Foreknowledge VS Predeterminism: An Open Discussion

As a brief introduction, a friend and I engaged in a discussion where we were discussing a post I did recently entitled "Is God The Author Of Sin". Click the link if you'd like to read it and the comments that followed, of which are the core focus of this post. I lifted from the comments questions and positions that were put forth and I intend to offer rebuttal here. For my purposes, I did not include the entirety of the comment, but rather enough background to understand the point and the point itself. I think I've been fair in my representation. His comments are in blue.

 

That said, you made it all too easy with the challenge on justice. Genesis 18:24-33 and Exodus 32 9-14...In the former (Gn 18), Abraham is pleading for the city of Sodom and argues to God that it would be unjust for Him to sweep away the just with the unjust and God agrees that if he finds 50 good, he'll spare the entire city for the sake of the 50 (and the negotiations continue). In allowing these negotiations, God is demonstrating or us that His justice is fixed and not whimsical. As the story unfolds, we also come to find out that He in fact spared Lot and his family out of justice though He was planning to just wipe out the city before being persuaded by Abraham.

If he was pleading that God would be unjust, he was only pleading that it would be unjust that God would destroy the elect along with the heathens. Abraham was defending HIS knowledge that his nephew Lot was there. I think what's being demonstrated by this account is simply that God is exceedingly long-suffering where His elect are concerned. Not only this, but help me make sense of what God means when He says: 

¹⁷And the LORD said, Shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I do;

 ¹⁸Seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him?

 ¹⁹For I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the LORD, to do justice and judgment; that the LORD may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him.

What in the world is God saying here? How does He in one hand make decisions based on His foreknowledge, but then question himself, seemingly in the absence of it? God is setting up this example where He says, "should I?" knowing that Abraham shall surely become a great nation...as if to say that some how by God engaging Abraham in this way, it was to affect him. Did God not already know what he was going to do? And was this event planned? Or was this one just forseen, and which part was foreseen, just Abrahams part of the conversation or God's too? Is God disingenuous? Careful, if you say it's FOR Abraham, then God MUST have planned it. If you say that he must react, then He's not God, for He certainly does not have complete and perfect forknowing of all events.

Ofcourse the deal killer is, 'For I know him; HE WILL command his children, and they WILL keep the way of the Lord; to do justice and judgement, that the LORD may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoekn of him'. So then, by who's power, and under which promise is Abraham able to do these things? For scripture says;

Man plans his ways, but God directs his steps

The heart of the king is in the hand of God and directs it like a river, which way it should go.

For He says to Abraham, I will make you a great nation and a company of nations.

Yes, God relents. And if you can explain to me how exactly it is that an all-knowing, all-powerful God has the ability to 'relent', then we can talk about this. But near so far as I can tell, neither foreknowledge, nor determinism explains this account. For even if you lay them both on the table and take them to their logical conclusions, there are logical errors and problems with comprehension. So, I say stalemate; so too the example of how Christ did not know when the day or the hour of the Father's return would be. Unexplainable. These are the secret decrees.

You quote Isaiah 53:10. However, if we take the whole passage in context, we see that God’s will is continuous here. In merciful response to man’s transgressions, God wills to restore union with man. God’s desire for union with mankind is the impetus of creation and salvation alike. Verse 3 explains how sinful man spurns God and hides his face from Him “suffering and accustomed to infirmity” God, in His mercy wills that His Son be crushed in infirmity because “If He gives His life as an offering for sin, He shall see His descendants in a long life, and the will of the LORD shall be accomplished through Him.” Verse 5 in particular makes clear distinctions and assigns ownership of offenses and sins on man! This chapter (particularly in verses 4 and 5) are so clear in assigning ownership of sin and offense to man that it’s impossible to logically conclude that the sins are God’s will. There’s no conflict here unless you decide that sin is the will of God.

I have never and will never offer that man is NOT responsible for his sin. I simply deny that he has any choice in the matter, and furthermore, I deny that choice is required for responsibility to be required. You agree with this reasoning already, as most do. You simply are not seeing it for what it is.

If the law says, do not steal and your son steals something, then he's responsible to you for stealing and perhaps other consequences may follow.

