toldailytopic: Did God predestine and therefore orchestrate the Sandy Hook Elementary

[rainee]

But, did God predestine and therefore orchestrate the Sandy Hook Elementary massacre?
Was it a preordained judgement?
your answer skirts the issue and does not answer the question Nang,

I am interested to hear a calvinist answer this. What say you...Yes or No?

Ohhhh no,
Rocket man, why are you picking on Nang?! I like rocket men.

Do you or do you not hold that man is fallen and has a sinful nature? Is he by his very nature an enemy to God?

Please say.

If you say the natural man is at odds with God , and remember the parable of the Sower with the first soil then you see there is more than One Thing happening. There are more than One or two players involved.
First the soil (who is the person whose heart is hard)
And then there's the Sower Who sows who doesn't get in the heart (The Lord Jesus).
And then there is the evil one who comes and takes away any chance that hard heart would have had.

Now Paul will say more than once that "the tempter" is one he feared was messing up the people he was working with and writing to.
So the evil one has a more prominent position in those verses than perhaps you or Calvinists would be comfortable with.

But in understanding and believing Romans 1:28-32
and thinking the evil one is messing with humans as they go from bad to worse, and knowing God has already said He did allow a partial hardening in Israel so the Gentiles could come in -
Then The Best Answer is to Pray Diligently What Jesus Told You to Pray:
Matthew 6:13
(Which I certainly hope is not what got Knight going with this thread)

 

[Desert Reign]

You're not paying attention to the Calvinist. The boy killed His mom on his own but God put the guns there before him and as a result, the boy used the gun to kill his mom.
Other people woulds pick up the gun to shoot a deer to feed their family.


Pay attention to my posts and Nang's. Pick up those whispers in the noisy rooms of TOL.

The free Willers are very, very, very loud.

I was paying attention to this:

He keep doing that til you do read it is His Will for you to read it.

You are saying that it was his will for this maniac to pick up those guns and kill his mother and then go and shoot a bunch of helpless children.

I'm not complaining. I already asked you and someone called credobaptist and neither of you replied to me on those other threads that you call noisy. But since you have explained it so clearly here, I shall just take that as the answer.

Also, I now know that you are hypocritical about the matter. Again, nothing personal. I've been trying for over three years to get some sense out of Calvinists and you are possibly the first who has ever made sense. You clearly want to claim that God willed it and achieved his purpose by arranging events and you want to make the individual responsible. I've of course no beef with the individual being responsible. You said above

Other people woulds pick up the gun to shoot a deer to feed their family.

But earlier you said

Who is going to walk around with a
book in the face without peeking into it.

which means that you are happy with the idea of God's will being irresistible in the case of reading a Bible but not in the case of a person who picks up a gun to massacre helpless children. This confirms to me (and it ought to confirm to you) how very hypocritical your belief really is.

But by the way (and this is really for credobaptist) what you are describing is not a decree. A decree is an ordinance or a command. Decrees are there to be obeyed. Decrees only apply to sentient beings under authority, not to inanimate objects or to sentient beings who are unaware of what the decree might be. What you are describing, though you call it God's decretal will, would probably be better described as God's manipulative will. Again, nothing personal, just pointing out issues of language here.

 

[vegascowboy]

The TheologyOnline.com TOPIC OF THE DAY for December 17th, 2012 09:58 AM

toldailytopic: Did God predestine and therefore orchestrate the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre?

Absolutely NOT. No question. No way.

 

[SeraphimsCherub]

Yes...because HE IS WORKING "ALL" THINGS TOGETHER FOR THE GOOD OF THOSE WHO LOVE HIM ACCORDING TO THE "ETERNAL PURPOSE" WHICH HE "PURPOSED" IN CHRIST BEFORE THE FOUNDATION OF THE WORLD. PLUS IN THE LAST DAYS...AS ALL THINGS IN HEAVEN,AND EARTH ARE (((BOUND))) BY GOD'S WORD TO COME TO PASS...AND A GREAT PORTION OF THOSE THINGS WHICH "MUST" COME TO PASS...IS THAT THINGS ARE GOING TO GET AS BAD AS (((HELL))) FIRST...BEFORE THEY GET AS GOOD AS(((HEAVEN))) ON EARTH... AFTER.

Plus as precious as little children are. It has been "appointed" unto mankind [all flesh] once to die,and then the Judgment. Plus...this is a SINFUL nation which has turned it's back on it's LORD~&~GOD. So HE WITHDRAWS HIS GOOD HAND,and allows satan to raise his evil one, in GOD'S JUDGMENT AGAINST THIS nation. BUT HOPEFULLY GOD WILL USE THIS EVENT,AND SEASON IT WITH HIS ALMIGHTY GRACE TO GRANT THIS NATION (((REPENTANCE))),THAT IT MAY BE HEALED. BUT THAT IS IN GOD'S OWN HANDS AS TO IF "HE WILL" OR NOT...

