I'm not saying it's an excuse...but neither am I saying man doesn't care what they are. It goes beyond caring to even being aware of the disparity between man and God. The man rejecting God is doing so every minute of every day but doesn't even realize it. It isn't a matter of caring but even being aware of it. You tell the man on the street that his good works are so much useless trash in pleasing God and then he gets defensive. But he doesn't go around consciously trying to justify himself. It's natural. Innate. It's like the Psalm says...the wicked man goes estranged from the womb telling lies as soon as he is born. In other words, wickedness is like breathing - it's natural.
So a man idolizing something probably wouldn't even say he's idolizing it. And even if every now and then the thought comes that he may be idolizing it, there isn't any inclination to stop. To be honest, there is no option to stop. Some may have a strong enough will to try and stop, but what is missing is the element of faith. Without faith it is impossible to please God. That idolater (or attempted reforming idolater) doesn't even have the option to submit to God. It just isn't on the list - and even if it were he wouldn't have the first inkling as to how to do so (nor the inclination). He's still trusting in himself.
The only way a man submits to God is by the Spirit of God. The Law was there for man to submit to and he proved rather convincingly that he can't. But men still try because the underlying nature (which is very closely associated with the will that I am calling "subconscious" here) is set a certain way and no amount of effort by that man will change that. Indeed, it is by that very will that man affects anything. Can it affect a change in itself? By what?
I don't say it isn't possible. And the one Peter is addressing is not the one who merely hears the truth and immediately rejects it. He's talking of one who has begun to actually learn firsthand of the goodness of God and then rejects it. He ends up worse than if he had never learned in a real inward way. But I would stop short of saying such a man was ever born again. I think that passage is pretty clear in saying he was never really fundamentally changed. The dog is still a dog.
What do you mean by "...win hearts..."? If who is saved and who is not is left up to man, then how can God know any would ever be saved? In fact, if God knows the hearts of all men, does He merely judge choices themselves or the root of those choices? And if we are dealing with underlying natures (which I believe we are per above) then how can arguments "win hearts" at that root level? I accept that many may find the sacrifice of Christ a noble thing ("Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends" has rather universal appeal), but does knowing that Christ died and rose actually change a man? This, I think, is why many "make decisions for Christ" and end up falling away - because there was no underlying change of nature. And that can only happen - as far as I can see - by the Sovereign move of God. A house divided against itself must fall, so the only way a man can choose against himself is if there is deep recognition of a perverseness in himself. And that is only by conviction of the Holy Spirit. So if a man "chooses Christ", is it the man's own corruption that does so?
So man in darkness... Does He know? I would say sometimes yes and sometimes no.
What about the conscience? Is God's Spirit working through it? I would say yes to try and move men to turn to Him. Of course the darkness is trying to use the shame of sin to destroy. Pyscologists will say puts
Pysocopaths have no conscience. Is that true? Can a man be so far gone to the darkness that the conscience Is completely obliterated? Idk... But it seems likely to me that through prayer even this stranglehold of the darkness can be broken through.
So the Spirit is convicting He is offering His grace. Is man going to say yes? Is there any other way a man can be freed from the darkness beyond the love, power, light and love of Jesus, the Father, the Spirit? Of course not. So a man says yes Lord I need you, I want your grace, I want you, I want all that you have to offer. And it's most certainly not any cerebral knowledge that moves a man's heart or wins it, it's Him, His love genuinely experienced. Is that it? Story over?
There are plenty of warnings, the world the darkness is warring against our souls, we must continue to go the well, the source of all hope, all power, all goodness, all love or we are toast. Slaves to God willingly like Jesus willingly did. Romans 6:22
I would say the further we go down the road to maturity, the stronger we are in Christ, the less chance the darkness could ever prevail...