If your oldest son, though no law be given for coercion, was the one who forced your younger son to steal, then who is responsible for the theft? Your eldest son did not steal anything. He didn't violate any laws, per se, but your youngest son did. Will you only punish your younger son because he chose to steal? So then, your youngest son may well have had a choice, but his choice did not change that he was forced to steal; so then choice did not affect the theft. Neither did it affect responsibility, neither did effect the repulsion of the coercion. It could not repel the coercion before it even started. No, I say that responsibility is assigned by the authority over you, not by your performance, adherance or inadherence as it were, to the prescribed law. So then, you're guilty for transgressing the law, though you don't have a choice. It's correct that sin entered by one man, this does not answer the question of how it became possible for the transgression to even take place. You say free will, but if it's that's true, how is it that God in foreknowing that man would sin, created him anyways? Why didn't He create a perfect Adam, who was entirely free but just wouldn't sin...not couldn't, but wouldn't? Isn't Adam's "Choice" directly traceable to the plan God had for his creation? Romans says that the "creation was subjected to futility, though, not willingly!"

Lastly, where does the Bible explicitly say or intimate that man MUST be a free-moral agent, in order that God might justly hold him accountable to the ends of his Holy purpose and by whatever cause He may deem necessary? 

It is simply the case with God that there are holy and righteous causes to the effect of sin. In fact one of the most obvious is what Paul points out in Romans 7. So that the law of commandment would show that sinfulness is utterly sinful! Futhermore it's simply not enough to take the whole passage. You must understand that chapters 40-66 are the entire discourse of the human relationship with God. Let us consider what precedes it to understand what comes after it.

Isaiah 44:6-8 (King James Version)

 ⁶Thus saith the LORD the King of Israel, and his redeemer the LORD of hosts; I am the first, and I am the last; and beside me there is no God.

 ⁷And who, as I, shall call, and shall declare it, and set it in order for me, since I appointed the ancient people? and the things that are coming, and shall come, let them shew unto them.

 ⁸Fear ye not, neither be afraid: have not I told thee from that time, and have declared it? ye are even my witnesses. Is there a God beside me? yea, there is no God; I know not any.

Then;

Isaiah 44:18 (King James Version)

 ¹⁸They have not known nor understood: for he hath shut their eyes, that they cannot see; and their hearts, that they cannot understand.

You might say this only refers to the Israelites, ofcourse then you'd be wrong about either their free-will, or yours. But in any case, even if I were to hold to a free-will theology, there is a point at which man loses his free-will as the scripture so obviously points out. You cannot say on one hand that God desires unimpeded love and unrestricted responsibility, but then not give the responsibility to God when He clearly demonstrates the taking of their ability to see and their spiritual perception of Him; and yet, does He not still hold them accountable? He does in deed!

Then;

Isaiah 45

 ¹Thus saith the LORD to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have holden, to subdue nations before him; and I will loose the loins of kings, to open before him the two leaved gates; and the gates shall not be shut;

Cyrus is a pagan ruler. He's not a Hebrew neither does the scripture reveal that he is called of God to be part of His kingdom. Yet, if we're to understand Christ to be accurate that 'unless one is born again he cannot even see the kingdom of God' then we're to understand that Cyrus certainly had no clue that what he was doing was a spiritual endeavor, exacting the justice of God Himself on His people. Yet what do the scriptures say?

²I will go before thee, and make the crooked places straight: I will break in pieces the gates of brass, and cut in sunder the bars of iron:

 

Why doesn't he tell Cyrus that he has to do these things, in order to complete the commands of God?

 ³And I will give thee the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places, that thou mayest know that I, the LORD, which call thee by thy name, am the God of Israel.

Why doesn't He say that Cyrus must go 'take' the treasures? Or why doesn't He say that He 'knows' he will?

 ⁴For Jacob my servant's sake, and Israel mine elect, I have even called thee by thy name: I have surnamed thee, though thou hast not known me.

And finally we're to the purpose and the cause for God being in control. For Israel, MINE ELECT, tho thou has not known me, I've called YOU to be my instrument of justice - and that, with no vote, or complicit understanding.

 ⁵I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me: I girded thee, though thou hast not known me:

 ⁶That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the LORD, and there is none else.

 ⁷I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.

