lab@uunet.uu.net (Lance Beckner) (07/31/89)
In article <Jul.22.17.51.16.1989.26025@athos.rutgers.edu>, bnr-fos!bnr-public!davem@watmath.waterloo.edu (Dave Mielke) writes: > > In article <Jul.21.03.43.46.1989.1919@athos.rutgers.edu> fibercom!lab@uunet.uu.net (Lance Beckner) writes: > >Then why do we need to pray for His will to be done on earth as it is in > >heaven? :-) > We are always to pray that His will be done, but this does not > necessarily mean that His will is that there be no sin in the earth. > Romans 1:24 tells us "Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness > through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies > between themselves:". Romans 1:26 begins "For this cause God gave them > up unto vile affections:". Romans 1:28 further states "And even as they > did not like to retain God in {their} knowledge, God gave them over to > a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient;". God's > will for this earth is to bring it into judgment after having removed > all those whom He planned to save from it so that they would not be > harmed. Since this is His will, it is for this to be done that we must > pray. Paul is referring to non-believers here. My question was "is it God's DESIRE that I, a child of God sin. Yes I know that He has willed that we keep our sinful bodies. But I also believe that He DESIRES that we do the best that we can (with His help) to avoid sin as much as possible. Let's take an example: A Christian man falls in love with and decides to marry a real nice girl that he works with. The only problem is that she is not a believer. This is in direct violation of God's word (and therefore, His will), because 2 Corinthians 6:14 tells us "Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers." In this example, the Christian man sinned. It was not God's DESIRE that this take place. However, He did ALLOW it to take place. My view is that what God DESIRES to happen does not always happen. He does work all things that happen (whether He desires them or allows them) together for His ultimate purpose. > It was God's will to sacrifice His only begotten Son at the hand of > man, and to accomplish this He had to be rejected by man. Speaking of > the new heaven and the new earth, Revelation 21:23 tells us "And the > city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it: for > the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb {is} the light thereof.". > Study this wording very carefully and you will see that the Lamb is the > glory of God. God is telling us that the Lamb is the means through > which He will display His glory to those with whom He will share > eternity. I am sure that there will be no disagreement when I say, > without going into a long proof, that the Lamb is a symbol of Christ as > the perfect sacrifice for sin. If His perfect sacrifice for sin, i.e. > His taking upoin Himself the equivalent of eternal damnation for those > whom He has saved, is the means by which He has chosen to display His > glory throughout eternity then we must assume that that was His plan > all along. He could not have accomplished this without having allowed > sin to enter into HIs creation and without allowing people to so > absolutely reject Him. I have a couple of problems with this. First, I don't think you have answered my question (or maybe you didn't understand it). I'm referring mostly to the O.T. and asking if God DESIRED Israel to reject Him and offer their praises, and sacrifices to false gods? I read some the O.T. and see that God is very displeased with their rejection of the true LORD God. Hosea comes to mind in particular. Obviously He foreknew of their rejection and even used it, along with their final rejection, to accomplish His plan of salvation. But I do not believed that God ever has, or ever will, DESIRE rejection from any of His creation. In fact, it is the rejection of God (Father and Son) the we are condemned for (John 3:18,19). It makes no sense to me that God would desire our rejection, and then condemn us for the same rejection. Second, as it reads, it appears that God is limited in some way. You imply that if Israel didn't reject Him, God would not have been able to save us. I think God would have come up with another plan if the rejection didn't happen. Of course, it did happen, and all we can do is speculate about how things might have worked under different circumstances. Again, I see God's foreknowledge of Israel's rejection, and His using that in His plan for salvation. Finally, you say that it was God's will (desire) that sin enter His creation. I don't agree with you. I think He knew that sin would enter His creation, and He had the whole salvation plan all worked out before Adam took his first breath. But in Genesis chapter three, I see a God who is very displeased about Adam and Eve's disobedience. I don't believe that it was God's desire for sin to enter His creation. But then, if God knew that man would sin, and He created man anyway, then you could say He did more than just allowed it. Maybe He...., nah. -- Lance A. Beckner "Jesus loves me, this I know, INTERNET: lab@fibercom.com for the Bible tells me so." UUCP: ...!uunet!fibercom!lab
davem@watmath.waterloo.edu (Dave Mielke) (08/02/89)
