Matt and Bob, you both have some great things to say, and I think I agree with you. And I also agree with you, Richard. (Though I’m mad at you – not really – for “stealing” the parent/child analogy I already had decided to use.
)
So Matt’s points about us needing God and realistically not being able to resist Him forever were excellent. I can’t remember exactly what Bob said, but it was good
and since I read it, it’s in me – like a grape I’ve eaten. The seed is there and has nourished and changed me
. It’s too hard to go back and find it in this response window at the moment, though.
Anyway, in addition to these things ya’ll have said, I would like to open up the parent child thing a little bit more. A three year old does not have a lot of freedom – though in a sense he has both as much and more freedom as an adult. He can choose the next thing he will do or say and no one can stop him. We can attempt to deter and discourage him from making choices we don’t like, but anyone who has been the parent of a toddler knows just how much immediate control is available to the parent. If it isn’t pure hands-on physical force, there’s no way to persuade the child if he’s unwilling.
Yet he doesn’t have many options open to him, really. He can’t truly save up his money and go out and buy a pony or even a puppy without his parents’ blessing. But as he matures, he becomes more free. He grows up; he gets both choices and responsibilities, and he can make those choices. From his pov he seems to be making those choices freely. (Because maybe he hasn’t heard about the whole existence of free will debate!) And I think that maybe our Father is doing the same thing the loving and competent parent does; that is, equipping us to handle freedom and setting us free little by little as we gain mastery over ourselves.
'Will He allow us to permanently and irrevocably damage ourselves or others? No. We don’t have the freedom to do that. Some Arminians would disagree, though, and it causes painful anxiety in their hearts. A person we care about but never felt right about witnessing to has died suddenly and we believe they must be in hell, and we believe that it’s OUR FAULT! Or I am a Christian but I don’t feel I’m devout enough and because I can lose my salvation at any moment, I live in fear and worry that I may not be doing enough to please God (even though I believe that I believe the just live by faith, not works). Or maybe I’m an Arminian preacher and, Chan-like, I look out over my congregation and know them to be mostly worldly people and my heart aches for them because they aren’t seeking God, obeying God, desiring God enough (how much is enough, btw?) I am afraid, genuinely afraid, that most of them are hell-bound and I can’t do anything about it. They aren’t getting it.
All that fear! It is not of God. No, they will not be permitted to permanently harm themselves, and I also will not be permitted to permanently harm them. But up to a certain point, they do get to choose. They get to choose quite an amazing lot, even to the point that many people looking on say, “If there is a god, why does he allow this sort of thing? I want nothing to do with such a god.” And it isn’t difficult to understand why they say it.
So . . . I say with Bob that He is leading us into freedom but that we aren’t really there until we’re free. Free from the tyranny of sin and the domination of the flesh. When we are perfect, then we will be free. The elect? IMO, they get there sooner and get to turn back and help the stragglers. “What would Father say if we came home without the others?”
Love, Cindy