Understanding God’s election

  • Christian Chat is a moderated online Christian community allowing Christians around the world to fellowship with each other in real time chat via webcam, voice, and text, with the Christian Chat app. You can also start or participate in a Bible-based discussion here in the Christian Chat Forums, where members can also share with each other their own videos, pictures, or favorite Christian music.

    If you are a Christian and need encouragement and fellowship, we're here for you! If you are not a Christian but interested in knowing more about Jesus our Lord, you're also welcome! Want to know what the Bible says, and how you can apply it to your life? Join us!

    To make new Christian friends now around the world, click here to join Christian Chat.

lrs68

Well-known member
Dec 30, 2024
1,153
328
83
There is no doubt whatsoever that Adam made wrong choices contrary to his nature before the fall.
And right choices after he fell.

Satan was unfallen at his creation as well. What happened? God willed that he should perish?
Yeah, why would God create the Angels with the ability to CHOOSE to stay with God or leave God but people on earth think human beings don't have the same ability.

Sometimes, the stupid is real.
 

Pilgrimshope

Well-known member
Sep 2, 2020
15,588
6,304
113
Yeah, why would God create the Angels with the ability to CHOOSE to stay with God or leave God but people on earth think human beings don't have the same ability.

Sometimes, the stupid is real.
It’s because of tbey acknolwedge that they have a choice they have to start choosing and begin to take responsability
 

Cameron143

Well-known member
Mar 1, 2022
22,437
7,674
113
63
again cameron man didn’t accomplish the gospel or send it out promising salvation to anyone who believes . That’s what God did to save people

The gospel is the power of God to save anyone who believes

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.
‭‭Romans‬ ‭1:16KJV‬‬
The gospel is the means by which God saves mankind. The power that saves is God exercising power to effect or produce salvation in an individual. There is a supernatural spiritual activity that transpires to bring about salvation. It is this activity by God that produces a new creation.
 

cv5

Well-known member
Nov 20, 2018
24,560
8,936
113
they are chosen and special God doesn’t want to save the others .
Yes, we get your drift: its the Calvinists who don't want to save "the others".
And worse, beneath all of the super-deterministic rhetoric, the motives are sinister.
They adore their supposed superior chosenite status, and love the unbiblical control freak psychology, an extension of their own.

No, but God allowed Satan to rebel and Adam to make his fateful choice. True life is free will in operation.
But, of course, God has the solution to all of this. The God-Man Jesus Christ.

2Co 1:20
For all the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us.
 

Cameron143

Well-known member
Mar 1, 2022
22,437
7,674
113
63
yeah God is merciful to you but not to them , Jesus died for you , not for them his blood covers your sins but it’s not for thiers …….

You should really do a study on judgement day bro
I recognize we disagree on this point, but scripture teaches that God will have mercy on whom He will have mercy. The implication is that the choice is with God.

How do you reconcile verses that speak of God exercising mercy to some but not others?
 

Cameron143

Well-known member
Mar 1, 2022
22,437
7,674
113
63
So God only wants some to be saved then or he’d do it for everyone ?
If salvation rests upon the activity of God and clearly not everyone gets saved, what is your conclusion?
One either accepts the inevitable truth or disagrees with the original premise.
 

Pilgrimshope

Well-known member
Sep 2, 2020
15,588
6,304
113
The gospel is the means by which God saves mankind. The power that saves is God exercising power to effect or produce salvation in an individual. There is a supernatural spiritual activity that transpires to bring about salvation. It is this activity by God that produces a new creation.
Cameron where are you learning this stuff from ?
 

cv5

Well-known member
Nov 20, 2018
24,560
8,936
113
Yeah, why would God create the Angels with the ability to CHOOSE to stay with God or leave God but people on earth think human beings don't have the same ability.

Sometimes, the stupid is real.
The determinists complain that rightly comprehending these Biblical "scenarios", these "dramas" are little more than sophistry.

They are not. They are object lessons, they are proofs, they are legal precedent.
Just as weighty and profound as anything else.
 

Cameron143

Well-known member
Mar 1, 2022
22,437
7,674
113
63
Yes, we get your drift: its the Calvinists who don't want to save "the others".
And worse, beneath all of the super-deterministic rhetoric, the motives are sinister.
They adore their supposed superior chosenite status, and love the unbiblical control freak psychology, an extension of their own.

No, but God allowed Satan to rebel and Adam to make his fateful choice. True life is free will in operation.
But, of course, God has the solution to all of this. The God-Man Jesus Christ.

2Co 1:20
For all the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us.
It is false to say that those of the reformed faith don't want people to be saved. I've never met one that doesn't want everyone to be saved.
 

HeIsHere

Well-known member
May 21, 2022
8,831
3,334
113
And yet I've shared the scripture with you that showed the genesis of faith, how understanding is opened, and Who weilds the power of the gospel. You, on the other hand, have yet to share a scripture.
Ephesian 2:8 Faith is not included a part of the gift, salvation is the gift.

