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spenlake
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| Posted 1/5/2006 1:03 PM (GMT -6) |   | | God promised with certainty to Zacharias that John the Baptist would be filled with the Holy Spirit while in the womb and that John would have the ministry in the spirit of Elijah.
Do babies in the womb have freewill to accept or reject God?
Did John have freewill to reject this certain promise of God to Zacharias?
If John rejected it would it have made God a liar?
Is John an exception?
Did God limit the opions or choices between which John could exercise his freewill?
Did God give John the desires He wished John to have such that John chose that God had promised?
Other?
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PotOnWheel
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| Posted 1/5/2006 5:53 PM (GMT -6) | | | Free will means will acting the way it was created to act -- before the fall.
True free will is present when slavery to sin and death is absent.
But the catch is, this side of the new heaven and the new earth we still have the domination of death.
So, the ultimate freedom for the Christian is martyrdom. As a monk from Mount Athos said, "They can never rob us of our death. And they might even help us." Billy Graham might not have said this so boldly, but I'm sure he quoted the vers that "All who desire to live Godly in Chirst Jesus shall be persecuted. And the Beatitudes teach us a lot.
. . .
As to John the Baptist in utero, your mention of it leads me to ask whether the consequences of the fall reach into the womb. I'm sure they do. And that would highlight, again, that the Spirit was active with him even there.
But listening to the way we speak of it -- as Americans, or Moderns, or Consumers -- we begin framing our thoughts that lead back to assumptions different from a biblical understanding of free will (as with above). Us shoppers what sales and two-for-one's. Coupons. Rebates. Above all we want CHOICES. And we don't feel free unless we have more than one choice.
. . .
But we have two living examples from scripture to help us out of our consumer mentality. Mary and her son Jesus. Jesus could pray with his human mind, will and emotions "Not my will but Thine" and mean it without any hesitation, regret, or reconsideration. Pain...yes. Bodily fear...yes. Forboding...yes. But not "deliberative will" as some call it. Not comparison shopping with partial commitment and incomplete resolve. And the much blessed woman--as they Angel said she would be--gives us the example of being overwelmed a-plenty, but in that and even with it retaining the willingness to be God's servant (hand maid). She trusted and loved God her creator, and knew that she was part of something bigger than herself, that would bring justice to the world. Afraid...yes. But also "yes" in her response.
. . .
IMHO, whatever episodes in their lives God used to develop them in character, the in utero of John and the annunciation of Gabriel were not tests, but were oportunities for service and worship. They were certainly not dimunitions of free will. They were paramount examples of free will, to the max. And they that loved God were certainly protected and kept from stumbling -- just as God will do for us EVERY TIME WE TURN TO HIM, OR RUN TO HIM, AND ASK.
. . .
What we can learn from all this, for our own lives, is to turn to God. To recognize temptation and implement the Lord's Prayer -- "when we are tempted, help us not to fall."
And when we come to God and pray that, we preserve free will in ourselves.
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PotOnWheel
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| Posted 1/15/2006 3:23 PM (GMT -6) | | Freedom is the capacity to do what one wants... that is, what one wants way, way, way down. To live according to one's calling, in whatever task that might be, in a manner that is in accordance to one's creational-design.
But freedom is not measured by what is unavailable. When Samuel was in his mother's womb he could choose to kick or not to kick. Neither choice involved not acting his age or species. But he was limited, certainly, by lack of writing material and education from keeping a journal.
So, we see, that limits on numbers of things that can be chosen does not figure into whether there is free sill or not. Whether one can select between Coke or Pepsi does not achieve free will. Nor does being limited to only water. Free will is challenged if the regulation of saline levels is misperceived in the brain (or however that dangerous malidy is triggered).
Human free will extends beyond nature. We have expansive similarities with the rest of the Creation. And in others we have the capacity, the potential of reflecting the image of God. (Only Chirst IS the exact image of the Father; we can "image" his image.) So, more is involved in our free will than, say, a bobcat. WE, of all creatures, can have free will even when it is not in our natural physiology's interest. (This statement opens up some reflection on natural-selection's sacrifices--but only to a point.) WE can bear our Cross in the image of Christ.
Our culture says that "freedom" is found in numerical choices. WE must use our free will to decide against the self-interest of that view. We must choose and not effectually have the choice made for us.
