All human beings have the innate ability to be able to make choices and decisions: as we know it. if there is a higher concept on this: it belongs to God and only to him!!
We can be preached to, but we can choose or accept.
since the begginning of creation men, the human race was given that ability of "Free Choice and Free Will.
God does not have slaves, and when we accept to serve and worship Him, it has to be from our own will.

Blessings
poimen

Praise the Lord!
I have to agre withan earlier post, about this being an interesting topic, and one that has many opinions , and is quite important.

I agree with what neastman said, I think you made an excellent explanation.

I believe as you stated that we have free will , not ultimate free will but that we do have the freedom to choose, a person after hearing and understanding what calvary means has the free will to choose it or not, I always think of Joshua?s address to Israel in, Josh 24:15

15 But if serving the LORD seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your forefathers served beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD."

Joshua made a choice and asks Israel to think of the choices they have before them.
I believe that man has the free will to choose, to make choices, that God has endued the will of man with that natural liberty, that is neither forced, nor by any absolute necessity determined to good or evil, as I believe this verse shows..

Deut 30:17,19
17 But if your heart turns away and you are not obedient, and if you are drawn away to bow down to other gods and worship them,
19 This day I call heaven and 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

we have the freedom to choose which path to take, and God makes very clear the consequences to each choice. Even though when blinded by sin doing what pleases God is not in our nature but we do have the opportunity to change after hearing the Gospel message.

God Bless!
Your Fellow labourer in Christ!

Your premise is false beacause your propostions are not supprted by biblical text.

We are not slaves to God, but we are slaves to sin, incapable of choosing God or obeying his law. Read Romans 3, Ephesians 2

By your definition of free will, God is dependant or bound by mans choice. Don't you see how this is contrary to the very nature of God. What hope do you have in any of the biblical promises of God? Or that the bible is inerrant, if man has ultimate free will?

By giving man ultimate free will we limit God and his ability, thus making him not God; God be his very nature is limitless (or Almighty).

Also by your definition of free will salvation is not definite, only possible. I can not see Christ seated at the right hand of God after his work on the cross saying to his Father, "I hope that worked". Instead, "it is finished" was his cry. A done deal, read John 10 and then John 17 the high priestly prayer. He is saving a specific people group, certain indivdiuals of whom the Father gives him and his sheep that hear his voice and believe. Notice the order in John 10:25 and following, they are not his sheep so they don't hear and don't believe, they do not believe first then become his sheep. The text is clear...

Again read Romans 9 "It does not, therefore, depend on man's desire or effort (literally will), but on God's mercy." how can you argue with that?

I just want to be biblical, I don't want to live by man's false ideas of God. To me I have no assurance or hope in anything if God is not absolutley sovereign over everything, including my "free will".

My previous response was direct towards poimen not sunergos, sorry for any confusion...

Thanks sunergos.

My previous response was direct towards poimen not sunergos, sorry for any confusion...

Thanks sunergos.

I just want to be biblical, I don't want to live by man's false ideas of God.

It's good to be biblical. For scholars it's not very difficult to be so. But if a simple soul, being blessed by the Lords mercy, has a very intelligent remark but due to his being simple he cannot support it by scriptural texts and his remarks are not in contradiction to the revealed scriptures than why should we not accept it? Understanding God and conversing about Him in a bona fide way is not a matter of scholarship but a matter of being blessed by the Lord due to serving Him with devotion.

To me I have no assurance or hope in anything if God is not absolutley sovereign over everything, including my "free will"

I agree. But still, God will not interfere with our minute independence. He wants us to love Him out of free will, not out of force, because than it cannot be called love anymore.

Rapadura said:
"cannot support it by scriptural texts and his remarks are not in contradiction to the revealed scriptures than why should we not accept it?"

If it cannot be support by scripture then theres no arguement. Theres not even a discussion.