Ephesians 2:8 states, "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God

It is widely agreed that grammatically touto (“this”) cannot refer directly to “faith.”
The demonstrative pronoun in verse 8 cannot refer back to the word “grace” or to the word “faith” because of the nature of the Greek construction.

There is no mention that God gave Abraham this faith.

Paul also mentions at times his own personal faith without a reference to the fact that God gave it to him as a gift (“my faith,” Romans 1:12).

Other references such as “your faith” or “their faith” are numerous in the NT (Matthew 9:2, 22, 29; Mark 2:5; 5:34; 10:52; Luke 5:20; 7:50; 8:25, 48; 17:19; 18:42; 22:32; Romans 1:8; 12; 3:3; 4:5, 12, 16; 1 Corinthians 2:5; 15:14, 17; 2 Corinthians 10:15; Philippians 2:17; Colossians 1:4; 2:5; 1 Thessalonians 1:8; 3:2, 5, 10; 2 Thessalonians 1:3; Philemon 6; 1 Peter 1:9, 21; 2 Peter 1:5).
John F. Hart


As well even John Calvin denies what you assert...

Calvin in his commentary on Ephesians 2:9 wrote, “And here we must advert to a very common error in the interpretation of this passage. Many persons restrict the word gift to faith alone. But Paul is only restating the former sentiment. His meaning is, not that faith is the gift of God, but that salvation is given to us by God, or that we obtain it by the gift of God.”
John Calvin, Commentaries on the Epistles of Paul to the Galatians and Ephesians, Calvin’s Commentaries, trans. William Pringle (repr., Grand Rapids: Baker, 1984), 21:227–28.
 

Pilgrimshope

Well-known member
Sep 2, 2020
15,588
6,304
113
I recognize we disagree on this point, but scripture teaches that God will have mercy on whom He will have mercy. The implication is that the choice is with God.

How do you reconcile verses that speak of God exercising mercy to some but not others?
I just read that he said he’ll be merciful for a thousand generations to those who love and obey him and destroy those who rebel and hate him ….

And see he’s always been giving man a choice

“I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:”
‭‭Deuteronomy‬ ‭30:19‬ ‭KJV‬‬

Bit mostly I don’t create doctrines that aren’t there and have to make them fit somehow
 

Magenta

Senior Member
Jul 3, 2015
64,436
32,753
113
Well...for starters the phrase isn't in the bible, so there is that. So, why don't you define for us what YOU mean by "moral ability"?
She reduces coming to believe to making a moral decision and says that everyone is born with the ability to believe , as if they were not slaves to sin and lovers of darkness suppressing the truth in unrighteousness, as Scripture plainly states... and she does understand how addiction makes those in its grip helpless in making choices that stray beyond their addiction ... but she seems incapable of transferring that understanding to what it is to be a slave to sin... She especially reviles personal spiritual revelation because she says that makes God unfair and considers that gnosis and tries to shame people when they express the idea of its necessity and their experiences with it, even though Scripture declares it a necessity, in the words that Jesus Christ Himself, As well as the fact that it is God fulfilling his promises to reveal himself to those who sincerely seek him, ... thougha few posts back she made some claim about the personal nature of salvation and God as if she were all for it While claiming that it was Calvin a sewer against the personal nature of it.
 

Pilgrimshope

Well-known member
Sep 2, 2020
15,588
6,304
113
If salvation rests upon the activity of God and clearly not everyone gets saved, what is your conclusion?
One either accepts the inevitable truth or disagrees with the original premise.
That man has always been given a choice by God an informed choice of good and evil and he lets us choose ….
 

Cameron143

Well-known member
Mar 1, 2022
22,437
7,674
113
63
I just read that he said he’ll be merciful for a thousand generations to those who love and obey him and destroy those who rebel and hate him ….

And see he’s always been giving man a choice

“I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:”
‭‭Deuteronomy‬ ‭30:19‬ ‭KJV‬‬

Bit mostly I don’t create doctrines that aren’t there and have to make them fit somehow
I appreciate the discussion. Grace and peace.
 

Mem

Senior Member
Sep 23, 2014
7,837
2,411
113
I recognize we disagree on this point, but scripture teaches that God will have mercy on whom He will have mercy. The implication is that the choice is with God.

How do you reconcile verses that speak of God exercising mercy to some but not others?
It strikes me that God will grant mercy on whomsoever, and no one can object, for any reason. And there's no need to induce an 'and I'll condemn whomsoever I will condemn, since that determination is given as 'those who do not believe.' While your implication is valid, there is an presumption baked in that, necessarily, there's absolutely no reason behind God's choice other than 'because He wants to.' This characterizes God as some sort of immature child.