/christian/ - Christian Discussion and Fellowship

>>595777

Calvinism seems so depressing. Especially if eternal conscious torment is true. Why do anything if it's all predetermined? Why witness to people if whether they are saved or not is predetermined?

>>595782

Because it doesn't negate the fact that we have responsibilities. Just because you are predestined to live for 100 years for example doesn't mean you can go on for the rest of your life without eating food. Likewise, those who will be saved need to hear the gospel first. Life goes on, it doesn't simply change once all of this has become known.

BTW I'm not a full-fledged Calvinist. I do however agree with their view on the Sovereignty of God.

>>595782

>Why do anything if it's all predetermined?

Because the content of God's decree is real. When you do something, you really do it, no less than if God had no will.

>Why witness to people if whether they are saved or not is predetermined?

How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach, except they be sent?

>>595784

But let's say I 'decide' (not really since no one can actually make their own decisions, we're all puppets) to stop eating tomorrow. I slowly waste away until I starve to death. You can say I should've eaten but according to Calvinism I had no choice anyway, it was God's plan that I starve to death and it could be no other way.

>>595777

Offtopic (I despise Calvinism): that picture is awesome

>>595804

>not really since no one can actually make their own decisions, we're all puppets

That's a strawman, anon.

>You can say I should've eaten but according to Calvinism I had no choice anyway, it was God's plan that I starve to death and it could be no other way.

Does God know you're going to choose to starve to death before He creates you? If so, there are two possiblities when the time comes, 1. it happens, or 2. God is wrong. So, is God only conditionally omniscient, or could it be no other way?

What if Calvinism VS Arminianism is a hegelian dialect both teaching lordship salvation?

>>595777

What you have explained is the Catholic not Calvinist view on predestination. That view still allows for free will even if God knows what choices we will make.

The Calvinist view says there is no free will and God literally made Satan, demons and humans to be evil. Thus God created evil. Which is a logical fallacy as a perfectly Good being cannot logically do evil.

Wait, how would people ITT argue against predestination? Isn't it the logical conclusion of omnipotence and omniscience?

>>595863

I guess I "should" be Arminian being Methodist and all, but I'm not. At least not fully. I believe in eternal security, so full Arminianism is out.

That said, Arminianism is better than Calvinism since all 5 points of TULIP is awful.

>>595941

I believe God knows who will and who won't reject Him. That said, I don't believe that He forces people into either believing or rejecting Him. They do it on their own freewill.

If eternal conscious torment is true (I don't believe it is), but since most Calvinists believe it is true, that would make God the ultimate evil villain. To create billions of people simply for the reason of tormenting them from trillions of eons, which is what predestination plus ECT is, when you get down to it.

>>595946

But if God knows at the point of creation if the person they are creating will be godly or not (omniscience), and God has created everything and nothing is beyond God's power (omnipotence), God has quite literally created someone to reject Himself. Whom He will then subject to eternal damnation.

I think the point you make about the conclusions of Calvinists' beliefs is correct, but also that the Calvinists are correct themselves.

>>595941

Predestination is a difficult subject because it requires being careful. Predestination to heaven, but not hell, exists. Predestination both makes the person go to heaven, but is also a response to the actions of a person. Not the actions they have done, but the actions they would do if they were given grace.

>>595952

>God has quite literally created someone to reject Himself.

God created someone who will reject Him, He did not create that person to reject Him, which is a large difference.

>>595957

>if they were given grace.

can you explain what you mean by this? I'm not a regular 'round these parts and not very well versed in religious terminology, not in English at least

>which is a large difference.

is it? at the point of creation God knows that a person will reject Him - he creates the person to be such that he will reject God

>>595992

>can you explain what you mean by this? I'm not a regular 'round these parts and not very well versed in religious terminology, not in English at least

Sure. A person is not born in a state of grace, God regenerates a person in baptism to reach that state. Once they are in that state there are things God needs of a person to admit them to heaven. Things like feeding the hungry, visiting the sick and the like. So before a person has been regenerated these acts don't work towards eternal life. They aren't sin before that point but they help in getting heaven. Once a person has been regenerated these acts do begin to help in getting to heaven. Now predestination occurs before a person is born, since Jesus says "Come into the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world". However we say it is in response to these foreseen merits of what a person would do with grace because this statement is followed by "For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink" and so on. So God predestined these people heaven because He knew that when they received His grace they would do these things and act in the manner He required of them. I think a saintMaybe Ambrose put it as "For those whose merits God foreknew, He predestined the reward".