When Isaiah said what is written on Bethel's cornerstone overlooking Lake Valentine ( "Send me." ) the free will in THAT is not reflected in the numerical opposites involved. FREE WILL is found in the HEART'S ECHOING of its master's voice. And prior to that calling, it was HOPE that heard what had not been contained in sound yet. Sustained by hope the nature created by God waited. And waiting was faith. And hearing, it responded with the one answer that it always knew its mouth was designed to speak. And it lept at the opportunity.
Amen.
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PotOnWheel
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| Posted 1/15/2006 5:29 PM (GMT -6) | | I shared all of this long-winded writing of mine with someone else. And he boiled it down to what he sees in Galatians 5:1 & 13, and in I Cor. 12 and in II Cor. 5.:
- "Freedom always serves a purpose beyond itself..."
- "Paul's vision of Christ is that freedom serves the purposes of love..."
- "Freedom in Christ serves the well-being of others. Christ has come to set us free, free again to serve the purposes of love as God created us to do. I am, and my will is, truly free when I am free to serve the purpose of love--in all of my relationships."
- "In that sense free will stands at the heart of the gospel of Jesus Christ. It always serves to build others up rather than to limit or tear them down. It was ours pre-fall and is ours today as well, though *this* freedom is not what most seem to want."
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Sahid
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| Posted 1/15/2006 6:05 PM (GMT -6) | | | "Freedom is the capacity to do what one wants.." (and nothing else)
So let's say I find myself a victim and hypnotize him into intensely desiring to eat bugs and live in the desert. I've liberated him! I then find some kids at a playground, give them a free taste of some illicit drug and get them hooked. Being a benevolent pusher, I continue to supply the means for satisfying their desire at no cost to them. Have I set them free? Yes! I've set them free to fulfill their desire (never mind that the desire itself is not itself free). Just so long as I enslave them to something they want anyway, we can call enslavement freedom. The person is free, but the will is not?
Once again the idea makes enough sense, it's just that we've chosen a very peculiar label for that idea. Freedom = bondage to one's fulfilled desire. OK. That's just not what people commonly mean when they use that word. It's calling grass red, and then redefining the term to make the claim true. At best it's unnecessarily confusing.
Watch me fly. Freedom like wings and I will use them. Freedom like wings and I will spread them wide. - StavesacrePost Edited (Sahid) : 1/15/2006 5:08:28 PM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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spenlake
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| Posted 1/15/2006 9:33 PM (GMT -6) | | Sahid,
What about the questions in the original post?
Did Jeremiah have a real choice? Jeremiah said in chapter 20:
For each time I speak, I cry aloud;
I proclaim violence and destruction,
Because for me the word of the LORD has resulted
In reproach and derision all day long.
But if I say, “I will not remember Him
Or speak anymore in His name,”
Then in my heart it becomes like a burning fire
Shut up in my bones;
And I am weary of holding it in,
And I cannot endure it.
This is what God said to Jeremiah regarding Jeremiah's life in 1:5.
"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, And before you were born I consecrated you;I have appointed you a prophet to the nations."
In a contrarian perspective, look at how God views the actions of Jacob in the womb in Hosea 12:2.
The LORD also has a dispute with Judah,
And will punish Jacob according to his ways;
He will repay him according to his deeds.
In the womb he took his brother by the heel,
And in his maturity he contended with God.
Spen Lake
Post Edited (spenlake) : 1/15/2006 8:47:59 PM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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| Posted 1/15/2006 11:40 PM (GMT -6) | |
Sahid said...
"Freedom is the capacity to do what one wants.." (and nothing else)
...it's just that we've chosen a very peculiar label for that idea.
Freedom = bondage to one's fulfilled desire.
OK, that's YOUR definition. One definition
Another is this: "...freedom serves the purposes of love..."
And the second is the one that I'm more familiar with... that I've seen modeled in more Christian's lives, and seen bloom in lives that formerly were bound by the definition you suggested, S.
Ask those in Prison Fellowship which is THEIR definition of freedom. You can reach them at: http://www.pfm.org/AM/Template.cfm? What do they know about freedom. True freedom.
Then pick what definition YOU want.
I've decided for "me, and my household."
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Sahid
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| Posted 1/16/2006 4:54 AM (GMT -6) | | |
IF the Bible says that a person's actions are not free and IF the Bible is right about that person, then I don't see why we can't go ahead and say that their freedom has been compromised (or never given in the first place). This might very well be the case with Jerry and Jake. God is allowed to make free humans, machines, and everything in between. The only potential problems come when God punishes or ascribes guilt to an unfree action. That isn't the case with John, Jerry, or Jake.
