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I chose God..Or God chose me...

Rella said:
Yay... thank you... LOL... I am getting there
Please, if I have this wrong tell me.....

So God actually made an order of things to happen? Correct?

freewill?
IOW: God created humanity, humanity sinned,^ and God has provided salvation through Jesus Christ and God makes His choice After the Clay (humanity) is fallen...

Or am I wrong?
However, why do I read that with a clear understanding and find it seems to fly in the face of Calvin.
If God made his choice after the fall.... ( by His provision of Jesus, our sacrificial lamb, right and our faith in Him?)
Then how could Calvin say God predetermined either eternal life or damnation for anyone?/
Would this be because of God's foreknowledge of everything and everyone?

Calvin: Predestination

Calvin on predestination: To his glory, God determined before all creation those who would obtain eternal life, and those who would receive eternal death.
www.theologian-theology.com


BTW... I did a little homework on the terms I surely did not know..... SUBLAPSARIANISM , and into the Sublapsarianism and Infralapsarianism

And I found...
Supralapsarianism / antelapsarianism (“before the lapse”) puts God’s decrees in the following order: (1) God decreed the election of some and the eternal condemnation of others, (2) God decreed to create those elected and eternally condemned, (3) God decreed to permit the fall, and (4) God decreed to provide salvation for the elect through Jesus Christ. Supralapsarianism focuses on God ordaining the fall, creating certain people for the sole purpose of being condemned, and then providing salvation for only those whom He had elected.
Click to expand...
It's not really a Free Will topic...

All the Lapsarian Categories are Calvinistic terms, the two most prominent are Infralapsarian and Supralapsarian; meaning God's Choice occurs before or after the Fall in Logical Order. The Lump of Clay is the perfect "Word Picture" for the difference; did God Choose the Elect from the Unfallen Lump of Adam's Clay, or from the Fallen Lump of Adam's Clay?

The Debate over Infra, Supra, Sub, and Ante will never be solved; because God is Timeless: without Sequence as we fathom Sequence. We just do the best we can. My opinion is that Supra is more Hyper than Infra is. I tend to like Sublapsarian better, as I am a notorious middleman ;)
 
Last edited:
ReverendRV said:
Yep; which did God Choose to do first, Create or Elect?
Click to expand...
I go with ELECT first. I don't recall why I came to that conclusion... I just recall that when is read about it the pros and cons presented for each contention it left me in the SUPRA camp .... plus SUPRA sound more cool (giggle)
 
fastfredy0 said:
I go with ELECT first. I don't recall why I came to that conclusion... I just recall that when is read about it the pros and cons presented for each contention it left me in the SUPRA camp .... plus SUPRA sound more cool (giggle)
Click to expand...
ELECTION/PREDESTINATION AND THE NEED FOR A THEOLOGICAL BALANCE

Election is a wonderful doctrine. However, it is not a call to favoritism, but a call to be a channel, a tool, or means of others' redemption! In the Old Testament the term was used primarily for service; in the New Testament it is used primarily for salvation which issues in service. The Bible never reconciles the seeming contradiction between God's sovereignty and mankind's free will, but affirms them both! A good example of the biblical tension would be Romans 9 on God's sovereign choice and Romans 10 on mankind's necessary response (cf. Rom. 10:11,13).

The key to this theological tension may be found in Ephesians 1:4. Jesus is God's elect man and all are potentially elect in Him (Karl Barth). Jesus is God's "yes" to fallen mankind's need (Karl Barth). Ephesians 1:4 also helps clarify the issue by asserting that the goal of predestination is not heaven, but holiness (Christlikeness). We are often attracted to the benefits of the gospel and ignore the responsibilities! God's call (election) is for time as well as eternity!

Doctrines come in relation to other truths, not as single, unrelated truths. A good analogy would be a constellation versus a single star. God presents truth in eastern, not western, genres. We must not remove the tension caused by dialectical (paradoxical) pairs of doctrinal truths:

1. Predestination vs. human free will

2. Security of the believers vs. the need for perseverance

3. Original sin vs. volitional sin

4. Sinlessness (perfectionism) vs. sinning less

5. Initial instantaneous justification and sanctification vs. progressive sanctification

6. Christian freedom vs. Christian responsibility

7. God's transcendence vs. God's immanence

8. God as ultimately unknowable vs. God as knowable in Scripture

9. The Kingdom of God as present vs. future consummation

10. Repentance as a gift of God vs. repentance as a necessary human covenantal response

11. Jesus as divine vs. Jesus as human

12. Jesus as equal to the Father vs. Jesus as subservient to the Father

The theological concept of "covenant" unites the sovereignty of God (who always takes the initiative and sets the agenda) with a mandatory initial and continuing repentant faith response from mankind (cf. Mark 1:15; Acts 3:16,19; 20:21). Be careful of proof-texting one side of the paradox and depreciating the other! Be careful of asserting only your favorite doctrine or system of theology!

