and translated into the kingdom of light. Whenever a sinner calls on the name of the Lord they are made a "new creature" in Christ a "partaker" of the "divine nature" of God. The saints are no longer the same they have to contend with the old sinful nature as well as the new nature in Christ and they both war against one another causing us to choose to walk according to the old man or the new man created in Christ Jesus. It will be by faith we will either choose to walk in the flesh (death) or walk in the Spirit (life) making us a whole "new creature" in Christ.

The sinners have not been set free from the sin nature and have not been made new creatures in Christ remaining a slave to sin having no other choice. Whenever sinners come and repent of their sins they are set free from the slavery of sin and as a result believers have been given a "choice" at that time to serve the sin nature(walking in the flesh) or to choose to walk in the Spirit (where there is no law) thus having two natures thus we are made "new creatures" in Christ where unbeievers are not new creatures. God did not make the saints a slave to him but set us free to choose of our freewill whom we want to serve as again mankind did not have that choice before salvation as we were held captive a slave to sin having no choice. Christ came and died on the cross while we were "yet" sinners so that grace would much more abound (spread or grow throughout the world). Just as sin abounded (spread and began to grow throughout the world) from the very beginning from Cain up unto this present time both sin and grace are growing in the world and the saints have been granted a choice to walk in the Spirit (the divine nature of God) or to walk in the flesh (according to our sinful carnal nature).

The doctrine of pre-destination takes "out" the whosoever "will" (freewill choice) call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Pre-destination doctrine says God creates us either "good" or "bad" having no choice because God has already pre-destined some people to heaven and others to hell thus leaving mankind without any choice in the destiny of his own soul. Mankind was not fashioned or created in the mothers womb either to be "good" or "evil". The doctrine of pre-destination in the Word of God has nothing to do with mankind having no freewill choices in our lives because our salvation or doom has already been predestined and set beforehand without any choices on our part. When the Word speaks of predistination it is referring to the Jews the nation of Israel (circumcision) and all of the other Gentile nations (uncircumcision) in the world. It has nothing to do with having freewill to make our own choices concerning our salvation. If we "Choose" the right then there's no room for the wrong.

Thank you for your response. Your post is a thoughtful one that ponders with an obvious sincerety. I sense no guile in any of your assertions. Consequently I trust that you will not play games with the semantics of wordplay. I doubt I can address all the issues you raise. So first off, in the ultimate big picture, God has foreseen all events and He accomplishes a purpose through all that transpires no matter which way we choose. He not only sees the powers behind why we choose the way we do, but he is able to manipulate them so that He brings to pass all that happens from the beginning to the end of time. He knows what powers there are because He made them. So He knows how to mix both good and evil so as to create an event that brings forth proper esteem and worship of Himself. This pleases Him and so He does it. All happens as a revelation of who He is. In summation it is unarguable that God set things in motion and vanity is that usurping of that energy simply so as to say I did it, God didn't. That vanity would be Satan trying to play God.

Clearly we are in time hence there is prophecy. The way I see it men were fated after the fall to die regardless of their desire to live. Hence prior to that, men could live well in contentment, but only within the boundries wherein God has proclaimed Truth, prosperity and life. This requires the faith to believe God is honest, loving and He in fact is the Creator who has established all Truth.

I see the Christ as an intervention upon the fate of both angels and man dropped into the middle of time that causes ripples in all directions, both forward and backward in time, able to save those who have gone before and secure hope for those to come according to God's purpose. And God's purpose is not ours to thwart but to thwart Satan's. We cannot add to it or take away from it. Consequently even the term fate is relative since what was fated before God was able to change so as to show he can. Either way there is always a fate.

I do not see the salvation choice happening by freewill but by revelation of Truth with the caveat assuming one wants to live. And even wanting not to live I attribute to the powers of darkness not men's claim of freedom. In this I honor God and not myself. Certainly I came willingly upon seeing my error, even as I willingly did not come when I was deceived. When Christ is introduced, we do not choose Satan over christ since we are already in Satan. Hence Jesus said that even if you don't choose you are against him. I believe every knee will bow willingly at some point when all vanity is defeated and death along with it. Such is the enduring power of God's reality.