POW, if free means free to/for love, then we are only talking about one specific type of freedom. In particular, a person with this freedom is not free to make moral decisions. They are unfree in this very significant way. If "freedom [necessarily] serves the purposes of love" then it's not really freedom we are talking about. Freedom is the opposite of being bound to serve/slavery. You (and Prison Fellowship) can go ahead and use a language in which yes means no and free means unfree, but your words will be very difficult to understand. It's like saying an apple falling from the tree is free, when what you mean is that it's free only to be a slave to gravity. It comes across as (and I think it is) deceptive.
Watch me fly. Freedom like wings and I will use them. Freedom like wings and I will spread them wide. - Stavesacre | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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| Posted 1/16/2006 2:14 PM (GMT -6) | |
Sahid said...
to say that freedom itself is defined as slavery is to rob the language of meaning. To say that you can't say that is to rob "the language" (or all languages) of their poetry.
(And ruin a lot of good sonnets and love songs...)
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PotOnWheel
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| Posted 1/16/2006 6:46 PM (GMT -6) | | | | |
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PotOnWheel
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| Posted 1/16/2006 7:40 PM (GMT -6) | | spenlake said...
God promised with certainty to Zacharias that John the Baptist would be filled with the Holy Spirit while in the womb and that John would have the ministry in the spirit of Elijah.
PoW: You are saying "would have the ministry in the spirit of Elijah."
How do you get lack of free will from that--to "have?"
Then, the actual passage says:
13But the angel said to him: "Do not be afraid, Zechariah;
your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear
you a son, and you are to give him the name John. 14He
will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice
because of his birth, 15for he will be great in the sight of
the Lord. He is never to take wine or other fermented drink,
and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even from birth. [b]
16Many of the people of Israel will he bring back to the Lord
their God. 17And he will go on before the Lord, in the spirit
and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to their
children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous
—to make ready a people prepared for the Lord."
All that I see is that "he will be filled with the Holy Spirit." So THEN we need to ask whether in the created nature of mankind--who are like nature in some respects and like God in other respects--to "be filled with the Holy Spirit. I think, from scripture, that this is the natural created-for state of humanity, and that anything short of this is unnatural. (So, lots of us are unnatural--falling short what God created us for.) Christ is the perfect man, and in Him we see Spirit fulled humanity.
So, this is no impossition, no loss that John would be filled with the Spirit, and remain so. (What blessing.)
spenlake said...
Do babies in the womb have freewill to accept or reject God?
PoW: This really asks whether they are free from sin.
And we have to ask whether there is anything compelling that would make them be compelled to reject the theanthropos (lover of mankind). Everyone inherits the consequences of original sin. (But not guilt.) One does not have to "accept" what one is not separated from.
So, what do you think, Spen? Rejecting God is not free will; its bondage. In the womb I don't imagine John being so bondaged. And "accepting" is not necessary for one "dwelling with" and "filled with the Spirit.
So, the question kinda' dissolves.
spenlake said...
Did John have freewill to reject this certain promise of God to Zacharias?
PoW: Doesn't seem that John, in particular, can reject what is promised to his father, and not to him. He's not party to the promising.
"Promises" to John are ongoing presence, and not suddenly beginning or impending matters. The Spirit "fills" or "is filling" or makes him "full" in language that John Stott points out in Greek is "continually fill-ed/filling -- recalling a flowing stream.
I get icecubes put in my glass, on a promise. But dropping my glass in a river...it just stays wet!!!
spenlake said...
If John rejected it would it have made God a liar?
PoW: By now I can see that this question/statement is vapor.
Seriously. John, and Mary, freely acted on behalf of themselves as they personally were. John acted and spoke. And Mary said "yes."
God knew them. The whole world had been prepared for them. And they were the culmination of the whole world. Allegorically, John "was" the Elijah. And the whole Old Testement had to be written to lead up to Mary. God did not hold his breath when Mary was asked by the Angel. Neither did God doubt John's ability or John's relationship.
Why are relationships so little thought about? The Bible is all about relationships!
spenlake said...
Is John an exception?
PoW: Exceptional. Pivotal. But not the only one filled with the Spirit.
spenlake said...
Did God limit the opions or choices between which John could exercise his freewill?
