Total Depravity
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No. I cannot predict ANY future event with 100% certainty.
You can predict that tomorrow you will get up and see the sunrise. And the LIKLIHOOD of that happening is very high. But it is absolutely NOT certain. NOTHING, outside of the scope of Scripture IS certain.
You are not guaranteed your next breath, much less seeing the next sunrise.
Jeremiah and Ezekiel prophesied King Zedekiah would see Nebuchadnezzar face to face, die in Babylon, yet not see Babylon.
But of course the LORD saw and ordained it. Zedekiah watched his 2 sons put to death and then had his eyes put out!
And died yrs later in Babylon. EXACTLY as foretold by the Lord.
But you are NOT the Lord. You CANNOT PREDICT ANYTHING to 100% certainty.
This is dangerous ground you tread.
You can predict that tomorrow you will get up and see the sunrise. And the LIKLIHOOD of that happening is very high. But it is absolutely NOT certain. NOTHING, outside of the scope of Scripture IS certain.
You are not guaranteed your next breath, much less seeing the next sunrise.
Jeremiah and Ezekiel prophesied King Zedekiah would see Nebuchadnezzar face to face, die in Babylon, yet not see Babylon.
But of course the LORD saw and ordained it. Zedekiah watched his 2 sons put to death and then had his eyes put out!
And died yrs later in Babylon. EXACTLY as foretold by the Lord.
But you are NOT the Lord. You CANNOT PREDICT ANYTHING to 100% certainty.
This is dangerous ground you tread.
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I can predict the sun rise time tomorrow where I live. You have a very specialised meaning for "knowing" that is a theoretical theological construct and you only apply when it is necessary to prop up your theology. If your mother were booked on a plane to arrive at a certain time next week, you would adjust your timetable to accommodate her coming. Why? Because you know she is coming on that date. If someone asks you,
"When will you see your mother next?" you would say, "
She's coming to visit next week." And if asked
"How do you know that?" you would say, "
She told me so," You would not say,
"I don't know she is coming, I only believe she intends to come."
We do not use language with the theological precision you want to impose on the Bible when the Bible reports people and God knowing stuff in it. Knowing something will happen simply means believing with a high degree of certainty that it will happen. We always have a silent caveat in mind: "... provided nothing unforeseen happens to prevent it."
The Bible was written by men and through men, but using their language, with the meaning they applied to words in real life.
"When will you see your mother next?" you would say, "
She's coming to visit next week." And if asked
"How do you know that?" you would say, "
She told me so," You would not say,
"I don't know she is coming, I only believe she intends to come."
We do not use language with the theological precision you want to impose on the Bible when the Bible reports people and God knowing stuff in it. Knowing something will happen simply means believing with a high degree of certainty that it will happen. We always have a silent caveat in mind: "... provided nothing unforeseen happens to prevent it."
The Bible was written by men and through men, but using their language, with the meaning they applied to words in real life.
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God speaks to Abraham about the future as though it is already the past:
Romans 4:16-17
Therefore [it is] of faith that [it might be] according to grace, so that the promise might be sure to all the seed, not only to those who are of the law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all (as it is written, [ "I have made you a father of many nations"]) in the presence of Him whom he believed—God, who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did;
Could you answer how open theism deals with verses like this:
And the LORD said unto Moses, Behold, thou shalt sleep with thy fathers; and this people will rise up, and go a whoring after the gods of the strangers of the land, whither they go to be among them, and will forsake me, and break my covenant which I have made with them.
How does God know they are going to do that, if the future is open?
That is my one and only gripe with open theism, other than that, in my opinion it looks biblical. God is operating in time and is relational and a lot of the philosophical man-made omnis and imns just arent in the Bible
And the LORD said unto Moses, Behold, thou shalt sleep with thy fathers; and this people will rise up, and go a whoring after the gods of the strangers of the land, whither they go to be among them, and will forsake me, and break my covenant which I have made with them.
How does God know they are going to do that, if the future is open?
That is my one and only gripe with open theism, other than that, in my opinion it looks biblical. God is operating in time and is relational and a lot of the philosophical man-made omnis and imns just arent in the Bible