Prior Book | Prior Chapter | Prior Verse | Next Verse | Next Chapter | Next Book | Viewing NASB and Amplified 2015 | |
NASB | Luke 22:42 saying, "Father, if You are willing, remove this cup from Me; yet not My will, but Yours be done." |
AMPLIFIED 2015 | Luke 22:42 saying, "Father, if You are willing, remove this cup [of divine wrath] from Me; yet not My will, but [always] Yours be done." |
Subject: Submissive or Suppressed Wills |
Bible Note: I appreciate the comment that God is training our will as it seems to correlate with progressive sanctification that you and Doc have pointed out. The question as to our submissive or suppressed will is from an attempt to understand better how both our human will and God’s divine will factor into the salvation process and to what extent they are allowed to coexist. Our salvation rests unreservedly with God. But we have a responsibility, which is to acknowledge it. Can we acknowledge God’s grace, His mercy, while acting on our own will, within our human nature? Like you pointed out, with your reference to Eph 4:24, we are told to put on the new self, and Eph 4:30,31 points out we are instructed not to grieve the Spirit and to put away those things that would. It seems we have a responsibility to God after He calls us to be His. So the old and new cohabitate, both natures with their own wills, and it doesn’t seem that both act in unison but the opposite. Depending on our desires, motives, one will does poke through at any given time, dictating our actions so that one must either be suppressed or submissive to the other. For our will to be suppressed is indicative that it is against our will to act in a Godly fashion. To be submissive to God’s will, yielding to it, stays with the concept of retaining a free will by freely letting the Spirit work us. (To be clear, I am speaking of the regenerate and not the reprobate when discussing this) Spurgeon wrote: “We are not saved against our will; nor again, mark you, is the will taken away; for God does not come and convert the intelligent free-agent into a machine. When he turns the slave into a child, it is not by plucking out of him the will which he possesses. We are as free under grace as ever we were under sin; nay, we were slaves when we were under sin, and when the Son makes us free we are free indeed, and we are never free before.” … “But we do hold and teach that though the will of man is not ignored, and men are not saved against their wills, that the work of the Spirit, which is the effect of the will of God, is to change the human will, and so make men willing in the day of God's power, working in them to will to do of his own good pleasure.” I spoke of Christ while praying in Gethsemane for a few reasons. We get a real picture of Christ’s human nature, and what it may have desired. His divine nature and will eagerly wanted His work to be carried out, and that meant going to the cross, but humanly, His desire was to have the cup pass from Him, so strong a desire that it took nothing less than an angel from Heaven to comfort Him. I believe Scripture is clear, in that Christ was tempted in everyway that we are and I agree with your comment, that they were likely stronger than what we could imagine. But Christ did not have a sinful nature. Being divine in nature, He never needed a calling and to be responsive to it since He was in His very person God. When He stated that God’s will be done and not His own, it was from His human perspective that he stated those words but nonetheless, from an uncorrupted nature. Jonathan Edwards wrote: “Nothing can induce or invite the mind to will or act any thing, any further than it is perceived, or is some way or other in the mind’s view; for what is wholly unperceived and perfectly out of the mind’s view, cannot affect the mind at all. It is most evident, that nothing is in the mind, or reaches it, or takes any hold of it, any otherwise than as it is perceived or thought of.” Being unfallen, uncorrupt and sinless, and God by nature, Christ did not perceive and ultimately act upon a sinful mind’s view, or maybe more aptly put, sinning and moving against God’s will wasn’t an option on many levels. We in contrast, have that old corrupted, vile, despicable nature to continually deal with until Glory comes. God calls us to be His and then makes it so. He makes us new, changing our hearts, our desire so that our will submits to His. Maybe our yielding to God’s will, the Spirit actually does suppress our old nature, but it is our submissiveness that is the catalyst. In that I can see your point that we are in essence, the switchman, throwing it from spirit to flesh or I think what my mind has formed an opinion of is not necessarily an on / off switch, but a “dimming” switch. Once God claims us as his, I don’t think He will let us fully flip it off, but we can dim it somewhat as God ultimately controls our destiny. I thank you for your input. I hope I was able to verbalize my opinion in a somewhat comprehensive manner. Sometimes it’s hard to get the thoughts straight in my own mind, let alone trying to convey them to another, without mixing them up and inadvertently leading to them being misconstrued by others. I was hoping maybe that rambling thing wasn’t contagious but it just might be. Sometimes being succinct just isn’t a viable option. Thank you Brother. WOS |