I read your other post. So I see where you want to take this discussion.
Let me try again.
Time: We measure time based upon the creation of "evening and morning" make the days as found in Genesis. We know that this is the movement of the earth from darkness to light. This is what God called a day. We also know that the earth moves around the sun and the distance and speed gives us a reference to time being a year. The other planets move around the sun in shorter distances or larger distances making those planet "years" longer or shorter. But the rest of the universe is neither moving around our sun nor does it directly relate to our sun, there is therefore no reference to time based upon our sun. However this does not even begin to give a clear definition of "time" that was created by God. Movement or motion only helps us related to the creation that we are living in and are a part of, but does not give the full view of what time is. The Bible does refer many times to the idea of "in the fullness of time" Acts of God are represented to us using these terms. How does that help us understand time from God's view. Though God is greater than His creation "time" He speaks in terms that in "time" at a certain "time" events take place. God reveals to us in Scripture that He appears in His creation which puts Him in "time" So with all the scriptures we learn that God exist outside of "time" and places Himself in "time" So if we are going to define time we must be able to define the realm in which God lives that we are incapable of existing. If we could exist there then we would be God. We as created beings will always dwell in what we refer to as "time". I heard many times when I was young that when Christ returns and the "end" when those cast into the Lake of Fire are there and the rest are with Christ in Heaven, it has been said time will be no more. I have a problem with that because as stated Revelation 22:1"And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.
2In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations." No need to have months if there is no time.

What are you measuring? You can hardly talk about the measurement of a thing without knowing what the thing is.

You mention some basic question begging statements (e.g. "we know") of an empiric worldview, which I criticized Aristotle for in that link. You do not deal with those questions, instead proceeding to say:

Agreed. At this point, however, you have yet to define time.

This is gibberish until you actually define time.

Agreed, insofar as this fits within how I have define time and eternity in the link.

This is a problem for you, then. Recall your previous statement:

First (directly above) you said the definition of eternity is predicate on a definition of time. Now (from the most recent post) you say if we define time we must know what eternity (the realm in which God "lives") means. You can't have it both ways. That's circular reasoning. To say we know what eternity is from knowing what time is and simultaneously saying we know what time is from knowing what eternity is is to say nothing at all. You don't know what either is, so you don't know what the "other" is. You can't predicate the meaning of A on B and then say the meaning of B is predicated on A. That's fallacious.

Agreed, again only because it coheres with my definition. I still have no idea what you mean when you use "time" or "eternity."

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I read your post, where did you define time. If I am missing it please restate here.

Here:

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Sounds impressive. However as you keep accusing others of not defining you use a something that can not be measured either. How often do thoughts change and changing thoughts are then calculated by time not as time. Though I agree with your statements that God is eternal and His thoughts are immutable; and because of this it does illustrate again that He is not constrained by His creation. However to define time as changing ideas only is a small part of what can be used to define time. If you take the movement we are aware of and movement that we are not aware of and combine it with the limitations of creation including the change of ideas or thoughts and move it in one direction then we have just begun to illustrate to our finite minds that we are no where near where God dwells. The original post speaks of the Biblical order of Salvation: the idea of order dictates time. So "in time" an order must be, but "outside time" God is all knowing. Just because God knows all and is not affected by time and order is there, God does all things decently and in order. The discussion goes on and on here about this order.... Did got in puppet style cause all things to happen with no will of man involved or does the will of man choose to accept what God revealed to man. Some say a person must be converted first before they will believe... why bother with belief if the choice was never theirs. It should be you are now saved because it was the "time" God choose for you to be saved, now you are changed and ready to go to heaven. God dealing with us in time does make a difference, and I agree that defining time is important, but as I have stated before true understanding of time is beyond our knowing because to know it in its fullest would put us in the realm of God. God exist outside outside of time and we exist inside of time, God can and does move in and out of time to deal with us personally and lovingly. We however can never move outside of time. I believe God sovereignty is based upon His being beyond His creation of time, it is not based upon making His creation a puppet stage with no will to choose Him.

Not precisely, no. However, the same difficulty would apply to an empiricist's Aristotelean framework. We can, however, approximate. We have memories, and those memories represent past experiences; that is, experiences which took place prior to a given succession of thought:

...what? Please write in complete sentences.

We can't use empirical principles as instruments with which to measure time. There are multiple problems with such methodology.

