Isaiah 41:8 “But you, Israel, my servant,Jacob, whom I have chosen, you descendants of Abraham my friend..."
Job 29:4 "Oh, for the days when I was in my prime, when God’s intimate friendship blessed my house..."
James 2:23 "And the scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,” and he was called God’s friend."
We are meant to be friends of God. As Paul might word it: If, in the old testament when the law was given to few, God chose to be friends with some, how much more ought we be friends with God in the new testament where grace was freely offered to all!
God wants to be in a relationship with us. We're married to him in Christ!
God is full of virtue and perfect. When talking with us he will not be proud of his high position but will listen to what we have to say, will listen to our prayers and pleadings, and will listen to our requests and cries for help.
John 14:14 "You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it."
Well, some of you may think that 'in my name' basically means 'if I was already planning on it'. Yes! But that's only because he can see into the future! Of course you can't ask for a free Ferrari or for Jesus to come back. But for one thing you can ask to be sanctified in certain ways. I have just started realizing on what a personal level God works on our hearts and have been asking him to change me in specific ways. I kind of forgot about it, but I just woke up today and realized that those things had been granted!
Matthew 7:11 "If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!"
At an even more surprising level, thing of the verses in Genesis I read that triggered this whole post. Genesis 18:16-33. Moses stands next to God and pleads with him to spare Sodom and Gomorrah if he finds only fifty people in the city. And in fact, he keeps asking again until he wheedles the number down to 10. What audacity! Yet God listens to him and pulls Lot and his family out of Sodom before he burned it with sulfur. Amazing! At least from our time-bound perspective, God can change his plans by our asking.
Finally, I would like to quote the notes below the text in my NIV study bible: "Abraham was God's friend. And because he was now God's covenant friend, God convened his heavenly council at Abraham's tent... He thus even gave Abraham opportunity to speak in his court and to intercede for the righteous in Sodom and Gomorrah... Here, Abraham exemplified the great privilege of God's covenant people thought the ages: God has revealed his purposes to them and allows their voice to be heard (in intercession) in the court of heaven itself."
21 September 2011
16 September 2011
heart and free will
Proverbs 4:23 "Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it."
We all want to make sure that we are saved; and a part of that is understanding how salvation works. For the most part we have it figured out, but when it comes down to free will and Gods spirit moving us, it gets fuzzy. Therefore, I have investigated the matter and am bringing you, dear reader, the best that I came up with.
It turns out, the primary agent in determining salvation is our heart.
SUMMARY "Our salvation is hugely affected by our hearts, which is controlled by both us (via our free will) and God. This may help the free-will debate."
Before treating control of hearts, let me summarize the components of salvation. The italicized part is less certain. Your heart believes (trust/depend) with a magnitude of faith that God gave us grace to be saved through the death of our Lord Jesus Christ. P.S. this belief is practical and will manifest itself in works and confession of the mouth of the Lordship of JC.
[separate and study the different synonyms for salvation: salvation, justification, saved, righteousness; along with methods: faith, grace, believe, heart, mouth/confess)
1 Obj: belief
2 Magnitude: faith
3 Owner/agent: heart
4 Direct obj: God saving
5 Energy/driver: Grace (JC dying)
6 Result: holistic salvation
Element 1# You access Gods salvation through believing.
Acts 16:31 "Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved..."
Element 2# Faith is a magnitude and is instrumental in salvation
Romans 12:3b "...according to the measure of faith that God has assigned."
Ephesians 2:8a "For by grace you have been saved through faith."
Element 3# Belief is of the heart, not purely academic.
Romans 10:10 "For with the heart one believes and is justified..."
Element 4# Belief is that JC died for you.
Romans 10:9 "If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved."
Element 5# The energy required to save you is by grace from God
Ephesians 2:8-9 "For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast."
So again, if your heart believes with a magnitude of faith that JC died for you then Gods grace saves you.
The question the following parts of this post attempts to answer is "Who controls your heart?" because that triggers everything and will decide your fate.
Now, unfortunately is seems that two people have control over your heart: God and you. We may prefer it otherwise, preferring one side or the other for various reasons but the truth seems to be in the middle. Both we and God control our hearts. For instance God worked on the hearts of the Israelis:
Isaiah 63:17 "Why, LORD, do you make us wander from your ways and harden our hearts so we do not revere you?"
But we also work on our own hearts:
Psalms 95:8 "“Do not harden your hearts as you did at Meribah, as you did that day at Massah in the wilderness..."
(for more references of hardening and other heart control see the end of this post)
So...who really controls our hearts? I mean, we can't ignore it. It affects our salvation and everything we do for heaven sakes! (see the Proverbs quote at the beginning)
I see this as a step forward, actually. Christianity has been debating free will for basically forever, and here is a weird duality. We have free will in controlling our hearts AND God works on our hearts too. No it doesn't solve anything, but it shakes up an old stalemate void, which is great.
On the one hand, we humans are incapable of living with God without his hand in our life. On the other, God cannot control us like automatons, for we still have the ability to feel and think. On the one hand, we cannot come to God without him drawing us (John 6:65) On the other, we must love God and learn to be imitators and sons of God.