Whether some will claim they choose God freely and others say I was forced to believe after seeing, this is not to say that the beauty of Christ's Love is not the underlying motivation for both. Our choices are corporeal matters and freewill is a subjective term that is relative in the big picture. Simply put, the power to choose counts for nothing. Knowing which path to choose counts for everything. When freewill is proposed as an absolute, it does not account for the value of faith since it counts faith itself as the ability to choose rather than the evidence of things hoped for. In fact the freewill to choose Christ is the antithesis of the freewill to choose Satan. For they are in reality two polar images of God. That's why those who count freewill as an absolute end up in their purely subjective reasoning deliberating upon a contradiction. For one cannot say I have faith that Christ is the absolute Truth but I have the freewill to change my mind at any moment. He either is or he isn't, our decisions don't change the reality.

[childeye]

then let me just say that I know more than one person who I know were believers and live for many years following Christ who have since denied Christ both as the son of God and as their Lord.

There are those who say that yes. There are even those who say they believe but really don't. Scripture testifies to the same. But that does not prove freewill either way. And I apoligize to you. I can see now, that this is probably what you were trying to say with the hammer thing all along. Unless I still got it wrong.

My example of a thumb smash is not a comparison of what the Lord has done for us, it is an example of a concept of how to prove something and it seems to be only you comparing it to Jesus.

Okay, yes it was I who compared it with Jesus, because one person had said everybody had the freewill to deny or except Christ. This is of course a paradoxical proposition wherein freewill would be established by the fact one stood before two options. Whereas the will is not an external factor and cannot be qualified as free simply because there are options that exist apart from the desire of the will. Moreover the will itself is determined by those morals that define right and wrong whether they are spiritualy minded or carnal minded. And these are predispositions that in the very least compromise the term freewill into two distinct meanings, and at the most disqualify freewill completely. For it can't be said the carnal mind is free to choose spiritualy although there are degrees of faith wherein the spiritual mind may choose the carnal path. But even then faith or lack thereof is the deciding factor. The term freewil as an absolute obscures and eben denies any higher powers. What are we to make of weakness of the flesh? Shall we call it our freewill? What shall we make of faith? Shall we call it freewill? What shall we say of sin? shall we call it freewill? And what of Love? Is it freewill? Is freewill our right to choose death? Then let's annoint the devil our god and sing a triumphant song of freewill as we march unto hell. This is all vanity.

So to address your point about not being able to prove whether men have a freewill or not by denying Christ after knowing him. I cannot show anyone where the light begins and the darkness ends while walking in repentance. And I can't show anyone where the light ends and the darkness begins when walking in sin. But I can show you which way the Light is shining from. I would ask anybody who would supports freewill by the ability to deny God and follow Satan, to answer this question. Who is trustworthy to follow, the one who would sacrifice himself to save you, or the one who would sacrifice you to save himself? That is the question at the cross and the judgment at the cup of Christ. And that is why I cannot deny the Christ. Those who reject Christ don't see that as the choice they are making. Of course every man will choose. Even if they don't choose they have already chosen. Either you're calling God a thief and a robber or a benevolent caring person, and how we judge says more about us than it does about God. We don't choose freely. God is sifting the elements finding the tares. So freewill obscures not, admitting any predispositions that would reveal the tares sown amongst the wheat of God. Because the wheat want to be found but the tares want to stay hidden. Hence some love the darkness while others step into the Light.

So will you take my testimony as to the truthfulness of the possibility of doing so, or do you need it proven by doing so yourself

I don't deny people can deny the Christ. I refuse to call it their freewill, indicating that not everyone is free to do so. For all I know they were meant to exist as such, as a testimony to the depravity of vanity.