PoW: NO, NO... No... The opposite. It is because of freedom that John's "options or choices" would be either expanded or amplified. Just LOOK at the things he did in his life. Can you match that. Anyone can do just anything, and lots of anythings at that. But what of it. What's that worth. What are lots of nothings worth.
But John did a few extremely profound things. . . things singularly essential to the entire comos.
John warned. John baptized for repentance in preparatoin of the "One". John Baptized the humanity, body and soul of the one who would redeem not only John and the onlookers, but the very water itself from the resulting curse of the fall. !!! John saw the Trinity revealed, as the Father spoke of the Son and the Spirit decended as a dove.
No limits. Infinities focused!!!
spenlake said...
Did God give John the desires He wished John to have such that John chose that God had promised?
PoW: This becomes a very, very, very extreemly important question IF we consider this a question about OURSELVES !!!!!
Are OUR lives "limited" by being filled with the Holy Spirit? (No.)
Is our love of God forced? (No.)
Are desires to be filled with the Spirit unnatural, and alien gifts. (No.)
And...
Were the promises that God made to Zachariah completley inline with what God had been doing all along in human history, even before sin? (Yes.)
Zachariah was promised and John worked towards the reuniting of God and man and of man and mankind.
Nothing could be more completing of humanity.
And the MOST completely completing act in history was Christ's sacrifice on the Cross. Of his own free human will.
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Sahid
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| Posted 1/17/2006 4:09 AM (GMT -6) | | | POW: So, this is no impossition, no loss that John would be filled with the Spirit, and remain so. (What blessing.)
Zach: I agree with what I think you mean by this. Being filled with the spirit is a very good thing. It is a condition that allows for much freedom. What John is unfree in is his ability to choose to be in this condition in the first place.
Let's say there is a train track with a fork in it. The fork on the left leads off a cliff to death. The fork on the right leads to a countryside full of more forks in the road and pleasant scenery. To take the right fork is to experience more freedom, certainly. But if God makes it so that you are unable to choose the left fork, then you have not been given freedom in that respect.
Maybe God set John on a path full of choices and freedom, but that path itself was not freely chosen. With regard to the overall direction of his life, John was a slave. Apparently, he had no freedom at all to refuse to be filled with the spirit.
Watch me fly. Freedom like wings and I will use them. Freedom like wings and I will spread them wide. - Stavesacre | | Back to Top | | |
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JEE
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| Posted 1/17/2006 5:16 AM (GMT -6) | | However wonderfully blessed John's pre-birth experience with the Holy Spirit was, he still had to choose to continue in that relationship with God, hearing and obeying His voice, every single day of his life. John was in no way exempted from the universal requirement that we love God supremely and our neighbor as ourself. At one point near the end of John's life, he sent messengers to ask Jesus if he REALLY was the Messiah or not, even though God had plainly revealed that fact to the baptizer early on in Jesus' ministry (John 1), so it seems clear that John was a man of similar passions as we. Profoundly human, but human still.
Similarly, Paul's Damascus Road experience did not obliterate his power to choose, it illuminated his consciousness to an especially heightened degree, thus making Paul even MORE accountable for his choices. Several years after His experience on the Damascus Road, Paul said to King Agrippa, "I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision." What is disobedience if obedience is not possible?
If we are responsible for what we know (the degree of light that we have), especially illuminated people such as Paul and John the Baptist are not LESS morally free to choose, they are MORE so. "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty."
John
Post Edited (JEE) : 1/17/2006 4:19:55 AM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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| Posted 1/17/2006 6:01 PM (GMT -6) | |
Sahid said...
What John is unfree in is his ability to choose to be in this condition in the first place. Well, the REAL 'spot on the road' for determinism is your very existence. A(Albeit your parents had a say.) You did not ask to be "born."
So. you did not ask to be born. No say. It was not up to you.
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spenlake
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| Posted 1/18/2006 7:39 AM (GMT -6) | |
JEE said...
However wonderfully blessed John's pre-birth experience with the Holy Spirit was, he still had to choose to continue in that relationship with God, hearing and obeying His voice, every single day of his life. John was in no way exempted from the universal requirement that we love God supremely and our neighbor as ourself. At one point near the end of John's life, he sent messengers to ask Jesus if he REALLY was the Messiah or not, even though God had plainly revealed that fact to the baptizer early on in Jesus' ministry (John 1), so it seems clear that John was a man of similar passions as we. Profoundly human, but human still.
