Are We “Free”? Part 2

August 26, 2002 @ 9:41 am by Pressed

This entry is a continuation of Are We “Free”. If you have not read that entry yet, I would suggest you read it and it’s comments before continuing with this entry.

Again when you get into the issue of “free” will I think “free” is the wrong term to use here. No one is free. If you are free then go join the Cardinals Baseball team, because apparently you are free to do so. It is very easy to think of the word “free” in the wrong way and it is better to not use the word at all. It’s not a matter of being free or not being free, but it is a matter of being able to choose. You can’t choose on all things, but you are allowed to choose some things. For example did you choose who your mother was? That wasn’t your choice, you didn’t have a free choice to go to any parent you wanted to go to, but instead God knew you before you were born, formed you in the womb, and he placed you where you are, it was not your decision to make. You also cannot make the free choice to fly. If you go and jump off the roof of your house you are going to fall to the ground, there is no dispute about this you don’t get a choice. And just like we live under the laws of gravity we also live under the laws of God and there are certain things that we do not get a “free” choice on.

I do think it is clear that people get to make choices and real choices that have real consequences. I can eat and drink when I want, and I can even climb up to the roof of my house and jump off if I choose to do so, there are some freedoms of decisions, but to say we are “free” is a mis-communication.

I am having a very hard time agreeing with the fact that people who are not saved have the choice to do good, because it seems to me that scripture teaches without the Holy Spirit you don’t have the power to do good. Paul says that he wants to do good, but he cannot carry it out in Romans 7:18. He cannot carry it out because of what he says in 7:14, “…I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin.”

I definitely do not claim to have all the answers, but as always I seek to be as biblical as I can about all such issues. The Bible most certainly talks about Sovereignty, Predestination, Election, and all of those other issues, so they are real things that God wanted us to be aware of, so I seek to try and understand them to the best of my ability. In order to do that I not only seek the answers in the Bible, but I also seek the opinions and teachings of other pastors, philosophers, and theologians. I would not call myself a Calvinist because I do not completely agree with every single point Calvin makes, but I do agree with most of what he says. I have great respect for Calvin because he was a tremendous theologian and a man truly blessed by God with wisdom and discernment and he was used in a great way during the reformation period that has helped to make our religion what it is today. Many people are instantly against Calvin and do not pay attention to anything that he taught as a theologian just because they disagree with one or two points that he makes, and that is both a shame and a unfortunate assumption. There are many great truths, and a lot of wisdom that comes from Calvin, Luther, and many of the other reformers in that time period.

I do not agree with the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church, but that does not change the fact that our religion was born out of the teachings of that very Church. Over the years we continued to look at the teachings of the Church, found things we did agree with that stood the test of time that we still hold true today, and then found things that we did not agree with that we changed in order to be more obedient to the inerrant scripture of God. So does that mean I should hate the Roman Catholic Church and their teachings and the Reformed Protestant Churches that don’t share the same belief that I do on only some issues not all of them? If I disagree with something my parents teach me, does that cause me to reject all their teachings they ever taught me alltogether? I do not support the wrong views of scripture, but I also do not support recjection of the views that are right.

It is my same issue with the whole Harry Potter series. If you have not read the books or seen the movies then you have no right to cast an opinion on something you know nothing about. Just because people hear that Harry Potter has magic in it they cast it off as witchcraft and sinfulness only by what they hear from others. In the same way people who know nothing about Calvin and why he is a Reformer and the theology he taught and the things that he did hear from other people his teaching on election and they completely reject him as being a heretic. That my friends is not right. The bible says to question everything an hold on to the good. I think we can definitely find a ton of good to hold onto in the teachings of all the puritans, reformers, and all the other people who shaped our religion into what it is today. That doesn’t mean we should believe every single thing, but we should question it all, put it to the test against scripture, and what we find to be truth we hold onto.

Pressed

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Are We “Free”?

August 24, 2002 @ 12:05 am by Pressed

Are we in any sense free if God exercises providential control over all events? I venture to say that the answer depends on what is meant by the word free. I think everyone would agree that we are in some sense free in our will and choices that we make, however the term “free” is subject to many misunderstandings and mis-interpretations.

If man is by nature evil and by nature does evil (Psalm 53:3b “…there is no one who does good, not even one.”) then how can man be able to do good works, unless he is helped by grace? And if man is helped by the grace of God to do good works, how then was his choice to do them completely on his own free will? Isaiah gives a good example of what a mans righteousness is like when he does it on his own. (Isaiah 64:6 “All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away.”)

The statment “free will” immediatly brings to my mind the thought, that if man is completely free then he is the master of himself uncontrolled by God who is supposed to be in control of all things. Calvin explains it better than I ever could:
“But how few men are there, I ask, who when they hear free will attributed to man do not immediately conceive him to be master of both his own mind and will, able of his own power to turn himself toward either good or evil.” — John Calvin

If man is completely free to turn himself toward either good or evil, then man can never turn himself toward good because his fallen sinful nature will always slant towards evil. It takes Godly intervention, providence, and grace to bring men to righteous acts, and in that sense we have freedom, but not complete freedom.

