The first is the nature of Gods omnipotence. The assumption is that God knows every thing you do at every moment. He knows for example in five minutes you will take a crap :). This is preposterous. God in awarding freewill to man is providing him liberty to act independently within limits. In this way man is a interactive player in Gods game of life.
First Zech, in order for me to follow that, I would need to see a scripture that says God DOESN'T KNOW everything. For instance, I hold my position because of this:
Heb 4:13
13 Nothing in all creation is hidden from God's sight Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.
1 John 3:20
For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.
John 16:29-30
Now we can see that you know all things and that you do not even need to have anyone ask you questions. This makes us believe that you came from God."
John 21:17
Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, "Do you love me?" He said, "Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you."
So, according to the above, God DOES KNOW everything. From what Bible passages are you adhereing to your position?
I also do not believe man has freewill. I believe only God has freewill, of which everyone else is subjected to. Freewill means your life is your own to decide and do as one sees fit. But the Bible makes clear, that the life we have is not our own, and that it IS NOT ours to decide what to do.
Jer 10:23
I know, O LORD, that a man's life is not his own;
it is not for man to direct his steps.
Ezek 18:4
4 For every living soul belongs to me, the father as well as the son-both alike belong to me.
If what you say is true, "God in awarding freewill to man is providing him liberty to act independently within limits," man's life would be his own to direct his steps as he saw fit, limits or no limits. I believe man is NOT a player, he is a game piece. Worse than that, he is the LEAST game piece, a pawn. And as a pawn, you or I have no say as to how we are to be played by the Player. We move according to Him who moves us.
As a actor in the Grand Drama of life each man receives a script that is a guide for what he should do and say. He is free to deliver his performance in his own way in his own language with his own feelings. The important thing is that Gods will be done.
Support your position with the Bible. Freewill is God's alone, of which Satan claimed HE HAS, and has diseminated as something each living being has possession of. Only God is free. It is unture to say anyone but God has freewill
God knows in his game of life what each door opens to. He knows where every path leads. He knows the final outcome of one choosing certain doors and paths. Just as in literal stage productions there are understudies for roles there is such in real life.
He knows who is/was going to be his or not from the beginning. Anything less then that is God relying on chaos. God has programmed this age, with all the different people in it to go exactly the way he wants. Each "LOOP" and "SUBROUTINE" are known and accounted for. Every bit and byte will do EXACTLY as He has determined from the beginning of physical time. All scripture points to that as fact. I have yet to see anything in the Bible that says otherwise.
If you for whatever reason do not choose to fulfill your role as a good guy he will find a villians role for you. Your good guy understudy will then take over. You will become a self made resister as the first resister Satan was. God is not making anyone rebel. We choose our course and whatever choice we make God uses it to accomplish his will.
Jonah didn't want to fulfill his role. Did God give HIM a villains role? NO! He followed that guy down till Jonah finally said, I would rather DIE in the ocean than do what God says. God didn't even let Jonah kill himself to avoid doing what He said. And the BIG LAUGH was on Jonah, when after being punished being in the fish, Jonah said OK OK OK I'll do it. He goes all the way back to Ninevah, and GOD CHANGES HIS MIND. God is not one to be mocked. He will do what HE pleases, and everyone else will be a pawn in His game. Some pawns will die, some pawns will be crowned king. That will be done by God's will alone.
The second issue is the prophecies concerning lions and wolves living peacefully alongside the sheep and the lambs. JWs have self servingly implied that this is a description of a future earthly paradise that is being held out very literally. It is clear that what was said was metaphors for false shepherds whose animal like natures will change. There is no reason to believe that this is in any way speaking literally.
I agree with you here.
We should not expect the natures of wild animals should ever change. Many were designed to eat others and no evil is attached to it. Only to men who choose to act like animals.
I believe an earth based on death (which the literal earth is) will truly be destroyed and a new earth NOT based on death will be created. All life forms on this new earth will also be NEW. Not RE-newed. BUT NEW. A NEW CREATION.
Our physical bodies as we know it will be destroyed. Paul insinuates that very fact here, that a body that survives on death, will be destroyed and so will the FOOD (death) that keeps the current body alive:
1 Cor 6:12-13
"Food for the stomach and the stomach for food"-but God will destroy them both.
Food (death of another, to keep another living) is to be destroyed, and so is the body of the one that consumes it.
New bodies, new concept of how we will survive. God will keep us alive.
Edited by - pomegranate on 30 October 2002 8:58:17