Similarly, Paul's Damascus Road experience did not obliterate his power to choose, it illuminated his consciousness to an especially heightened degree, thus making Paul even MORE accountable for his choices. Several years after His experience on the Damascus Road, Paul said to King Agrippa, "I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision." What is disobedience if obedience is not possible?
If we are responsible for what we know (the degree of light that we have), especially illuminated people such as Paul and John the Baptist are not LESS morally free to choose, they are MORE so. "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty."
John
John,
I agree with you that we are held responsible to continue and persevere. Blessed are those who persevere for they will receive an inheritance... I thought of the passage where John was doubting when I wrote the questions. In some way John knew Jesus' mission (behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world) yet somehow it wasn't so clear to John when Jesus didn't immediately judge the wicked and extablish His civil kingdom. I think that the challenges we face with our own doubts are often similar in that mentally we know that Jesus took our sin and is returning to extablish His kingdom and set things right, yet the fact that He doesn't set things right immediately causes us doubt. I think that this is the same doubt as that of John. Our intellectual agreement concerning the "Lamb of God" has a disconnect with an apparent lack of God's power/kingdom. Thus our faith in the sufficiency in the work of the Lamb of God to forgive our sins is assailed by doubts.
It is encouraging and comforting that Jesus, even though He didn't break John out of jail as He certainly had the power to do, sent John comforting words and encouraged him to persevere in his faith in the Lamb.
Spen Lake
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Sahid
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| Posted 1/22/2006 5:13 PM (GMT -6) | | | POW: So. you did not ask to be born. No say. It was not up to you.
Zach: Agreed. I did not have the freedom to choose to be born. In that way I am unfree. John the Baptist was (apparently) even more unfree than I.
POW: btw, while the Roman Cath. church tends to think about "guilt, the Eastern half thinks of sin as causing sickness.
Zach: I think both are good ways of thinking about it.
Watch me fly. Freedom like wings and I will use them. Freedom like wings and I will spread them wide. - Stavesacre | | Back to Top | | |
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JEE
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| Posted 1/25/2006 2:21 PM (GMT -6) | | A couple of days ago I was watching with my three-year-old daughter the Veggie Tales movie, "Jonah" (a cute and funny movie even for oddball adults like me, actually). While watching it, I was struck with the fact (which I guess I had seen before in the Book of Jonah itself, but hadn't noticed before) that Jonah NEVER really had a heart that was right. All through the book, he operates from ungodly motives of self-preservation, cultural prejudice, and general selfish malevolence. The end of the book finds God rebuking the prophet for caring more for his own comfort (afforded by the gourd God caused to grow as a shade for Jonah) than for the welfare of the people of Nineveh "and much cattle."
What really struck me was the fact, so often and so sadly observed, that a person may in fact be MIGHTILY used by God without even himself having a pure heart. Could this sort of thing be what Jesus was referring to in Matt. 7:21-23?
So the question of whether or not John the Baptist was regenerate in his mother's womb seems moot with regard to his divinely ordained role as a prophet of God. The same God could use a donkey to speak for Him if need be.
John
Post Edited (JEE) : 1/25/2006 1:24:28 PM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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Sahid
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| Posted 1/25/2006 3:45 PM (GMT -6) | | That's cool. I think it is right to distinguish between the work God deterministically does through a person and the choices of that person. There is also sometimes (or maybe in every free action) a synthesis in which we are free to act as we choose, but God uses our actions for his purposes. Like in the book of Habakkuk and Isaiah 10.
5 "Woe to the Assyrian, the rod of my anger,
in whose hand is the club of my wrath!
6 I send him against a godless nation,
I dispatch him against a people who anger me,
to seize loot and snatch plunder,
and to trample them down like mud in the streets.
7 But this is not what he intends,
this is not what he has in mind;
his purpose is to destroy,
to put an end to many nations...
12 When the Lord has finished all his work against Mount Zion and Jerusalem, he will say, "I will punish the king of Assyria for the willful pride of his heart and the haughty look in his eyes. 13 For he says:
" 'By the strength of my hand I have done this,
and by my wisdom, because I have understanding.
I removed the boundaries of nations,
I plundered their treasures;
like a mighty one I subdued their kings...
16 Therefore, the Lord, the LORD Almighty,
will send a wasting disease upon his sturdy warriors;
under his pomp a fire will be kindled
like a blazing flame.
Watch me fly. Freedom like wings and I will use them. Freedom like wings and I will spread them wide. - Stavesacre | | Back to Top | | |
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