From a Texan Baptist minister.

Where would you place this on your list?
 
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fastfredy0 said:
I go with ELECT first. I don't recall why I came to that conclusion... I just recall that when is read about it the pros and cons presented for each contention it left me in the SUPRA camp .... plus SUPRA sound more cool (giggle)
Click to expand...
That's where I land also.

Great minds run. . .
 
Johan said:
ELECTION/PREDESTINATION AND THE NEED FOR A THEOLOGICAL BALANCE

Election is a wonderful doctrine. However, it is not a call to favoritism, but a call to be a channel, a tool, or means of others' redemption! In the Old Testament the term was used primarily for service; in the New Testament it is used primarily for salvation which issues in service. The Bible never reconciles the seeming contradiction between God's sovereignty and mankind's free will, but affirms them both! A good example of the biblical tension would be Romans 9 on God's sovereign choice and Romans 10 on mankind's necessary response (cf. Rom. 10:11,13).

The key to this theological tension may be found in Ephesians 1:4. Jesus is God's elect man and all are potentially elect in Him (Karl Barth). Jesus is God's "yes" to fallen mankind's need (Karl Barth). Ephesians 1:4 also helps clarify the issue by asserting that the goal of predestination is not heaven, but holiness (Christlikeness). We are often attracted to the benefits of the gospel and ignore the responsibilities! God's call (election) is for time as well as eternity!

Doctrines come in relation to other truths, not as single, unrelated truths. A good analogy would be a constellation versus a single star. God presents truth in eastern, not western, genres. We must not remove the tension caused by dialectical (paradoxical) pairs of doctrinal truths:

1. Predestination vs. human free will

2. Security of the believers vs. the need for perseverance

3. Original sin vs. volitional sin

4. Sinlessness (perfectionism) vs. sinning less

5. Initial instantaneous justification and sanctification vs. progressive sanctification

6. Christian freedom vs. Christian responsibility

7. God's transcendence vs. God's immanence

8. God as ultimately unknowable vs. God as knowable in Scripture

9. The Kingdom of God as present vs. future consummation

10. Repentance as a gift of God vs. repentance as a necessary human covenantal response

11. Jesus as divine vs. Jesus as human

12. Jesus as equal to the Father vs. Jesus as subservient to the Father

The theological concept of "covenant" unites the sovereignty of God (who always takes the initiative and sets the agenda) with a mandatory initial and continuing repentant faith response from mankind (cf. Mark 1:15; Acts 3:16,19; 20:21). Be careful of proof-texting one side of the paradox and depreciating the other! Be careful of asserting only your favorite doctrine or system of theology!

From a Texan Baptist minister.

Where would you place this on your list?
Click to expand...
Take note @JIM -no one is answering this. Free human volition is a "no no"
 
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Johan said:
Take note @JIM -no one is answering this. Free human volition is a "no no"
Click to expand...
Not completely.

Man has free agency, and is capable of making some free choices, just not all. He cannot choose to be sinless.
Man is a free agent, able to make some free choices.

However, the human will is governed by the disposition, and chooses what it prefers.
And man's disposition is fallen, which fallen disposition does not prefer submission to God in all things, but prefers self rule, and that is what it chooses.

So man's will is not totally free to make all moral choices, but it does have the freedom to choose what it prefers.
 
Eleanor said:
Not completely.

Man has free agency, and is capable of making some free choices, just not all. He cannot choose to be sinless.
Click to expand...
Obviously not after having sinned. But sinning is a choice. We are not forced to sin any more that was Adam and Eve.
Eleanor said:
Man is a free agent, able to make some free choices.
Click to expand...
Man is able to make all free choices, otherwise, by definition, it would not be a free choice,
 
JIM said:
Obviously not after having sinned. But sinning is a choice. We are not forced to sin any more that was Adam and Eve.

Man is able to make all free choices, otherwise, by definition, it would not be a free choice,
Click to expand...
You will be correct when you present the man who has successfully chosen (accomplished) never to sin in thought, word and deed throughout his life.
 
Eleanor said:
You will be correct when you present the man who has successfully chosen (accomplished) never to sin in thought, word and deed throughout his life.
Click to expand...
What? o_O Over 10 billion people born since Adam and none have used their 'free will' to avoid all sin. That's seems like evidence showing the will is not "free" ... or maybe earth's population is very unlucky.
 
fastfredy0 said:
What? o_O Over 10 billion people born since Adam and none have used their 'free will' to avoid all sin. That's seems like evidence showing the will is not "free" ... or maybe earth's population is very unlucky.
Click to expand...
Getta load of them odds!
 
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