Also said: "God will not interfere with our minute independence. He wants us to love Him out of free will, not out of force, because than it cannot be called love anymore"

Where is this idea taught in scripture? Again another one of mans false ideas or presuppostions about God.

Just because God first does the work in my heart and "takes out the heart of stone and puts in the heart of flesh" doesn't make me love for him any less, in fact it makes it truly genuine. My love for God is very real, in fact it is God given. The Spirits work in my life transforms me into new creation, it gives me the ability to see that God is worthy and the Christ is my greatest treasure. Until that happens, we are without hope and incapable of making a descion for God.
What kind of love can a sinful man offer God? None, "we are at enmity with God"; "haters of God"; "there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God." (Romans 3:10-18 and 1:30).

Without God giving us the ability to see him as all satisfing and all sufficent we would never be able to choose him. Again back to John 10:25, we are His sheep therefore we believe, they are not his sheep so they do not believe.

Spurgeon and Edwards says it best here:
"I do not come into this pulpit hoping that perhaps somebody will of his own free will return to Christ. My hope lies in another quarter. I hope that my Master will lay hold of some of them and say, "You are mine, and you shall be mine. I claim you for myself." My hope arises from the freeness of grace, and not from the freedom of the will." C.H SPURGEON

"...the first effect of the power of God in the heart in regeneration is to give the heart a divine taste or sense; to cause it to have a relish of the loveliness and sweetness of the supreme Excellency of the divine nature." - JONATHAN EDWARDS

Alot of people say we where predestined by God to be with him without choice and it says says in the bible prverbs 16:1 that every word that man speaks is predetermined by God so people say we have not freewill. It alsothe same verse that we have deminion over the matters of the heart or our hearts disires. It even says in the bible in Luke 6:45 that "A good man says good things. These come from the good that is put away in his heart. An evil man says evil things. These come from the evil that is put away in his heart. Their mouths say everything that is in their hearts. So God does give us words to express what we feel and he allows us to sppeak what's in our hearts if we didn't have freewill we would be able to speak the words that are on our heart but you see we can speak whats on our hearts and minds so we do have freewill.

Yes, I agree we have free will as you are refering to, but it's not ultimate. I have the ability to say whatever I want to, whenever I want. These words that I am typing, I am typing them, not God. However my will is not free in the sense that I can do all things or even make descion for Christ without first God changing my heart and giving me the ability to choose him. It's not an issue of freedom, it's an issue of bondage, we are bound to our sin, "slaves to sin" or "dead in our treaspass and sin" , enemies of God. I think of the seriousness of Hell, that alone should relay some message of the serious nature of our sin. So that being said, I agree we are completely free to do what we want, the problem is that we never do what we ought, we always sin, we are incapable of doing good (in Gods eyes) until we have a changed heart or "new birth".

neastman wrote (View Post): › Yes, I agree we have free will as you are refering to, but it's not ultimate. I have the ability to say whatever I want to, whenever I want. These words that I am typing, I am typing them, not God. However my will is not free in the sense that I can do all things or even make descion for Christ without first God changing my heart and giving me the ability to choose him. It's not an issue of freedom, it's an issue of bondage, we are bound to our sin, "slaves to sin" or "dead in our treaspass and sin" , enemies of God. I think of the seriousness of Hell, that alone should relay some message of the serious nature of our sin. So that being said, I agree we are completely free to do what we want, the problem is that we never do what we ought, we always sin, we are incapable of doing good (in Gods eyes) until we have a changed heart or "new birth".

I agree, I would also like to reiterate that freewill is the ability to make a choice or decision. I think too often people look at freewill as though you have the ability to make a choice and succeed. Sure, you can choose to do whatever you like, but it doesn't mean you will succeed. Without God, our freewill is limited to our sinful nature. As neastman said our freewill is not ultimate and it is limited by many things.

