What happens at death?

QBD2

Old Mossy Horns
Ain't buying that. If He created the mechanism and the capacity for sin, both in the devil and in us, and he knew we were going to do it, being omniscient and all, He created it.

For instance, say you bake some cookies. You leave one out on the counter knowing full well your kid was gonna eat it. You don't tell him to eat it, you don't tell him not to. You merely leave it on the counter...regardless of what he does or doesn't do, you still made the cookie...
 
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Helium

Old Mossy Horns
Ain't buying that. If He created the mechanism and the capacity for sin, both in the devil and in us, and he knew we were going to do it, being omniscient and all, He created it.

For instance, say you bake some cookies. You leave one out on the counter knowing full well your kid was gonna eat it. You don't tell him to eat it, you don't tell him not to. You merely leave it on the counter...regardless of what he does or doesn't do, you still made the cookie...

As a Christian and a minister, I will give credence to your argument if you want to argue that he couldve prevented it or even the desire or freewill to do so. However, you are on a slippery slope of God creating robots.

Either way, you are right...God is in control, all powerful, and all knowing. The beauty is that although he knew we woukd sin He still chooses to love us. He knows our darkest secrets..even us blaming Him...yet He still sent His Son to die for our sins and offer eternal life and heaven. God restores anything that has been unrestored if we allow it.

QBD..love Him or hate Him = He still loves you.

The questions you have are legit. I truly believe most people have a problem with the idea of ultimate authority
 
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Swamp_Donkey

Eight Pointer
Romans 14:10-12. I am sure not all believe it, but I believe that all will eventually believe.

10 …..For we will all stand before Godʼs judgment seat. 11 It is written: “ ‘As surely as I live,’ says the Lord, ‘every knee will bow before me; every tongue will acknowledge God.’ ” 12 So then, each of us will give an account of ourselves to God.

Not sure if I am reading you right, but what you are referring to is universalism. The bible is pretty clear that not everyone will be saved, just look at the NT. Spurgeon once said that he is confident that Christ will get the victory (more saved than unsaved). But the notion that everyone is saved is not correct, I wish it were true.

When it says in Philippians "that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in Heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord" I believe that is referring to the notion that when you die and you are before God, the only appropriate response is to tell Him that He is God. In other words, I believe what it is saying is that even if you were not a believer on earth, when you are in front of the Lord after death, the God who made the universe, the only response will be that Jesus is Lord. That will not make you saved at that point, it is only the correct and appropriate response.
 

Swamp_Donkey

Eight Pointer
Ain't buying that. If He created the mechanism and the capacity for sin, both in the devil and in us, and he knew we were going to do it, being omniscient and all, He created it.

For instance, say you bake some cookies. You leave one out on the counter knowing full well your kid was gonna eat it. You don't tell him to eat it, you don't tell him not to. You merely leave it on the counter...regardless of what he does or doesn't do, you still made the cookie...

Regarding your first paragraph, I believe God allowed the possibility for man to sin and would permit it to happen as we see in the Old Testament.

Regarding your scenario about cookies, it's important to note that Adam and Eve were not kids and we can probably assume that they were fully aware of right and wrong.
Genesis 2:16 The Lord God commanded the man, saying, "From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day you eat from it you will surely die."

That is a pretty strong warning to not do something, the cookie kid was tricked
 

badlandbucks

Ten Pointer
Regarding your first paragraph, I believe God allowed the possibility for man to sin and would permit it to happen as we see in the Old Testament.

Regarding your scenario about cookies, it's important to note that Adam and Eve were not kids and we can probably assume that they were fully aware of right and wrong.
Genesis 2:16 The Lord God commanded the man, saying, "From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day you eat from it you will surely die."

That is a pretty strong warning to not do something, the cookie kid was tricked

Very well put. God gave humans the gift of free will out of love. God's purpose cannot however be altered by human decisions. He will always accomplish his purpose; if people on earth misuse their free will and alter the course of the outworking of God's will, he simply uses a different method to accomplish the same goal. God's purpose was never for Adam and Eve to sin and die. They were instructed to live eternally on earth and fill it with perfect humans. They made the choice to sin and did not achieve that, but God is not going to let that change to final outcome. His original plan for mankind will be accomplished. That is why he sent his son to earth do give a ransom. If Adam had never made the wrong choice and sent humans down the path of sin, there would never have been a need for Jesus to provide a ransom to create a way out of sin. Now every person has the opportunity to exercise their free will to either put faith in that ransom, or not. The final outcome will not change based on which one we decide, only whether or not we will be able to be a part of it or not.
 

