Thank you for the thorough response.
You have brought up a few vs's that I would like to discuss.
2Peter 3:9- "...none should perish...."- If it is truly Gods will that none should perish, then why do some men perish? God ALWAYS gets His will.
May I offer this explanation: Peter was directing this letter to a group of believers, it was the church or Body of Christ not "all men of the world" but the "you" was "believers". It is the doctrine of eternal security.
John 6:44- In this passage the word "drawn" in used....the aramaic word for this (don't have it at the tip of my fingers to share it, but I can get the reference for this if you would like), is only used 2 other times in the new testament. When Paul and Andrew (I think) got arrested it was used, and interpreted "they were 'dragged' before the authorities". Later in one of Pauls epistles he is entriting people "not to cross the rich, because they delight in dragging you before the courts".
I think you see my point. The word drawn in John 6:44 is not a word of "cooercion" but a word denoting a "forcefull pulling, or irresistable draw" (lexicon definition of that particular aramaic word). It is not a "wooing". Passages in Acts regarding the "appointed", Jesus claim that "My Church heres my voice" "my flock will recocnize my voice", "some are goats and others are sheep", goats don't speak sheep . Also in John Jesus says that "I don't pray for the whole world, only those that the Father has given me".
You quite correctly pointed out in your response, that God foreknows. You however, conveniently left out all discussion of where the Word clearly states "predestined" Romans 8:29-31...throughout Ephesians 1, and many others, in both the new and old test. If you grasp the passages on free will, and Gods foreknowledge, you must also recognize that God makes a clear distinction between "foreknowledge" and "predestination"
Paul clearly states he was predestined...Romans 9 tells us that Esau was, and Pharoh too. The old Test gives us this picture in the Election of the Jewish Nation, where it says "because you have been chosen, other nations will perish"
I assume you are inline with the doctrine of "we do nothing to gain our salvation" and as such, even a "choice" would be, to some extent, to merit Heaven: in that, the one who makes the choice is either "holier, smarter, wiser, more righteous" or something "more" than those who don't, and as such we have "earned" our salvation, if by nothing else by the fact that we recognized our need and others did not.
Scripture clearly talkes about 2 types of calls....and outer call the "the whole world" and an inner call, in which God reveals the truth to us....example is Jesuss' response to Peter when aske "who do u say I am"
Now I will backtrack....you can also quote me MANY vr's that support free will and "our choice". To be consistent, we cannot deny free will, since it is clearly a biblical doctrine. On the other hand, the message of election, or Gods predestination is also clearly evident, and seems to be a contradiction...yet I proffer that its a mere paradox, and one that is easily reconsiled.
How? The resolution of all biblical paradox's lie in first identifying the point of reference (such as we do in the scientific method, which by the way was first laid out in Genesis). What is the point of reference for election vs free will? It is from a multi-dimensional perspective.
If God predestined you to read this, and you "choose" to read this, how do you "EXPERIENCE" this? You, in the dimension will experience your "choice"....but if it was predestined, you would not experience any difference, you would still experience the actual choice.
In Gods existence He resides in a dimension where He can predestine (in fact scripture tells us He does) and in this dimension in which we live we actually make, and experience a choice. Both doctrines must coexist, and the denial of either clearly contradicts scripture.
I have a compilation of the volumn of vs's that describe both free will, and the set that discuss election, and the set of scripture that actually talk of BOTH in the same vs...when I have time, I will send them to you. The point is, we do not resolve seeming contradiction, by ignoring what scripture says about certain things (predestination) we must reconcile scripture as best we can, knowing there are NO CONTRADICTIONS in Gods Holy Word.
Interestingly, our muslim friends would completely agree with the theory of predestination...if they are at all familiar with there own rightings since the Quran clearly points it out. I dont use that as support for my claim, only an interesting aside.
Carol, it all comes down to understanding Gods purpose for us, Genesis explains that God created us as His ultimate means of defeating evil....how He chooses to do that through us is a mystery, but as you quoted in Romans 9, please reread it with what I have said in mind, especially 9:17-24. I think some of your points are addressed by Paul there.
I will not be able to respond until monday eve at the earlies..FISHING IN NEW ORLEANS this weekend...talk to you more I hope. You have well thought out, and thorough responses and I enjoy reading them.
Thanks