So the path from Gods perspective looks like this: foresee merits -> predestine reward -> person is regenerated -> merits become real -> person receives reward

And from our perspective it is

Have no merits -> be regenerated -> have merits -> receive reward

You see that the persons chart and God's chart are the same except in where they start.

>at the point of creation God knows that a person will reject Him - he creates the person to be such that he will reject God

Not necessarily. No one is made so that "They will go to heaven" or "They will go to hell". Where they end up is a result of their choices. God doesn't force them to make these choices, so God isn't creating the person to reject Him. It is true that God creates a person that will reject Him, however I don't think the potter is responsible for how someone uses his pot.

>>596006

Aren't you effectively saying that before you're baptized, you should do whatever you want?

>They aren't sin before that point but they help in getting heaven. Once a person has been regenerated these acts do begin to help in getting to heaven

I think you might have misspoken here or something, these two sentences are phrased contradictory to one another.

>>595944

>I guess I "should" be Arminian being Methodist and all, but I'm not.

There is still a strong Calvinist tradition in Methodism left over from George Whitefield. You should try to revive it.

>>596011

>Aren't you effectively saying that before you're baptized, you should do whatever you want?

No. God is more willing to give His grace to a person who strives to be worthy of it, and while it is true that before baptism you can't do anything for reaching heaven(aside from being baptized), God will certainly look more kindly on you if even before baptism you do what is right. While any wrong you do would be forgiven in baptism, if you persist in doing wrong God may, for a while for eternity, withdraw the offer of His grace since that person wouldn't be treating what he is about to receive properly. Saint Cyril in his catechetical lectures records

<If the fashion of your soul is avarice, put on another fashion and come in. Put off your former fashion, cloke it not up. Put off, I pray you, fornication and uncleanness, and put on the brightest robe of chastity. This charge I give you, before Jesus the Bridegroom of souls come in and see their fashions. A long notice is allowed you; you have forty days for repentance: you have full opportunity both to put off, and wash, and to put on and enter. But if you persist in an evil purpose, the speaker is blameless, but you must not look for the grace: for the water will receive, but the Spirit will not accept you. If any one is conscious of his wound, let him take the salve; if any has fallen, let him arise. Let there be no Simon among you, no hypocrisy, no idle curiosity about the matter.

>I think you might have misspoken here or something, these two sentences are phrased contradictory to one another.

Yes I made a type. It should read

>>They aren't sin before that point but they do not help in getting heaven. Once a person has been regenerated these acts do begin to help in getting to heaven

>>596006

>a state of grace

Can you define this?

>God regenerates a person in baptism to reach that state

So the 'Righteous Heathens' (or whatever the technical term is for Plato, Aristotle etc.) and indeed anyone who died before Jesus would be doomed to damnation simply by the misfortune of their circumstances?

>Where they end up is a result of their choices.

Omniscience necessitates determinism. God knows all results of all choices that have been or will be made, thus there is no 'choice' or 'result' of that is not known to God at the point of creation. God creates a person to make the choices they will make.

>I don't think the potter is responsible for how someone uses his pot.

We aren't discussing potters and pots but God and His creation. Please refrain from obfuscating the conversation with false equivalences.

>>596015

Good to know. I am curious, though, if a pre-baptized person's prayers are considered if one is praying for the deceased faithful. Do you subscribe to the Catholic view of Purgatory and indulgences?

>>596006

That implies that we're blank slates.

>>595777

If you watch a rerun of a basketball game and you know who's gonna win from before because someone told you, have you in any way affected the outcome of the game? Or is the result of the game actually what the players did on their own?

Also, there is no past, present and future with God, He sees time completely differently, read some Aquinas man.

>>596054

>>595777

Here's how Aquinas explained it:

>God knows contingent things not successively, as they are in their own being, as we do but simultaneously. The reason is because His knowledge is measured by eternity, as is also His being; and eternity being simultaneously whole comprises all time, as said above.

>Hence all things that are in time are present to God from eternity, not only because He has the types of things present within Him, as some say; but because His glance is carried from eternity over all things as they are in their presentiality. Hence it is manifest that contingent things are infallibly known by God, inasmuch as they are subject to the divine sight in their presentiality; yet they are future contingent things in relation to their own causes.

>>596054

I've heard that analogy before, and it falls apart because I did not actually create the players.

>>596060

So you're saying that if you were a coach to those players when they started playing basketball you actually predisposed them to win a certain amount of games and lose a certain amount? That's silly. Even if you know they're gonna lose 50 and win 35 you in no manner affected their actions that led to those numbers. But again, there's no future and past with God, for Him all is present time.