Weekender

Twelve Pointer
Romans 9 seems to be one of those arguments against free will. I realize sound biblical or literary critiquing requires the reader to interpret the "unclear" with the "clear," and to interpret the part by the whole and not vice versa. But that chapter always troubled me back when I was still a believer. It seems to imply that God used the people in question like wind-up toys. That all of Esau's faults were programmed in him. The same with Pharoah.
 

badlandbucks

Ten Pointer
Romans 9 seems to be one of those arguments against free will. I realize sound biblical or literary critiquing requires the reader to interpret the "unclear" with the "clear," and to interpret the part by the whole and not vice versa. But that chapter always troubled me back when I was still a believer. It seems to imply that God used the people in question like wind-up toys. That all of Esau's faults were programmed in him. The same with Pharoah.


It sounds as if the part that troubles you about that passage is knowing the difference between foreknowledge and foreordination. Yea they are big words, but they have different meanings. Foreknowledge means knowledge of a thing before it happens or exists; also called prescience. In the Bible it relates primarily, though not exclusively, to God the Creator and his purposes. Foreordination means the ordaining, decreeing, or determining of something beforehand; or the quality or state of being foreordained. To understand the matter of foreknowledge and foreordination as relating to God, certain factors necessarily must be recognized. First, God’s ability to foreknow and foreordain is clearly stated in the Bible. God himself sets forth as proof of his Godship this ability to foreknow and foreordain events of salvation and deliverance, as well as acts of judgment and punishment, and then to bring such events to fulfillment. His chosen people are witnesses of these facts. (Isa 44:6-9; 48:3-8) Such divine foreknowledge and foreordination form the basis for all true prophecy. (Isa 42:9; Jer 50:45; Am 3:7, 8). A second factor to be considered is the free moral agency of God’s intelligent creatures. The Scriptures show that God extends to such creatures the privilege and responsibility of free choice, of exercising free moral agency (De 30:19, 20; Jos 24:15), thereby making them accountable for their acts. (Ge 2:16, 17; 3:11-19; Ro 14:10-12; Heb 4:13) They are thus not mere automatons, or robots. Man could not truly have been created in “God’s image” if he were not a free moral agent. (Ge 1:26, 27) Logically, there should be no conflict between God’s foreknowledge (as well as his foreordaining) and the free moral agency of his intelligent creatures.
A third factor that must be considered, one sometimes overlooked, is that of God’s moral standards and qualities, including his justice, honesty, impartiality, love, mercy, and kindness. Any understanding of God’s use of the powers of foreknowledge and foreordination must therefore harmonize with not only some of these factors but with all of them. Clearly, whatever God foreknows must inevitably come to pass, so that God is able to call “things that are not as though they were.”—Ro 4:17.
The question then arises: Is his exercise of foreknowledge infinite, without limit? Does he foresee and foreknow all future actions of all his creatures, spirit and human? And does he foreordain such actions or even predestinate what shall be the final destiny of all his creatures, even doing so before they have come into existence? Or, is God’s exercise of foreknowledge selective and discretionary, so that whatever he chooses to foresee and foreknow, he does, but what he does not choose to foresee or foreknow, he does not? And, instead of preceding their existence, does God’s determination of his creatures’ eternal destiny await his judgment of their course of life and of their proved attitude under test? The answers to these questions must necessarily come from the Scriptures themselves and the information they provide concerning God’s actions and dealings with his creatures, including what has been revealed through his Son, Christ Jesus.