The Misapplication of Romans 9 to Predestinarian Views
April 28th, 2008 by JohnO
Click here to listen to The Misapplication of Romans 9 to Predestinarian Views as presented by Ray Faircloth, Apr 28th 2008, Atlanta Georgia. Commentary by John Obelenus
On the extreme Calvinistic side there are particular individuals who from “before the foundation of the world” are chosen to be ‘saved’, and ‘damned’ by God. The complete and utter lack of free will. Ray explains that this paper is derived from the fact that Romans 9 is often used to support these ideas, when in fact this chapter does not uphold this idea whatsoever.
JAT Robinson: “But we must not press Paul’s analogies, here or elsewhere. He has brought it in for one purpose only to show that God has absolute freedom over his creatures: He is not concerned at this point to find one which will safeguard their freedom”. “To press” means to find all the answers in one analogy. Rather than finding one (or two) answers in one analogy, and then having multiple analogies.
Ray asserts that Romans 9-11, on the whole, is not about the choosing of individuals, but rather people groups, nations, to further his (God’s) purposes. Chiefly, Israel, and the Gentile inclusion to Israel.
Paul upholds God’s justice, his correctness, in rejection of Israel, as a result of their rejection of God’s Messiah, precisely because God has improved the status of Gentiles, some of Israel does in fact believe, and the future chance for Israel to repent.
Ray finds three illustrations in this section. The first is about Isaac and Jacob. Two groups are formed from different seeds, “the children of the flesh”, and “the children of the promise”. Next, from one seed, Jacob is chosen, not Esau before either were born. These two stories prove that God’s sovereignty can be seen in many ways that might be obvious, or not. As we continue on to v16, we do not find that God compels men to believe. Rather in v16, the will of man and the will of God are both involved. “Yet predestinarians commit the fallacy of the False Dilemma when they decide that something that depends either initially or ultimately on God means that it can depend only of God. The fact that the man wills show he has his part to play and therefore displays freewill.”
The second illustration is that God uses his enemies to accomplish his purposes, specifically the case of Pharaoh. He also reminds us that Moses acts as the representative of God’s people, and Pharaoh as the representative of God’s enemies. Often times predestinarians will say that Pharaoh had no free will God hardened his heart. In fact the Scriptures say that both Pharaoh hardened his own heart, and God participated as well. (v18, Ex 4.21, 8.15, 1 Sam 6.6 – where the Egyptian nation is included). “Interestingly the main Hebrew word used concerning the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart by God is ‘chazaq’ which means ‘to strengthen or give courage’. So God’s part was that of emboldening Pharaoh to do what he was stubbornly determined to do even in the face of the devastating plagues on Egypt.”
The third illustration is about the potter and vessels from Rom 9.20-21. This illustration comes from Jeremiah where God has determined to judge Israel for not being what he intended them to be. This makes the opposite point which the predestination intends to make! And is Israel repents, God will not judge. Again talking about a nation, not individuals. Morever, this is not a permanent decision. Israel was not a vessel of wrath initially, but is now – yet can repent and escape wrath. CK Barret: “It appears that the designation ‘vessels of wrath’ and ‘vessels of mercy’ is not irreversible… that he is also thinking (as Hosea did) of the temporary lapse of Israel and their subsequent return, that is, of the possibility that ‘vessels of wrath’ might become ‘vessels of mercy’.
Hello all,
What is the view of Kingdom Ready blog on the predestination, salvation, and Calvinism?
I was in a conversation today with a friend and wanted to see how some of you would answer that God predetermines exactly who will be saved and who will not.
Joseph,
I do not believe in predetermination or that if you’re once saved your always saved. It seems to me that we must behave as God’s children should behave or else God won’t recognize us as being one of His children. We are of course “all” God’s children when we are born, even Atheists, but we can choose to ignore the fact that we are God’s children and behave like ruthless animals if we so decide.
In Matthew 25:41-46 Y’shua says;
“…’Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. (42) For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, (43) I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ (44) Then they also will answer, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to you?’ (45) Then he will answer them, saying, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’ (46) And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”
At least that’s how I see it anywaze. I hope you had a blessed and inspiring Sabbath…
Thanks for your thoughts, DT. Shabbat Shalom to you as well.
However, I’m more specifically talking about does God know already who will be saved and who will not, therefore, making it impossible for people to have true freewill in the matter of their own fate?
Joseph,
I know that many people will probably disagree with me, but I don’t believe that God already knows who will be saved and who will not. I get this belief mainly from the parable of the tares in Matthew 13:24-32;
“The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field, (25) but while his men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat and went away. (26) So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared also. (27) And the servants of the master of the house came and said to him, ‘Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have weeds?’ (28) He said to them, ‘An enemy has done this.’ So the servants said to him, ‘Then do you want us to go and gather them?’ (29) But he said, ‘No, lest in gathering the weeds you root up the wheat along with them. (30) Let both grow together until the harvest, and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Gather the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn’.”
I believe it is clear that the enemy in the above parable is Satan. Matthew 13:38-39 says; “The field is the world, and the good seed is the sons of the kingdom. The weeds are the sons of the evil one, (39) AND THE ENEMY WHO SOWED THEM IS THE DEVIL. The harvest is the close of the age, and the reapers are angels.” (ESV – emphasis mine).
I believe God wants to give each and everyone of us a chance at salvation. That is why he said, “Let both grow together until the harvest.” Of course I’m just a humble layman, but that’s how I see it.
BTW – I don’t speak any Hebrew and I was just wondering what “Shabbat Shalom” means. I think that Shabbat means Sabbath and Shalom means Peace, but I don’t know for sure…
DT,
Thanks for your thoughts on that.
