Lurker wrote:
Oh my, diggin' deep in the bag of dirty tricks, eh?....The verses you quoted fail to make your case. They were written as admonishments to Israel who had faith toward God and love of neighbor upon entering the Land of Promise but forsook God in time and He hid His face from them.

Lurker wrote:
Rom 1:21 Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.
I'll grant you one more opportunity to establish from scripture that all mankind has faith. By "faith" I mean in its biblical sense... "Deu 6:5 And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might."

I am not going to have space to deal with every error in this post- but Deut 6.5 is a commandment which calls for obedience not faith (it ain't a defn of faith), because this is addressed to a people where faith towards God is "presumed" - though for the most part it did not exist.

You might like to refer to the words actually used in the NT to get a better or biblical understanding of "faith".

John UK wrote:
Sure do, but I'm grateful that 'all things work together....etc.
Allow me to introduce you to the Lurker from USA, who is a Reformed Baptist (well, he was a few years ago), and who lurks about occasionally on SA, but who prefers the Reformed Baptist forums where he is more at home, away from these hyper wotsits who seem to dominate these forums to the detriment of many folks who might post some comment or other but who will not for fear of blasted out of cyberspace.
I think you'll find my ol' buddy Lurker is okay, and bears a good character. So far he has misunderstood your points, but give it time. He'll be agreeing with you in no time.

These forums are good for sanctification- one needs a great deal of patience, forbearance, endurance etc, and an ability to be insulted withouot taking it to heart.

Candle lit wrote:
Or, like Joe Biden telling the man in the wheelchair to stand up and take a bow? - Not pertinent to discussion, but similarly funny in odd sorta way.
-------------------
Actually, I wanted to call your attention to Psalm 20 - it only has 9 verses. Did you mean Psalm 22:27?

Oops! That was a typo.. should have read Ps 20.7

Lurker wrote:
Ah, finally some scripture... every one of them written to the house of Jacob upon whom God had set His love.

Lurker wrote:
Would you have me believe all Gentiles trusted God at one time and all fell away to unbelief?

Lurker wrote:
More philosophical musings but no scripture. Having trouble finding anything biblical to support your position?
Isa 41:21 Produce your cause, saith the LORD; bring forth your strong reasons, saith the King of Jacob.

John UK

Ever feel that you are hitting your head against a brick wall?

I am absolutely appalled at the level of comprehension displayed by these Hyper Calvs.

John UK wrote:
NOTE! The natural man exercises trust every day.

Lurker wrote:
More philosophical musings but no scripture. Having trouble finding anything biblical to support your position?
Isa 41:21 Produce your cause, saith the LORD; bring forth your strong reasons, saith the King of Jacob.

And what about Edwards and Luther- were they heretics? Frankly to say that their works were philosophical musings betrays your ignorance of these great works.

Psalm 49.6; Ps 52.7; Ps 62.10; Ps 115, 8 cf with v9; Ps 118.9; Ps 135.18; Ps 146.3, Prov 11.28 etc..

Kindle wrote:
....Hence your desperate attempts to validate a human faculty of "saving faith" in the pre-regenerate sinner...

Lurker wrote:
...As for Mike NY, I consider him a dear brother in Christ but we do not butt heads on secondary matters of theology.

Your position that there is no such thing as man's ability to believe and trust in anything pre conversion is patent nonsense.

If your position were correct then Martin Luther's great book would not have been called "Bondage of the Will", it would have been called "The non-existence of the will before conversion", and Rev. Jonathan Edwards would not, in his treatise "An enquiry into...the freedom of will", have been able to make the distinction between natural and moral inability. But perhaps you have not read either of these works.

They argue that man's natural abilities are in bondage to sin and need to be freed, not that these abilities do not exist in the first place and are created at conversion!

Your gospel to poor needy sinners is "repent and believe the gospel with faculties that you currently do not possess!!" This would be a natural inability. A bit like saying to someone who has had his arms amputed, raise your arms!!

You want scripture .. try Deut 32.37, Psalm 20.27.