Temporally true, logically false. God's plan is filled with means unto ends. In this sense, we speak of the ends of God's plan as having logical precedence to the means; God effects A so B occurs, which is to say His reason for causing A was to effect B. To avoid constantly speaking in such loquacity, we colloquially refer to such design by referring to B as having logical precedence to A in God's mind, recognizing no temporal distinction takes place.

When I object to your contention that God knows an autonomous will logically prior to observation, in so doing I am directly contradicting the compatibility of your understanding of God's omniscience with God's eternality. Either He knows our deeds via observation - a rejection of eternal omniscience, for His knowledge would be contingent on a contingent creature - or He causes all things, in which case our wills are not autonomous. You can't have it both ways, and unless you submit a valid definition of time and eternity such that it is biblical and compatible with God's omniscience and the concept of autonomous men, then you have yet to address my argument.

Again, I can't understand you.

I think you are rejecting determinism by propping up the "robot" strawman. There is no incompatibility between a determined or caused will and a voluntary ("free" or "uncoerced" or "unforced") will. Choice is simply an execution of the will, and the will is predicated on one's strongest desires. By manipulating our desires through direct (e.g. regeneration) or secondary (e.g. ordaining evil spirits to tempt) causes, God causes what we will without violating the function of the will. Besides, robots don't have intellect or emotions. Your argument is dubious, and even if it weren't, it would not prove the concept is unbiblical.

You are attempting to monopolize the use of choice as though it necessarily contains the capacity to choose other than what we do. That begs the question, however, as "choose" is used in the very definition of "choose."

You have problems validly defining your terms.

Non sequitur. You can't just assert that and expect anyone to find it convincing. "I know that am I saved, therefore I am God." Does that make any sense? No. But it's in nowise dissimilar to what you just said. Your wish to muddy the waters just enough so that we have no conception of time is a sacrifice of the perspicuity of Scripture to preserve an unbiblical concept of election.

Straw man, and you still have not defined time, so if you're predicating God's sovereignty on an uncertainty, your ground for asserting God's sovereignty is likewise uncertain. Your house is built upon sand.

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OK: lets use your definition to time. However much I still think it is in no way even close to defining it completely. It is just one small aspect to illustrate time but by no means a final definition. With that said let us use it.
God has no changing ideas or thoughts therefore he is not confined to time. Since God is not confined by time you take that to mean that He determines the beginning to the end and there in not will of man because man being in time can not have a will or he or she would be God. Talk about circle reasoning.


Let us go back to the Biblical order of salvation.
Romans5:12Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:

1. Sin first

Romans 10:13For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. 14How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher? 15And how shall they preach, except they be sent? as it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things! 16But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Esaias saith, Lord, who hath believed our report? 17So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.

2. God's Word reveals truth (this is the written Word about the Living Word; Jesus Christ)

3. Word presented by a sent one: a person who obeys God by giving the word out.

4. People then hear the Word; whether this is by physical ears or eyes or any other form of communication needed for a person to understand the Word.

5. This person believes; this is something that takes place within view and acknowledgment of the mind of understanding by means of the work of the Holy Spirit revealing the truth and the drawing of the Father.

6 This person calls on the name of the Lord.

All of these takes place in time; no matter how you want to define time. At one point in time ( no thought of God... thought of God; using KNIGHT definition) I was changed. I wasn't saved, I am now saved. Did God have to wait for that time to save me or not? Did I have a choice at that time not to call on Him or not?

If I or anyone else did not have a choice or a will on anything then I feel that God has a cruel way of using the word "will" throughout the Bible. I feel that any passage that implies that anyone made any choice is unjust since no choice is ever truly made. Let me illustrate. "whosoever God make toto call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved" "with the heart which God makes man believe and with the mouth which God makes to confessis made unto righteousness. "For God so loved some people in the world that He gave is only begotten Son that whosoever God makes tobelieve in Him shall not perish but hath everlasting life that God made you have

I am not saying I have all the answers but if someone picked up a Bible and did not go to some fancy Seminary for two to four years and read John 3:16 he might actually believe that he had a choice. But that is not true the verse was misleading because God has already determined he would not be saved so he dies and goes to hell. Now I no there are some who say that it does not matter because it is God's plan and we should just accept it and move on. But I just do not believe God would imply will if there was none and a will made by God is no will. So if God makes me will then I have no will. Order of salvation takes place in time and involves a choice of man and never affects God's sovereignty because He is outside of time and never affected by time.

As you can't provide a definition, you have no grounds for asserting this.

