Free Will vs Predestination

discus70 · Post by **discus70** » Tue Dec 30, 2008 6:05 pm

I'm confused. The bible clearly states both are intertwined. Example, God new of Jesus's sacrifice while at the same time wants us to choose between good and evil. Predestination just doesn't make any sense to me. If predestination could ever in some kind of magical world be proven, my beliefs would reside with the atheists. If God had it in his "big plan" for African children to starve and be born with aids I would want no part of it. If God was in agreement over the death 6 million people during the Holocaust then I would rather choose not to be associated with this type of God.

If the God that so many claim to know has influence in our lives and everyday decisions you might as well go ahead and send me to hell because a God who picks and chooses over his own people is one very sick being. So people who try to convince me that God is a loving God better think twice about what it is their actually saying. There are only 3 possible outcomes to these conclusions. One, God is hands off and has nothing to do with us (which is where i stand) 2, God has influence in our everyday lives ( these actions would make a very unfair and unloving god in my opinion) 3, There is no God.

Please prove me wrong.

Nilloc James · Post by **Nilloc James** » Tue Dec 30, 2008 6:12 pm

Some parts of the bible show god as omnipotent and all knowing while others don't.

Proabably just another one of those infamous contradictions.

msmcneal · Post by **msmcneal** » Tue Dec 30, 2008 11:52 pm

Nilloc James wrote:Some parts of the bible show god as omnipotent and all knowing while others don't.

Proabably just another one of those infamous contradictions.

This is actually one of THE main contradictions in the Christian Bible. It's funny to me, that the NT supports both points of view, and at the same time, denies both. About the last year or so that I was a Christian studying this topic, I was led further and further into mind boggling numbness. You can look at it from each point of view, and see the problems with both, from both a theistic and philosophical viewpoint.

Predestination:

1. Everyone is destined by the sovereignity of God to either be saved or not. It's not our choice, it's God's. We have absolutely no say in the matter.
2. If this is the case, it makes God out to be not all-loving or all-merciful. It actually makes him look like a sadistic dictator, with no compassion for his creation.
3. If predestination also includes our actions being predestined to have happened, then God has no right to judge us based on actions that he himself forces us to do.
4. This idea makes humans nothing but robots and zombies, mindlessly following and not questioning, and being discouraged and even punished for questioning.
5. This makes proseltyzation pointless. There's no point preaching to people if they're predestined to either believe or not believe anyway.

Free Will:

1. From some passages in the Bible, it would seem that man's free will is more powerful than God's all-knowingness.
2. While predestination takes away from God being all-loving, free will takes away from God being all-knowing, because he cannot determine what man will do with his free will.
3. This makes the fall of man the most powerful event in history, as it is the determining factor of "God's plan of redemption." God creates man to be perfect, to serve him in a paradisaical earth, and man turns his back on that.
4. This means that "God's redemption", or "God's redemptive plan" could not have been hashed out before the creation of man, as the Bible asserts. Because God simply didn't know it was going to happen.

There are multiple problems with both positions if we consider what Christians claim as doctrine, and the claims they make about God. And these are besides the fact that the Bible, especially the NT, doesn't seem to know which one is true, and which one isn't. Since these things can be considered, another question we might ask is, "Can these two views co-exist?"

JoeyKnothead · Post by **JoeyKnothead** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 1:12 am

>This is more opinion than fact, but I think it is a reasonable position, and I'm prepared to defend what I can and plow under what I can't<

I think this issue points to humans as the creator of God. I think this message has been sub/consciously tailored to a given audience. Where some folks need a loving, Oprah Winfrey Show type of God, then God is that. When folks need a more violent, When Animals Attack type of God, here ya go.
Humans come in a multitude of personalities, and so God must be such He can appeal to these different individuals. This can be observed in the many interpretations folks have of this God. I think the many denominations within a religion point to the adherent's underlying personalities, and expectations of what a God should be.
Here's a true story, and a good example of the OP in action. Right here up the road we got these two churches (google 'em), Dewberry Baptist Church 1, and Dewberry Baptist Church 2, over in Cleveland, Ga. Kinda like when there was a Mr. Wrestling 1, and a Mr. Wrestling 2. Anyway, it used to be one church. There were some of 'em thought God knows everything that's gonna happen, and there were just as many of the others saying nah-ah.
Now you just gotta know this kind of deal can't carry on for too long, and sure enough it finally came up to a boil, and there was this falling out. They were having a picnic one day, and these two brothers, just like some old Civil War story, these two brothers were on either side of the issue.
So they're eating their fried chicken there, and by all reports it was good, but they're eating that fried chicken there and one brother says to the other such as, "God knows what's gonna happen". Well you know that other brother there, he ain't gonna let that one slide after all's gone on, so he says such as, "Nah-ah". And sure enough they get to arguing back and forth.
So they carry on for a spell, and the one brother, he says such as, "God knows what's gonna happen." So the other one brother, he flings a chicken bone at the other one brother, and he says such as, "I bet He didn't know that was gonna happen!" Sure enough, this sets the whole place to arguing back and forth, and they finally just split up the church into two.
It just goes to show, folks'll have their own ideas about what God should be, or how God should carry on. Watch these folks close enough and you'll see they both have their part of the Bible that supports their side of the deal. I say this is because the very folks that wrote the Bible were just as diverse of opinion about what a proper God should be as folks are of an opinion about it now.