Blessings...
SC

 

[Letsargue]

Yes...because HE IS WORKING "ALL" THINGS TOGETHER FOR THE GOOD OF THOSE WHO LOVE HIM ACCORDING TO THE "ETERNAL PURPOSE" WHICH HE "PURPOSED" IN CHRIST BEFORE THE FOUNDATION OF THE WORLD. PLUS IN THE LAST DAYS...AS ALL THINGS IN HEAVEN,AND EARTH ARE (((BOUND))) BY GOD'S WORD TO COME TO PASS...A GREAT PORTION OF THOSE THINGS WHICH "MUST" COME TO PASS...IS THAT THINGS ARE GOING TO GET AS BAD AS (((HELL))) FIRST...BEFORE THEY GET AS GOOD AS(((HEAVEN))) ON EARTH AFTER.


Blessings...
SC

You're fixing to get in trouble for being right!!

Paul -- 121812

 

[ThePresbyteers]

You are saying that it was his will for this maniac to pick up those guns and kill his mother and then go and shoot a bunch of helpless children.

Where did I say that?

If I said that, I might as well shoot myself :colt45: but
I haven’t yet recalled saying that.

The Calvinist doesn’t put God in one of the two boxes and say
God isn't in the other box. God put those two boxes there in the
first place.

Very, very, few TOL'ers treat God as an object. .PGF, Portable
God Format. The Calvinist programs can't read .PGFs. It's
a new modern format so everyone can get along and share
the same FreeWill.

Stick with the old Bible operating system. It works !

​

 

[john w]

Guess you do not love God, for you seem intent on blaming Him for this evil event while denying Him the right to execute judgments upon wicked societies and the actions of evil individuals within.

:nono:

Translated: I, Nag, know that I am saved/elect, because my lifestyle tells me so, and I just nailed JohnW, with my old, reliable "bait'nswitch" debating technique.

"while denying Him the right to"-Nag

Wow! Next up: "You limit God...put Him in a box...," and all that jazz.

Impressive, Clavinist.

 

[ThePresbyteers]

You're fixing to get in trouble for being right!!

Paul -- 121812

What kind of trouble?

 

[Grosnick Marowbe]

TOL'ers should allows read Nang's post twice. The unregenrates should always read Nang's post 10 times and remember it anyway as a General Call. Those that are effectively called don't even have to finish reading Nang's posts cause it's already in the Bible and read a billion times over, plus.

Nang's posts are mostly, if not all, proclaimed as she is instructed by the Elect's Lord even if she doesn't like it herself. There is a difference beween general called and effectivly called. Both are the same. Those that are effectively called understand Nang's post due to "God said that too!".

Have you been effectively called?

So read them again, she is more likey to be right. If not, move on.

It's fine that you're a "fan" of Nang, but
don't expect the rest of us to place her
on a "golden pedestal!!"

 

[Grosnick Marowbe]

What happened with those "murdered" in Conn.
is a result of sin in the world!! God didn't "plan"
and orchestrate this horrible murder spree as some
Calvinists would have us believe!! We ALL have a
"freewill of choice" to choose good or evil!!

 

[chatmaggot]

In an atheistic world view what happened at Sandy Hook is NO DIFFERENT than a baleen whale eating dinner.

An atheist cannot call what happened at Sandy Hook "evil" no more than they can call a whale eating a mouthful of small fish evil.

Matter, living or dead, is just that. There is no such thing as purpose, evil, good, justice, etc... All that there is...is opinion.

We are just chemical reactions. Chemistry has no feelings. An Alka-Seltzer tablet placed in a container of water is just a chemical reaction.

A chemical reaction takes place when molecules collide with sufficient energy to break old chemical bonds and form new ones.

An Alka-Seltzer tablet fizzing is not evil...it's a chemical reaction.

When someone guns down multiple people we are merely witnessing the results of a chemical reaction. A chemical reaction is not evil and we are the result of chemical reactions.

 

[ThePresbyteers]

...
But earlier you said

which means that you are happy with the idea of God's will being irresistible in the case of reading a Bible but not in the case of a person who picks up a gun to massacre helpless children. This confirms to me (and it ought to confirm to you) how very hypocritical your belief really is....

He will invent a way to get the person to Choose Him one
way or the other and He won't fail and always succeed.