No, I think I just whooped you in the last post so you have to contrive my beliefs to mean something other than that which I've clearly stated.

I didn't state this proves God determines all things, I stated this disproves your argument that determinism is incompatible with men choosing and willing. Respect me enough to put more effort into your replies, if you please. Or just shut up, and then neither of us will have to account for your straw men.

Either way, I stated determinism is a necessity because God cannot simultaneously be eternally omniscient and also have His knowledge cannot be contingent on contingent creatures. I explained why that is the case right here:

If you cannot rebut this objection, that's one thing. But to lie and call it circular is another.

Agreed.

Realistically, this is true (because God caused our decision). In the synergistic system, however, in which God does not cause our will, He necessarily knows of our acceptance of His word de facto by observing our acceptance of His word... which, again, is to say that His knowledge is contingent on ourselves (and we are contingent on Him), which is to say He knows via observation, which is to say He learns, which is to deny His eternal omniscience.

Monergistically, no. Syergistically, yes.

You would choose in even if He saved monergistically. To imply otherwise is to ignore another very clear argument I made:

This isn't a discussion if I'm the only one interacting with what's being said.

Again, you have not demonstrated that determinism is incompatible with choice and will, and you haven't even defined will (!), so I'm just going to laugh.

[quote=DW}I am not saying I have all the answers but if someone picked up a Bible and did not go to some fancy Seminary[/QUOTE]

Why does everyone think I go to seminary? I don't go to seminary. I've thought about it but have not.

He does! And if He kept reading through to Romans 9, He might actually believe choice and determinism are not incompatible, as I have shown.

Do you know what a bare assertion fallacy is? You're being intentionally ignorant.

You don't address the incompatibility between God's eternal omniscience and autonomy, so repeating your stupid comments is not helpful in the way of dialogue.

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Knight,

You keep accusing me of not defining words and being ignorant, stupid and other personal descriptions of my presentation. However you continue to assert the same idea with no backing. Your only argument that God must dictate and control all actions is because He of His attribute of all knowing. But this can not be proved unless we could fully understand what that means. The full understanding of this can only be understood by God because we can never understand omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent God. Your definition of time is incomplete and lacking any understanding of scope of God's creation. If we had a understanding of 95% of creation we still could not understand the fullness of time and space and the matter God created. We are going to be lacking knowledge. So to state that based upon your understanding of time you conclude that God must by His nature He controls all actions of man and their is no room for a will. To address your question to define will... again you try to argue that man has a will as long as God is in control of it and dictates all action. All language through out history has asserted that persons have a will, an ability to make an action take place.

I assert here that I do not have a full understanding of all of God's sovereignty and man's will to choose. My assertion is that God gave His word to man through the Scriptures and based upon common language and understanding through out the ages; the Scriptures assert that man must choose to turn to God. If God never intended this to be the truth He would have clearly stated in Scripture that no one has a choice whether they go to hell or heaven, no one has a choice whether they can sin or not. Adam had no choice but to sin against God in the garden. Satan had no choice but to rebel against God and the following angels had no choice but to follow Satan. Cain had no choice but to kill Abel. And rewarding Abel for his faith as stated in Hebrews 11 was a false hood because why reward Abel for faith since it was given by God and he had no choice. Why reward any action or condemn and action if there was no choice of this person to do anything.


So call me names and use useless criticisms, because if you are right you are only doing what God made you do, and I am doing what God makes me do. However I miss the passage of Scripture that shows that God wants and is directing His children to fight and argue. But you must be right and God is directing disorder.

Where have you defined time/eternity, then?

That's not the only argument for determinism, but I don't see why I should give you others when the one I already have provided is not yet refuted.

I understand what the words mean; I never said we could be omniscient. But if you don't think we can understand anything about what it means to be omniscient et. al., what point was there in revealing such info to us?

Prove it.

By that logic, one can't understand anything unless we are God.

I believe men has a will. Imbecile, how many times do I have to repeat myself?

Yea. And?

Of course, how do you know what a will is if you don't understand what omniscience is? Hm?

Then don't pretend as though you understand the veracity of my argument.

No one denies this. You have yet to demonstrate an incompatibility between men possessing the ability to choose in a deterministic world.

He does: see here and here.

He did choose to come to faith, because of God. You haven't established choice and determinism are incompatible. It's stupid comments like these for which I mock you.

They're only useless insofar as you do not take them constructively.

Which does not, as Paul writes in Romans 9, suffice as an excuse.

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