I form the light, create the darkness, send peace and create evil. Why doesn't He say that when you fall into evil that you're the one that causes that? This is very confusing. Why would God say that He's the cause of Evil that comes upon man, when really, it's man's choice that ultimately stands or falls as the cause of whatever befalls him? Ultimately it's because God is the first cause of all things. And he will not share that with any man, as though man could possibly carry the mantle of responsibily of governing God's creation. The first man that God gave any part of that responsibility to, sinned the very first time the possibility of sin was wafted under their noses.

1) If God's will encompasses all that is (even contradictory things) how can sin exist? Even if He has multiple contradictory decrees as you posit, their sum total would still comprise the total of His will. How can God at once will something that he doesn't will?

Consider and excerpt from John Piper's article on the matter;

Why I Do Not Say, "God Did Not Cause the Calamity, but He Can Use It for Good"

 

How God governs all events in the universe without sinning, and without removing responsibility from man, and with compassionate outcomes is mysterious indeed! But that is what the Bible teaches. God "works all things after the counsel of his will" (Ephesians 1:11).

This "all things" includes the fall of sparrows (Matthew 10:29), the rolling of dice (Proverbs 16:33), the slaughter of his people (Psalm 44:11), the decisions of kings (Proverbs 21:1), the failing of sight (Exodus 4:11), the sickness of children (2 Samuel 12:15), the loss and gain of money (1 Samuel 2:7), the suffering of saints (1 Peter 4:19), the completion of travel plans (James 4:15), the persecution of Christians (Hebrews 12:4-7), the repentance of souls (2 Timothy 2:25), the gift of faith (Philippians 1:29), the pursuit of holiness (Philippians 3:12-13), the growth of believers (Hebrews 6:3), the giving of life and the taking in death (1 Samuel 2:6), and the crucifixion of his Son (Acts 4:27-28).

From the smallest thing to the greatest thing, good and evil, happy and sad, pagan and Christian, pain and pleasure - God governs them all for his wise and just and good purposes (Isaiah 46:10). Lest we miss the point, the Bible speaks most clearly to this in the most painful situations. Amos asks, in time of disaster, "If a calamity occurs in a city has not the LORD done it?" (Amos 3:6). After losing all ten of his children in the collapse of his son's house, Job says, "The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away. Blessed be the name of the LORD" (Job 1:21). After being covered with boils he says, "Shall we indeed accept good from God and not accept adversity?" (Job 2:10).

http://www.desiringgod.org/resource-library/taste-see-articles/why-i-do-not-say-god-did-not-cause-the-calamity-but-he-can-use-it-for-good

 

Spurgeon On Merely Forsight

Election - Forseen Faith 

by C. H. Spurgeon

“But,” say others, “God elected them on the foresight of their faith.” Now, God gives faith, therefore he could not have elected them on account of faith, which he foresaw. There shall be twenty beggars in the street, and I determine to give one of them a shilling; but will any one say that I determined to give that one a shilling, that I elected him to have the shilling, because I foresaw that he would have it? That would be talking nonsense. In like manner to say that God elected men because he foresaw they would have faith, which is salvation in the germ, would be too absurd for us to listen to for a moment. 

There was nothing more in Abraham than in any one of us why God should have selected him, for whatever good was in Abraham God put it there. Now, if God put it there, the motive for his putting it there could not be the fact of his putting it there.

If I were to plead that the rose bud were the author of the root, well! I might indeed, be laughed at. But were I to urge that any goodness in man is the ground of God’s choice, I should be foolish indeed. 

The love of God therefore existed before there was any good thing in man, and if you tell me that God loved men because of the foresight of some good thing in them, I again reply to that, that the same thing cannot be both cause and effect. Now it is quite certain that any virtue which there may be in any man is the result of God’s grace. Now if it be the result of grace it cannot be the cause of grace. It is utterly impossible that an effect should have existed before a cause; but God’s love existed before man’s goodness, therefore that goodness cannot be a cause. 501.172

Some, who know no better, harp upon the foreknowledge of our repentance and faith, and say that, “Election is according to the foreknowledge of God;” a very scriptural statement, but they make a very unscriptural interpretation of it. Advancing by slow degrees, they next assert that God foreknew the faith and the good works of his people. Undoubtedly true, since he foreknew everything; but then comes their groundless inference, namely, that therefore the Lord chose his people because he foreknew them to be believers. It is undoubtedly true that foreknown excellencies are not the causes of election, since I have shown you that the Lord foreknew all our sin: and surely if there were enough virtue in our faith and goodness to constrain him to choose us, there would have been enough demerit in our bad works to have constrained him to reject us; so that if you make foreknowledge to operate in one way, you must also take it in the other, and you will soon perceive that it could not have been from anything good or bad in us that we were chosen, but according to the purpose of his own will, as it is written, “I will have mercy upon whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.”