—1Co 2:16. Predestinarian view is the view that God’s exercise of his foreknowledge is infinite and that he does foreordain the course and destiny of all individuals. Its advocates reason that God’s divinity and perfection require that he be omniscient (all-knowing), not only respecting the past and present but also regarding the future. According to this concept, for him not to foreknow all matters in their minutest detail would evidence imperfection. Examples such as the case you mentioned of Isaac’s twin sons, Esau and Jacob, are presented as evidence of God’s foreordaining creatures before their birth (Ro 9:10-13); and texts such as Ephesians 1:4, 5 are cited as evidence that God foreknew and foreordained the future of all his creatures even before the start of creation.To be correct, this view would, of course, have to harmonize with all the factors previously mentioned, including the Scriptural presentation of God’s qualities, standards, and purposes, as well as his righteous ways in dealing with his creatures. (Re 15:3, 4) Consider, then, the implications of such a predestinarian view. This concept would mean that, prior to creating angels or earthling man, God exercised his powers of foreknowledge and foresaw and foreknew all that would result from such creation, including the rebellion of one of his spirit sons, the subsequent rebellion of the first human pair in Eden (Ge 3:1-6; Joh 8:44), and all the bad consequences of such rebellion down to and beyond this present day. This would necessarily mean that all the wickedness that history has recorded (the crime and immorality, oppression and resultant suffering, lying and hypocrisy, false worship and idolatry) once existed, before creation’s beginning, only in the mind of God, in the form of his foreknowledge of the future in all of its minutest details. If the Creator of mankind had indeed exercised his power to foreknow all that history has seen since man’s creation, then the full weight of all the wickedness thereafter resulting was deliberately set in motion by God when he spoke the words: “Let us make man.” (Ge 1:26) These facts bring into question the reasonableness and consistency of the predestinarian concept; particularly so, since the disciple James shows that disorder and other vile things do not originate from God’s heavenly presence but are “earthly, animal, demonic” in source.—Jas 3:14-18.
The argument that God’s not foreknowing all future events and circumstances in full detail would evidence imperfection on his part is, in reality, an arbitrary view of perfection. Perfection, correctly defined, does not demand such an absolute, all-embracing extension, inasmuch as the perfection of anything actually depends upon its measuring up completely to the standards of excellence set by one qualified to judge its merits. Ultimately, God’s own will and good pleasure, not human opinions or concepts, are the deciding factors as to whether anything is perfect.—De 32:4; 2Sa 22:31; Isa 46:10. To illustrate this, God’s almightiness is undeniably perfect and is infinite in capacity. (1Ch 29:11, 12; Job 36:22; 37:23) Yet his perfection in strength does not require him to use his power to the full extent of his omnipotence in any or in all cases. Clearly he has not done so; if he had, not merely certain ancient cities and some nations would have been destroyed, but the earth and all in it would have been obliterated long ago by God’s executions of judgment, accompanied by mighty expressions of disapproval and wrath, as at the Flood and on other occasions. (Ge 6:5-8; 19:23-25, 29; compare Ex 9:13-16; Jer 30:23, 24.) God’s exercise of his might is therefore not simply an unleashing of limitless power but is constantly governed by his purpose and, where merited, tempered by his mercy.—Ne 9:31; Ps 78:38, 39; Jer 30:11; La 3:22; Eze 20:17. Similarly, if, in certain respects, God chooses to exercise his infinite ability of foreknowledge in a selective way and to the degree that pleases him, then assuredly no human or angel can rightly say: “What are you doing?” (Job 9:12; Isa 45:9; Da 4:35) It is therefore not a question of ability, what God can foresee, foreknow, and foreordain, for “with God all things are possible.” (Mt 19:26) The question is what God sees fit to foresee, foreknow, and foreordain, for “everything that he delighted to do he has done.”—Ps 115:3.
Selective exercise of foreknowledge. The alternative to predestinarianism, the selective or discretionary exercise of God’s powers of foreknowledge, would have to harmonize with God’s own righteous standards and be consistent with what he reveals of himself in his Word. In contrast with the theory of predestinarianism, a number of texts point to an examination by God of a situation then current and a decision made on the basis of such examination. Thus, at Genesis 11:5-8 God is described as directing his attention earthward, surveying the situation at Babel, and, at that time, determining the action to be taken to break up the unrighteous project there. After wickedness developed at Sodom and Gomorrah, God advised Abraham of his decision to investigate (by means of his angels) to “see whether they act altogether according to the outcry over it that has come to me, and, if not, I can get to know it.” (Ge 18:20-22; 19:1) God spoke of ‘becoming acquainted with Abraham,’ and after Abraham went to the point of attempting to sacrifice Isaac, God said said, “For now I do know that you are God-fearing in that you have not withheld your son, your only one, from me.”—Ge 18:19; 22:11, 12; compare Ne 9:7, 8; Ga 4:9.
 