Nilloc James · Post by **Nilloc James** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 1:24 am

joeyknuccione wrote:>This is more opinion than fact, but I think it is a reasonable position, and I'm prepared to defend what I can and plow under what I can't<

I think this issue points to humans as the creator of God. I think this message has been sub/consciously tailored to a given audience. Where some folks need a loving, Oprah Winfrey Show type of God, then God is that. When folks need a more violent, When Animals Attack type of God, here ya go.
Humans come in a multitude of personalities, and so God must be such He can appeal to these different individuals. This can be observed in the many interpretations folks have of this God. I think the many denominations within a religion point to the adherent's underlying personalities, and expectations of what a God should be.
Here's a true story, and a good example of the OP in action. Right here up the road we got these two churches (google 'em), Dewberry Baptist Church 1, and Dewberry Baptist Church 2, over in Cleveland, Ga. Kinda like when there was a Mr. Wrestling 1, and a Mr. Wrestling 2. Anyway, it used to be one church. There were some of 'em thought God knows everything that's gonna happen, and there were just as many of the others saying nah-ah.
Now you just gotta know this kind of deal can't carry on for too long, and sure enough it finally came up to a boil, and there was this falling out. They were having a picnic one day, and these two brothers, just like some old Civil War story, these two brothers were on either side of the issue.
So they're eating their fried chicken there, and by all reports it was good, but they're eating that fried chicken there and one brother says to the other such as, "God knows what's gonna happen". Well you know that other brother there, he ain't gonna let that one slide after all's gone on, so he says such as, "Nah-ah". And sure enough they get to arguing back and forth.
So they carry on for a spell, and the one brother, he says such as, "God knows what's gonna happen." So the other one brother, he flings a chicken bone at the other one brother, and he says such as, "I bet He didn't know that was gonna happen!" Sure enough, this sets the whole place to arguing back and forth, and they finally just split up the church into two.
It just goes to show, folks'll have their own ideas about what God should be, or how God should carry on. Watch these folks close enough and you'll see they both have their part of the Bible that supports their side of the deal. I say this is because the very folks that wrote the Bible were just as diverse of opinion about what a proper God should be as folks are of an opinion about it now.

It is impressive that more people don't relize that though, the bible supports both sides.

However it does help prove the

On the first day man created god theory though

discus70 · Post by **discus70** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 10:17 am

That is exactly what I'm talking about. 90% of the Christians I know (I live in Texas ) pick and choose what they feel is more relative to how they live their life. They read over certain gospels, analyze the story of Jesus and try to take only the "good" from it. If the bible was really and truly the word of God one must assume the "book" would be without contradictions. Its a faith built around the individual by their own interpretations. I also find it really funny that most Christians selling point is the story of Jesus Christ. They try to preach all the good and moralistic values associated with Jesus yet not in any instance have I ever seen those individuals actually act accordingly. Its a faith not built on Christ, but built on contradiction.

dgruber · Post by **dgruber** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 11:01 am

I will hit this first and then go back and talk about the original post.

discus70 wrote:

I also find it really funny that most Christians selling point is the story of Jesus Christ. They try to preach all the good and moralistic values associated with Jesus yet not in any instance have I ever seen those individuals actually act accordingly. Its a faith not built on Christ, but built on contradiction.

There is a basic concept at work here. No one is perfect. Many strive to live according to what they believe but we are all going to fail at living up to something 100%. That is just my thought on the situation.

Please prove me wrong.

Prove you wrong about what?

arutledge · Post by **arutledge** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 11:50 am

discus70 wrote:I'm confused. The bible clearly states both are intertwined. Example, God new of Jesus's sacrifice while at the same time wants us to choose between good and evil. Predestination just doesn't make any sense to me. If predestination could ever in some kind of magical world be proven, my beliefs would reside with the atheists. If God had it in his "big plan" for African children to starve and be born with aids I would want no part of it. If God was in agreement over the death 6 million people during the Holocaust then I would rather choose not to be associated with this type of God.

If the God that so many claim to know has influence in our lives and everyday decisions you might as well go ahead and send me to hell because a God who picks and chooses over his own people is one very sick being. So people who try to convince me that God is a loving God better think twice about what it is their actually saying. There are only 3 possible outcomes to these conclusions. One, God is hands off and has nothing to do with us (which is where i stand) 2, God has influence in our everyday lives ( these actions would make a very unfair and unloving god in my opinion) 3, There is no God.

Please prove me wrong.

What is you argument? You simply state that you believe that â€œGod is hands off and has nothing to do with usâ€�, but you do not actually offer any reason to believe this.

discus70 · Post by **discus70** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 12:02 pm

Believing in free will leads to believing in a God that is hands of. Believing in predestination is believing just the opposite. Seems pretty clear to me. An individual who believes we have freedom of choice and are accountable for our own actions can't possibly believe God is involved in our everyday life. An individual who try's to believes in both is a walking contradiction, not a person of faith.

dgruber · Post by **dgruber** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 12:15 pm

Believing in free will leads to believing in a God that is hands of. Believing in predestination is believing just the opposite. Seems pretty clear to me. An individual who believes we have freedom of choice and are accountable for our own actions can't possibly believe God is involved in our everyday life. An individual who try's to believes in both is a walking contradiction, not a person of faith.

I disagree. For example, God might lead you to a situation where you must use freewill to make an important decision.

This is my opinion on the freewill vs. predestination concept:

When you hold a pencil in your hands you can turn it in many different ways, look at the ends, the sides, etc. I believe this is how God sees time. I believe that God sees our lives similar to how we would look at a pencil. He can see it all at once and therefore knows what will happen but all of us have the freewill to choose to get there. This is just my opinion.