In light of the fact that we are created to have a relationship with God, this duality makes sense. In a relationship, where the two have become one flesh, one does not decide things without the other. When a man and a woman get married, one does not make the decision, it is mutual. In the same way God reached down to us by his Son and moved on our hearts with love so that we may assent with our hearts, loving him back, and go on to live in him for glory.
[End body]
Case support for dual heart control:
In the ten plauges, God hardens Pharaoh's heart 9 times, the king does his own heart 3 times, and the event is stated neutrally "but his heart was hardened" or something similar 6 times, 7 of which (of both latter cases) the phrase "just as the LORD had said" afterward, possibly implying Gods promise to harden his heart.
Just read this passage and note the duality: Exodus 9:34-10:1 "When Pharaoh saw that the rain and hail and thunder had stopped, he sinned again: He and his officials hardened their hearts. So Pharaoh’s heart was hard and he would not let the Israelites go, just as the LORD had said through Moses. Then the LORD said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his officials so that I may perform these signs of mine among them."
For more examples of God hardening hearts see Isaiah 6:10 (within John 12:40), Exodus 7:3, and Joshua 11:20.
For people hardening their own hearts see Exodus 8:32, Proverbs 28:14, and 2 Chronicles 36:13
For other ways that we control our hearts see Colossians 3:23, Psalms 40:10a, John 14:27
For other ways that God controls our hearts see Philippians 4:7, Deuteronomy 28:65, 1 Kings 3:12, Psalms 86:11, Jeremiah 24:7/32:39, Ezekiel 11:19/36:26
Other actions of the heart: Exodus 25:2,
We all want to make sure that we are saved; and a part of that is understanding how salvation works. For the most part we have it figured out, but when it comes down to free will and Gods spirit moving us, it gets fuzzy. Therefore, I have investigated the matter and am bringing you, dear reader, the best that I came up with.
It turns out, the primary agent in determining salvation is our heart.
SUMMARY "Our salvation is hugely affected by our hearts, which is controlled by both us (via our free will) and God. This may help the free-will debate."
Before treating control of hearts, let me summarize the components of salvation. The italicized part is less certain. Your heart believes (trust/depend) with a magnitude of faith that God gave us grace to be saved through the death of our Lord Jesus Christ. P.S. this belief is practical and will manifest itself in works and confession of the mouth of the Lordship of JC.
[separate and study the different synonyms for salvation: salvation, justification, saved, righteousness; along with methods: faith, grace, believe, heart, mouth/confess)
1 Obj: belief
2 Magnitude: faith
3 Owner/agent: heart
4 Direct obj: God saving
5 Energy/driver: Grace (JC dying)
6 Result: holistic salvation
Element 1# You access Gods salvation through believing.
Acts 16:31 "Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved..."
Element 2# Faith is a magnitude and is instrumental in salvation
Romans 12:3b "...according to the measure of faith that God has assigned."
Ephesians 2:8a "For by grace you have been saved through faith."
Element 3# Belief is of the heart, not purely academic.
Romans 10:10 "For with the heart one believes and is justified..."
Element 4# Belief is that JC died for you.
Romans 10:9 "If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved."
Element 5# The energy required to save you is by grace from God
Ephesians 2:8-9 "For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast."
So again, if your heart believes with a magnitude of faith that JC died for you then Gods grace saves you.
The question the following parts of this post attempts to answer is "Who controls your heart?" because that triggers everything and will decide your fate.
Now, unfortunately is seems that two people have control over your heart: God and you. We may prefer it otherwise, preferring one side or the other for various reasons but the truth seems to be in the middle. Both we and God control our hearts. For instance God worked on the hearts of the Israelis:
Isaiah 63:17 "Why, LORD, do you make us wander from your ways and harden our hearts so we do not revere you?"
But we also work on our own hearts:
Psalms 95:8 "“Do not harden your hearts as you did at Meribah, as you did that day at Massah in the wilderness..."
(for more references of hardening and other heart control see the end of this post)
So...who really controls our hearts? I mean, we can't ignore it. It affects our salvation and everything we do for heaven sakes! (see the Proverbs quote at the beginning)
I see this as a step forward, actually. Christianity has been debating free will for basically forever, and here is a weird duality. We have free will in controlling our hearts AND God works on our hearts too. No it doesn't solve anything, but it shakes up an old stalemate void, which is great.
On the one hand, we humans are incapable of living with God without his hand in our life. On the other, God cannot control us like automatons, for we still have the ability to feel and think. On the one hand, we cannot come to God without him drawing us (John 6:65) On the other, we must love God and learn to be imitators and sons of God.
In light of the fact that we are created to have a relationship with God, this duality makes sense. In a relationship, where the two have become one flesh, one does not decide things without the other. When a man and a woman get married, one does not make the decision, it is mutual. In the same way God reached down to us by his Son and moved on our hearts with love so that we may assent with our hearts, loving him back, and go on to live in him for glory.