badlandbucks

Ten Pointer
Selective foreknowledge means that God could choose not to foreknow indiscriminately all the future acts of his creatures. This would mean that, rather than all history from creation onward being a mere rerun of what had already been foreseen and foreordained, God could with all sincerity set before the first human pair the prospect of everlasting life in an earth free from wickedness. His instructions to his first human son and daughter to act as his perfect and sinless agents in filling the earth with their offspring and making it a paradise, as well as exercising control over the animal creation, could thus be expressed as the grant of a truly loving privilege and as his genuine desire toward them—not merely as the giving of a commission that, on their part, was foredoomed to failure. God’s arranging for a test by means of “the tree of the knowledge of good and bad” and his creation of “the tree of life” in the garden of Eden also would not be meaningless or cynical acts, made so by his foreknowing that the human pair would sin and never be able to eat of “the tree of life.”—Ge 1:28; 2:7-9, 15-17; 3:22-24. To offer something very desirable to another person on conditions known beforehand to be unreachable is recognized as both hypocritical and cruel. The prospect of everlasting life is presented in God’s Word as a goal for all persons, one possible to attain. After urging his listeners to ‘keep on asking and seeking’ good things from God, Jesus pointed out that a father does not give a stone or a serpent to his child that asks for bread or a fish. Showing his Father’s view of disappointing the legitimate hopes of a person, Jesus then said: “Therefore, if you, although being wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more so will your Father who is in the heavens give good things to those asking him?”—Mt 7:7-11. Thus, the invitations and opportunities to receive benefits and everlasting blessings set before all men by God are bona fide. (Mt 21:22; Jas 1:5, 6) He can in all sincerity urge men to ‘turn back from transgression and keep living,’ as he did with the people of Israel. (Eze 18:23, 30-32; Jer 29:11, 12.) Logically, he could not do this if he foreknew that they were individually destined to die in wickedness. ( Ac 17:30, 31; 1Ti 2:3, 4.)
In a similar vein, the apostle Peter writes: “God is not slow respecting his promise [of the coming day of reckoning], as some people consider slowness, but he is patient with you because he does not desire any to be destroyed but desires all to attain to repentance.” (2Pe 3:9) If God already foreknew and foreordained millenniums in advance precisely which individuals would receive eternal salvation and which individuals would receive eternal destruction, it may well be asked how meaningful such ‘patience’ of God could be and how genuine his desire could be that ‘all attain to repentance.’ The inspired apostle John wrote that “God is love,” and the apostle Paul states that love “hopes all things.” (1Jo 4:8; 1Co 13:4, 7) It is in harmony with this outstanding, divine quality that God should exercise a genuinely open, kindly attitude toward all persons, he being desirous of their gaining salvation, until they prove themselves unworthy, beyond hope. (Compare 2Pe 3:9; Heb 6:4-12.) Thus, the apostle Paul speaks of “the kindly quality of God [that] is trying to lead you to repentance.”—Ro 2:4-6. Finally if, by God’s foreknowledge, the opportunity to receive the benefits of Christ Jesus’ ransom sacrifice were already irrevocably sealed off from some, perhaps for millions of individuals, even before their birth, so that such ones could never prove worthy, it could not truly be said that the ransom was made available to all men. (2Co 5:14, 15; 1Ti 2:5, 6; Heb 2:9) The impartiality of God is clearly no mere figure of speech. “In every nation the man that fears [God] and works righteousness is acceptable to him.” (Ac 10:34, 35; De 10:17; Ro 2:11) The option is actually and genuinely open to all men “to seek God, if they might grope for him and really find him, although, in fact, he is not far off from each one of us.” (Ac 17:26, 27) There is no empty hope or hollow promise set forth, therefore, in the divine exhortation at the end of the book of Revelation inviting: “Let anyone hearing say: ‘Come!’ And let anyone thirsting come; let anyone that wishes take life’s water free.”—Re 22:17.
 

Crappie_Hunter

Twelve Pointer
Contributor
So you guys believe "free will" equals only two choices?

<>< Fish

Every decision you make is only 2 choices, it either glorifies God or it doesn't. I've never really thought about it til now, but yeah free will equals 2 choices: to bring glory and honor to God in what you do, or not
 

deerhunter28

Ten Pointer
Every decision you make is only 2 choices, it either glorifies God or it doesn't. I've never really thought about it til now, but yeah free will equals 2 choices: to bring glory and honor to God in what you do, or not

^^^^^^^ the truth.




Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

DFisher

Eight Pointer
Not sure if I am reading you right, but what you are referring to is universalism. The bible is pretty clear that not everyone will be saved, just look at the NT. Spurgeon once said that he is confident that Christ will get the victory (more saved than unsaved). But the notion that everyone is saved is not correct, I wish it were true.

