Subject: what can God do against man's free will? |
Bible Note: The Bible is not FULL of references to man's freewill. [] In the NIV the words elect, election, choose, chosen and chose appear 250 times. In all cases they mean, simply, "chosen," or "to choose". While not always referring to election for salvation, the majority of the occurences of the words choose or chosen is speaking of God's choosing, not man's. [] "Freewill" is not the term the Bible uses when it talks about human choice. [] The word "freewill" appears a mere 22 times in the entire Bible and ALWAYS in connection with the word "offering(s)". [] 'Many people misunderstand the concept of "free will," which is not a biblical term. The reality is that while we have the ability to make truly significant choices, we don't have truly "free" will. You cannot, for example, choose to wake up tomorrow morning in China when you go to bed in Chicago. Or wake up speaking Chinese when all you know is English. You cannot choose to be a different gender than what God made you. (Yes, I'm aware of sex-change operations and know people who've had them--we're not even going there! [smile]) But we can make choices that make a difference: for example, in our attitudes, in who we marry and most importantly, which God we serve. We have limited freedom in our choices, and God does not force us to choose things His way; He respects our choices. But we do not have totally free will.' ____________________ Source: www.probe.org/docs/e-freewill.html |