Understanding God’s election

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Oct 19, 2024
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I have already publicly on this forum acknolwledged my spiritual impotence, weakness, frailty and have praised the Lord for rescuing me from the jaws of the second death! But your PRIDE will not allow you to do that because your deceitful heart has lied to you; for you think your mighty "freewill" was the efficacious human faculty that saved you.
The point is that if YOU can acknowledge such and be rescued, then anybody can!
There is even hope for me!
 

studier

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Apr 18, 2024
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I have already publicly on this forum acknolwledged my spiritual impotence, weakness, frailty and have praised the Lord for rescuing me from the jaws of the second death! But your PRIDE will not allow you to do that because your deceitful heart has lied to you; for you think your mighty "freewill" was the efficacious human faculty that saved you.
This last part is such a feeble argument. Please consider setting it aside. It would be of benefit to us all, including you, if you would do so.

So I wouldn't have to think or work too hard to ponder the fallacies involved, I followed @Inquisitor and asked AI - CoPilot so credit where credit is due:

Query: fallacious argument that says it's pride to choose to accept one's need for grace

Ah, yes—this is a subtle but significant misstep in reasoning that often masquerades as piety. The argument typically goes something like: “If you choose to accept grace, then you’re taking credit for your salvation, which is prideful. Therefore, true humility means you can’t choose—it must be entirely imposed or irresistible.” But this line of thought is riddled with fallacies.

Here’s a breakdown of the fallacious reasoning involved:

🧠 1. False Dilemma (Either/Or Fallacy)
  • It assumes only two options: either grace is accepted by coercion (irresistibly), or any voluntary response is prideful.
  • This ignores the possibility that one can humbly recognize their need and freely respond without claiming credit.
🪞 2. Equivocation on “Pride”
  • It conflates acknowledging need with boasting in self. But recognizing one’s brokenness and receiving help is not pride—it’s the very definition of humility.
  • As one writer put it, “Grace is not opposed to effort, it is opposed to earning.” Choosing to receive is not the same as earning.
🧩 3. Begging the Question
  • The argument assumes what it’s trying to prove: that any human response to grace must be prideful. But that’s precisely what’s under debate.
  • It presupposes that divine sovereignty and human response are mutually exclusive, rather than complementary.
🧠 4. Straw Man
  • It misrepresents the position of those who affirm human response by caricaturing it as self-exalting.
  • In reality, many who affirm a responsive role in salvation emphasize that even the ability to respond is itself a gift of grace.
This kind of argument often arises in debates over monergism vs. synergism
 

Rufus

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Feb 17, 2024
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The point is that if YOU can acknowledge such and be rescued, then anybody can!
There is even hope for me!
Yes, there is hope for you IF YOU one day can acknowledge and confess to God that you're a helpless, wretched, vile, depraved sinner with a desperately wicked and deceitful heart and cry out to the Lord to rescue you.
 

Rufus

Well-known member
Feb 17, 2024
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This last part is such a feeble argument. Please consider setting it aside. It would be of benefit to us all, including you, if you would do so.

So I wouldn't have to think or work too hard to ponder the fallacies involved, I followed @Inquisitor and asked AI - CoPilot so credit where credit is due:

Query: fallacious argument that says it's pride to choose to accept one's need for grace

Ah, yes—this is a subtle but significant misstep in reasoning that often masquerades as piety. The argument typically goes something like: “If you choose to accept grace, then you’re taking credit for your salvation, which is prideful. Therefore, true humility means you can’t choose—it must be entirely imposed or irresistible.” But this line of thought is riddled with fallacies.

Here’s a breakdown of the fallacious reasoning involved:

🧠 1. False Dilemma (Either/Or Fallacy)
  • It assumes only two options: either grace is accepted by coercion (irresistibly), or any voluntary response is prideful.
  • This ignores the possibility that one can humbly recognize their need and freely respond without claiming credit.
🪞 2. Equivocation on “Pride”
  • It conflates acknowledging need with boasting in self. But recognizing one’s brokenness and receiving help is not pride—it’s the very definition of humility.
  • As one writer put it, “Grace is not opposed to effort, it is opposed to earning.” Choosing to receive is not the same as earning.
🧩 3. Begging the Question
  • The argument assumes what it’s trying to prove: that any human response to grace must be prideful. But that’s precisely what’s under debate.
  • It presupposes that divine sovereignty and human response are mutually exclusive, rather than complementary.
🧠 4. Straw Man
  • It misrepresents the position of those who affirm human response by caricaturing it as self-exalting.
  • In reality, many who affirm a responsive role in salvation emphasize that even the ability to respond is itself a gift of grace.
This kind of argument often arises in debates over monergism vs. synergism
My remarks that you highlighted are not fallacious. Since GWH and other FWers insist that God's grace is not efficacious, then they must tell come up with something that IS -- something that finally got them to ultimately "choose" Christ. And that "something" can only be their "freewill" that, of course, is in bondage to sin, the devil and the world. It is this "freewill" that parted their Red Sea that empowered them to cross over from Egypt (death) to eventually occupy the Promised Land (life).