When it says in Philippians "that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in Heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord" I believe that is referring to the notion that when you die and you are before God, the only appropriate response is to tell Him that He is God. In other words, I believe what it is saying is that even if you were not a believer on earth, when you are in front of the Lord after death, the God who made the universe, the only response will be that Jesus is Lord. That will not make you saved at that point, it is only the correct and appropriate response.

To be clear then, and I am not sure what universalism is, but I did not say nor imply that everyone would be saved. I said everyone will believe, and add to that, acknowledge, as the Bible says. I too wish it true that everyone would be saved, but that is simply not the case.
 

Weekender

Twelve Pointer
It sounds as if the part that troubles you about that passage is knowing the difference between foreknowledge and foreordination. Yea they are big words, but they have different meanings. Foreknowledge means knowledge of a thing before it happens or exists; also called prescience. In the Bible it relates primarily, though not exclusively, to God the Creator and his purposes. Foreordination means the ordaining, decreeing, or determining of something beforehand; or the quality or state of being foreordained. To understand the matter of foreknowledge and foreordination as relating to God, certain factors necessarily must be recognized. First, God’s ability to foreknow and foreordain is clearly stated in the Bible. God himself sets forth as proof of his Godship this ability to foreknow and foreordain events of salvation and deliverance, as well as acts of judgment and punishment, and then to bring such events to fulfillment. His chosen people are witnesses of these facts. (Isa 44:6-9; 48:3-8) Such divine foreknowledge and foreordination form the basis for all true prophecy. (Isa 42:9; Jer 50:45; Am 3:7, 8). A second factor to be considered is the free moral agency of God’s intelligent creatures. The Scriptures show that God extends to such creatures the privilege and responsibility of free choice, of exercising free moral agency (De 30:19, 20; Jos 24:15), thereby making them accountable for their acts. (Ge 2:16, 17; 3:11-19; Ro 14:10-12; Heb 4:13) They are thus not mere automatons, or robots. Man could not truly have been created in “God’s image” if he were not a free moral agent. (Ge 1:26, 27) Logically, there should be no conflict between God’s foreknowledge (as well as his foreordaining) and the free moral agency of his intelligent creatures.
A third factor that must be considered, one sometimes overlooked, is that of God’s moral standards and qualities, including his justice, honesty, impartiality, love, mercy, and kindness. Any understanding of God’s use of the powers of foreknowledge and foreordination must therefore harmonize with not only some of these factors but with all of them. Clearly, whatever God foreknows must inevitably come to pass, so that God is able to call “things that are not as though they were.”—Ro 4:17.
The question then arises: Is his exercise of foreknowledge infinite, without limit? Does he foresee and foreknow all future actions of all his creatures, spirit and human? And does he foreordain such actions or even predestinate what shall be the final destiny of all his creatures, even doing so before they have come into existence? Or, is God’s exercise of foreknowledge selective and discretionary, so that whatever he chooses to foresee and foreknow, he does, but what he does not choose to foresee or foreknow, he does not? And, instead of preceding their existence, does God’s determination of his creatures’ eternal destiny await his judgment of their course of life and of their proved attitude under test? The answers to these questions must necessarily come from the Scriptures themselves and the information they provide concerning God’s actions and dealings with his creatures, including what has been revealed through his Son, Christ Jesus.—1Co 2:16. Predestinarian view is the view that God’s exercise of his foreknowledge is infinite and that he does foreordain the course and destiny of all individuals. Its advocates reason that God’s divinity and perfection require that he be omniscient (all-knowing), not only respecting the past and present but also regarding the future. According to this concept, for him not to foreknow all matters in their minutest detail would evidence imperfection. Examples such as the case you mentioned of Isaac’s twin sons, Esau and Jacob, are presented as evidence of God’s foreordaining creatures before their birth (Ro 9:10-13); and texts such as Ephesians 1:4, 5 are cited as evidence that God foreknew and foreordained the future of all his creatures even before the start of creation.To be correct, this view would, of course, have to harmonize with all the factors previously mentioned, including the Scriptural presentation of God’s qualities, standards, and purposes, as well as his righteous ways in dealing with his creatures. (Re 15:3, 4) Consider, then, the implications