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NASB | Romans 5:6 ¶ For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. |
AMPLIFIED 2015 | Romans 5:6 ¶ While we were still helpless [powerless to provide for our salvation], at the right time Christ died [as a substitute] for the ungodly. |
Subject: Christ dying only for elect? |
Bible Note: You think Jesus made salvation possible for everyone, but you are still torn. Everybody goes to Romans 9 on this predestined thing. I get it, but you start from a paradigm that I can't fit myself into. I have no problem accepting predestination. Romans 9 is blunt. But Paul didn't know everything. Jesus said there were things that were only for the Father to know. I believe the Bible is divinely inspired and is the literal Word of God. I even think Paul was dead on in Romans, but sometimes he talked about things from wisdom and some he got out of knowledge. He obviously struggled with women throughout his letters. (I freely submit to my husband and believe that I should, but it's because of God/Genesis and Jesus, not anything that ever came from Paul's pen.)I know that God gave the seperate gifts of Speaking and Translating Tongues, so I don't have a problem accepting that the Spirit was giving Paul things he didn't have a clue of how to interpret. And neither do we. And are we not told this is the way God works? Starting with Babel and going all the way to Jesus who said somethings He taught in such a way as to make sure eyes and ears WERE NOT opened? As the song says, "God is God, and I am Man. I will never understand all the picture He's painting." I can't even see all of it. So, I accept predestiny unquestioningly even though it could raise questions. I don't have them because my starting place when looking at it is that, because God knows who will or won't be part of the elect, He plans accordingly. It's not that we don't have a decision or a choice, it's that He knows what decision or choice we're going to make. It's not all that hard to wrap your brain around either. I do the same thing with my husband and children all the time. I know them; I know what choices they will make in any number of given situations; I even make plans counting on that knowledge of them. Imagine what I could do if I knew them as intimately as God knows each of us. But I want to address the "...in light of ancient Israel of how God chose just one small group of people for His inheritance. Did all of those other peoples and countries die in their sins?" Go to Genesis 5:24 "Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, because God took him away." Genesis 6:8 "But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord" Then we are told right out that Abraham believed God and that was credited to him as righteousness. And these weren't perfect men. We don't know about Enoch, but Noah got drunk and cursed his own grandson (which curse God had already worked into His plan); and Abraham was fearful of earthly kings and twice stuck his wife out there as a sacrificial goat; word-playing on lies. 'Well, she is my sister so I wasn't really telling you a lie.' If not for God protecting her, Sarai/Sarah would have really been up a creek. So we know God did have relationships, saving relationships, with men before Jesus. And not just in the Seth/Noah/Shem/Abraham/David line either. Melchizedek is the perfect example. The proof that things were going on that God didn't feel like He needed to tell us. It was enough for us to know that it was going on, and He gave us that when He told us about Melchizedek. A King of Salem. Which as I understand it was in the area of Jeru-salem. Which makes sense. God didn't make Jerusalem His holy place just for the Israelites. He'd already claimed it as such, and He eventually brought His chosen people to it. Melchizedek was also the "...priest of God Most High". King and priest in one man. Something forbidden by God to the Israelites. Something that would be in the future reserved for Jesus. (Psalm 110). And read Hebrews 7:1-17. And verse 7 says clearly "And without doubt the lesser person is blessed by the greater." Melchizedek is the greater who blessed Abram/Abraham the lesser. According to verse 2 his name meant "king of righteousness" while his title (King of Salem) meant "king of peace". Verse 3 says "Without father or mother, without genealogy, without beginning of days or end of life, like the Son of God he remains a priest forever." So if you have a priest, you have a people who worshiped the God the priest served. Hmmm. Verse 4 says, "Just think how great he was: Even the patriarch Abraham gave him a tenth of the plunder!" To my way of thinking, there was a whole people who knew God and did not die in their sins under Melchizedek; there were also those mentioned in the chosen line; so since the Bible doesn't say "and there was no one else", I'm not going to assume there was no one else. Just because He was moving about quietly, it doesn't mean He wasn't moving about. Melanie |