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I think what is predestined is that we will be conformed to the image of Christ. I don't believe our every decision is ordained or predestined. If it were, God's will would always be done in the earth as it is in heaven and there would be no sin.
Rom 8:28 But we know that to the ones loving God all things work together for good, to those being called according to purpose;
Rom 8:29 because whom He foreknew, He also predestinated to be conformed to the image of His Son, for Him to be the First-born among many brothers.
Rom 8:30 But whom He predestinated, these He also called; and whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.
Rom 8:31 What then shall we say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us?
This goes along with the statement of those names already written in the book of life from the foundation of the world...If we are slaves to sin and cannot in any way be different than a slave of sin, which is our nature, until God has called us and regenerated our spirits unto belief, repentance and faith, where then is our free will if we are slaves to sin and can do nothing else but sin?...And if God has elected a people and has called them, those whom He had written in the book of life from the beginning, and those elect are changed due to the regeneration of God and become slaves to righteousness, where then is free will?...It does not exist...
No. If I offer my kid a bowl of ice cream, or a bowl of brussel sprouts...I'm pretty sure I know which one she'll choose. All we are saying is that God gives grace to people to be able to see the goodness of God. If God doesn't regenerate us, we are blinded by sin and can't see it.
You know this from observations of your child, not because you knew from the beginning what she would choose...Human reasoning cannot explain the attributes of God very well...What if you do not want to be regenerated?...
If we believe that God is so powerful that he created the universe simply by speaking....and he chose the nation of Israel by picking Abraham.....what is so hard to believe that he chooses the individual?
That we seem to have an innate sense of justice also, and it is easy to see that the idea is a travesty of the justice some are so adamant that we have to satisfy.
And THAT is the problem . . . your erroneous conception of God. In order for US to have any responsibility for our actions of love and not love . . . we have to be free from God's coercion. This does not mean we are free from God's laws . . . but we are free from His Will . . . that is why we are commanded to bring His Will to earth through OUR efforts. When we don't . . . WE create Evil on earth, period. We have responsibility for what happens on earth because we have Dominion BY GOD'S SOVEREIGN WILL. God does NOT go back on His Will. What God wills . . . WILL happen . . . all in God's good time.
A law is acoecion...There is a consequence for not obeying it...If the command is stated to you along with the consequences for not obeying it, is this not a coercion?...
God must divide us. Surely you have read enough of Paul to realize that no one is completely sanctified while residing in a mortal body. It is not an either or with any human being. No one has attained to the righteousness of Jesus Christ, otherwise there would be room for boasting.
The the OP: YOu're kind of messed up on some things. First, keep in mind the concept of "Free Will" is not mentioned in the Bible and does not really exist. Second, Just because God wills something, does not means it happens. We are not puppets. EG: God does not will people to sin, but they do. God does not will the sin, people make those decisions on their own.
Predistination brings us into the church, brings us to become believers in the true God. But God does not force Christians to love Him, serve HIm, put their trust in HIM. Christians who remain in believers remain because they want to, helped by the power of the Holy Spirit. But Christians are also free to walk away and return to a life of unbelief and rebellion against God.
Gen 50:19 And Joseph said to them, Do not fear. For am I in the place of God?
Gen 50:20 And you, you intended evil against me, but God meant it for good, in order to make it as it is this day, to keep a great many people alive.
The word for 'intended' and 'meant' are the same word,
H2803
חשׁב
châshab
khaw-shab'
A primitive root; properly to plait or interpenetrate, that is, (literally) to weave or (generally) to fabricate; figuratively to plot or contrive (usually in a malicious sense); hence (from the mental effort) to think, regard, value, compute: - (make) account (of), conceive, consider, count, cunning (man, work, workman), devise, esteem, find out, forecast, hold, imagine, impute, invent, be like, mean, purpose, reckon (-ing be made), regard, think.
So, according to this, God had this planned, from the brothers' perspective, they intended evil against Joseph, however, God had intended it to be for saving lives...The incident born from and executed from both minds were the same, however, God had planned it and executed it and used the brothers as the medium of execution, so from their perspective, it was their idea, but, Joseph says it was of God...
God knows what you will do fifty years from now...he knows exactly what choice you'll make before you make it. He knows why you'll make it...how you'll make it...and under what context the decision will be made.
If that is so...if we believe in gods inerrant omniscience.........could you do something differently?
If we believe in god the way the bible reports that he is...the answer to that question is unequivocally no...and there is no room for negotiation or wiggling. We lack the ability to resist God if we are called....Calvin called this irresistable grace.
Because, whom He foreknew, He predestinated, those He predestinated, He also called...People do not want to understand this nor believe it for it interferes with their ego...Did Calvin conceive of Hyper-Calvinism or Double Predestination?...Maybe not...But it stands to reason that if God predestinates a people unto righteousness, the flip side of that record is predestinating a people to wrath...The one already fitted out for destruction, the word employed for 'fitted out' is a Greek word for fitting out a sea going vessel, if it is not fitted out, then it cannot be used for the purpose intended, which is sailing...On the flip side of God already having fitted out those for destruction, He logical would have fitted out those intended for righteousness...Could this possibly be contained within our DNA?...I wonder...
Creation was made subject to vanity (defective) in order that His will for salvation would be inacted. (Rom 8:20)
This is not cruelty or forced labor, but a means to reveal His plan to bring us into an adoption brighter and fuller than anything Adam had known before the fall. The church has no idea the freedom and power we have in Him, but that's a sermon for another Sunday.
I would say that He is reserving out an eternal people for Himself from the mess that is humanity, and a lot of pain and suffering goes into forming that...It is like the world is a big rock and contained within that rock somewhere is a bright gem, and through chipping away one finds the gem, then one has to facet it through much toil in order for it to be put into it's ultimate condition of intended perfection...It is like a pile of dross that must be burned away to find the nugget of Gold then the Gold is refined to purity...Slaves of sin are the rock and dross, respectively, the slaves of righteousness are the gem and gold, respectively...
Just because God predestined you to walk in relationship with Him, doesn't mean you have to take that path. Let's say a wealthy father dies, and in his will he leaves his wealth to his son. So it was predestined from the father that his son would have his wealth. Yet the son decides not to receive it. So the son was predestined to be wealthy, yet he decides to be poor. That is predestination and free will in a nut shell.
This is human reasoning...
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