>>596018

I have not considered nor read about whether an unbaptized persons prayers can serve for those in purgatory. They can to the extent an unbaptized persons prayers are heard, and God may in response to these prayers alleviate the suffering of those in purgatory. Further Jesus said "If you ask anything of the Father, he will give it to you in my name". This request is not given on the merits earned by the person, but on Jesus' infinite merit, and so an unbaptized person can request with a reasonable confidence of being answered. An unbaptized person has no method of obtaining an indulgence, and so no unbaptized person can put forward anything other than prayer for their benefit. This may be incorrect, I've thought of it to the best of my ability, I hope it helps.

>>596017

A state of grace is any state that is not

1) A state before baptism

2) After baptism, a state where you are guilty of mortal sin

That's the easiest way to define it I think.

>So the 'Righteous Heathens' (or whatever the technical term is for Plato, Aristotle etc.) and indeed anyone who died before Jesus would be doomed to damnation simply by the misfortune of their circumstances?

No, Abraham couldn't be in Heaven if that was the case. Aside from a state of grace, a person is given actual grace for every act he does or does not do. A person is given actual grace even before baptism which enables him to uphold, as best as is able without sanctifying grace(the state of grace), the commandments of God and to do all that he is expected to. As to how these deeds done without a state of grace go to merit for those who died before Christ it could be said off the top of my head

1) In the harrowing of hell their merits were applied for both heaven and the increase of that reward

2) the merits applied to the increase of reward before they had heaven but not the attainment of heaven. The attainment was gotten in the harrowing after they had merited the increase.

3) It is written God said to Abraham "Walk before me and be perfect" and further God says "Abraham obeyed my voice and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws" it could be asserted that the requirement of baptism was not placed on those who existed before baptism was instrumented. As the saying goes, "Do not judge by the law those who came before it". There is further evidence for this, since before the mosaic law was given no one was judged for not having a levite perform the sin offering, it could be similarly asserted that before baptism no one would be punished for not being baptized, but their actions would be considered as if they were baptized and be judged to what standard they met with merely actual graces.

>God knows all results of all choices that have been or will be made, thus there is no 'choice' or 'result' of that is not known to God at the point of creation

Which is very different than God making you make that choice or decision. You chose to make it in that instant, and since God is outside of time it is something that to Him is happening and has happened and will happen, while to you it may still be yet to happen. The explanation by St. Aquinas cited was probably the best one you could get.

>We aren't discussing potters and pots but God and His creation. Please refrain from obfuscating the conversation with false equivalences.

Isaiah 64:8, Romans 9:20-21. The point of these is that God isn't responsible for how you use your body, He made you and you've made it for good or for bad.

>>596024

I don't think I fully understand what you are getting at.

>>596091

I realize now point 1 and 2 could be confusing. It could be better worded as "their actions before the harrowing were treated as after the harrowing". To relate it to how I've treated baptism so far, it would be like all good deeds before baptism are turned into merit that is given to you on baptism. I'm hope that makes it more clear.

>>595957

>Predestination both makes the person go to heaven, but is also a response to the actions of a person

So salvation is owed to them? They are saved because they did something to deserve it, not because of the mere grace of God?

>Not the actions they have done, but the actions they would do if they were given grace.

And how does God know of these actions?

>>596006

>Once they are in that state there are things God needs of a person to admit them to heaven

So from that point on, they earn heaven by their deeds?

>>596054

The analogy collapses because 1. I am taking in knowledge after the fact, not determining the truth of each circumstance by my very being, and 2. I can be wrong. The analogy is disgustingly univocal.

>>596091

>No, Abraham couldn't be in Heaven if that was the case

So the way men are saved has changed? How were men saved under the old law?

>it could be similarly asserted that before baptism no one would be punished for not being baptized, but their actions would be considered as if they were baptized

This is an interesting contradiction in Roman Catholic theology. If baptism effects an ontological change, then its necessary effects cannot be held without the reality of baptism, since otherwise the ontology of baptism is nothing more than a legal fiction. Unless someone has an actual ontological change, they cannot be treated as having that ontological change.

>He made you and you've made it for good or for bad

That isn't how Paul used the analogy. He said God makes us for a good or bad end, "Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use?"

>>596091

> In the harrowing of hell their merits were applied for both heaven and the increase of that reward

what does this mean

>Which is very different than God making you make that choice or decision.