[End body]
Case support for dual heart control:
In the ten plauges, God hardens Pharaoh's heart 9 times, the king does his own heart 3 times, and the event is stated neutrally "but his heart was hardened" or something similar 6 times, 7 of which (of both latter cases) the phrase "just as the LORD had said" afterward, possibly implying Gods promise to harden his heart.
Just read this passage and note the duality: Exodus 9:34-10:1 "When Pharaoh saw that the rain and hail and thunder had stopped, he sinned again: He and his officials hardened their hearts. So Pharaoh’s heart was hard and he would not let the Israelites go, just as the LORD had said through Moses. Then the LORD said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his officials so that I may perform these signs of mine among them."
For more examples of God hardening hearts see Isaiah 6:10 (within John 12:40), Exodus 7:3, and Joshua 11:20.
For people hardening their own hearts see Exodus 8:32, Proverbs 28:14, and 2 Chronicles 36:13
For other ways that we control our hearts see Colossians 3:23, Psalms 40:10a, John 14:27
For other ways that God controls our hearts see Philippians 4:7, Deuteronomy 28:65, 1 Kings 3:12, Psalms 86:11, Jeremiah 24:7/32:39, Ezekiel 11:19/36:26
Other actions of the heart: Exodus 25:2,
09 September 2011
clarifications on free will
This is primarily a list of questions and options that hopefully will make the free will debate more clear.
First, I begin with a list of distinctions.
1) Maybe God controls our ability to make decisions (takes away our arm so we can't throw a baseball) but not the decisions themselves (if you have the arm, he won't stop you)
2) Does God have the ability to control our abilities or decisions to begin with (highly probably yes, but just realize that)
3) Maybe God controls us (in either way) only some of the time. Exodus 4:21 "But I will harden his [Pharaoh's] heart so that he will not let the people go." and Samuel 6:6 "Why do you harden your hearts as the Egyptians and Pharaoh did?" (there are 4 other instances of people hardening, and 2-3 others of God hardening hearts)
4) The last two verses mentioned bring the possibility of some duality. Where God can harden hearts at the same time as they harden their own hearts. (P.S. This instance is of our ability to decide, because it is our hearts, not will.) Note that in the ten plauges, God hardens Pharaoh's heart 9 times, the king does his own heart 3 times, and the event is stated neutrally "but his heart was hardened" or something similar 6 times, 7 of which (of both latter cases) the phrase "just as the LORD had said" afterward, possibly implying Gods promise to harden his heart.
Just read this passage and note the duality: Exodus 9:34-10:1 "When Pharaoh saw that the rain and hail and thunder had stopped, he sinned again: He and his officials hardened their hearts. So Pharaoh’s heart was hard and he would not let the Israelites go, just as the LORD had said through Moses. Then the LORD said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his officials so that I may perform these signs of mine among them."
5) Another consideration is the guilt of various actions. However, it is fairly clear that people are guilty of what they do regardless. Romans 9:19-21 "One of you will say to me: 'Then why does God still blame us? For who is able to resist his will?' But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God? 'Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, "Why did you make me like this?"’ Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?" Or note the phrase "he sinned again" mentioned in the end of section 4.
6) How does being made "in the image of God" affect our free will? How are we alike/different to God in terms of free will?
7) How does Gods foreknowledge of all events affect these operations?
Just some things to think about.
First, I begin with a list of distinctions.
1) Maybe God controls our ability to make decisions (takes away our arm so we can't throw a baseball) but not the decisions themselves (if you have the arm, he won't stop you)
2) Does God have the ability to control our abilities or decisions to begin with (highly probably yes, but just realize that)
3) Maybe God controls us (in either way) only some of the time. Exodus 4:21 "But I will harden his [Pharaoh's] heart so that he will not let the people go." and Samuel 6:6 "Why do you harden your hearts as the Egyptians and Pharaoh did?" (there are 4 other instances of people hardening, and 2-3 others of God hardening hearts)
4) The last two verses mentioned bring the possibility of some duality. Where God can harden hearts at the same time as they harden their own hearts. (P.S. This instance is of our ability to decide, because it is our hearts, not will.) Note that in the ten plauges, God hardens Pharaoh's heart 9 times, the king does his own heart 3 times, and the event is stated neutrally "but his heart was hardened" or something similar 6 times, 7 of which (of both latter cases) the phrase "just as the LORD had said" afterward, possibly implying Gods promise to harden his heart.
Just read this passage and note the duality: Exodus 9:34-10:1 "When Pharaoh saw that the rain and hail and thunder had stopped, he sinned again: He and his officials hardened their hearts. So Pharaoh’s heart was hard and he would not let the Israelites go, just as the LORD had said through Moses. Then the LORD said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his officials so that I may perform these signs of mine among them."
5) Another consideration is the guilt of various actions. However, it is fairly clear that people are guilty of what they do regardless. Romans 9:19-21 "One of you will say to me: 'Then why does God still blame us? For who is able to resist his will?' But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God? 'Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, "Why did you make me like this?"’ Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?" Or note the phrase "he sinned again" mentioned in the end of section 4.
6) How does being made "in the image of God" affect our free will? How are we alike/different to God in terms of free will?
7) How does Gods foreknowledge of all events affect these operations?
Just some things to think about.
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