How would you deal with the argument that if God is omniscient, then he must already know each persons destiny of salvation before they are judged? If he didn’t then he wouldn’t be omniscient, right?
I don’t necessarily take any position on this to heart, just want to see how everyone from this blog responds to this issue. Again, these questions I’m asking are for anyone who wants to answer.
Yes, you are correct. Shabbat Shalom (Peaceful Sabbath) is the common Hebrew greeting one would use for the Sabbath.
We just went through Romans 9-11 in Bible study at our church, but we didn’t get into it in depth as it was known there are those on each side of the aisle on this topic (even our pastor-elders are split).
I have a hard time accepting Calvinism – it just seems like if it is true, then God has made us think that we have the ability to choose, and that would be a ruse. All of the exhortations from God to obey are all a ruse. I cannot push that aside in favor of a few passages that might say otherwise.
But then again, in looking at my own conversion experience, a thought came into my mind that started the wheels turning. Did that thought come from me or did it come from God?
Further, my eyes were then opened to understand what repentance really meant – I am pretty certain that was from God and was not my own doing. When I was ‘called’, it was undeniable and I felt led. So in that sense, it does give me pause to dismiss Calvinism entirely.
Joseph,
You asked, “How would you deal with the argument that if God is omniscient, then he must already know each persons destiny of salvation before they are judged?”
I do not know how this effects God’s omniscience. It seems to me that God has a pretty good idea of who will be good/saved (in his eyes) and who won’t. Thus he was able to choose human representatives, prophets, Kings, etc… to represent him and be his agents. But, I think it is possible that there are some people that he is not so sure about. For example God’s holy spirit had Y’shua choose Judas as one of the 12 destined to be apostles. Yet Judas fell victim to the influence of Satan and in the end betrayed Y’shua.
I’ve often wondered about all the pain and misery throughout the world and why God would allow it to continue for so long. It seems to me there could be two reasons for this. One is that God wants to give these people, that he is not sure about, a chance to prove themselves as worthy to be called the “children of God” and to be included among the sheep on the day of judgment. After all he wants to give everyone a chance at eternal salvation.
And the second reason might be to clearly show all of us that we humans are incapable of establishing governments that can justly and wisely govern over us. Time and time again the corruption of people in positions of power has occurred and has been occurring since the beginning of time. Even King David and King Solomon fell prey to these human frailties. I think that’s why in the beginning God repeatedly told the Israelites that they didn’t need a human King.
I think it is clear that God wanted to be their King. For only God (and his hand picked everlasting King Y’shua) have the ability to govern over us justly and wisely. I think it is clear that we humans are incapable of doing this on our own. Like the old saying says, “Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely”. Of course this is all just my own personal point of view. I readily admit that I could be wrong.
But, I do think that it does seem to make the most sense. At least to me anywaze…
Antioch,
You said, “… in looking at my own conversion experience, a thought came into my mind that started the wheels turning. Did that thought come from me or did it come from God? Further, my eyes were then opened to understand what repentance really meant – I am pretty certain that was from God and was not my own doing.”
I feel the same way about my conversion. I believe that God was guiding me and continued to guide until I eventually found this site with fellow like minded Christians that I could learn from and share my thoughts with. But, I don’t believe that God ever forces us. I believe he just nudges us. In the end is it up to us if we want to be receptive to God’s nudging/guidance, or if we want to depend on ourselves and try to go it on our own.
God can plant a thought or a feeling, but in the end we must accept it and then act upon it…
Anyone here heard of Open Theism?
I think Sean did a radio spot with Ken Westby about this.
Hi Xavier,
No I have never heard of Open Theism before. My ideas are all based on my own understandings of life and the world around us. I had no idea that my ideas had an official name of any kind. I Googled Open Theism and this is what I got;
“Practically, open theism makes the case for a personal God who is open to influence through the prayers, decisions, and actions of people. Although many specific outcomes of the future are unknowable, God’s foreknowledge of the future includes that which is determined as time progresses often in light of free decisions that have been made and what has been sociologically determined. So God knows everything that has been determined as well as what has not yet been determined but remains open. As such, God is able to anticipate the future, yet remains fluid to respond and react to prayer and decisions made either contrary or advantageous to God’s plan or presuppositions.”
I agree with all of the above statement accept where it says, “So God knows everything that has been determined as well as what has not yet been determined but remains open.”
If God knows everything that has not yet been determined but remains open then why does he allow all the pain and suffering throughout the world to continue millennium after millennium. Why didn’t he just end it all long long ago and have the judgment day. After all if he knew exactly what we were all going to do in the 21st. century, he could have judged all of us way back in the 3rd. century or even earlier.
There must be a reason why God in his wisdom has decided to put off the judgment day to a future date. I personally can only come up with two possible reasons for this. Which I outlined in message #7 above. Of course I don’t make any claims at having any kind of special knowledge. This is all just my own humble opinion…
Thanks for posting this DT. Some thoughts…
If God knows the ultimate outcome of how each person will be judged as he is omniscient, then this still does not solve that aspect. And one could make the case that if God is omniscient, then any decision we make he must have known beforehand as well. That he knew when, where, and how believers would turn to him. Otherwise, if he doesn’t know what your next move will be, is he really omniscient?
Then we get into the realm of whether God can be ignorant of his omniscience?, or whether he can be selective in omniscience?, which is a contradictory statement. This is a toughy as I would like to believe that each person born into this world does have a hand in their fate.
Xavier, do you have a link to the dialog?
Joseph
No. Ask Sean. I think he interviewed Westby about Open Theism.
In His sovereign will God chooses not to know certain things. I can live with that.
Sean,
Any chances on a link to the dialog? I found this in a Google search but no download… http://truthmattersradio.wordpress.com/