In article <Jul.30.21.57.40.1989.934@geneva.rutgers.edu> fibercom!lab@uunet.uu.net (Lance Beckner) writes: >Second, as it reads, it appears that God is limited in some way. You imply >that if Israel didn't reject Him, God would not have been able to save us. >I think God would have come up with another plan if the rejection didn't >happen. Of course, it did happen, and all we can do is speculate about how >things might have worked under different circumstances. Again, I see God's >foreknowledge of Israel's rejection, and His using that in His plan for >salvation. You have very clearly illustrated a very common point of view which I used to have but have since been convinced cannot be true. I am now totally convinced that every single historical item mentioned in the Bible was part of a deliberately enacted plan by God. This is because I have learned more and more to see aspects of His salvation program depicted as figures in each and every historical episode. I shall tell you what finally convinced me of this truth. God promised Abraham, when he was 75 years old, that he would have a son in his old age, etc. Abraham's wife was 65 at this point, well beyond the normal age around which women cease to be fertile, so he took his wife's advice one day when his faith must have waned for a moment, and had a child, Ishmael, by her maid Hagar. I used to believe that this was just something that Abraham did that was a bit dum, never giving it any significance. I just assumed that God was teaching us the morral truth that He will have things His way when He promises them, and that anything else we try to do will be of little, if no, value. Then, one day while I was paying a bit closer attention to what I was reading, I noticed that Galatians 4:24 and vacinity clearly says that Hagar is an allegory of the law and that Sarah is an allegory of the promise. This taught me that even the most seemingly insignificant historical detail had a spiritual meaning, and that God chose this particular example as a way to make us aware of this fact. Applying this principle to all the rest of the Scriptures, all that God was saying in the Bible suddenly fell into place so marvelously that I became unconditionally convinced that what I had noticed in Galatians 4 was not a whim on my part but was, rather, a now very much appreciated piece of revealed truth that led to a tremendously new way to interpret the Scriptures. I share it with you in the hope that you will see this too, and that this will lead to an alleviating of a lot of doubt about what you may feel the Scriptures are teaching. There is an all too common trend among Christians to doubt, if not outright reject, another person's insight into the Scriptures just because the doubter cannot as yet see a given truth. We must remember that the Scriptures are a revealed truth, and that each believer is not necessarily given the same piece of revealed truth at the same time. I also feel reasonably confident in claiming that the Scriptures could not be a revealed truth if they were merely to be interpreted literally. Please let us take each other's spiritual insights into the Scriptures seriously and treat them as though God has revealed that truth to us through the other believer who presented the view. We must then take that interpretation and check it out against the rest of the Bible to see if it meshes, all the time prayerfully asking God to give us His guidance as we study. Let us also not forget to thank Him when we finally arrive at our conclusion, and finish with a plea that He will guide us to the real truth if the conclusion that we have arrived at is incorrect because He has not chosen to reveal that particular truth to us yet. Now, back to the original topic. I now see that all the historical events have been set out so carefully by God to depict all sorts of spiritual insights, that I can no longer believe that He just set it all up by knowing what would happen. He had to orchestrate that stuff so carefully that there is absolutely no doubt in my mind that it was all according to His will. You appear to have doubts because the Scriptures tell us how displeased God was. I believe that this is His way of telling us what displeases Him, but not that it was contrary to His will. I believe that His will was to have a few things happen that would displease Him. I am not suggesting, however, that He instigated them. I believe that He just let go of people's hearts enough and in the right ways so that their own sinful nature caused them to elect to do those unpleasant things that He wanted to have done. This makes His abilities even more impressive. He can, aparently, allow a specific bad thing to occur simply by letting go of any one of us in the right way by just the right amount, and that still leaves us fully responsible for deciding to commit that particular sin. Read very carefully the description of how God hardened Pharoah's heart several times during the Egyptian plagues. He would never have made Pharoah sin. The only rational explanation is that He just let go of Pharoah enough so that his natural state of rebellion against God took over in the right way to cause him to refuse to let the Israelites go. Also note that His own enduring of His own wrath could have in no way pleased Him, yet it was most definitely His will to do so. Dave Mielke, 613-726-0014 856 Grenon Avenue Ottawa, Ontario, Canada K2B 6G3
coatta@cs.ubc.ca (Terry Coatta) (02/12/90)
Dave Mielke writes: > You gave a number of other reasons, but I suspect that I need not > respond to all of them in order to illustrate the point of view which I > believe God teaches. Romans 8:28 says "And we know that all things work > together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called > according to {his} purpose.". Dave, I don't think that anyone is arguing with you about whether it is good or not to try and carry out God's will. The prolem is that you have not provided a useful means of identifying what is and what not God's will. Even if I agreed entirely with your inerrantist beliefs with regard to scripture, I could not apply the contents of your postings to my life. You say that if God wills a child to have birth defects, or a mother's health to be endangered by pregnancy, then that is the will of God. Why then is it not the will of God for a child to get polio, or small pox? Why is it acceptable to use our medical skills to prevent these problems, and yet we cannot use those same medical skills to prevent illness or injury by preventing conception? Where in scripture does it list what matters are to be regarded as entirely in the province of the divine, and those in which we humans may take an active part? Is the weather in the hands of God? If so is it immoral to ``seed clouds'' or even to attempt to predict the weather so that we may take preventative action? Terry Coatta Dept. of Computer Science, UBC, Vancouver BC, Canada coatta@cs.ubc.ca `What I lack in intelligence, I more than compensate for with stupidity'