You obviously don't understand very well Arminianism or Pelagianism. And for your info there is no such thing as "synergism", for in FWer's world when one rejects the gospel, it's the sinner that is to blame -- NOT God! (No "synergism" there!) Yet, at the same time when a sinner believes the gospel and repents, the sinner ultimately takes the credit since he believes that his eternal destiny also ultimately rests in his own hands, i.e. his "freewill" choice (so NO "synergism" here either). Synergism is just a nice sounding, polite ploy that pays lip service to God's saving grace while the sinner simultaneously pats himself on the back for being smarter, wiser, more pious, more religious, more spiritually savvy, whatever...for making a good decision.
 
Oct 19, 2024
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Yes, there is hope for you IF YOU one day can acknowledge and confess to God that you're a helpless, wretched, vile, depraved sinner with a desperately wicked and deceitful heart and cry out to the Lord to rescue you.
From infancy I loved the Lord and lived in accordance with His Scripture, although imperfectly of course,
so I acknowledged being a sinner as soon as I understood the need/reason to do that (2Tim. 3:15-17).
 

studier

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Apr 18, 2024
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My remarks that you highlighted are not fallacious.
IOW you disagree that your arguments are fallacious. No surprise there.

Neither is there any surprise in your assertion of monergism against the synergism many do believe in and of course would define differently than you do, but that takes us back to the lack of concern for making fallacious arguments.
 

Rufus

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Feb 17, 2024
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From infancy I loved the Lord and lived in accordance with His Scripture, although imperfectly of course,
so I acknowledged being a sinner as soon as I understood the need/reason to do that (2Tim. 3:15-17).
From "infancy" you say? You already had a good, loving heart from birth and didn't need a divine transplant, did you? You're MORE self-righteous than the rich young ruler who boasted about his righteousness from only boyhood (Lk 18:21). :rolleyes:
 

Rufus

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Feb 17, 2024
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IOW you disagree that your arguments are fallacious. No surprise there.

Neither is there any surprise in your assertion of monergism against the synergism many do believe in and of course would define differently than you do, but that takes us back to the lack of concern for making fallacious arguments.
Synergism is a satanic scam that allows its adherents the luxury of self-righteousness, as they get to share in God's glory since the salvation buck stops with the ones doing the cooperating with God's ineffectual grace. Therefore, the ultimate cause, the ultimate determinant behind any sinner's salvation is the "freewill" of that sinner. You have already confessed previously that the difference between one sinner accepting the gospel truth and another rejecting it lays with the sinners themselves, and not God. So...where is your insipid synergism in such an admission!? You have never publicly given God 100% credit for the salvation of your soul. After all...God would never FORCE His will upon any sinner like he did with Adam, Abimelech, Balaam, Eli's two sons, Pharaoh, Cyrus and all those mentioned in the Parable of the Banquet (LK 14), etc.. In your universe, every man ultimately directs his own steps, his own ways, his own path, his own destiny -- all of which contradict scripture.
 

studier

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Apr 18, 2024
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Synergism is a satanic scam that allows its adherents the luxury of self-righteousness, as they get to share in God's glory since the salvation buck stops with the ones doing the cooperating with God's ineffectual grace
Spoken by a monergist but it carries about as much weight as monergism does to a synergist.

No real point here. Just mischaracterization that leads us back to discussion about fallacies.
 
Oct 19, 2024
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From "infancy" you say? You already had a good, loving heart from birth and didn't need a divine transplant, did you? You're MORE self-righteous than the rich young ruler who boasted about his righteousness from only boyhood (Lk 18:21). :rolleyes:
Yes, just like Paul says, thanks to Christian parents who taught me to love Jesus and against such teachings I never rebelled. As I already said, when I reached the age of about eight I learned that I needed to confess that I was a sinner and so I did and still do.
 