I think a major problem is that people throw the term “free will” around without properly defining what it means. When the question is asked do we have free will it is important to be clear as to what is meant by that phrase. According to Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology, “Scripture nowhere says that we are ‘free’ in the sense of being outside of God’s control or of being able to make decisions that are not caused by anything. (This is the sense in which many people seem to assume we must be free.) Nor does it say we are ‘free’ in the sense of being able to do right on our own apart from God’s power. But we are nonetheless free in the greatest sense that any creature of God could be free–we make willing choices, choices that have real effects. We are aware of no restraints on our will from God when we make decisions. We must insist that we have the power of willing choice; otherwise we will fall into the error of fatalism or determinism and thus conclude that our choices do not matter, or that we cannot really make willing choices. On the other hand, the kind of freedom that is demanded by those who deny God’s providential control of all things, a freedom to be outside of God’s sustaining and controllilng activity, would be impossible if Jesus Christ is indeed ‘continually carrying along things by his word of power.’ If this is true, then to be outside of that providentioal control would simply be not to exist! An absolute “freedom,” totally free of God’s control, is simply not possible in a world providentially sustained and directed by God himself.”

I am convinced that people have a false understanding of what it means to be free. Many believe that they have complete and total freedom and their choices are not influenced by anything outside of themselves. I see no Biblical evidence of that. In fact Biblically that senario cannot exist because God’s Word says that all things are providentially sustained and directed by God himself therefore an absolute freedom completely free of God’s control is simply not possible.

We cannot in anyway deny Gods providence. God is in control of all things that he has created, including us. We also cannot deny our ability to make willing choices that have real effects. So how can we be under God’s providence and still have free will? This is where we have to realize that our finite human capacity for understaning can only go so far. And just like we cannot fully conceive or understand the implications of the trinity, we also cannot understand fully how God’s providence and free will can go hand in hand.

Pressed

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A Choice

August 17, 2002 @ 11:49 pm by Pressed

Sitting here tonight, pondering the greater meaning of life, I cannot get this statment out of my head. “There is no one good, no not even one.” Is there no one good in this world? At one point in my life I would have said yes there are people who are very good. Those people I can trust and count on at all times, but as time passes and the reality of other peoples lives cave in on the parade of happy thoughts that once roamed my head I don’t know that my answer would be as certain anymore. Most people are not what they claim to be, and yet they portray a role that you accept and believe until the mask has been lifted and the truth unveiled.

The world is full of preditors who hide under the mask of christianity. These people prey on others for their own needs and pleasures, never seeking the good of others but only the good of themselves and yet happily and whole heartedly call themselves followers of Christ. There are also people in the Church today who think they are saved and try to act like it but may one day wake up to the sad conclusion that what they thought was their salvation experience was infact their death warrent. It is not uncommon to find people who are truely saved, and yet engaging in sinful lifestyles with no regret nor remorse and claim to be enlightened and blessed by God for it. It makes me think of Jesus when he said, not everyone who comes to me and says Lord, Lord shall enter the kingdom of heaven.

As I continue to receive e-mail after e-mail, phone call after phone call, and office visit after office visit I begin to realize that many people whom I have thought of their life as being a certain way, when in fact they are not at all what they claimed to be. Within seven months I have been confronted with the cold hard reality of the contradictory lives of over 7 different people 3 of those are my own flesh and blood. What causes such deceit? What makes people say they believe in the truth of the bible and then stomp all over it with the way they live? As I sit and ponder the absolute factor in each situation I come to the conclusion that there is something absolute in each persons life, sin. The reason there are none good is because there are none who do not sin.

Many people who are living sinful lifestyles with no thought of repentance are often confused, blind, and looking for someplace to stick the blame. Of course they will never place the blame on themselves or anyone else in the situation for that matter, but the blame is always placed on the innocent. “If my parents hadn’t raised me this way…, if so and so would not have pushed me to do this…, if whoever would not have snooped in others buisness…, if they were not so pushy this never would have happened…,” and so on. It is fine time that people started to take responsability for their own actions. The choices and decisions we make are no ones fault but our own, and if those choices cause pain and greif then people need to suck it up and take the blame for it instead of trying to pass it on to other people. Don’t blame your friends or your family or church members, or pastors, or teachers, for the consequences of sin, place the blame where it belongs, yourself!

For myself I have learned that faith and trust in man will sometimes fail, but I come to expect it because man is not perfect. Placing my trust in man will lead to nothing but failure at some point in life, but placing my trust in God has and will never fail. It is not man who created me, who gave me talent, and leads me to use it, it was God. May I never give man the glory for what God did in me!

Which brings me to the question what should I do? Do I continue to have a personal friendship with those who have chosen to live a lifestyle contrary to the word or do I not associate with such people. I believe the answer is found in 1 Corinthians 5:9-11. If it was the will of God that I not associate with anyone in the world who was immoral then I could not stay in this world, I would have to leave it. Becuase all the lost people and many saved people live immoral lives. When Paul says do not associate with the sexually immoral people in 1 Corinthians he isn’t talking about non-believers outside the church, he is only talking about those who you know are believers. It is the immoral beleiver in Christ that lives a life contrary to Christ that I am not to associate with.