Recollect also that God himself did not foresee that there would be any love to him in us arising out of ourselves, for there never has been any, and there never will be; he only foresaw that we should believe because he gave us faith, he foresaw that we should repent because his Spirit would work repentance in us, he foresaw that we should love, because he wrought that love within us; and is there anything in the foresight that he means to give us such things that can account for his giving us such things? The case is self-evident—his foresight of what he means to do cannot be his reason for doing it. 

You are obliged to confess that it is of grace then, and cast away the thoughts, that it was of your foreseen faith, or of your foreseen good works, that the Lord chose you.

God's Justice

In America, we know nothing of sovereignty, almighty power or even localized power that is so dominant that even our very existance is governed. Most of the known world has always been governed by a ruler, a king, a monarch, a dictator, a chief for all of time leading up the the declaration of independence; incidentally from a King. America was really the first nation, though there may have been others, to radically present freedom and independent sovereignty to man from the divine governor. All Christians and the Hebrews believe that the King is setup by God, so that's why it's appropriate to say divine govenor. Even Barack Obama is setup by and serves God. "The heart of the king is in the hand of God and like a river he directs it which way it should go". Prov 21:1

Then comes the matter of God's justice. In our eyes we have a trained perversion to extend, logically, our sovereignty in citizenship to sovereignty from God. The framers who believed in God would have found this conclusion to be erroneous. Because to be sovereign from God is impossible, since the only way that this could be possible is for God to have granted such a thing; in which case you are simply a lower god than He, but still never standing outside of His absolute decree of anything that should come to pass. This is important to understand, because the vary nature of our existance is disguised. Meaning, the things we see, observe, comprehend, apprehend, condescend and ascend to are simply the imagination of God. It seems real, because we've been taught that there is no reality outside of this one, except for this unapproachable, existential existance in some place called Heaven, or Hell. Yet, the scripture says that God will pull back the sky like a scroll...

There's a saying that I really like; "you've been living in a dream world neo" ~morpheus in the matrix 1.

We observe cause and effect and we believe in some sense that this is all there is. Most do. Yet, there are those who are trained in the classic sense of theology who know that even though there is some sense of cause and effect, there are also angels and powers and principalities that are all beyond what we can see through cause and effect. So then, it stands to reason that while cause and effect may be a rule of life, it's certainly not the only rule.

In the case of Balaam, the donkey's mouth was opened and it was revealed that the donkey saw more than Balaam saw and was saving his life. All Balaam saw was that the donkey would not obey.

In the case of King David taking the census that led to God's punishment of killing 70,000 Hebrews David decided to take a census. But later in the next book, Chronicles I believe, It was revealed that it was actually Satan who caused this.

In the case of Judas, it could well be said that Judas betrayed Christ, yet, the scripture reveals that Satan entered him...

God's Justice in Place:

God's justice and plan for justice is tied to human freedom by most. That is, it's said that without human freedom justice cannot stand. But the exact opposite is true. It's because there is justice that there is no human freedom. This is not a hard thing to understand; before we apply to God what is rightly his, let's consider an analogy.

• If a man owes a debt and his King throws him in jail, is he just? Yes, most would agree that if those are the laws, then this is just.
• If a King requires a debt to be paid, yet the man cannot pay and he kills him, is this just? Again, many would cringe, but if this is the law, then it is just. If it is not the law, then it is not just.
• If a King kills someone because he's been disobedient, or even simply disrespectful, is this just? You may not like this, but it is just, because he's the king. There's no higher human authority than him. So then in the relationship between king and servant, this is perfect justice.
• Now then, if a man owes a GREAT debt, but cannot pay and the King releases him from this debt, is this just? Think carefully. If you say that it is just by the same rules, 1) that the king has no higher human authority, that is just, then you conclude that HE MUST forgive ALL debts.  For justice cannot be forgiveness and payment at the same time. But if you say NO, then how can you call a king UNJUST? By what authority?

