Predestination

Nope! Terrible analogy!

Its more like if I wrote a computer program to chose the wrong answer then asked the question. God decided every aspect of us. Then saw we would go to hell. Then, instead of fixing us, MADE US ANYWAY TO DIE.

How far do you think this goes? Since we could still die as fetuses, it's not since then at least so circumstance then free will is what follows.

If the program is designed to choose yes and no (right and wrong) on it's own during it's run time and that's all the creator expects, then it's working as intended. If the program kills it's fellow programs and rebel against the creator, it's not hard to imagine why it won't get backed up.

This doesn't mean much in the larger scheme if you believe in this religion about heaven.

Mind-melt. Somewhere along the way I think Christianity got into huffing philosophical paint-thinner so you get this whacked out speculation. Truth of the matter is that if predestination is true, you still do not know if you are predestined. Same for philosophical determinism, if determinism is true, you cannot know if it is true. The Bible doesn't rule on the matter, the most you can say is that God knows certain future events, and I wouldn't push it further for reasons below.

When you get onto this subject you're asking for trouble; it's hubris we know from Job not to out-think God or attempt to out-think Him, this is just another "where are the foundations of the earth set?" type questions, it's just beyond your capacity to reason. You'll also quickly see that predestination is incompatible with the Christian answer to the problem of evil, that evil exists so that the believer will spurn worldly goods because they are corrupted by moths and rust, and will therefore lay up treasure in heaven.

Also consider that nature/the world works according to laws, and spirit works according to spirit. Predestination would make perfect sense if I assented to the notion that God is going to abide by YOUR legalistic and individual interpretation. But really, your emotional belaboring just convinces me that you are wrong. If former prostitutes are in heaven, as Jesus says they are, I think it will be fine.

So you see, all you've set upon is the axiom that God is unforgiving and cruel because you insist He is on the basis of some spurious theory. You've confined God arbitrarily until He's just like an Old Testament legal code (hence not anything like God, but rather more like the old rabbis who killed Him) you haven't answered your own problem of evil (getting rid of God doesn't solve the problem of evil no matter how much you try to ignore it), and worst of all, you have murdered a thread!

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Predestination is very important and most people are getting it wrong. But here's a simple thing for you to think about that no one can deny.

Before God creates the reprobate, he infallibly knows they will go to Hell. He doesn't cause them to reject him but he knows they will reject him. He can choose easily not to create this person. He could of made the world with just a few children who died after their baptism and incredible creations like St. Mary and St. Joseph. The reprobate doesn't ever have to be conceived or God can take their life in the womb etc. God knows infallibly if this person is born and lived this life they will reject me and go to Hell. And God doesn't stop that. It's trivial for such a person never to be created. God could choose
to take the child's life before the age of reason.

Unless your theory can really explain why God does this you won't get it. But St Augustine, St Thomas and St Paul in scripture(Romans) actually pretty explicitly explain why.

Please explain further user

If I put a bowl of icecream in front of you and a bowl of rusty nails I know which one you'll eat without it being predestined.

This is not predestination. God is the first cause of people going to Heaven. He acts first before us. This is the stupid 'predestination' that modern Catholics who have even heard of predestination (most have never heard, and then others think oh no thats Calvinism).

I've written about this many times on this board I should save it again I'm a bit lazy. Did you get that part I wrote so far or what don't you get. Essentially though God is writing a story, it's more animated than JK Rowling since it's God but it's still a story.

God predestines someone to go to Heaven not because of any of their works. The people who are not predestined go to Hell but (technically) it's their fault and not God, but still God chose to create that person. He could have not created that person. So why? Well honestly and this might make you feel strange but it's for the elect and Gods pleasure. We will enjoy seeing them in Hell. St. Thomas said this explicity in the Summa.

People do like seeing justice though. There is all those justiceporn subs or well just think about that LGBT who hates the church actively works to destroy insult and mock it, mocks the faithful, and thinks they're getting away with it. Haha guess what buddy, how is Hell now. Seeing God's justice will be delightful to us, so that's why they are created.

