How does the doctrine of election reconcile with John 3:16 and Colossians 2:2
Discussion
42 comments
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Paul knew that their unity came from not only love, but also from the truth, from both being knit together in love and growing in the understanding and knowledge of God’s truth. The true wisdom Paul wanted them to know in Jesus would bring them together – indeed, knit them together in love – instead of dividing them the way that false wisdom did. For Paul, real riches were found in the believer’s full assurance. Many lack full assurance about the character of God and are unconvinced that He is really good and loving. Others lack full assurance of their salvation and wonder if their Christian life is for real. Great freedom and confidence comes when we come to this full assurance.
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There is no contradiction God loves those He elects unto salvation. God is sovereign and does according to his pleasure and will.
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If you like the analogy of God being the Potter and we the clay, an analogy of both the OT and NT. The clay was cursed when Adam Sinned. All are made of the same clay and are sinful pots. God choose his pots through no merit of the pots and glazes them with his righteousness. ‘But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.’ 2 Cor 4:7 KJV.
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He that believes is he that God has chosen.
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The proper way to interpret the Bible is by the context ,we need to read the whole content not only by verse
Col 2:2 is talking to the church (elect) in laodicea the word “you” is talking to Christian not all the people
Jhn 3:16 is about the attributes oF God, God is love thats is His character/attribute thats why He loved the world, that “whosoever believed in Him” is hyperbolic question because in v19 this is the judgement, that the light (Jesus) has come but people loved the darkness in v20 they (world) hate the light (Jesus) and dO not come to light (Jesus) so No one come in his own freewill to Christ unless he is been born from above/just like we born here in physical not on our will and also in spiritual we are born not own our will but the will of God -
I believe God is patient as he wants everyone to be saved and Jesus died for everyone. John 3.16 says God sent his only son that whoever believes in him will have eternal life, not that only some people will have it and others are doomed no matter what they believe
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First of all God is not the Author of Confusion(1 Corinthians 14:33) and it doesn’t contradict, may I ask why you brought this up? Kathy DeVoss
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God as the omniscient one knows those who will believe in Jesus Christ before it happened are those elected.
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Why is it you cannot study this out for yourself? Do you not have a bible and the ability to read and understand what you read? Or are you just out for a debate on a subject you have no real knowledge about?
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Easily cause there is no problem.
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Do yourself a favour and find study material on Romans 9. It would change your whole perspective of God and His salvation. In fact for me I really understood for the first time in my life what ” the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. ” meant. I also understood that my salvation I have today is definitely not of any good works, that it is only a gift from God.
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It’s not “who believes” in John 3:16, but “whoever believes”. God said that predestination comes alongside foreknowledge and it is VERY clear to all who aren’t indocrinated in the man-made tradition of TULIP which is only half right, that there a hundred command imperatives to believe/receive/surrender/repent, all heart choices, that God says we must do. If we don’t, we perish. This creates a twofold problem for TULIP pickers. One, if you have Irresistible Grace, which is unbelievably heretical and unBiblical!!!!, then you can’t obey these command imperatives. God gave Adam and Eve a choice and they failed miserably, but they had to be able to choose fail, if they were going to be given a command. There has to be the choice to obey or disobey, follow through with the command or fail to obey the command. You can’t have a God that purposely gives a command when there’s no option to follow. Otherwise, you have a hundred totally useless salvation commands. If it’s instinctual, automatic and irresistible, then those commands are mindbogglingly useless. Moreso, the parts where God actually commands the elect to believe/receive, etc and ALSO threatens punishment for failure. Well that’s a total contradiction of Irresistible Grace entirely. “Hey, guys, I’m going to call you and you’re going to irresistibly and unfailingly be drawn to obey, and you have no choice, but just in case, let me write down commands to obey a hundred times over and warn you what happens when you disobey, which can’t happen, according to 5 point Calvinists, so all these warnings are completely worthless, according to 5 point TULIP Calvinists. ”
See, instead of marrying the verses where God says He chose us, aka knew us before we were born and knew we would choose and therefore made us in His sovereign timing which is predestination based on foreknowledge that we would choose Him, and together marrying those verses with those that say we do choose, need to choose, are commanded to choose, and oh, by the way, there’s literal Hell to pay for choosing poorly. That is called Isogesis, not Exegesis. You are not using Scripture to interpret Scripture, but using man-made doctrinal interpretation and undoing the literal textual meaning of most of the New Testament to fit your wonky idea you received from some guy. You all are falling for the oldest fallacy in the book, the a or b dichotomy fallacy. You are presented with two bad choices and forced to choose. The option is answer C, which is believe Everything the Bible actually clearly says. Yes, there’s foreknowledge if what we would choose. Yes, there has to be predestination because God formed us in the womb and decided that we would be born, knowing what we would choose. He also knew what the unrepentant would choose.
Yes, that means we all already have a destiny. No, that doesn’t mean that we do not have free will, because we are simply given the destiny we already would have had. Yes, we are too depraved to choose God on our own. No, that doesn’t mean we can’t choose Him when God effectually calls us and prompts us. Yes, when God calls us, we are able to obey the command imperatives and receive Him. Yes, we had enough free will to say No!. Yes, God used the Holy Spirit to prompt us BECAUSE he knew we would choose Yes!. Yes, that still leaves a Sovereign God, AND still leaves predestination and free will intact. Yes, that means God chooses and we choose. No, that is not works based salvation, because works are what we do AFTER we resolve to obey. Repentance is resolving to obey, the choice we make BEFORE we follow through with the works. Resolving happens in the heart, aka soul, which is Spirit, like receiving, believing, surrendering, repenting. Works are done by the mind and body, which is flesh, to divert from lust, to speak in love, to act I’m righteousness. Those are works of the flesh, not a choice of the spirit.