It is not. God at the point of creation knows every choice you make, and creates you into one that will make those choices.

>The point of these is that God isn't responsible for how you use your body,

The creator of Everything, the Alpha and Omega, the Omniscient, the Omnipotent - is not responsible for everything that happens? Are we discussing moral or causal 'responsibility'?

Out of curiosity: yours is the Catholic doctrine, with all this talk of acts and merits?

>>596099

>I am taking in knowledge after the fact

The principle remains the same. You have not affected the actions of the players, whether you know the result before or after. And then we are back at how God actually sees time.

Knowing the results of free actions in advance =/= predestinating someone to do something.

>I can be wrong

We suppose you are not wrong.

>>596108

>We suppose you are not wrong.

It doesn't matter if I actually am or am not wrong, the question is am I capable of being wrong? God is not.

>You have not affected the actions of the players

See, here's the thing, if I have infallible knowledge of the outcome before it happens, it is predestined. Because there are two possibilites, either 1. it happens exactly as I knew it would, or 2. I am wrong. The latter would not be true omniscience, so if God is truly omniscient, 1. is the only actual possibility. Now, this is where the "God hasn't actually effected anything" argument really backfires; that just means it was predestined by someone other than and above God.

>>596099

>So salvation is owed to them? They are saved because they did something to deserve it, not because of the mere grace of God?

Salvation is not owed, since salvation is a result of mercy and mercy is not earned. Salvation is owed, since having been shown mercy those who properly use the talents they have been given and are not "lazy and slothful" servants are then given the reward of heaven. Salvation is unearned and also earned, since the scripture calls salvation both a reward for deeds and the grace of God.

>Unless someone has an actual ontological change, they cannot be treated as having that ontological change.

The ontological change could easily, as I said, be given in the harrowing.

>He said God makes us for a good or bad end, "Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use?"

St. Chysostom in his homilies on Romans records

>And yet not even is it on the potter that the honor and the dishonor of the things made of the lump depends, but upon the use made by those that handle them, so here also it depends on the free choice.

>>596103

>what does this mean

The harrowing of hell was when all the people who were in Abrahams bosom were taken to heaven. My point here is that even you were to force the standard of the NT on people from even before the mosaic law you wouldn't arrive at a contradiction, since the harrowing of hell is not well described and it could easily be said that whatever was necessary for them by NT standards was given fully then.

>The creator of Everything, the Alpha and Omega, the Omniscient, the Omnipotent - is not responsible for everything that happens? Are we discussing moral or causal 'responsibility'?

He is responsible in so far as without Him it wouldn't exist/occur. He isn't responsible since it isn't Him doing it. Just like God isn't responsible for a prisoner being raped in the showers, since it was these peoples own choice to commit the act, God could be said to be responsible in the less strict and less meaningful sense since He still created them knowing that. To which I would say, suppose that is correct, doesn't the potter have a right to allow someone to use His pot for dishonor?

>>596109

Things are predestined in accordance with free choice.

>>596109

>It doesn't matter if I actually am or am not wrong, the question is am I capable of being wrong?

We suppose you are not wrong. Everything else is not really relevant.

>if I have infallible knowledge of the outcome before it happens, it is predestined

No it's not, you didn't command it. When people make their choices, they have every possibility to do whatever they want. And I will again emphasize that God does not see time as we do. God may know what you're gonna do, but he doesn't tell you to do it.

To say that God deliberately creates men to go to hell means God is not omnibenevolent. It also means mercy and justice are completely useless concepts too. It means Christ dying to save people is absolutely irrelevant too because those who are saved would've been saved anyway and the rest would be damned anyway.

>>596111

>Salvation is unearned and also earned, since the scripture calls salvation both a reward for deeds and the grace of God.

Romans 11:6

>St. Chysostom in his homilies on Romans records

It does depend on the choice, but that doesn't mean it is a contingent truth, or that it was not their purpose.

>>596119

>We suppose you are not wrong. Everything else is not really relevant.

Of course it's relevant. Is God only conditionally omniscient?

>No it's not, you didn't command it. When people make their choices, they have every possibility to do whatever they want. And I will again emphasize that God does not see time as we do. God may know what you're gonna do, but he doesn't tell you to do it.

Anon, I hate to break it to you, but simply ignoring the problem I raised doesn't make it go away.

>To say that God deliberately creates men to go to hell means God is not omnibenevolent

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+9:19-23

>It means Christ dying to save people is absolutely irrelevant too because those who are saved would've been saved anyway and the rest would be damned anyway.