Lurker wrote:
...Seems like the only holdout is *Calvinist Understanding*. Long on philosophical musings... short on scripture.
Too bad.
From the Song of Moses...
Deu 32:20 And he said, I will hide my face from them, I will see what their end shall be: for they are a very froward generation, children in whom is no faith.

Quoting scripture is easy and your ability to proof text is evident.. ONLY ONE BIG PROBLEM!- none of the texts support what you purport!!

But don't let that bother you too much.. it is the way of the Hyper Calvs.

E.g.Using Deut 32.20 to try to prove that men have no faith at all... What?!! Before conversion men and women operate in a vacuum? They do not believe and trust anything.. not idols, not themselves etc..

Wake up Lurker.. if you think you have a case start making it clear by opening up the scriptures and showing how it supports your view. Don't just pop in and out of the discussion with snide remarks. Aren't you supposed to be a moderator? How unworthy!

Mike wrote:
If an unbeliever hates the things of God, by what faculty does he do so? The accusers would say he cannot know anything of God, nor has any desire for anything spiritual, for he is totally unable. How is it the unbeliever hates the things of God, if they lack any ability in any spiritual matter?

These guys have real problems, because their systematic theologians do their thinking for them. They then use that as a grid to interpret scripture.

Faith per se must always be a gift, and if you cannot fall in with this then you are guilty of works righteousness. How so? Can they prove that faith is ever a work? No! But their systematic workbooks tell them that it must be so! And so they flock to SA to teach us all the true religion!

Likewise they talk about "dead in sins and tresspasses", and more often than not they mean there can be no relation to spiritual things, because the sinner is like a corpse. The problem is of course that the picture is very imperfect, because whilst it is true that there can be no movement towards spiritual good, there is plenty of movement aganist it. As you rightly point out, if a sinner is a corpse then there should no movement at all- not for and not against.

John UK wrote:
Thank you very much for that concise answer, CU.
G'night all, and may the Great Spirit lead many more sinners to the foot of The Cross.

John UK wrote:
No Kindle, you did not. ..
Or do you really want to continue the debate? Sure, I'm ready and waiting. Let's carry on.

Since you asked some questions, permit me to clarify.

MAN'S NATURE is endowed with certain faculties - the ability to hear, see, taste, smell etc.. but also the mind, the emotions, the will etc. Now man in the garden could have believed and trusted God. He chose not to, and since the fall, man's sinful nature means that there is an aversion to and a hatred of the things of God. Does this eradicate man's actual ability to believe and trust? No certainly not - he just chooses to believe and trust all sorts of things rather than God.

What then happens in conversion? These brainwashed Hyper Calvs say, why he is given an ability which he never possessed before!! Really?!!

The ability to believe is not new in the sense that this is something man has never had, but it is new in the sense that now it travels in a direction which prevously it would not.

John UK wrote:
Let me do this in ABC fashion for the babies here. And do not think I am being patronising, it is quite biblical to be a spiritual baby, as long as it does not go on for too long. We are predestined to grow - No growth = no predestination to life.
I said to C.U.
"You are not claiming an ability in man which he does not possess."
You = Calvinist Understanding
are not = are not
claiming = claiming
an ability in man = man's capability
which he = he (the man)
does not = does not
possess = is within him
Now the ability in man referred to is the ability to "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ" and thus be saved.
Or to put it another way, the natural man is incapable of saving faith.
Or to put it another way, the natural man can see nothing in Christ which would cause him to even desire to believe on him.
Or to put it another way, man is spiritually dead, and is therefore unable to go in the right direction.
He trusts in things, he believes certain things, but that trust and believe is never towards Christ.

Kindle wrote:
Yes John
.....However you and CU should make it abundantly clear to one and all that you are devout Arminians! - AND you wouldn't know the Biblical Doctines of Grace from Roman catholic dogma if you tried.
An honest confession would suffice fellas......

Where is your proof? Able to produce any quotes (assuming that you undestood them in the first place!) from either of us to convict us of the charge of Arminianism?