The answer is, that is not unjust, but rather non-just. The king has preferred mercy rather than justice, which is HIS perogative. Notice, in all of these examples, we were totally and flatly able to discern the process of justice without the variable of human freedom. Such as it is, freedom is not necessary for justice to remain what it is. Simply the existance of one with whom the power lay to choose exactly what is his perogative and no higher agency can abrogate such authority. This is what it is with God.

Is God The Author of Sin? (Unabridged)

I've wrestled over this question for at least a year now. I hold to a calvanistic theology and in all things I'm a determinist. What this means relative to this discussion is that if God in fact decrees all things, or stated correctly, "whatsoever comes to pass, has been necessarily decreed by God. Yet, God is not the author of sin", then God is somehow connected with the causation of sin, since it occurs, yet is not the author of it. I always struggled with that last part. I thought, in what way could you be the decreer of a thing, but not the author of it? What does it mean to "author" sin? I've read many papers, I've searched this out, I've talked with colleagues and it even comes up in men's bible study. 

I've been told that I shouldn't think this way. That I'm wrong to think that God can be the author or decreer of sin. Yet, I cannot escape, if all things have been determined, man has no substantive free-will. It's all done in God's eyes. That is, in some reality apart from this one, all things are already accomplished, even my sin which I don't have a choice about.

So then, what is the source of the problem? In part, so many say we CANNOT say that God is the author of sin. People I like, trust and respect. People who have taught me much about God. So then, I felt guilty, but still unable to rationalize anything logically consistent and biblically accurate. However I've been reading some work by Gordon Clark and Vincent Cheung recently and something hit me. A spark of clarity I've experienced before, but now so fully that I can articulate it and write it down. Let me start off with this;

1. There would be, if it were possible, nothing wrong with God being the author of sin. Nothing God does, thinks, believes, or decrees is sin or could be considered sin. There is no court higher than him and no entity to which he is responsible to speak, act or obey.

2. God is holy not because of what he performs, but rather because he is. Only men become things through performance, yet not even sons of God. Men run races and become winners and losers. God does not achieve, he simply is. All things are at his command and wait idly until he has a purpose for them. Nothing moves without God's divine intervention. My fingers move, not because of the neural synapses coalesced with an impatient desire to write something on the internet, but rather by the metaphysical control God is imposing on me at this very moment, directly and only. God is the first cause of all things. To believe otherwise is to desire autonomy from God. Which is foolishness. God isn't the better of a multitude of options, he's the only option. His truth isn't more truth than other truths, it's the truth and so all that he does and causes to do, is exactly the right way for things to happen. 

SO then, to my realization;

Since sin is the transgression of the law of God, then God is not the author of sin because he is not transgressing his own law, nor does he ever. Yet, he can and does cause man to sin by decree but transgresses no law in so doing. This makes man the author of sin because before there was no law there was no sin, and before there was no transgression there was no sin, therefore when God causes man to sin he does so with a holy and righteous intent. And when man necessarily transgresses the law of God he becomes the author of sin. In this sense, Sin is not merely a status or precondition or a gene or dna so as to become part of the flesh, or a thing that needed to be created. It is simply the transgression of God's law, which the possibility thereof was created by the creation of the law of God. Therefore, sin has no preexistent condition that must be upheld, it simply occurs each and every time we transgress the law.

SO then, I agree with Augustine in that sin is not a physical thing that is in need of creation, storage or inventory, to be assigned or purchased by the rightful owner at the rightful time, but rather it is a metaphysical reality that comes into existence the moment that transgression occurs.

The body is such that you are born without the spirit of God, so as to be unable to obey the law of God. SO that, in every thought, word, and deed you utterly transgress the law of God and are utterly lawless. So then, you are the author and the doer of sin, but by the decree and ordination of God for his holy and righteous purposes.

When the Spirit of God is given the believer instantly becomes righteous but not as though they have earned it through knowledge, experience or understanding, but rather by being regenerated by the washing and renewing of the holy spirit. Thus, even though sin, the transgression of the law of God, remains in the fleshly members, it reigns as a means to show that sin is utterly sinful. It's purpose is part of the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit to draw the children of the Light to God through sanctification.