God decrees the means as well as the ends. No, they would not have been saved anyway, because that is how they were saved.

>>596123

>Romans 11:6

Romans 2:6-7. One off scripture citations are pointless. I'd recommend St. Augustines "On Grace and Free Will" for an in depth explanation of what I'm saying.

>>595782

Why did God create the universe in 6 days when he would have done it on just 1 second?

Why did Jesus take 3 tries to heal the blind man?

You see God can use whatever method he wants to bring about his plan. Yes, God could have just sent us to heaven why not others instantly but the method he has chosen to bring the full number of the elect, as clement writes, is through evangelism and that's because that's the method God has chosen.

Why? I don't know, but I don't really care, It's not for me to know. All I know is I am supposed to spread the gospel and be used as a tool by Christ to call the elect.

>>595777 (check'd)

You are correct that God is outside of time, or at least exists in additional dimensions unfolded from the time axis. Anyways… predestination is a necessary consequence, but we also have free will. It seems like a contradiction, but it's true and analogous to quantum physics e.g. wave-particle duality.

I like to listen to Reformed apologists; they're simply the best that the Christian world has to offer in defending the faith. I wouldn't say I'm a "Calvinist", just a scientifically literate, bible-believing, sola scriptura Christian.

>>595782

What you will do, always was and always is. Your decisions are the event horizon of a reality; actions do have meanings. Ponder on this and come closer to understanding the mystery of iniquity, and why hellfire is just.

>>595782

>Why do anything if it's all predetermined?

We live in the 3rd dimension. If time were to "freeze" for us, it would appear as a flat image to a 4th dimensional entity. When time is moving along as normal, all actions within a given chunk of time would appear as a sculpture.

With that in mind, your question is akin to asking a sculptor why he didn't just draw a picture.

>>600811

Oops, I mean this as a response to this:

>>600793

>Why did God create the universe in 6 days when he would have done it on just 1 second?

>>595815

Zdzislaw Beksinski was a master. Polite sage for off-topic.

> I feel that because God is outside of time and sees past, present, and future, our actions are predestined

knowing the outcome does not imply the outcome came deterministically

you can even fit the outcome to your pleasure and not have a deterministic process overall

>sees past present and future

there is not a past present and future for a god.

i think y=2x. i know every y for any x already. somebody travelling on x sees one value at a time? not my concern

> hey but you picked a deterministic f

so what? instead of an equation i have a black box, i feed a number called t, it outputs another called S

t is time, S is state of every particle in the universe

i can feed any t, i can know any S, which makes me omniscient wrt S. yet i can't tell or prove anything about the black box

> but if you feed it t1 twice and get S1 twice then it is deterministic, if it were random or free willed….

…nope because t is time, there is no Twice.

> pizza or hamburger?

> pizza

there, you have decided pizza, once and for all past and future eternity. why did you pick pizza? another matter entirely

if calvin implies otherwise, he is in error.

>>595777

Free Will. The future is not set in stone. How ever a guiding hand is present. Not everything affected by the hand is intentional. Or maybe it is.

A computer system using quantum mechanics will take us much closer to understanding the universe.

>>595777

>everything happens according to God's Will!

>don't sin that's going against God's Will

Predestination destroys free will and turns all of history into a bad puppet show.

>>601384

So God isn't omnipotent? (His Will isn't always done??)

God has done much worse than child rape for ultimately good purposes later on

>>601374

U mean the D-wave that's opening portals to demons in other dimensions?

>>595784

>>595782

I think Calvinist 'Predestination' is hugely misrepresented

Of course God 'knows' what we will do in the future, but it doesn't mean we don't have free will in the way we understand it. He know what we will do with it, but we still have to make decisions and live pious lives. Someone can't lead a sinful life because they think 'I'm either one of the elect or I'm not, it doesn't matter, it's already been decided". God exists outside of our linear perception of time, it hasn't "already" been decided. It depends on our acceptance of Christ's teachings if we are saved or not. It's just that God knows what we do/will do in the future.

>>595784

The "sovereignty" point is probably the biggest problem I have with Calvinism. They tend to make an argument that God must be a certain way in order for Him to be sovereign. But having total control over the universe and exercising it doesn't seem to gel with what we know of the Christian God in the bible.

It sounds kind of Islamic to me.

It seems to me that a God who was willing to die for His creations is a God who is also willing to work together with His creations in order to bring about his plan.

It also shows, I think, great sovereignty to be able to bring about all you want to bring about even accounting for free will. Playing yourself in a game of chess where you move both sides of the board isn't that impressive.

