The Highway Forums General Discussion Theology Discussion Forum Who does the believing and repenting?

Ditto Tom. You might also be interested in attending Ligonier Ministries' 2005 annual conference, which will be in Akron Ohio on September 16-17. The conference topic is "Chosen by God" --- all about His sovereignty in our salvation. This would give you a chance to hear these issues discussed by some of the greatest teachers of our time --- and ask questions! Check it out here.

Wish I could go but you know how it is <img src="/forum/images/graemlins/broke.gif" alt="" />
Calvinists have to pay to attend (I guess since we are the recipients of so many other gifts of grace), but they may let you in for free if you tell them you're an Arminian.

No, that was not my point, so you cannot say "my point exactly." My point was that your will cannot be changed against your will. God does not force a person to be saved against his will, He changes the will of the person so that he desires to be saved!

Delvanis wrote:


Exactly the opposite is what Calvinists believe! The human will is not free until it is freed, sovereignly, by God. Once his will has been freed from its bondage to sin, then the person is free to choose Christ, and does so.

Arminians hold to two common presuppositions which the Scripture refutes: So-called "Free will" before the New Birth, and repentance before the New Birth.

Jesus said, "Unless one is born from above, he cannot even see the kingdom of God." Conversion is the response of a believer to the New Birth. The New Birth precedes conversion. The will is freed first, so that the newly-born man is free to choose Christ.

Recommended reading: Martin Luther's brilliant book, The Bondage of the Will.

One more bit of info that provided a great deal of clarity for me when I was just learning these things after years of believing in mythical "free will" is this:

While Arminians teach that Christ lived and died and rose again to make salvation possible for "whosoever will," Calvinists teach that Christ actually accomplished the salvation of all the elect.

I hope this is helpful...
[color:"0000FF"]Robin[/color]

Lemme try another angle... you wrote:


A person can only do whatever he has the ability to do. An unregenerate man cannot cgoose Christ because his will is not free. It is enslaved to sin! Thus no matter what, the unregenerate man is not able to choose Christ, anymore than you or I can "choose" to jump over the moon!

So God just awesomely, sovereignly frees the will of a person (that's what we call regeneration, or the New Birth), enabling him to freely choose Christ.

Only Christians have free will! The unregenerate are unable to choose Christ. No male can choose to become pregnant, for example, because it is not within his ability to become pregnant. No leoperd can change his spots. He lacks the ability to do so, no matter how much he might want to. The ability to follow Christ must first be supernaturally granted to an individual before he or she truly has any choice in the matter.

Does that help?

-Robin

Paul

Your question is not relevant. Before God brought any being into existence they never existed in any form. But a living person does already exist with intellect, rational power of choice and a sense of right and wrong. And I might add a conscience.

King Agrippa when confronted by Paul with the gospel made a choice. He was convicted by what Paul said. For he said he was almost persuaded. But he chose not to believe entirely in all that Paul said. This is similar to a mass of people who hear the gospel in a evangelical church. Some choose to respond, while others refuse and some although convicted put off coming forward at that time.

delvanis,

You must look at the implications of your assertion that man has freewill to repent and believe. If man does have freewill to repent and believe, then God is ultimately not sovereign. You make God dependant on man and therefore He is frustrated many, many times over those who never repent and believe. The result is the glory for our repentance and belief goes to man or at least is shared between God and man.

God gets all of the glory for our ability to truly repent and believe. This then squares perfectly with the Bible that we cannot boast in it. (Eph 2:9)

Also, if man has freewill to repent, then why does the Bible speak of God being the one who "grants" repentance: "...if God perhaps will grant them repentance, so that they may know the truth." - 2Ti 2:25

Who does the appointing here? "And as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed." - Act 13:48b

Who's doing the choosing and causing here? "Blessed is the man You choose, And cause to approach You..." Psa 65:4

delvanis

I would like you to exegete a Scripture verse if you don't mind.
John 6:37 "All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out."

