"Free-will"----A dressed up form of idol worship!

[lsmann2]

Many of my believing friends insist that they came to thier belief through thier own "free-will". They insist that it's the cornerstone of a "loving God", to have His creation come to Him of thier own "free-will".
This belief, however sincere, leads us down an incredibly dangerous mindset. I would contend that Satan himself, who is called the author of the lie(idolatry), was created with just such an ego.
In Romans 1:25, we see the result of this "free-will" doctrine. We can't help but turn ourselves into our own saviors when we adopt this doctrine of demons into our lives.
Free-will changes the truth of God into a lie, and soon you'll become unloving towards those who don't exercise thier "free-will" and choose to believe like you.
You will be trapped into thinking that YOU made the choice for God. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Lee

[Doc]

Many of my believing friends insist that they came to thier belief through thier own "free-will". They insist that it's the cornerstone of a "loving God", to have His creation come to Him of thier own "free-will".
This belief, however sincere, leads us down an incredibly dangerous mindset. I would contend that Satan himself, who is called the author of the lie(idolatry), was created with just such an ego.
In Romans 1:25, we see the result of this "free-will" doctrine. We can't help but turn ourselves into our own saviors when we adopt this doctrine of demons into our lives.
Free-will changes the truth of God into a lie, and soon you'll become unloving towards those who don't exercise thier "free-will" and choose to believe like you.
You will be trapped into thinking that YOU made the choice for God. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Lee

Exactly right, Lee.
There is no one who can show you a single verse in the scripture that says we have free will. Quite the opposite, in fact.

God locks up all in disobedience so that he can have mercy on all.

[martincisneros]

I couldn't disagree more, though there is a Will of God to be obeyed.

Many of my believing friends insist that they came to thier belief through thier own "free-will". They insist that it's the cornerstone of a "loving God", to have His creation come to Him of thier own "free-will".

Though my coming to Christ was more like St. Paul's, I do know many many people who simply responded to a 4 spiritual laws pamphlet and to this day are as strong in Christ as I am or stronger.

This belief, however sincere, leads us down an incredibly dangerous mindset. I would contend that Satan himself, who is called the author of the lie(idolatry), was created with just such an ego.

Couldn't disagree more 'cause of the total sovereignty crowd that chucks Kingdom responsibilities like the fool who buried his talent and got thrown into the Lake of Fire for what he did rather than for what his Master made him do.  His Master didn't have a quota that had to go into the Lake of Fire.  I LOATHE the absolute sovereignty doctrine 'cause it makes a mockery of everything I see in the Word of God about what we're supposed to do with the Word of God on a daily basis by not letting it depart from before our eyes, keeping it in our mouths, and keeping our hands and feet moving towards it at all times.  That's the express declaration of Scripture in Proverbs 4:20-27, Joshua 1:8 and countless, countless other Scriptures, including John 8, and Colossians 3:12-17 -- yet countless Christians are in perpetual rebellion against God by their free wills and not because the Word of God is of any private interpretation where I'm concerned, but they're not able to walk in that yet because of His Will.  His ENTIRE Will is in the Book.

In Romans 1:25, we see the result of this "free-will" doctrine. We can't help but turn ourselves into our own saviors when we adopt this doctrine of demons into our lives.

No, this is not the only fruit of the free will doctrine.  This is the fruit of people using their free will and going in a direction opposite of the Covenants of Promise.  I see many people healed of the incurable [physically and mentally] each and every single day and raised up out of wheel chairs because they exercised their free will, and acted on a revelation of the Word that they'd received of Christ the Healer.

Free-will changes the truth of God into a lie, and soon you'll become unloving towards those who don't exercise thier "free-will" and choose to believe like you.

The most unloving people I've ever met on these boards or on any other have been the absolute sovereignty folks, actually.  I'm less concerned about Islamic terrorists than I am about absolute sovereignty folks.  They keep me up at night more.  To me, they're the villians of the story.

You will be trapped into thinking that YOU made the choice for God. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Again, you deny the truth of the Scriptures that say that God has already reconciled Himself to us and we're supposed to reconcile ourselves to Him in 2Corinthians 5 and according to 2Corinthians 7, having these precious promises, we're supposed to cleanse ourselves of all filthiness of flesh and spirit and perfect holiness in the fear of God.  Much more to say and I could turn this into 3 to 5 posts of 20,000 characters each, but I'll cork it right here since I already have more than 2500 posts on these boards dealing with all of this.

[jabcat]

I'm going to seize my brief window of opportunity now that this has been opened up  :happygrin:, and say I personally believe in a limited will; man having a will, but ultimately within limits/boundaries set by God (so I certainly personally don't call it "free");  then required choice-making as part of God's plan. 

I tend to discourage extremes in general, and I've seen problems on both sides.

I knew I wanted to use this today...I understand the following to mean God definitely choosing us, however we may think we or someone else has come to know Him...each time being a Divine appointment...no accidents or anything done in our own strength or goodness....but then again, thereafter, God requiring choices for our obedience and growth;  within boundaries set by Him.  Otherwise, how would He "direct our steps", as scripture says?

Galatians 4:8  "... but now that ye have come to know God, a) or rather to be known by God, b) how turn ye back again to the weak and beggarly rudiments, whereunto ye desire to be in bondage over again?"


Howevah, since this is an offlimits topic, would it be better to just lock this?  I'm guessing Lee didn't know...

[jabcat]

I'll go ahead and lock it until Martin makes a further decision on it...unless he wants to allow folks to get it out of our system for awhile by fighting it out...within boundaries set by Martin  :icon_joker:...

no problem Lee, it's just a topic that has started too many food fights here...