Or are you just another fractious and pretentious Hyper Calv posturing on SA?

John UK wrote:
It is true that many folks here simply do not read carefully enough before they respond.
Even a turnip like me knows that you are not claiming an ability in man which he does not possess. Am I right in saying that the faculty which can believe or trust, is a faculty of the natural man? And that in the awakened man, this faculty is able to trust in Jesus Christ as having died for his sin, something which previously he was not able to do?
Or something akin to that?

suspicion wrote:
"Faith in the living God and his Son Jesus Christ is always the result of the new birth, and can never exist except in the regenerate. Whoever has faith is a saved man."
(Charles Spurgeon “Faith and Regeneration”)
"If salvation is the implantation of a new, infinite life in the soul, it must be a work of God. Self-caused effects can never rise above the character or qualities of their cause. "Flesh gives birth to flesh but the Spirit gives birth to Spirit," Jesus told Nicodemus. This saving grace cannot be caused by the creature, it can only come from God....blah blah.

DJC49 wrote:
Good!
I notice that you've FINALLY gotten around to calling *rogerant* by his actual name (Roger) instead of your insulting "Roge"[Rant].
It appears that my chastisements and rebukes towards you have finally produced some good fruit!
And it took you only ... what ... 7 posts before you eventually ceased with your subtly insulting "Roge" innuendo?
Woof! Woof!

DJC49 wrote:
You deserved every bit of the "antagonism." ....

Additionally Roger is a full grown man capable of looking after himself and I am sure that he does not need you to act as his pitbull, even if you have the loudest bark and sharpest teeth on these forums.

Now get off your soap box, humble yourself and make your peace with God.

DJC49 wrote:
My defense of a true brother against some wiseguy newbie was totally just. You WERE out of line and deserved a rebuke.
And it's *Roger* or *rogerant* ... not "Roge" (just so you can put a "Rant" after it and CONTINUE to be a DH by referring to him as *Roge RANT*)

Good to know you still love me!

DJC49 wrote:
Yes, vague.
Perhaps more precisely: "elusive"
...You strongly implied that man's natural faith was sufficient in the salvation event.

From a previous posting you made, to appearances you seemed to understand that all I have been arguing for is that the faculty of faith is not something acquired at conversion, and that post conversion it is still the same faculty.. not another new and previously unknown one that is in use.

In fact I have taken the trouble to look at your postings under the thread "what is faith" and to my pleasant surprise you appear to have made the same case.

I have made no comment about the ability of this faculty to secure salvation, aided or unaided, until someone accused me of stating that it could be secured without the work of the Holy Spirit.

suspicion wrote:
"Faith" as a human faculty/ability in the sinners natural estate, which some imply is carried over by the Holy Spirit unto salvation, is still salvation by works. This is a similar heresy to that of Wesley and his "Temporary" bit of grace to tickle the sinner into making a choice.
...blah blah blah..

Did God have to give you a new ability to "will"; an ability you did not previously possess? Or did God change the direction of that will so that what you previously would have willed no longer gives you pleasure and what previously you hated now you will to happen?

Leave your "my logic" theology to one side and think biblically. When God says you are "born again", that you are a new creature etc. - do you start thinking like Nicodemus and ask "can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born?"

DJC49 wrote:
*Calvinist Understanding* --
I'm gonna ask you kindly to not willfully misinterpret what I post.
I recently bent over backwards trying to determine what YOU said about faith, and had to dig rather deeply through your posts to come to some sort of conclusion via deduction as you were extremely vague in all your (non)definitions of the word.

What have you been reading - you will find in numerous of my posts immediately after the word faith the deifnition - "the ability to believe and trust" .. now what part of that is difficult or vague?

DJC49 wrote:
IF grace is not involved, then natural faith remains misdirected and thereby INEFFECTUAL

DJC49 wrote:
So if you wish to remain an antagonist for the mere sake of being antagonistic, then you and I have a problem.

DJC49 wrote:
Now as far as "whosoever" meaning anyone...