"...but of Love, of Joy and of a Sound Mind."

Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen. Jude 24-25

Monday, December 29, 2008

Free will

"...for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure." - Phil 2:13

For some time I have made my theological stand that man is saved by grace alone. That also mean we can't will ourselves to be saved because our fallen nature is constantly in conflict with God's will. We're fickle-minded and we change over time, but the grace of God changes our hearts so that we can respond to his grace forever. One cannot imagine a salvation that is temporal. What then does that tell us about the one who offers salvation? That he saves us now and forsakes us later due to our nature which tend to reject him? May that not be so, for even I will never bow the knee to such a diety. However the doctrine of grace demands that God continue to will us unto salvation despite our eventual "willful" rejection of grace because the power of the Holy Spirit at work in believers is way too strong even for a "cousciencious objector" of grace.

That said, it shouldn't be confused that since God saves us forever, so we can sin since we'll be saved eventuallg. That is a gross misunderstanding of the goodness of God because the Spirit at work in us always compels us to do good. Inspite of that God allows some believers to, at their seemingly free will, to fall away so that his grace will be manifested and abound even more.

On a darker note, there are those who think they are saved but are not. So there seems to be a kind of uncertainty about who gets saved and who doesn't. That shouldn't be so if we understand the work of God in salavation. He always finish the work He began to His glory.

Therefore God's sovereign grace saves even the hardest hearts, leaving no room for any of us to boast. If we should boast, let us boast in the amazing grace of God. The resulting decision is not a result of our free will, but God's work to offer us salvation and enabling us to bypass our stubborn will to respond to His grace.

Free will? Yeah, our will has been set free bythe Spirit which wills our souls to be saved tothe glory of God. Hallelujjah!

1 Comments:

At 12:34 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hey Jenn, its nice to be reading what you write. Was about to type in something short but I was reminded about a word study I did on the word Grace as reflected on Roman 5:20 which I think an understanding of it would be vital to the discussion :)

It is distinctively Pauline to use the word χάρις to expound the structure of the salvation event showing it to be unmerited grace that is freely given.

It should be noted that Paul does not talk of the gracious God but speaks of the grace that is actualized in Christ death and resurrection. This grace does not support Man’s striving for the good. It is not tied to any human presupposition but negates all human preparation and this makes the recipient a new creation and a justified sinner.

This Grace is not the basis for justification and so Grace remains a gift. But this grace is not given to let Man go on in sin. It does not owe its origin to sin nor can it be manipulated by men. Its grounding is in the righteous of Christ and the goal being eternal life.

So where does freewill come in then? If chris, as a concept introduced primarily by Paul, can be summed up as the "enabling power", then I suppose Man's part is about the response which is really the definition of worship. After all it is promised that this gift (of grace) comes when the person denies himself on the cross and in weakness, so when Paul says that Grace “is sufficient” it means that what that is given is more than enough.

Sorry if I didn't respond as fully as you expect. I do not feel that I know enough to fully unravel its wonder fogged within the centuries worth of debate.

I hope this helps :) Lets meet up!

 

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