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Alistair
Ranger
Joined: 27 Mar 2007
Posts: 55
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 Posted: Sat Apr 07, 2007 12:48 am Post subject: Free will, do we got it? |
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| Quote: | do people have free will? because if god knows everything, then he knows what we are going to do in the future, so we do what he made us to do. we as humans have no free will according to catholic faith. but they say we do. hm...
think about it.
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Someone on another site posed that question, I think it needs to be answered by everyone who calls themself a Christian.
Here is my belief:
1.We have free will.
2. God knows it.
3. God is omnipotent
4. God won't do anything about our free will.
If I were God, which you'd better thank Him that I'm not, I would love to control all the little people I had created on the Earth.
First I will represent my worldview with 'spiritual physics'
God is real, yes?
People are real, duh.
Sin is real, is it beginning to feel like Kindergarten?
God cannot be around sin. (ex.. you or I fell up.)
God cannot make sin. (ex.. you or I flew off the ground by the means of our own natural talent for flying.)
There is sin. (ex.. there is the earth.)
People can make sin. (ex.. cow makes milk, chicken lays egg, God is like the cat which cannot lay an egg. and the lizzard which cannot produce milk.)
People can be around sin. (ex.. bird lives in tree, God is like a whale, theoretically, you could get a whale in a tree, but work with me, k?)
Who made sin?
People.
Does God like sin?
No.
Why would God let us make the thing that is like a toxin to Him if He wants to spend eternity with us in Heaven?
Don't know.
If God controls our every move, why is their sin?
Because He doesn't.
Psychologically, God wants us to love Him. Love is not created by the object of the loving. It's not real love if it is forced. Why would God want that? Why would anyone want that?
Let me ask you a question,
If God controls us, then why make the Bible? Why ask us to love Him? Why sacrifice His only Son so that we would be able to what He asks?
I think it is important that we question our faith. Not so that we shake it, but so that we strengthen it. I ask you to please take the opposing side, if only to strengthen your faith in God. You will learn more about why you chose your faith and why it matters.
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Duncariel
(dies)
Joined: 18 Mar 2007
Posts: 481
Location: Resisting temptation in a TNT fireworks stand near you...
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| Posted: Sat Apr 07, 2007 4:32 pm Post subject: |
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If people didn't have free will, then there would be no sin. If there was no such thing as free will because God is all-powerful, or whatever, then, as soon as a person became a Christian, he or she would immediately become sinless, because they would no longer have the choice to disobey, or not.
Simply saying that God "knows what we are going to do in the future" does not negate the fact that we were going to sin. Thus the flood, when the world was so sinful that God didn't feel like dealing with it any longer, essentially. There're obviously enough people in the world living how Christ wants them to that it's worth it for God to let us continue living. Plus, He promised not to flood the earth again, and short of exploding it, there isn't really a better way to obliterate an entire people....
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"He was smiling an innocent, amused smile, the smile of an anarchist sitting in the movies with a bomb in his pocket."
-- Nathanael West |
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Tiana Calthye
The Admin with Lime
Joined: 16 Mar 2007
Posts: 783
Location: Canada!
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| Posted: Sun Apr 08, 2007 2:01 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: | | If people didn't have free will, then there would be no sin. |
God is sinless. God ALLOWS sin. Therefore, if we didn't have free will, God would be contradicting Himself if there was still sin. If He was contradicting Himself, then He wouldn't be trustable. If He wasn't trustable, how could He be God? Therefore boxing us into a paradox if we DIDN'T have freewill.
(cough)
And, anyway. I refuse to take the opposing side because I'm currently at a doubtful stage where if I was to question things, I would break down my faith far too much. It may help you, but I know that it won't help me.
I'll keep an eye on this to make sure it doesn't get enflamatory.
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I will not walk on the keyboard when my human is writing important emiognaioerp ga3qi4 taija3tgv. |
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Jandalf
But I don't WANNA think!
Joined: 17 Mar 2007
Posts: 299
Location: 49°10.751' N, 97°56.5415' W
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| Posted: Sun Apr 08, 2007 3:38 am Post subject: |
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...Curses, am I going to go and use the parade analogy again? I guess so. Anyways, I believe that predestination and free will can exist simultaneously. God's like the guy in the blimp overlooking the parade, letting it move as it will, and from his perspective he can see what has happened and what will happen as well as the present moment, unlike the limited view of the spectators on the ground. And for the sake of argument, let's say God has a way of controlling the flow of the parade as needed, to boot.
Essentially, I believe God will and does arrange things for the best, putting moments and opportunities together. Whether or not those opportunities are seized? Up to us, even if we aren't making a conscious decision to do so (like for a bit of a drastic example, maybe giving some random person on the street who is bent on suicide a smile will change their mind; even if we have no idea at the time, we still make the decision to smile). I also believe there are times when God intervenes to do something no one else can affect, but then again this whole thing was brought on in the first place by an act of free will, by the eating of the forbidden fruit. One could almost render down human history into that one instance of free will abused, and everything after that as consequence. Although I think that's rendering it down a little much considering, but the general idea... hmm. I'm rambling again.
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"[Zeus] sent them to a shepherd of Troy, whose name was Paris because his mother had had a lot of gaul and had married a Frenchman..."
- The Principia Discordia |
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Tiana Calthye
The Admin with Lime
Joined: 16 Mar 2007
Posts: 783
Location: Canada!
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| Posted: Sun Apr 15, 2007 8:23 pm Post subject: |
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I could be saving people's lives just by grinning at them!
...Or driving them to their own death by scarred mind, but nevertheless!  
Or there's the river analogy! But I'm too lazy to dig out my Awana book and copy it down. Basically, say you have this nice river floaty ride, right? In a park. There's a cliff overhead, and the ride's down inside of it. Down there, you can see people floating down, and then they vanish beyond a bend or into a tunnel. You know they're going somewhere. But say you climbed the cliff. From up there, you can see beyond that bend. You can see the entire ride. You can see that the people are getting pushed through a little waterfall that you couldn't see before.
Because you're up there, does that mean you're controlling them? Nooo. It just means you can see it all in its entirety, whereas you when you were down there were limited and could only guess.
And if you wanted to, while you were up there, you could get into a glider and go on down and stick your hand into the ride up ahead. You could hop in from outside the box and effect things in an unexpected manner. You could push someone's tube on a bit further if you wanted.
See?
God's omnipotent, but that means nothing. It just means he can see it all. For us, we're making the choices as we go along. It's still free will. Maybe there's various possible outcome universy thingies, but let's NOT go there.
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I will not walk on the keyboard when my human is writing important emiognaioerp ga3qi4 taija3tgv. |
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