Sat on the bus on my way to work (more about that later) pondering stuff..
Free will..
I decide my actions, God knew what I will choose yet still here I am. So in a sense everything I decide and do was predetermined but it's still down to my free will. My future was determined by me before I even existed. Maybe I've always existed. God cannot change, right? So if I've not always existed doesn't that change God? Energy and matter can transform, I am energy and matter now, maybe death is just matter changing to energy..
Free will
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Storyteller
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Free will
Faith is a knowledge within the heart, beyond the reach of proof - Kahlil Gibran
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Philip
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Re: Free will
Story: So in a sense everything I decide and do was predetermined but it's still down to my free will. [/quote]
No, God does not decide for you what color socks you must put on. We FREELY make our decisions, but God can influence and thus controls OUTCOMES.
Story: God cannot change, right? So if I've not always existed doesn't that change God?
How so? As everything was created by God!
"For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him." (Colossians 1:15-16)
Revelation 21: 1 "Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. 2 And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place[a] of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God."
1 Corinthians 15: 51: "Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep (our former bodies dead), but we shall all be changed, 52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed."
And do not make the error of belief in "soul sleep": https://www.gotquestions.org/soul-sleep.html
No, God does not decide for you what color socks you must put on. We FREELY make our decisions, but God can influence and thus controls OUTCOMES.
Your future as far as what? Salvation? As far as salvation, what God predetermined were the choices (accept vs. reject Him) and the consequences and destinations for each choice. But He did not choose person A will be saved and person B will go to hell - although He has always known their eternal fates, as He is ALL-knowing. Each person chooses their own fate per their final response (while living) to God / Christ.Story: My future was determined by me before I even existed. Maybe I've always existed.
Story: God cannot change, right? So if I've not always existed doesn't that change God?
How so? As everything was created by God!
"For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him." (Colossians 1:15-16)
Sounds like your being influenced by New Age thinking? Christians will have PHYSICAL bodies - albeit spiritual, non-corrupted, transformed ones in the New Heaven and Earth. Jesus was PHYSICALLY resurrected, as all Christians will be - their spirit already with the Lord will unite with their eternal resurrection bodies. The new Heaven and earth described in Scripture is of a physical place, as the Apostle John writes He actually SAW:Story: Energy and matter can transform, I am energy and matter now, maybe death is just matter changing to energy.
Revelation 21: 1 "Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. 2 And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place[a] of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God."
1 Corinthians 15: 51: "Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep (our former bodies dead), but we shall all be changed, 52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed."
And do not make the error of belief in "soul sleep": https://www.gotquestions.org/soul-sleep.html
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Storyteller
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Re: Free will
No, God does not decide for you what color socks you must put on. We FREELY make our decisions, but God can influence and thus controls OUTCOMES.
No but i bet He knew what colour i will choose.
Your future as far as what? Salvation? As far as salvation, what God predetermined were the choices (accept vs. reject Him) and the consequences and destinations for each choice. But He did not choose person A will be saved and person B will go to hell - although He has always known their eternal fates, as He is ALL-knowing. Each person chooses their own fate per their final response (while living) to God / Christ.Story: My future was determined by me before I even existed. Maybe I've always existed.
My future as in all of it. He knows what i was going to believe. He guided me. I don't think He controls my decisions, they are completely my own, but He knows what they're going to be.
Story: God cannot change, right? So if I've not always existed doesn't that change God?
How so? As everything was created by God!
Hmm, not sure i explained that very well. Exist perhaps isn't the right word.
"For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him." (Colossians 1:15-16)
Sounds like your being influenced by New Age thinking? Christians will have PHYSICAL bodies - albeit spiritual, non-corrupted, transformed ones in the New Heaven and Earth. Jesus was PHYSICALLY resurrected, as all Christians will be - their spirit already with the Lord will unite with their eternal resurrection bodies. The new Heaven and earth described in Scripture is of a physical place, as the Apostle John writes He actually SAW:Story: Energy and matter can transform, I am energy and matter now, maybe death is just matter changing to energy.
Revelation 21: 1 "Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. 2 And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place[a] of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God."
1 Corinthians 15: 51: "Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep (our former bodies dead), but we shall all be changed, 52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed."
Again, i haven't expressed my thoughts how i mean. I know we will have physical bodies (i ponder on that a lot. What they'll look like? How old? Will i look like me but beautiful?)The matter/energy thing.. Ok, i am energy and matter now, when i die i transform from that into energy then become matter and energy again in my resurrected body. How does that sound?
And do not make the error of belief in "soul sleep": https://www.gotquestions.org/soul-sleep.html
I have seen, and held the hand of, a lot of people as they've passed away. At a guess over 50. Apart from 2, every single one of them, the moment they took their last breath there was a look, a knowing.. i have no doubt in my mind that we will have our answers when we die. After that is the mystery but soul sleep? Get the answers then oblivion until resurrection? I don't see it.
[/quote]
Faith is a knowledge within the heart, beyond the reach of proof - Kahlil Gibran
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Philip
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Re: Free will
Story, to get some Biblically grounded and very interesting ideas about what Heaven will be like, get Randy Alcorn's book, "Heaven": https://www.amazon.com/Heaven-Alcorn-Ra ... B000FCKCJC
Our flesh and bodies now are decaying, as is the earth and all of it's wear and tear, and things about it man has messed up. But Scripture teaches there will be a new Heaven and a new earth that merges together, that the corruptions and filth of the present earth will be no more. And as God is in the business of restoring people spiritually, He will also do physically. We will be recognizable, but with bodies that are far more capable and beautiful that we ever had on our best day. In fact, the best and most beautiful things about earth that we cherish, are pale imitations of what God has in store for us. But the REAL beauty of Heaven will be living in the constant presence of the Lord. And as we are currently dripping with sin, we can't currently perceive that being with the Lord will transcend every other beauty of Heaven. And God loves us to be happy in fulfilled in good pursuits, so everything we feel collapsing now, all of our yearnings of good things we feel we'll never have the time to pursue, I sure that we'll have an eternity to pursue them.
What will our heavenly bodies be like? https://www.gotquestions.org/look-like-in-Heaven.html
Our flesh and bodies now are decaying, as is the earth and all of it's wear and tear, and things about it man has messed up. But Scripture teaches there will be a new Heaven and a new earth that merges together, that the corruptions and filth of the present earth will be no more. And as God is in the business of restoring people spiritually, He will also do physically. We will be recognizable, but with bodies that are far more capable and beautiful that we ever had on our best day. In fact, the best and most beautiful things about earth that we cherish, are pale imitations of what God has in store for us. But the REAL beauty of Heaven will be living in the constant presence of the Lord. And as we are currently dripping with sin, we can't currently perceive that being with the Lord will transcend every other beauty of Heaven. And God loves us to be happy in fulfilled in good pursuits, so everything we feel collapsing now, all of our yearnings of good things we feel we'll never have the time to pursue, I sure that we'll have an eternity to pursue them.
What will our heavenly bodies be like? https://www.gotquestions.org/look-like-in-Heaven.html