The only sense 'God gets into a person's head' in this
is by the person's perceptions of circumstances around
them.

Providence doesn't operate by the blunt instrument of
the Lord directly putting thoughts into our mind !

We simply react to circumstances around us. ( It's
uncomfortably hot or cold, so we adjust the thermostat.
We see an attractive member of the opposite gender
and are aroused. The bus is late, or our automobile has
difficulty starting, and we become upset. Etc. Etc. Etc. )

Our entire life is one of confronting serial circumstances !


The Supreme Being need only supernaturally alter one
tiny thing in our environment, and it ripples through time
and space to change other things until we respond to it.

The shooter's mother and society effected the Shooter.

God -in His divine foreknowledge- knows what tiny thing
shall have such an effect so it affects us to make the
divinely intended choice.

However (and this is important), we also intended our
choice.

NOTHING forced upon us.

When we Calvinists reject the idea of human "free will",
the free will we have in view being a totally independent
and autonomous volition without limits. Only the Lord
has that kind of volition !

Humans have a "free will". Yet it's a limited Circumstantial
Will.


God exploited the sin nature of the shooter by presenting
him with circumstances which both aroused his desire to
murder as well as obtain the necessary means for committing
murder.

Not really different than any other use of Divine Providence by
the Lord to achieve His intended result.

[ Like the Supreme Being arranging circumstances to distract
us so that we forget to turn on our alarm clock thereby causing
us to over-sleep and miss an appointment. This merely a single
example out of a zillion ways in which Providence can operate. ]

The critical thing here being that God's use of Providence was
in sync with the shooter's sin nature. He was NOT made to
do something he didn't want !


If anybody wishes, we can discuss why the Most High arranges
the occurrence of bad events.

Suffice it for now to say that this isn't a instance of "bad things
happening to good people".

There are no "good people" !

 

[Letsargue]

What kind of trouble?

The same kind the Conservatives are with the Liberals, or to say, with the Americans and the Marxists.

Paul -- 121812

 

[john w]

In an atheistic world view what happened at Sandy Hook is NO DIFFERENT than a baleen whale eating dinner.

An atheist cannot call what happened at Sandy Hook "evil" no more than they can call a whale eating a mouthful of small fish evil.

Matter, living or dead, is just that. There is no such thing as purpose, evil, good, justice, etc... All that there is...is opinion.

We are just chemical reactions. Chemistry has no feelings. An Alka-Seltzer tablet placed in a container of water is just a chemical reaction.



An Alka-Seltzer tablet fizzing is not evil...it's a chemical reaction.

When someone guns down multiple people we are merely witnessing the results of a chemical reaction. A chemical reaction is not evil and we are the result of chemical reactions.

An "atheists"s Grandpa Sludge told him it was evil.

 

[ThePresbyteers]

Knight,
How, how, how can we talk about anti-Calvinist struggles and accusations within theology at a time like this?

Isn't this when we as believers should all unite?

Calvinist do unite and do pray at a time like this.
The purpose of prayer is NOT to override God's will.

If the Most High predestined 'Person X' to be
in a certain condition, we can pray for...

* The Lord to comfort 'Person X' in their affliction.

* The Lord to grant 'Person X' grace in
enduring their present condition.

* The Lord to enable 'Person X' to praise
God even though He has afflicted them.

[ Read the Book of Job, which is all about this. ]

What we cannot do is ask the Lord to change
what He has predestined !


Important point: Sometimes God afflicts
even His own people.

This occurs for one of a few different reasons.

a.) Sometimes it's to chastise us.
( "whom the Lord loves He reproves" Proverbs
3:12 NASB; cf Revelation 3:19, 1 Corinthians
11:32. )

b.) Sometimes it to bring us closer to Him.
Believers we're never closer to God than when
we're afflicted.

c.) Sometimes it's to glorify Him.
When we are under severe affliction (say, got
cancer or something), yet we refuse to abandon
God whom allows it, this represents a powerful
testimony to unbelievers !



Another Important Point:

None of us are so good, so obedient to God,
so free of sin, that we don't deserve any
afflictions we receive.

Even as the regenerate Elect, we continue
being sinners !

Our righteousness is Christ's righteousness
imputed to us.

God saves us from the eternal perdition we
deserve. And that not because we're so good,
but for the sake of His Son, Jesus Christ.

Therefore -if we suffer in this life- we have no
cause to complain. Our eternal punishment
has been remitted. That we suffer here and
now in as sinners in this fallen world, is
merely temporary.

The Most High uses our present affliction for
His glory and purposes.