Example: I can choose to jump off a building and fly, but because of gravity I will fall. Gravity limits my ability to succeed at my choice.

neastman I agree totally with you I dont agree with the literalist veiw that says every word in the bible is what God means.In Joshua 24:14-15 says we have choices on which God we can follow can follow the God of the bible or we can choose not to. This is what Joshua 24:14-15 say, Now fear the lord and serve him with all faithfulness throw away the Gods that your forefathers worshiped beyond the river in Egypt, and serve the lord. but if serving the lord seems undesirable then choose for yourself this day whom you are going to serve whether the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living in. but as for me and my household I shall server the lord. (NIV) So we do have a choice to follow God but we don?t have to. I mean would you jump off a bridge if you saw another person do it, odds are you wouldn?t because you have a sense that its wrong plus that?s your choice and freewill to do so. Not even god can make us do something we don?t want to do. I mean he can make us but that would not love would it? In the bible it says God is love. In 1 John 4:16 it says And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and god in him. (NIV)

Amen Spartan.

You forgot verse ten.

1 John 4:10
In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

Not that we have loved God, but that he loved us. Let's remeber that John is writing to Christians/believers here, not the world. This emphasises the fact that we are incapable of first loving God until he changes us by the work of the Spirit. You read thru the scriptures as a whole and see how time after time man has turned their back on God by their own free choice and never have they turned Godward by their own free choice.

Ezekial 11:19-21
And I will give them one heart, and a new spirit I will put within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in my statutes and keep my rules and obey them. And they shall be my people, and I will be their God. But as for those whose heart goes after their detestable things and their abominations, I will bring their deeds upon their own heads, declares the Lord GOD."

Notice who gets the credit for the work here in the new covenant, GOD is giving them one heart, HE is putting in a new spirit, HE will take out the heart of stone. That statement says a lot about mans condition, a heart of stone, how many Godward decsions can a heart of stone make?

If man has free will in the sense that they are able to freely choose, in this case freely choose to love God, then why did Christ die? If man has this type of ability then he has the ability to obey the law and get to God thru the covenant of works. It is not possible, as the Old Testament proves, Christ died because no one was able to use their free will to choose Godward. A Romans clearly states 3:10-12"None is righteous, no, not one;no one understands;no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless;no one does good, not even one."

We are slaves to sin (Romans 6) but now by the blood of Christ and the indwelling work of the Spirit we are free from sin, able to see the goodness of God and the beauty of Christ. We have a new heart that beats for God, also called the new bitrh. God gets all the credit for salvation, if man has any part it in that he can boast in his desicion, he can hold something over someone else. I like how Luther and Owen put it:

"God has surely promised His grace to the humbled, that is, to those who mourn over and despair of themselves. But a man cannot be thoroughly humbled till he realizes that his salvation is utterly beyond his own powers, counsels, efforts, will and works, and depends, absolutely on the will, counsel, pleasure and works of Another - God alone. As long as he is persuaded that he can make even the smallest contribution to his salvation, he remains self-confident and does not utterly despair of himself, and so is not humbled before God." - MARTIN LUTHER

"To suppose that whatever God requireth of us that we have power of ourselves to do, is to make the cross and grace of Jesus Christ of none effect." - JOHN OWEN

Rapadura said:
"cannot support it by scriptural texts and his remarks are not in contradiction to the revealed scriptures than why should we not accept it?"

Reply by neastman;
If it cannot be support by scripture then theres no arguement. Theres not even a discussion.

I agree with that. If a statement cannot be supported.... But it may be different if a person cannot support his own statement but his statement can be supported by scripture (by a learned person) and not be contradicted by any scriptural statement. Such a layman shouldn't be excluded.

Also said: "God will not interfere with our minute independence. He wants us to love Him out of free will, not out of force, because than it cannot be called love anymore"

Where is this idea taught in scripture? Again another one of mans false ideas or presuppostions about God.

Please give any scriptural arguments which refutes this statement.

Quote;"I do not come into this pulpit hoping that perhaps somebody will of his own free will return to Christ. My hope lies in another quarter. I hope that my Master will lay hold of some of them and say, "You are mine, and you shall be mine. I claim you for myself." My hope arises from the freeness of grace, and not from the freedom of the will."