Thus, God, since he's under no higher authority is not responsible for, nor is he the author of sin. Since He has no one to hold Him responsible and he never transgresses the law. He never transgresses the law, because the law does not apply to him. Whatever God does is right and holy. For him to transgress the law the Bible would have to explicitly articulate that God submits himself to the law he puts on man, or that decreeing sin is necessarily sinful, for God. Yet, so as to be in accordance with his attributes, which he cannot violate, he remains God. For to violate his own attributes makes him not God. But lest you believe that God's law are his attributes, let me explain what I'm saying further. God is said to be all-knowing, then, God is all-knowing, but if he ever ceases to not know something, then he ceases to be God. Some might say, does this make Jesus not God because He says that he did not know when the last day would be? No. God knows. God is still God. For Christ to lay down his deity in some sense or another is not a denial of the attribute of omniscience, it's simply the restraint of it, and, as it were, it was Christ who did this, not God the Father. So then, God acts freely and in accordance with his High Counsel of His Own Will and not in submission to anything or anyone.

What man could say that God causing me to lie, to ultimately save a nation for his own purposes, is God sinning? Or worse, who would reject God in so doing? This is a silly humanistic argument. Does God not have the right to employ any means he chooses to bring about his Holy Will? Consider that case in the story of Rahab and the two spies. Do you know who is in the line of Jesus? Rahab the harlot.

What man could say that God causing Joseph's brothers into the pit so that he could save a nation is God sinning? Does God not have the right and authority to use whatever means he desires? How could we, and with what logical authority could we approach Holiness and say that it's choices are suspect? That would mean that you are over God and God is subject to you, or your understanding of him. Since we know that it is scriptural to say that God DOES do these things, then it is unscriptural to say that he does not or believe that he does not.

I struggled before because I didn't understand what people meant by "author" of sin. I also could not see a rational reason why being the author of sin would be a problem. Since I could not perceive how this made God unholy or not God. Now I see that it's logically imprecise to say that. For the purposes that sin is not a created thing. It's simply the transgression of the law of God. Unlike a spider plant that needed to be thought up and created to have existed, sin is only the crossing of the boundary that God has defined. The manifestation of that sin is an act, which is not in and of itself sinful, but rather the moving across the line, or rather BEING on the other side of the line, which is sinful. For instance, plunging a knife into a person's heart is not sinful, the fact that it will kill them is. This may seem like a utterly fine point to draw, but the reality is, the only way to contend with life is to not make assumptions and work entirely with euphemisms, intentions, implication, inuendo, metaphor and colloquialisms. While for most, it's fine to live in that space to contend with everyday events, in order to understand and truly interpret your world-view, precision is the only course.

Finally, we are responsible to God since he is the authority over all creation, which was subjected to futility, but not willingly. We're responsible because God has made us so, and the mere making of us makes us responsible to him, for whatever cause he has created and destined us unto. So then it follows, man does not need to transgress the law to be responsible for his sin, his very existence of being born without the spirit of God makes him responsible to God for all sins that he will commit. That is not to say that he's born with sin, but he is born sinful. And thus, his nature is to be lawless and transgress God's law, and therefore doubly responsible to God. So since being born brings an immediate responsibility to God for what you will do, the actual commission of such a thing brings a double responsibility.

What is the purpose of this and why is this important?

I'm not certain it is important to all, but I also cannot understand how you could ever live at peace with your sin as the scripture says. We're born to live in life and peace, now. There's no condemnation. So if you're constantly trying to atone for your sins you lack the ability to advance your knowledge of God since you plainly reject what the scripture teaches. We're not under any condemnation. Not only are we already forgiven, but we've also been handed Christ's righteousness. Our sin was nailed to the cross and died with Christ, as we also died and when we were resurrected in Spirit, we were born unto the faith. So then how do you contend with the sin in your life? Do you beat yourself up? Ignore it? Pretend like it's not there? Or, do you live in freedom like Paul says, it is NO LONGER I that sins, but the sin that dwells within me! It would take up another volume for me to explain how to rightly live with sin in your life, but suffice it to say, you should obey the scriptures, obey your Father, confess your sin, but not feel false guilt or shame. If you feel those things because of your performance against the backdrop of a belief that you could choose better, you are setting your mind on the flesh; which cannot please God. The best word I've ever been able to come up with, that seems to rightly convey a non-performance view is remorse. And the reason is, I don't feel guilt because I don't expect me to do anything better than sin. To presume you can is the epicenter of false confidence, leading to shame and dishonor. Yet, is this what we're called to? NO! So then, you're totally depraved. Believe it. You sin so that you understand that you're totally sinful. It's part of God's economy of redemption and sanctification.