People falsely say that God predestines the people he knows will accept him. This is false it goes against scripture because in Romans it explicitly says that he predestines his elect before they are created and not for any work that we do. You should read the Summa on predestination and then the scripture involved and really think about it. Most people are semi pelagians actually. It requires you to really change the way you look at life in my opinion.

Imagine it from a tech standpoint.

Do you know how the random number generator in the game Doom works? It chooses from a known table of random numbers, and incrementing which number is selected from this table every so often. What this boils down to is, if you know how much time has passed in the game and the exact actions you took, you can know the state of the random number generator and how any creature in the game will behave. This is a technique used by speedrunners.

Now, multiply that times infinitely more complex. If you had perfect ontological knowledge of the entire state of another human's mind and the state of the universe, down to the cellular level at any moment, you could predict with complete accuracy how that human would act given any particular situation.

We can't do that because we don't, and can't, ever have that level of knowledge.

God can.

And, adding onto this, remember that God exists outside of time. Some concepts that we have words for, like omnipotence and omniscience, that we can reason about to a point, still don't map cleanly onto a being who exists outside of our time and outside the rules of causality.

It's a mystery, one that won't be answered until after your death here, and maybe not even then. We simply can't comprehend it yet.

I’ll put it simply OP you can choose to follow God or choose to disobey him.

Worrying about who is saved and who isn’t is a meaningless endeavor that only leads to suffering.

Read Ephesians in the KJV OP.

There is an elect. We are chosen by a Sovereign God. Grace is unmerited ( merriam-webster.com/dictionary/grace ), if you are saved by choosing god, or damned by rejecting him, then merit has entered into the equation. Those who say you have to accept Christ or that you can reject him are wrong. God's elect are drawn to him and he is irresistible. Be happy that you are drawn to the things of god, that you are convicted of your sins, that you war with the flesh, that GOD HAS CHOSEN YOU.

t. Dutch Reform master race

No it is completely fair. God is just to send everyone one of us to hell.

For a long time I thought God was completely malevolent. When I learned there was a benevolent side to him at all, it was an improvement for me. He is to be feared and loved.

Nope. He has to manifest the fullness of himself. He is All in All.

To comfort you I will tell you this OP. Evil is finite. Hell itself will be conquered. Only the good is infinite. There are those destined to be destroyed in the lake of fire but that which is destroyed is only temporal. The divine part is never destroyed. The greater portion of God and the ultimate reality of him is good, destruction having an end in itself, and only a third of the angels rebelling against God.

Your life isn't futile if you're one of his elect. Just ask god for his light.

If you're not. Do not worry too much. It is an evil nature which you have and which will be destroyed. Nothing of value is ever lost in the lake of fire.

It had to happen because of free will. God knows the ending of our life, but he allows us to take responsibility to decide where we are going. God gave you a chance, but it’s your fault if you reject that chance

Think about what exactly you're asking God to do here. The people who go to Hell are there because they intentionally, consciously, and knowingly reject God and His moral law. The only way for God to "fix" that would be to completely take away their ability to reject Him. Would that be the action of a loving God, to your mind? Would a loving God entrap a soul within a body and mind without free will? That people choose damnation is an eternal tragedy, and it should be distressing to us, but it's a logical conclusion of a world where people can meaningfully choose to be saved.

Here, CS Lewis answered your objections better than I can. Read The Problem of Pain.
gutenberg.ca/ebooks/lewiscs-problemofpain/lewiscs-problemofpain-00-h.html

Let me stop you right there. People are not like computer programs. Your decisions are not inevitable results of events and conditions beyond your control. Rather, your decisions are under your control.

Only in the most coarse sense of the term. People's actions are a result of many things.. their upbringing, their mood, and so forth. Some actions will provoke a reaction that is immediate, strong, and predictable.

For instance, if I blaspheme on this board, the mods will ban me. There is a rational process happening there, to recognize blasphemy and such, but the cause and effect are known with certainty ahead of time.

Are you sure He elects people in a sense? Doesn't the Lord just knows everyones fate but creates them either way? Like for example, He doesn't make a person become a Saint, but He knows due to their actions they will be one.