1 Corn. 5:9-11 “I have written you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people–Not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world. But now I am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat.”

Because I choose not to associate with those living immoral lives it does not make me a bad christian, nor does it mean I hate them, it is instead an act of obedience to God. It doesn’t mean I should shun them and never talk to them, but it does mean that I should approach them with caution and choose not to be associated with them as I was before. How can I claim to be a follower of Christ and support those things or people that stand contrary to the cross. You cannot serve two masters, you will love one and hate the other.

Pressed

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Please me or Please God is that the question?

August 11, 2002 @ 11:37 pm by Pressed

It never ceases to amaze me that the sinful human nature that all humans possess has a way of blinding us to reality. One of the biggest problems that leads us to sin is selfishness. Most Christians spend more time watching TV or movies, playing games and doing things to bring pleasure and comfort to themselves than they do reading the word, praying and witnessing. We are so consumed with making ourselves better, buying more, weighing less, fulfilling each one of our pleasures that we often do not stop to think about anyone or anything else outside of ourselves. This is sad indeed, especially since I find myself doing the same. A big problem is that this crafty sinful nature sometimes sneaks its way into our theology and how we view the Bible.

This was something that God brought to my attention this morning as I taught my Sunday School class. I have been using the Lifeway material that our Church provides, and it is possible that you have studied the same lesson if your church uses the same material. Anyway the lesson was on Genesis, more specifically on Adam and the Garden of Eden. We see Eden as the perfect paradise. The Garden of Eden was a place where God walked and Adam had the privilege of being in the very presence of God. It was also a place of no sorrow and no pain and no tears, a place where plants and animals grew and lived abundantly. God created it, he inspected it, and he said it was �very good.� The Garden of Eden was paradise, it was a perfect place designed by God for Adam to dwell.

After discussing this with my class I asked the question, “How would you describe paradise”� They gave me answers such as, “It is a place where we have everything that we ever wanted. It is a place that we can eat what we want and just sit around and enjoy all day. It is a place where there is no pain and tears so we can just sit back and be happy all the time.” Notice the common theme in the answers they gave? Me. Me. Me. You see the place they described as paradise, was a place that pleased their earthly desires. They described it as a place where they didn’t have to work, where they could just sit back and relax, a place where they could have whatever they wanted and do whatever they wanted. Sounds a bit selfish�

That is the perfect example of how our sinful nature gets in the way of how we interpret scripture sometimes. They said that it was a place they never had to work and yet in paradise Adam worked. He was in charge of the animals, he had to name them, he also had to work the fields. So there were things that Adam had to do. There were also rules in paradise. Adam could eat from any tree except for one. It wasn’t some “free for all” that he could do anything he wanted, he had rules and consequences to breaking those rules. The theme of their answers was please me, please me, when the truth is paradise is a place where our theme will be please God, please God. In all things God gets the glory and our joy and pleasure comes not from serving ourselves, but from serving God. Don’t let your human nature stand in the way of what the Bible actually says.

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Relaxed and Ready

August 7, 2002 @ 11:31 pm by Pressed

I just spent two days fishing at Montauk State Park around Salem, MO. I love going on these trips because it is a time to just get away and get things off of my mind. I also love being around the spring and the woods and just being outdoors. It is nice to go and see the beauty of God’s creation. But to go along with the relaxing time and the great outdoors there is also serveral life lessons to be learned on each trip.

Life lesson #1 : If you buy a hammock at wal-mart for your trip make sure you get a camping site that has tree’s close together. If you don’t get that luxury then I have a suggestion. Don’t tie one end of the hammock to a tree and the other end to the luggage rack of a Ford Explorer. And if you do happen to do that, then don’t let certain large guest’s try and lay in the hammock… the luggage rack isn’t that strong.

Life lesson #2 : Don’t stand on a slippery, mossy, rock. But if your friend decides to stand on a slippery, mossy, rock, get the camera. You can take some excellent pictures of them falling one, two, maybe even three times. And let me just say it is a funny site to see someone decked out in full fishing gear go ploppin in the water.

Life lesson #3 : Hooks are dangerous. Having one flying at you at a high rate of speed requires some quick reflex action, which I don’t have. If you yank your pole and miss your fish you might as well count on your hook and line to come flying out of the water at the speed of light and nail you in the forehead.

Life lesson #4 : If you are going to try and catch a nice big fish be sure to climb over the big log in the way before you throw your line in and not after. If you happen to forget to climb over the big log and hook a fish you are in a world of hurt. Attempting to climb over a huge log with a fish on your line, climbing and reeling at the same time requires a professional. The non-professional person tends to get half-way over the log and fall to their death on the other side, dropping bait and lures and everything else you could imagine as they go plummeting into a big pile of mud. But I guess the important thing is they got the fish… right?

Pressed

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