 

 

CATECHISM BUZZ: NOT TO HIT US IN THE MOUTH [repost]

Q. 13. What has God especially decreed concerning angels and men?

A. God, by an eternal and immutable decree, out of his mere love, for the praise of his glorious grace, to be manifested in due time, has elected some angels to glory; and in Christ has chosen some men to eternal life, and the means thereof: and also, according to his sovereign power, and the unsearchable counsel of his own will, (whereby he extends or withholds favor as he pleases,) has passed by and foreordained the rest to dishonor and wrath, to be for their sin inflicted, to the praise of the glory of his justice.

How do you take your decrees? What sort of lapsarian are you? Do you take your decrees with a side of Supra? Infra? Are you an Amyraldian? If you have no idea what any of that means, then there may yet be hope for you to get through this post without having an apoplexy. If you do understand what those things mean, then I beg you to understand that it is my hope to post devotionally on God's prerogatives as God, not just cerebrally. Give me some space here; I'm a Baptist.

As a man who is deeply affected in all parts by the rebellion of Adam, I temper my approach to the sovereign authority of God with great trepidation. I have serious authority issues due to my constant desire to usurp God and be my own god. So, even if God had decreed something inane like peanut butter and jelly for March 12th, I would want ham and eggs that day. How much more shall I shake my fist over His pleasure in election? 

Instead of quarreling with God over His own business of running the world however He likes, I'd like to try something different. I do not believe that God inspired Paul to write about foreknowledge, predestination, sovereignty, and election so that you and I would get sick worrying about our children and the fate of Joe Pagan in the heart of Africa who has never heard the gospel. I know that the Holy Spirit isn't interested in hearing about how free our will is in response to reading Ephesians chapter one. So what did he tell us all this stuff for? 

Look at Revelation 13:1-10. Seriously, look at it. It's full of lions, leopards, and bears, oh my! There's even a dragon. All these terrible, powerful, beastly predators are smashing, thrashing, and devouring the Saints of God. And how is the hero of chapter 13 described? He's a lamb?! Are you kidding me? We have a beastly lion, leopard, bear thing backed by a dragon and we get a lamb? And look at the decree! "If anyone is to be taken captive, to captivity he goes, if anyone is to be slain with the sword, with the sword he must be slain" (Rev. 13:10). Are we getting that fuzzy, warm, devotional feeling yet? Is it possible that God would decree that I be slain by a sword-bearing blasphemer? How is that encouraging? (Acts 14:22). 

Here's the point: God isn't aiming to hit us in our rebellious mouth with His decrees; He aims to comfort our hearts. I need God to be sovereign over my salvation in every way He can be. I know my heart. I do not want an offer of salvation; I want a salvation accomplished. If a seven-headed, ten-horned beast kicks in my door and threatens myself and my family with the sword, I want to know that I am in the embrace of a sovereign God who marked my going in and coming out from the foundation of the world. I want to wear the badge of "elect of God" in that time, and I want to know in that moment that my position in Christ isn't as fickle as my faith or as precarious as my circumstance. I want to feel the power of these words, "Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine" (Isaiah 43:1). This is fore-ordination. This is the joy of predestination and election. I have been summoned by name; I have been bought by Christ; I have been fashioned for honor, and everything that befalls me is ordained for my good, for my joy, and to redound to God's glory so much so that upon my redemption the angels of heaven shouted with joy. 

Beloved, God has been moved by mere love to save you. He is ready and willing to save. I hold Him to that. I pray it over my precious babies. I trust my God to do what is good and right, and I work each day to subdue that rebel who would question or scoff at the decrees of my Sovereign Lord.

http://new-calvinist-gadfly.blogspot.com/2011/04/catechism-buzz-not-to-hit-us-in-mouth.html