It's a big mystery and God exists outside of time so the whole thing is really confusing, look into compatibilism, we are accountable for our actions despite them being foreknown.

This is pretty complicated, but check out this James White debate - I'm not saying I'd go this far, but he makes a good case that Heaven is inherently unfair.

Calvinism/the Reformed Tradition is horrific, and if it were true this whole religion would be worthy of the harshest condemnation.

that's an interesting way to phrase it, but yes; it is completely 'unfair' that anyone goes to Heaven

the scripture goes so far as to say it's scandalous that God would condescend to rescue such rebels as man

Predestination is a christian concept, the thing Calvinists believe in is double-predestination a.k.a. God makes souls explicitly to burn in hell and suffer for all eternity a.k.a. super heresy.
When asked how this is characteristic with the rest of the bible where God says he wants everybody to be saved and how God loves everybody they generally answer something in the line of "Dude you just don't understand" and argue that we cannot comprehend how God thinks but it's per definition love.

talk to many Calvinists, do you?

the same sort of Calvinists who would point to certain key verses like God saying 'Jacob I loved, Esau I hated' or speaking of Pharoah 'I will harden his heart' ?

how about the kind of Calvinist who would look to greater themes in Scripture such as God's Justice, and the assertion that 'the Judge of All The Earth will do right', and that true Justice for mankind would be that every single one of we reprobates would be condemned to eternal fire before we are even conceived, so as not to mar His good earth with our rebellion against its Creator – so it is a scandal of the Cross that this same God would deign to rescue even one of us, though it be to the praise of His glorious Grace?

as to God being loving, well yes; but to Whom does God owe love if not to the Three Persons of the Trinity first and foremost – and if God the Father were to decide that it were best that God the Son not suffer the ignominy of Humanity's war against His Person; or if God the Son desired to uphold the Father's name from the assault of man's rebellion, and acting in unison so consign us to eternal flame: where would be the wrong in that – in fact, would it not be better that God never suffer our presence at all ?

but instead this patient and loving Three Persons act in unison from before the beginning in a plan of redemption, glorifying each other in their roles as Father, Son and Spirit; the Father patiently withholding His wrath and instead giving to the Son a people to be His reward, the Son redeeming this people from rightful wrath and so glorifying His Father, and the Spirit humbly contending with the hearts of these predestined people so as to bring their dead souls to life, thus loving Father and Son - each of these Persons demonstrating a long-suffering patient lovingkindness first to each in their putting up with man for even an iota, and only then to fallen man

now user, i think you'll recognise that i don't think so little of you as to say, 'Dude, you just don't understand', because i've explained matters thus far in the expectation that you'll be able to grasp the train of thought; but if you really can't comprehend how verses such as 'God is Love' are compatible with those which speak of eternal torture for those who remain in a rebellious blasphemy of the Holy Spirit to their dying day, i have to ask, do you understand the unquenchable wrath of God for evil?

if not, allow me to illustrate it a little

we

are

evil

by very nature, in every imagination and intent we are wicked all the day long, and anyone who says otherwise is arguing with their very Creator who declares this in both Genesis 6 and Genesis 8 - and to disagree with God on this is itself an act of evil against the Eternal which demands eternal wrath

moreover, God is infinite in all His attributes, so just as He is eternally and infinitely loving, He is eternally and infinitely 'angry at the wicked… all the day long', and much as the Three Persons will be satisfied in the absolute and complete fulfilment of the Plan of Redemption – for whatever God sets to do, He does – God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit will be equally satisfied at the display of Their infinite wrath

this is an act of love, not for men, but toward each other; gracing each one with the gift of pouring out all vengeance on those who would sully the Majesty of the other

1. The predestination you describe (that your "priest" describes) is Calvinist. It is false. It is not Catholic. Please forget about it.

2. The Catholic Church was taken over by Freemasons (foot soldiers of the Jew, with their agenda, the destruction of His Church) 9 Oct 1958, the "second vatican council". So they are now preaching various Protestant heresies. Find a church that rejects all that filth. God cannot contradict Himself (such as reversing what He has taught for 2,000 years.