Tom

delvanis,

In another thread you mentioned that you were looking for a Reformed Baptist church near your home. After reading your comments here I'm wondering why you'd be looking for a REFORMED Baptist church. It's apparent by your comments that you do not embrace Reformed doctrine and I would think you'd be more comfortable in a Free Will Baptist church.

The questions you're asking have already been answered earlier in this thread from a Reformed perspective but you seem to want an Arminian perspective. You not going to get that here because as has been pointed out it doesn't agree with Scripture.

John 15:16

"You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you."

Jesus does not mean that His disciples exercised no will of their own; they did choose to follow Him. Rather He is indicating that the first initiative, the original and saving choice, was His. Had He not chosen them, they would not have chosen Him. The immediate reference in this verse is to service as apostles, but this principal applies to many other matters including election and salvation (see Eph. 1:4, 11).

John 15:16 also mentions I appointed you which emphasizes the sovereign activity of God exercised without violation of the human act or decision.


Wes

David

When God grants man repentance, this does not mean he coerces a man to repent forcefully. It is true that when a sinner is exposed to the gospel they are convicted in their spirit.But this is not the same as saying they fully repent. The human will must submit to God in this conviction for true repentance to occur. In King Agrippa's case he was touched, but not repentant. Many people when exposed to the gospel react in the same way as King Agrippa. As Jesus told the hardened pharisees of his day, "you will not come to me that you may have life." John 5:39-40. Not that they could not.

Wes
When our Lord was speaking of choosing his disciples, he was speaking of choosing men to follow him as apostles and not for personal salvation. If choosing one for the office of being an apostle would have meant the same as salvation, then none would have rejected him. But we know that Judas who also was chosen, in the end rejected Christ and so lost his apostolic office and salvation as well.

Tom

The Father in his all knowing foreknowledge knows before hand just who will actually remain faithful to Christ. But he also knows those who will fall away and love the world more in the long run. We do not know who these persevering saints are. But only the father. I like what A.W.Pink says in his commentary on Hebrews. That it is a false teaching to believe that all those who profess Christ will be saved. Rather it is only those who actually persevere in the faith that can claim they are chosen of God the Father.pg 605,par 2 and on.

No, and none of us has asserted any such thing. Rather, God causes the man's will to be repentant. So the man repents of his own will, yet this repentant will is given him by God.


So you believe that God may grant conviction, but not repentance?


Jesus answered them, "I told you, and you do not believe; the works that I do in My Father's name, these testify of Me. But you do not believe because you are not of My sheep. My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand. I and the Father are one" (John 10:25–30).

King Agrippa did not believe because he was not one of the sheep whom the Father had given to the Son.

Wes pointed you to Eph. 1:

He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved (vv. 4–6).

Now, to whom was the Apostle writing, and to what does God's choice and predestination refer? The Apostle was writing to saints; these saints were chosen by God from the mass of sinful humanity (cf. Eph. 2) to be made holy and blameless, and they were predestined by God to be adopted as His sons through Jesus Christ—all this before the world had even been created! This is all about salvation!

Pink also believed that God chose who would persevere; your use of him is contrary to your own purposes. None of us believes that all professing believers will be saved, but only those who are true believers; and those who are true believers will persevere to the end by the grace of God.

Those who fall away and never repent have never been truly saved. John says, "They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us" (1 John 2:19). Judas appeared to have followed Jesus for several years, but Jesus says, "Have I not chosen you, the Twelve? Yet one of you is a devil!" (John 6:70). Verse 64 explains, "For Jesus had known from the beginning which of them did not believe and who would betray him."

So it was not as if Judas had true faith, and then fell into sin and lost his salvation, but he never had true faith at all. Jesus chose Judas knowing that he would be the traitor: "While I was with them, I protected them and kept them safe by that name you gave me. None has been lost except the one doomed to destruction so that Scripture would be fulfilled" (John 17:12). This verse presupposes divine election, and explicitly teaches the doctrines of preservation and reprobation. Jesus kept safe the eleven, who were among the elect, but Judas was lost because he had never been saved in the first place; he was among the reprobates, "doomed to destruction."


Wes