Rufus

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Yes, just like Paul says, thanks to Christian parents who taught me to love Jesus and against such teachings I never rebelled. As I already said, when I reached the age of about eight I learned that I needed to confess that I was a sinner and so I did and still do.
Pray tell...I'm dying to know what Paul had to say about infants born in Adam! Did he actually boast about how righteous, holy and good they are!?
 

Rufus

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Feb 17, 2024
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Spoken by a monergist but it carries about as much weight as monergism does to a synergist.

No real point here. Just mischaracterization that leads us back to discussion about fallacies.
I mischaracterized nothing! At the end of the day, the FWer's faith is in his mighty and powerful and awesome freewill! Something has to be effectual in a sinner's salvation, and it certainly isn't God's grace! So...with what does that leave the sinner?
 

studier

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Apr 18, 2024
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I mischaracterized nothing! At the end of the day, the FWer's faith is in his mighty and powerful and awesome freewill! Something has to be effectual in a sinner's salvation, and it certainly isn't God's grace! So...with what does that leave the sinner?
Of course you did. Every fallback argument you guys have - like this one - misrepresents what others believe. This one actually misrepresents where the merit re: faith resides. As I've shown you, it's just fallacious argumentation.
 
Oct 19, 2024
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Pray tell...I'm dying to know what Paul had to say about infants born in Adam! Did he actually boast about how righteous, holy and good they are!?
I wish you would read the Scripture I posted, which was 2Tim. 3:15-17, which indicates that it is more important for infants to be born of Christian parents.
 

studier

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Apr 18, 2024
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I wish you would read the Scripture I posted, which was 2Tim. 3:15-17, which indicates that it is more important for infants to be born of Christian parents.
Maybe 2Tim1:5 too re: entering into the world in a home at least 2 generations of which were in Faith.
 
Jul 3, 2015
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Of course you did. Every fallback argument you guys have - like this one - misrepresents what others believe. This one actually misrepresents where the merit re: faith resides. As I've shown you, it's just fallacious argumentation.
Who is "you guys"? Because I have seen you misrepresent what others
believe, plus, quite a few here get called "Calvies" when they are not.


In fact all I have to do to get called a Calvie is affirm what the Bible actually says.
 
Oct 19, 2024
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Who is "you guys"? Because I have seen you misrepresent what others
believe, plus, quite a few here get called "Calvies" when they are not.


In fact all I have to do to get called a Calvie is affirm what the Bible actually says.
The problematic part of your opinion is that it only affirms the parts of GW that appear to support the Calvinist tulip interpretation.
 

Rufus

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Feb 17, 2024
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Of course you did. Every fallback argument you guys have - like this one - misrepresents what others believe. This one actually misrepresents where the merit re: faith resides. As I've shown you, it's just fallacious argumentation.
It is you who mischaracterizes what I have written! I have never said man's faith is efficacious; but rather...(now try to pay really close attention!!!) since you FWer's do not see God's grace as being efficacious, then this must mean that the sinner's "freewill", the human faculty that has chosen to "cooperate" with God's grace and his gospel demands, must be what is efficacious! What else could it be!? You have a third option, do you? But since you won't be able to come up with another option, then the only logical inference to the Pelagian, Arminian or FWT heresies (whatever floats your boat) must be man's faculty of volition since man's will is the ultimate, final, authoritative and, therefore, efficacious arbiter and determinant of a sinner's eternal destiny. And you have already proven this FACT when you unequivocally denied that God makes the difference between one sinner who chooses to repent and believe the Gospel and another who chooses to reject the Gospel invitation. Your god is truly the "freewill" you think you have and used to choose your eternal destiny.

Also, I remind you once again that the heresy of Synergism cannot withstand the scrutiny of scripture. In fact, Synergism is a satanic lie -- a myth -- that has been foisted upon the minds and hearts of mankind. This is just another lie of the father of lies that the evil one uses to ask everyone..."Has God really said...?" But my answer to that question is YES! God really has asserted his sovereignty over his entire creation. God is running the universe and this world. He is in absolute control, no matter how much you despise the doctrine of God's sovereignty; for Synergism cannot get past these explicit and clear passages: Prov 16:1, 9, 33; 19:21; 20:24; 21:1; Isa 46:10; Jer 10:23; Dan 5:23; Act 4:23-28; Rom 9:14-18.

Even Prov 16:33 is very instructive in this doctrine of sovereignty because it teaches those of us, who have eyes to see and ears to hear, that there are no such things in this world as coincidences, luck, chance, fortune, randomness or arbitrariness. ALL is under God's providential control -- even something, as seemingly mundane, such as the roll of dice does not escape God's scrutiny or his eternal purposes.