Free will offerings.

>freewill

>>601498

>It also shows, I think, great sovereignty to be able to bring about all you want to bring about even accounting for free will. Playing yourself in a game of chess where you move both sides of the board isn't that impressive.

By this logic shouldn't we be scoffing at every other aspect of God as unimpressive? Afterall, what's so impressive about his perfect justice? Since by definition he already has it. Same for beauty, mercy, goodness, etc. etc.

Respectively, get woke ppl: http://www.iep.utm.edu/middlekn/

C'mon, buddeh: http://www.iep.utm.edu/middlekn/

I check and read /christian precisely for this kind of thread as the issue of predestination in christianity is interesting to me.

I haven't gone through all the links itt yet but I haven't seen anything posted yet that to my understanding really addresses the intersection of omniscience and omnipotence. Most of the post attempting to address omniscience do so by denying omnipotence. In that they ignore the intersection of the two. God knows everything that will happen and our experience of "why" he also created everything with that knowledge which to me denies any logical understanding of freewill and thus any meaningful definition of the concept. For me this allows only a view that our experience of time is passive. We go through life to experience what god has laid out for us. Why he chooses that we do so I'm not sure. The obvious temptation is to say that it is so we understand why we end up where we do but I think it is entirely possible for people to go through life and end up in hell and still not really understand why they got there.

Just because it seems the most obvious one to me I wanted to comment on the Basketball example. I feel that this is insufficient because it doesn't adequatly address god omnipotence. God is not a fan watching a game nor is he a coach he created everything exactly as it is and will be with full knowledge of every detail, intricacy and how all these things would interact to produce the result. removing or limiting the omnipotence of god renders this situation irrelevant.

Also the pottery example seems flawed to me because it posits the idea that god made the pots and we use them. I think the proper understanding of this example is that we are the pots, not just our bodies but our entire being. By saying that god made the pots and we are the people using them ignores the fact that god made us with just as much control and foreknowledge as he did with the pots themselves.

I understand the appeal of preserving the possibility of freewill but it just doesn't make any sense to me when considering the intersection of omniscience and omnipotence.

>>600811

>>600813

False equivocation. I'm talking about the means in which he created the universe not the material. There is a difference between a sculpture and a painting.

>>601384

>Does God decree the rape of children

This is one of the paradoxes where God decreed things that against his will. I'm fact acts 4:27-28 gives a exact example of God decreeing things that are evil and against his will:

<for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, 28 to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place.

>>601596

Do you even know what free will offerings are? They're offerings that are not required. This does not in anyway prove free will exists.

>>601797

I would argue that this position denies god omnipotence to explian his omnisicence. Even saying that 1+1=2 is true regardless of gods will is a denial of gods omnipotence. I can see someone arguing that this is symantics but I would argue the reverse. That saying a concept as concieved by man to assign certain concepts to symbols and then say that the concept represented is a truth regardless of gods will is a denial of gods omnipotence. I may not be able to truely understand the implications of how 1+1=2 may be false but if god cannot make it so then he is not omnipotent.

>>601828

Have you seen vid related anon? Should be of interest, but TL;DW is that we have freewill but it is limited and not total freewill/autonomy as it's often assumed to be defined by those advocating an arminian/synergistic postion. Total freedom of the will belongs to God only.

>Also the pottery example seems flawed to me because it posits the idea that god made the pots and we use them. I think the proper understanding of this example is that we are the pots, not just our bodies but our entire being. By saying that god made the pots and we are the people using them ignores the fact that god made us with just as much control and foreknowledge as he did with the pots themselves.

>I think the proper understanding of this example is that we are the pots, not just our bodies but our entire being

Pretty sure this is the proper understanding, I don't think it was ever meant to decribe the pots we use, but rather as you say describe us as God's pots which he uses

>>601834

You've failed to understand the dimensional analogy, but I don't blame you; it's complicated stuff.

>>601952

Perhaps, I have heard of the analogy before but did not see how it got into this discussion. So I just tried to respond to the conclusion.

>>601876

Based brother Sproul, may he rest in peace.

>>601876

thanks for the post but it doesn't touch on omniscience and in general avoids examining the issue of causation but rather presents the human experience as being inexplicable. What I get from this is that the guy is saying that humans make their own choices which just so happen to line up with what god intended but god didn't force them do to so. I don't know how he would address the issue of humans being made by god with complete foreknowledge of their choices and the intent to make them exactly as they play out.