[color=#]Shall we simply wait for His mercy to come? If God is impartial then why should he bestow His mercy upon one, and not upon the other? If one is able to receive the Lords mercy, he must have had a certain desire to get it. That's called free will. To desire to get the Lord's mercy. Before we make this choice, there is no way of receiving it. Being impartial, He is bestows His mercy upon everyone at every moment, but only the one who desires to get it, can receive it. The one who doesn't cultivate this desire, will (most probably) never get it. That's called free will.[/color]

If man has free will in the sense that they are able to freely choose, in this case freely choose to love God, then why did Christ die? If man has this type of ability then he has the ability to obey the law and get to God thru the covenant of works. It is not possible, as the Old Testament proves, Christ died because no one was able to use their free will to choose Godward.

[color=#]As far as my understanding goes, Christ didn't die. His body may have become life-less but he continued to live in his spiritual body (which looked different from his material one) and reappeared before his disciples. He teached us how to make the choice of crucifying our self-centred desires (of which our present body is a result) and to continue to live according to God's desires. Our free will lays in choosing our desires and nowhere else. There is no question of making the choice to jump from a building. We may choose certain desires which will result in jumping from a building, but we have no control over the act itself. The actual act is forced upon us by higher forces.
Again, I'm stating this whithout quoting scriptures, but at the same time these statements are not violating any scriptural evidence[/color]

Rapadura wrote (View Post): › Rapadura said: "cannot support it by scriptural texts and his remarks are not in contradiction to the revealed scriptures than why should we not accept it?" Reply by neastman; If it cannot be support by scripture then theres no arguement. Theres not even a discussion. I agree with that. If a statement cannot be supported.... But it may be different if a person cannot support his own statement but his statement can be supported by scripture (by a learned person) and not be contradicted by any scriptural statement. Such a layman shouldn't be excluded. Also said: "God will not interfere with our minute independence. He wants us to love Him out of free will, not out of force, because than it cannot be called love anymore" Where is this idea taught in scripture? Again another one of mans false ideas or presuppostions about God. Please give any scriptural arguments which refutes this statement. Quote;"I do not come into this pulpit hoping that perhaps somebody will of his own free will return to Christ. My hope lies in another quarter. I hope that my Master will lay hold of some of them and say, "You are mine, and you shall be mine. I claim you for myself." My hope arises from the freeness of grace, and not from the freedom of the will." [color=#]Shall we simply wait for His mercy to come? If God is impartial then why should he bestow His mercy upon one, and not upon the other? If one is able to receive the Lords mercy, he must have had a certain desire to get it. That's called free will. To desire to get the Lord's mercy. Before we make this choice, there is no way of receiving it. Being impartial, He is bestows His mercy upon everyone at every moment, but only the one who desires to get it, can receive it. The one who doesn't cultivate this desire, will (most probably) never get it. That's called free will.[/color] If man has free will in the sense that they are able to freely choose, in this case freely choose to love God, then why did Christ die? If man has this type of ability then he has the ability to obey the law and get to God thru the covenant of works. It is not possible, as the Old Testament proves, Christ died because no one was able to use their free will to choose Godward. [color=#]As far as my understanding goes, Christ didn't die. His body may have become life-less but he continued to live in his spiritual body (which looked different from his material one) and reappeared before his disciples. He teached us how to make the choice of crucifying our self-centred desires (of which our present body is a result) and to continue to live according to God's desires. Our free will lays in choosing our desires and nowhere else. There is no question of making the choice to jump from a building. We may choose certain desires which will result in jumping from a building, but we have no control over the act itself. The actual act is forced upon us by higher forces. Again, I'm stating this whithout quoting scriptures, but at the same time these statements are not violating any scriptural evidence[/color]

So do you believe every person is born able to choose God over the desires of their human nature?