of such a predestinarian view. This concept would mean that, prior to creating angels or earthling man, God exercised his powers of foreknowledge and foresaw and foreknew all that would result from such creation, including the rebellion of one of his spirit sons, the subsequent rebellion of the first human pair in Eden (Ge 3:1-6; Joh 8:44), and all the bad consequences of such rebellion down to and beyond this present day. This would necessarily mean that all the wickedness that history has recorded (the crime and immorality, oppression and resultant suffering, lying and hypocrisy, false worship and idolatry) once existed, before creation’s beginning, only in the mind of God, in the form of his foreknowledge of the future in all of its minutest details. If the Creator of mankind had indeed exercised his power to foreknow all that history has seen since man’s creation, then the full weight of all the wickedness thereafter resulting was deliberately set in motion by God when he spoke the words: “Let us make man.” (Ge 1:26) These facts bring into question the reasonableness and consistency of the predestinarian concept; particularly so, since the disciple James shows that disorder and other vile things do not originate from God’s heavenly presence but are “earthly, animal, demonic” in source.—Jas 3:14-18.
The argument that God’s not foreknowing all future events and circumstances in full detail would evidence imperfection on his part is, in reality, an arbitrary view of perfection. Perfection, correctly defined, does not demand such an absolute, all-embracing extension, inasmuch as the perfection of anything actually depends upon its measuring up completely to the standards of excellence set by one qualified to judge its merits. Ultimately, God’s own will and good pleasure, not human opinions or concepts, are the deciding factors as to whether anything is perfect.—De 32:4; 2Sa 22:31; Isa 46:10. To illustrate this, God’s almightiness is undeniably perfect and is infinite in capacity. (1Ch 29:11, 12; Job 36:22; 37:23) Yet his perfection in strength does not require him to use his power to the full extent of his omnipotence in any or in all cases. Clearly he has not done so; if he had, not merely certain ancient cities and some nations would have been destroyed, but the earth and all in it would have been obliterated long ago by God’s executions of judgment, accompanied by mighty expressions of disapproval and wrath, as at the Flood and on other occasions. (Ge 6:5-8; 19:23-25, 29; compare Ex 9:13-16; Jer 30:23, 24.) God’s exercise of his might is therefore not simply an unleashing of limitless power but is constantly governed by his purpose and, where merited, tempered by his mercy.—Ne 9:31; Ps 78:38, 39; Jer 30:11; La 3:22; Eze 20:17. Similarly, if, in certain respects, God chooses to exercise his infinite ability of foreknowledge in a selective way and to the degree that pleases him, then assuredly no human or angel can rightly say: “What are you doing?” (Job 9:12; Isa 45:9; Da 4:35) It is therefore not a question of ability, what God can foresee, foreknow, and foreordain, for “with God all things are possible.” (Mt 19:26) The question is what God sees fit to foresee, foreknow, and foreordain, for “everything that he delighted to do he has done.”—Ps 115:3.
Selective exercise of foreknowledge. The alternative to predestinarianism, the selective or discretionary exercise of God’s powers of foreknowledge, would have to harmonize with God’s own righteous standards and be consistent with what he reveals of himself in his Word. In contrast with the theory of predestinarianism, a number of texts point to an examination by God of a situation then current and a decision made on the basis of such examination. Thus, at Genesis 11:5-8 God is described as directing his attention earthward, surveying the situation at Babel, and, at that time, determining the action to be taken to break up the unrighteous project there. After wickedness developed at Sodom and Gomorrah, God advised Abraham of his decision to investigate (by means of his angels) to “see whether they act altogether according to the outcry over it that has come to me, and, if not, I can get to know it.” (Ge 18:20-22; 19:1) God spoke of ‘becoming acquainted with Abraham,’ and after Abraham went to the point of attempting to sacrifice Isaac, God said said, “For now I do know that you are God-fearing in that you have not withheld your son, your only one, from me.”—Ge 18:19; 22:11, 12; compare Ne 9:7, 8; Ga 4:9.

With all due respect, I am not reading what you've copied and pasted here.

The context of Romans 9 is that God chose and God made things happen, entirely apart from anything pharoah or Esau did.
 

badlandbucks

Ten Pointer
With all due respect, I am not reading what you've copied and pasted here.

The context of Romans 9 is that God chose and God made things happen, entirely apart from anything pharoah or Esau did.

When I read your comment about Romans 9 I remembered the article and dug it up. It explains what you referred to better than I could in my own words. It discusses the exact passage in Romans 9.
 
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