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God chose His elects by His love, mercy and will. God is impartial God therefore He never plays favoritism. God gives His gift of salvation to all not just for some. When a sinner believed in Jesus that’s then we would find out if he/she is an elect.
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One thing to keep in mind about John 3:16 is that it is in the context of Jesus’ discussion with Nicodimus. Earlier in the discussion Jesus states that no one who is not born of the Spirit will see the kingdom of heaven. So those who believe in John 3:16 are those who have been born of the Spirit. Also, John 3:18 states that those who don’t believe are already condemned.
Context matters. Theology matters. Doctrine matters.
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You see ‘whosoever” as all inclusive when it’s not. If you go into a restaurant and tell the waitress ‘whoever’ sits at my table, I’m paying for’, does that mean ever person through the door can sit at your table? No. It just means, the people you invited to dinner, your paying for. The whosoever is evidence of salvation, no size of it.
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God chooses those who He knows will willingly choose Him.
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Eric OConnor…..yeah, that sounds like you added your own opinion to you analogy …… sorry
I say God invited everyone to dinner . . .
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The Greek phrase, “pas ho pisteuwn,” in John 3:16 = “WHOSOEVER WILL?” NOT SO!
The phrase in the original Greek, “whoever believes,” in John 3:16 = “pas ho pisteuon” = relative pronoun “pas” = “everyone who” with a definite article “the” = “ho” + the present participle verb functioning as a noun, “pisteuon” = believing one, lit. “everyone who is the believing one”. NOT whosoever will!
➡️So “pas ho pisteuon” in Jn 3:16 = “everyone who is the believing one”, i.e, everyone who is the believer at the moment one begins believing.
?So , now let’s re-read John 3:16 with the correct rendering of, “pas ho pisteuwn,” for, “whosoever believeth,”:
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, (that everyone who is the believing one) in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
Thus a believer is legitimately referred to as a believer from the moment he trusts in Christ for eternal life, at which moment he receives possession – continuous and forever – of eternal life because possession of eternal life is forever.
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I usually don’t get involved in these kind of debates but it seems it’s either this or osas so here’s the question why did god create us and us meaning mankind?
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Can’t get elected until you run for office
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Election is God’s personal rights. Belief is human side.
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Keep reading,
John 3:18 who ever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only son of God.The key here is condemned already.
They have not trusted
In Gods solution. They stand condemned Already for their sins.
The already show that the condemnation of those who would not trust In Jesus already have been judged.And I don’t see how cols.2:2 is against election
All knowledge is in Christ. He knows all things. Keep in mind as you read it; Colossians is a letter written to Christians in the city of Colossae as implied by the book’s title. -
Since God doesn’t show partiality then all have a chance to be saved
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Foreknowledge.
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God’s foreknowledge is that all should repent and believe the gospel. I can do this all day
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It doesn’t
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So god doesn’t want people to repent and believe the gospel?
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Are the two verses enemies? I, for one, think not!
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Elect= israel.
And Election has nothing to do with salvation.That’s how john 3.16 fits.
That’s also how Genesis 1.1- John 3.15 fits, and John 3.17- Revelation 22.21 fits. -
Elect = Jesus if someone is in Jesus he’s part of the elect because Jesus is the elect one. It’s all about jesus
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If you believe that one of God’s attributes is Omniscience then he does know who is going to be his or not. We don’t though and that is where evangelism comes into play.
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I’m struggling to see what the conflict is
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God shows his love and people respond that’s how all relationships work.
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If these are questions by people honestly asking for the purpose of learning the truth, well and good. But the Word tells us:
But avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and strife and disputes about the Law, for they are unprofitable and worthless.
Titus 3:9 NASB
https://bible.com/bible/100/tit.3.9.NASB -
Uninformed, ignorance. See the previous post or the one underneath .
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When you carefully read John 3:16, you will find that this verse is discriminatory (it does not say that everyone will be saved). Instead it says that it’s only those who will believe – will be saved. So, this verse implies that those who will not believe will perish. Doesn’t it? So, this verse does not teach of universal salvation. It teaches us that only people who will be enabled to believe from different nations will be saved. Only believers in Jesus Christ from among your people will be saved. The same applies to our nation and this includes even the Jews. Only the Jews who believed in Jesus Christ preached through types in the OT and those who believe in Jesus Christ crucified are being saved and will be saved. True gospel is always discriminatory. True gospel speaks of goats and on the other hand speaks of sheep, wheat and tares, foosh virgins and wise virgins and it tells us of wise builders and foolish builders who built on sand. Why did they build on sand? It’s because they were not given wisdom from above. Natural man cannot understand spiritual things. He will remain foolish to spiritual things, until when the Holy Spirit chooses (elects) to give him wisdom unto salvation.
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Perfectly
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It’s a contradiction.
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In all seriousness, Kathy, what is your understanding of election?
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My understanding is that God, in His sovereignty, chooses whom He will to salvation. Man, in his sin, has no ability to call out to God but it is only by the working of the Holy Spirit
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“No man is excluded from calling upon God, the gate of salvation is set open unto all men: neither is there any other thing which keepeth us back from entering in, save only our own unbelief”.
John Calvin
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God has chosen a body, Not the indevidual, And that body is made up from every born again Christian who from their own free will accept Jesus as saviour and Lord.
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