Understanding God’s election

[MeowFlower]

R


I only too well do I know that. But prove to me that God made a covenant with Adam. That covenant is figment of more than few people's imaginations. The first covenant God made was with Noah. And the first redemptive covenant God made was with Abraham -- both covenants are in the OT, right? So...what is the point to your first sentence?

I respect all the covenants because they are the foundation to the most Glorious Covenant of them all -- the New Covenants which fulfills all the other covenants in the OT.

You don't know well enough to realize the Adamic covenant cannot be ignored. Knowing what it was helps to bring understanding of the second Adam and the new covenant.

 

[Kroogz]

There's is no such animal in the bible as the Adamic Covenant.

Hosea 6:7
But like Adam, you broke my covenant and betrayed my trust.
Hosea 6:7
But like Adam they have transgressed the covenant; There they have dealt treacherously against Me.

 

[Kroogz]

All the covenants God made in the bible were post-Fall; and those covenants were made in order for God to provide a salvific remedy for the Fall of mankind with each subsequent covenant building on the prior one.

Genesis 1:5
God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.

Jeremiah 33:20
“Thus says the Lord : If you can break my covenant with the day and my covenant with the night, so that day and night will not come at their appointed time,

 

[Genez]

[Eph 2:5, 8 KJV]
5 Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved ...
8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: [it is] the gift of God:

I have no argument with that.

It's Irresistible Grace that does not appear in God's Word.

The understanding of what grace is, and what grace does for the believer, has been bantered about in various ways...
And, depending upon which sect is using it, it's failing to be understood.

 

[brightfame52]

Well, I bet you a million dollars that when we get to heaven we will learn the true/harmonized interpretation of Scripture is that God is all-loving and wanted all to become elect, and remain elect, but some chose not to cooperate with His will/love/POS, and therefore were broken off/became bound for hell justly, because it was due to their determination to be obstinate/callous.

Rom 11:5-7

5 Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace.

6 And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then it is no more grace: otherwise work is no more work.

7 What then? Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for; but the election hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded.

 

[GWH]

Rom 11:5-7

5 Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace.

6 And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then it is no more grace: otherwise work is no more work.

7 What then? Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for; but the election hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded.

Again, the need is to harmonize RM 11:5-7 with other Scriptures such as the following:

DT 30:19, "This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live."

MT 23:37, "Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing."

JN 3:16, :For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life."

1TM 2:3b-4, "God our Savior wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth."

Since you did not agree with the way I sewed the Scriptures together...:

1. Paul views the elect as those who receive God's grace though faith instead of trying to merit salvation by obeying moral laws (RM 11:5-6, EPH 2:4-10). God initiates; souls cooperate--or not.

2. Some Jews cooperated with God, but others did not and shut their ears and eyes to GW (RM 11:7-10, ACTS 28:25-28)

3. The Jews as a whole did not fall completely beyond recovery or from the possibility of being saved, because the possibility of Gentiles receiving salvation may make some of them envious and prompt them also to accept God's grace (RM 11:11-14, 1TM 2:3-4, JN 3:16).

4. Gentiles should not feel superior to Jews, because all are broken off the tree of life because of unbelief or grafted into the tree of life by faith (RM 11:15-21, DT 30:19, MT 23:37).

5. God is stern toward those who reject His POS and kind to all (1TM 2:3-4, JN 3:16) who accept grace, if they continue to cooperate rather than persist in unbelief/unwillingness (RM 11:22-24, DT 30:19, MT 23:37).

6. God allows Jews to be hardened and become ungodly enemies just (pun) as the Gentiles were, so that He may have mercy on them all--that is, on all He chooses to elect, which is all (1TM 2:3-4, JN 3:16) who reflect His love by accepting Messiah/Christ (DT 30:19, MT 23:37). In this way His POS is just (2TH 1:6).

...It is up to you to suggest a better way to affirm both sets of Scripture, but simply stating Calvinist doctrine doesn't do it--so my bet still stands. :^)

 

[rogerg]

I have no argument with that.

It's Irresistible Grace that does not appear in God's Word.

The understanding of what grace is, and what grace does for the believer, has been bantered about in various ways...
And, depending upon which sect is using it, it's failing to be understood.

I'm not going to prolong this discussion further, but it should be understood, and should have been clear from reading the verse, that if a person is spiritually resurrected from death to eternal life solely by God's grace, as depicted in Ephesians 2:5, then such grace was/is indeed irresistible. There simply is no other way to perceive it.
You would transform God's salvation into some kind of a bizarre Rube Goldberg contraption - one derived from the pits of man's intellect - rather than of one befitting a great, infinite, wise, merciful, gracious, and omnipotent God.

 

[brightfame52]

@GWH

Again, the need is to harmonize RM 11:5-7 with other Scriptures such as the following:

I dont need to harmonize it. Election of Grace is for a remnant, regardless of what other scripture says.

 

[brightfame52]

I'm not going to prolong this discussion further, but it should be understood, and should have been clear from reading the verse, that if a person is spiritually resurrected from death to eternal life solely by God's grace, as depicted in Ephesians 2:5, then such grace was/is indeed irresistible. There simply is no other way to perceive it.
You would transform God's salvation into some kind of a bizarre Rube Goldberg contraption - one derived from the pits of man's intellect - rather than of one befitting a great, infinite, wise, merciful, gracious, and omnipotent God.

Also Rom 5:21 teaches that grace is irresistible, even more so than death,

That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.

Grace reigns through its author Jesus Christ. Reign means

1. metaph. to exercise the highest influence, to control

Now think about it, what Adam caused, for death to regin, is death resistible ? Ecc 8:8

There is no man that hath power over the spirit to retain the spirit; neither hath he power in the day of death: and there is no discharge in that war; neither shall wickedness deliver those that are given to it.

Now why do we think Grace can be resisted coming from Jesus Christ our Lord ? Is Adams death greater than His Grace ?

 

[GWH]

@GWH



I dont need to harmonize it. Election of Grace is for a remnant, regardless of what other scripture says.

Wow! I have never heard a supposed Christian express such disregard for GW! However, other Scripture also says that only a remnant of humanity will become elect by receiving God's grace. (MT 7:13-14)