 

[oatmeal]

No, God is not evil, nor does God do evil. Never, not even a little, not once.

He permits/allows evil because God never, never, never oversteps man's freedom of will.

If man wants to do evil, God allows it and man reaps what he sows.

When you take God out of society, evil reigns.

When you take God out of government, evil reigns

When you take God out of the schools, evil reigns.

oatmeal

 

[Desert Reign]

The Supreme Being need only supernaturally alter one
tiny thing in our environment, and it ripples through time
and space to change other things until we respond to it.

The shooter's mother and society effected the Shooter.

God -in His divine foreknowledge- knows what tiny thing
shall have such an effect so it affects us to make the
divinely intended choice.

However (and this is important), we also intended our
choice.

NOTHING forced upon us.

When we Calvinists reject the idea of human "free will",
the free will we have in view being a totally independent
and autonomous volition without limits. Only the Lord
has that kind of volition !

OK. Now that you've had your say, listen up! Because you obviously haven't understood me at all. I am not sure there is such a thing as free will. Please believe me. You are arguing against a straw man.

The ONLY thing I am interested in, in the present debate context, is God's will. Not man's. I can get my cats to walk through a door if I want them to by rattling the food carton or by offering them a saucer of cream. No problem. Believe me, please. I have no doubt that God can do the same thing to us.

I am only interested in one issue. Was it God's will for that man to shoot all those people?

In the first instance you said

otherwise He keep doing that til you do read it is His Will for you to read it.

These are your own words. Let me break this down further:

1) God uses a means to achieve an objective:

God arranges something that causes choices to be made. God
puts the Bible in your face through other means

2) God desires that objective to happen:

it is His Will for you to read it.

3) And finally you assert that God's will is irresistible:

Who is going to walk around with a
book in the face without peeking into it.

All your own words.

This thread is not about God willing someone to read read the Bible but about shooting down helpless children. So there is only one interpretation I can give to these words of yours. You believe that God causes various circumstances to take place in order to cause someone to do something that God wants to happen and that from that point on, his will is irresistible. And that specifically he willed those children to be killed in that way. (Again, I'm not interested in whether or not the depraved blokey willed to kill them or not so please don't bring that up. All that matters is did God will it?) Your answer here is clearly a yes answer. But in giving the example of God manipulating circumstances so that a person reads the Bible, you make it easier to accept that God's will is irresistible because you conclude with:

Who is going to walk around with a book in the face without peeking into it.

Now you were quite keen to stress that this blokey did it of his own free will:

God puts the Bible in your face through other means and you chose to read it

which as I said, I have no objection to. That is not an issue.

But it seems to be an issue for you because even though you are keen to stress that he did it of his own free will, God's will was irresistible. Like with my cats. I can sort of hear in the background:

"Who is going to walk around with semi-automatic guns in the house and not want to use them on helpless children?"

But then you completely deny yourself by saying in relation to the actual massacre

The boy killed His mom on his own but God put the guns there before him and as a result, the boy used the gun to kill his mom.
Other people woulds pick up the gun to shoot a deer to feed their family.

which is another way of saying that he could have done something different. That therefore it was his own fault and not God's and that God's will was in fact resistible. We are not talking here of God putting the guns in his way and then he completely independently and unexpectedly deciding to shoot some children. What you are talking about is God putting the guns there for the precise purpose of causing him to shoot those children. Again, don't tell me that it was the depraved young man's fault. I'm quite happy with the idea that it was his fault. I am talking about God's involvement in the situation, not the bloke's.

So do you want to retract anything you previously said, since your position is so clearly hypocritical?

 

[Paulos]

The TheologyOnline.com TOPIC OF THE DAY for December 17th, 2012 09:58 AM

toldailytopic: Did God predestine and therefore orchestrate the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre?

Physics Ends the Free Will Debate

 

[Christ's Word]

Why did God not prevent the tragedy?


I believe Christ answered that question in the parable about the Wheat and the Tares. Check Matthew chapter 13.

Some will be led to God over this tragedy, and the harvest will grow larger. Those innocent children will hear Christ's voice, be called from the grave, and be resurrected by Christ to a resurrection of life.

 

[Christ's Word]

No, God is not evil, nor does God do evil. Never, not even a little, not once.

He permits/allows evil because God never, never, never oversteps man's freedom of will.

If man wants to do evil, God allows it and man reaps what he sows.

When you take God out of society, evil reigns.

When you take God out of government, evil reigns

When you take God out of the schools, evil reigns.

oatmeal

When you take mommy's AR-15 out of the safe, without permission, evil has a force multiplier.