Ruach, why do you suppose that some people are evil and some aren't? Do you think that anyone would deliberately choose to be evil? If so, why? What makes some people able to resist temptation while others can't? If not, do you think that they are born evil (in which case God must have designed them to be evil as part of His Plan) or that the things they experienced in life led them to make choices which resulted in evil (of course everything they experienced was part of God's Plan, so they were set up to fail).
Yep, God has a Plan all right. He planned to harden Pharaoh's heart so He would have an excuse to afflict them with plagues and kill their first born. He Planned to exterminate the people who had inhabited Canaan for generations. He planned to have His Son killed as a sacrifice to Himself so that He could forgive people for having the design flaws with which He endowed them. He Planned for the Jews to stick to the original agreement and not believe that He had changed His mind without informing His credentialed representatives.
He Planned every Holy War, Holy Inquisition, Holy Book Burning, and Holy Flood and Famine. He Planned to have His priests molest His altar boys in His Holy Houses of Worship. He Planned for most of the world to worship their own gods so he could cast them into Hell and torment them for all eternity. What a Plan!
Dunno Terry - Does God plan it or foresee it? I think it's possible for God to be outside of time and space as we understand it. Comprehension and understanding are very large hurdles for mankind - we want it and we want if now, if we cannot have it NOW then it's more like to hell with it or damn it! If you cannot prove it then you cannot believe it and it's not damn possible.
Sex is a joke in heaven....they all watch us and laugh at our goofy faces.....But from what I hear, it's mainly a joke down here too.
Husker, I do not know whether God actually plans things or just lets it happen, whether he is omniscient or just as surprised as we are at how things turn out. You can make a case for predestination from Bible verses, but I have no reason to believe that the Bible is an infallible source of information about God.
Of course it is possible for God to be outside of our time and space, but it's just as possible that there is no God at all.
Heh heh, nice screen name. I don't beleive in free will - you are what you do with yourself. If we had been made to do only one thing, we would not be able to choose to do it or not.
People do not wake up one day and they are evil. It is a choice then another choice and another...............................
Until wickedness is what they have given themselves over to.
Many criminals in prison, realizing the choices they made put them there.
Some criminals in prison, child molesters, killers do repent of their works and rethink this whole salvation and forgiveness gospel.
Wickedness is not always in that state, a person can change. It is their choice. They have a brain that even Jesus said , even a child can understand the gospel.
Some people , many people, deliberately harden their hearts AGAINST God in anger, in frustration, out of sheer will, they deny his existance.
Have you ever not heard of or seen how someone says , "oh, no , now I don't want to give it to you." But first what happened is an insult or uncaring attitude from the recepient.
Like a BD gift. You give a gift, you can see the recepient is not happy with the gift. You say, " OH, you don't like it, here, give it back to me.
The recepient grudgingly states, "no, I will keep it. Well, the giver knows the recepient is ungrateful and dislikes the gift.
God wants us to come to him with faith. Not begrudingly, unpleased.
But I just stated this reasonable attitude on the perception of a human example. God who knows the heart of every man, has a much higher order of thought and perception and knowledge.
Time is not a dimension to God. It is just something he created for mankind.
God knows all time, even unto the end of this age.
If you see your child playing near the street, your intelligence, wisdom and the ability to see the evident future of what could occur to the child makes you get up and put the child in a safe place.
Pharoah started with a hard heart and continued with a hard heart against the God of Israel, against the words of Moses. And there was just no way Pharoah was going to let those Hebrews go free. At his own insistence , consciously, he was against freeing thousands upon 1000's of slaves. Where as now God has been hearing the cries of the slaves for 400 years, and knew that Pharoah would never let them go, Not for what Moses had to say. Do you think Pharoahs heart only hardened for this momentary time? No, his heart was hardened even from his ancestors.
Egypt today is just a mediocre nation , that never did and never can reclaim even a small percent of her glory. She is a quiet nation who remembers her past when dealing with the Hebrew God.
Quick turn on 60 Minutes!!!!!
You probably won't like it. I hope KJV True watches it and posts a rant!
Ruach wrote: Pharoah started with a hard heart and continued with a hard heart against the God of Israel, against the words of Moses. And there was just no way Pharoah was going to let those Hebrews go free. ... Do you think Pharoahs heart only hardened for this momentary time? No, his heart was hardened even from his ancestors.
Ruach, have you ever actually
read the Bible? FYI, the Pharoah was going to let the Israelites go
several times, but God intervened and hardened his heart in order to make the final scene more dramatic:
Quote:Exodus 10
16 Pharaoh quickly summoned Moses and Aaron and said, "I have sinned against the LORD your God and against you. 17 Now forgive my sin once more and pray to the LORD your God to take this deadly plague away from me."
18 Moses then left Pharaoh and prayed to the LORD . 19 And the LORD changed the wind to a very strong west wind, which caught up the locusts and carried them into the Red Sea. Not a locust was left anywhere in Egypt. 20 But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he would not let the Israelites go. ...
24 Then Pharaoh summoned Moses and said, "Go, worship the LORD . Even your women and children may go with you; only leave your flocks and herds behind."
25 But Moses said, "You must allow us to have sacrifices and burnt offerings to present to the LORD our God. 26 Our livestock too must go with us; not a hoof is to be left behind. We have to use some of them in worshiping the LORD our God, and until we get there we will not know what we are to use to worship the LORD ."
27 But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he was not willing to let them go.
Exodus 11
9 The LORD had said to Moses, "Pharaoh will refuse to listen to you-so that my wonders may be multiplied in Egypt." 10 Moses and Aaron performed all these wonders before Pharaoh, but the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he would not let the Israelites go out of his country.
Phoenix, it is frightening to live in a country where 70 million people cannot distinguish fact from fiction.
Terry wrote:Phoenix, it is frightening to live in a country where 70 million people cannot distinguish fact from fiction.
Amen, that's why I'm hatching a plan!
They say there's a heaven for those who await.
Some say its better but I say it aint.
I'd rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints.
The sinners are much more fun.
Darlin only the good die young.
The "Rapture" is a perfect example. It only makes sense if Heaven is "up."
And how do they let this smug peckerhead just make up these 'facts'.....
Quote:"I'm not accusing my Democratic friends of being ungodly. But I'm just saying statistically, people that attend church frequently, at least once a week or more -- two thirds of them vote Republican," says Bauer. "Those voters that say they seldom if ever attend religious services, two thirds of them vote Democratic."
Well, I am a registered Democrat (I like to be able to vote in a primary and all), and I'm pretty dang ungodly, so...
(Anyway, wouldn't it be hubris -- or whatever the equivalent fundie term is -- to consider yourself "godly"?)
whited sepulchres, full of rotting flesh and dead men's bones . . .
God judges the heart of a person and not the outward appearance.