We are called sedevacantists. If you stay in the Modern Church (falsely called "catholic") you will lose your faith. This is just one example.

3. In Catholicism, we do have predestination, but it is quite different from the Calvinist concept discussed here. It does not contradict or excite any other Catholic teaching (up to 1958). It is not worth getting into, because it is thing that happens rarely, and only to those in deep Contemplation.

Indeed. Predetermination removes moral agency from man and is thus heresy.
Protestantism is like far eastern thought where "fate" becomes all powerful and man simply a stupid vessel either for God or the devil. The devil doesn't have that kind of power morons, stop preaching Manicheanism.

I feel like Ephesians 1-2 and John 15 kind of make it clear it isn't man doing the choosing…

Best post of the thread

Are you subscribing to annihilationism or universalism? Aspects of your post strongly imply this.

Isn't this contrary to everything this user posted, which has gone unrebuked?

The distinction between normal and double predestination REALLY bends my mind and cannot fathom how there is actually any real distinction between the two. How is it not the case that when God predestines the elect to salvation, by virtue of doing this by extension by default the inescapable logical consequence is that those he doesn't elect are predestined to damnation (aka double predestination)?? Am I misunderstanding something extrememely obvious here? I simply cannot fathom how one (pre destination of the elect) does not entail the other (predestination of the damned)?? I have never understood this!!

I believe predestination is that the Lord knows who's going to be damned or not being all knowing, but doesn't really make people to be damned. Double predestination is the Lord specifically making people to be damned.

ok with this phrasing of it I can see why you *might* think there is an actual distinction between normal and double PD. For all intents and purposes though, practically speaking, taking the end result into account, how is it not the case that by virtue of God chosing to elect some purely by grace and of no merit of those chosen, he by extension does damn those who he doesn't choose (and by extension of his foreknowing, literally does make those people to be damned - isn't this precisely what Rom 9:22 is about?).

Note, I'm not saying the damned don't deserve their damnation or that it is unjust, I'm only questioning how it can possibly be the case that double predestination does not necessarily follow from predestination.

Well try to think of it as this if it helps. God doesn't send anyone to hell, people send themselves to hell because they rejected the Lords Love and Life. Sure, the Lord could've made us all good, but what would be the point of our goodness if we have no freewill?

Chemical predestination is a bad meme. The entropy, that is randomness, of the universe is constantly increasing. This means that for any given chemical reaction, even under identical circumstances, there are multiple possible outcomes and whichever one comes true isn't necessarily dependent on any external condition. And entropy increases with every chemical reaction. Something as complex and full of chemical reactions as the human body is practically an entropy factory. Even from a purely materialist standpoint, nothing is predestined in the way you're suggesting.

But there's more to a human life than his material body. There's also his spirit, from which his reason is derived and which isn't bound to any physical laws whatsoever. Thus, if you had the perfect ontological knowledge which you had described, but lacked true fore-knowledge, you still wouldn't be able to perfectly predict every action a man would take.

You can't imagine it from a tech standpoint. Men aren't programs. God does know where your soul will end up, but that's because he's truly omniscient, not just because he knows the entire current state of your mind and the universe. God did not set the universe in motion in such a way that damnation for anyone was inevitable.

Wishful thinking or 'trying to think' of something in a different way simply to escape what is otherwise the logical consequence of something isn't a good way to go about thinking about things if you ask me..

None of us are good though, and the Lord doesn't save us 'because we're good,' he saves some of us in spite of our (lack of) good.

What he could do, as an alternative to/to address the logical consequence of only saving some (i.e. as already stated, that consequnce being necessarily by extension of saving some, not saving others, and thereby damning them) is save everyone rather than some. They'd be no less free than the free people who God has chosen to be part of the elect, purely of his grace and of no merit of their own?

But maybe part of the confusion on my part and my communication with these issues is my view of and unfamliarity with how grace works (and potentially our conflicting//differing view on this). By default I lean to 'irrestible grace,' because it seems to me that anything outside of that would imply that we have done something to merit salvation, something I can't follow through with and don't want to affirm for fear of contradicting the gospel, the explicit scriptures and for fear of falling by pride.