Think Wink.

5 Comments so far

1. Henry December 7th, 2006 9:29 am

   This is a big question for me. I think I understand how your system treats prayer, but I would hate to misrepresent. Here is a quote that bothers me a bit.

   Prayerful: Because your prayer is as fixed as the predestined answer.

   I sometimes hear that God only overrides free choice (or manipulates it [no negative connotation implied for you can say he own us]) only in matters of salvation. These people still ascribe to free will in other areas b/c Adam and Eve had to have free will in these areas or they would not have been responsible for the fall, God would have.

   Now, in all areas of prayer, if God ordains the prayer and I am not praying, then that is ok, because I would not be praying if God had not ordained it, if I am reading that quote correctly, and I might not be.

   From the second article:

   Prayer is a request that God do something.

   I like what he says about the flip side of the prayer argument. Asking God to change a persons’ heart assuming s-d is the same thing the Calvinists are doing when they assume n-s-d. However, those are not the only two possibilities.

   I guess I don’t pray for the conversion of the individual. I pray that my wants and needs and desires might fall into line with what God wants for me. I pray to reform my character. That assumes s-d. I am woefully torn on prayer.

   I still don’t think he has made a case for a responsibility of the person for prayer. God’s plans cannot be changed and he wills everything to happen, even our prayers(see above quote). If I am not praying, then it must not have been God’s will. I am let off of the hook in Calvinism if I end up not praying. I cannot fail because I am not doing anything. I am not even acting, I am merely floating on the current of God’s will that is so strong that I cannot change my course.

   From what I can tell, and I wish you would give your summary of those articles and your position on prayer here or even on MT, that prayer is ordained by God, is a part of the causes of salvation, like a match that lights a candle, and we are pressed to do it in God’s word. What this means for a person not praying is that it must not have been God’s will that they did pray at the times that they did not, in fact, pray.

   Am I being clear? There is no heat in this discussion, I honestly want to know your viewpoint and not misrepresent.

2. Hank December 7th, 2006 10:52 pm

   I like what he has to say in those articles, especially the article “The Sovereignty of God and Prayer.” Piper really gets to a great point there. Point 1 is that he turns the question back to the non-Calvinist (I say that because many people hold to some of the Five but are not full Calvinists): why should the “free will” person pray for the lost when he or she believes that it is not up to God? What can God do? The answer is really no more than you or I can do. Many free will proponents, in my estimation, don’t consider that argument. I have asked a person that here at school and at SBU and both times they looked blankly at me and then came back with the question: “What about free will?” I have never really heard a good answer to that in light of the biblical evidence Piper gives.

   Point two in the article is that of ordination of prayer. God has ordained that the gospel be spread through men and women proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ crucified and resurrected. That is the way God saves sinners. The same thing is applied to prayer by Piper. God has ordained to do things as answers to our prayers. Thus we should pray so that the prayers will be answered like we should preach so that people will hear and believe the gospel. I would say that is my position as well and I think Piper’s words are a fair treatment to the conversation.

   In response to your comments I would begin with where you talked about not praying is okay because your prayers are not occuring because they aren’t ordained to occur. I think you miss out on what he was trying to say: that we must pray so that these things will occur. He was not trying so much to tell people that this is why we must pray, although that was part of the argument, but rather how prayer and predestination work together. However your point is a good point. To respond to this I only echo the commands of the Bible where we are commanded by Jesus, Paul, John, James, Jude, Peter, and the author of Hebrews to pray. It is also a question of obedience to the Holy Scriptures and Jesus, our God. To not pray at all is not being a faithful child of God, being totally dependent upon all we do. Thus we are not let off the hook. Piper concludes “Prayer and Predestination” with this line, “Prayerful: Then let’s stop thinking up problems and go with what the Scriptures say. Ask and you will receive. You have not because you ask not.” We are not off the hook if we want to be biblical and that is what Piper and myself are saying.

   Also Piper says that prayer is a human action, one that we must still chose to do.

   But I must say that you can argue that if not praying is okay b/c it wasn’t ordained and that is a good objection. But I think that we must also consider the biblical witness for the why pray also. He is just trying to help one understand why he as a Five-Point Calvinist prays. No one can get around the verses like 1 Thessalonians 5:17 or 1 Timothy 2:1.

3. Henry December 14th, 2006 7:28 am

   I don’t know - you set up that we have no choice in the matter and then condemn for not doing - even though were are merely acting as we are supposed to.

   Here is the real rub with the above. If we are only doing what God fore-ordained, and what we are doing is sin. God ordained sin.

   Piper concludes “Prayer and Predestination” with this line, “Prayerful: Then let’s stop thinking up problems and go with what the Scriptures say. Ask and you will receive. You have not because you ask not.” We are not off the hook if we want to be biblical and that is what Piper and myself are saying.

   I would challenge that - I would ask the hard questions, praying the whole while. These objections are not problems to have problems - they are real and honest questions about seeming contradictions this this thought-view. If you want one to adhere to it, it must be addressed. I also realize that just because neither you nor Piper addressed my issues here does not mean that you don’t have good and satisfactory answers to the above problems.

4. Hank December 14th, 2006 1:43 pm

   In case you don’t remember my post on Jeremiah 12:2, let me try to restate it. Jeremiah has just learned that there is a plot against him. Jeremiah asks God in Jeremiah 12:1-2, “Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all who are treacherous thrive? You plant them, and they take root; they grow and produce fruit.” Jeremiah says that God plants the wicked in the ground of this world. Jeremiah is holding God responsible for the evil in the world around him. What is God’s response to Jeremiah, “If you have raced with men on foot, and they have wearied you, how will you compete with horses? And if in a safe land you are so trusting, what will you do in xthe thicket of the Jordan?” That is God’s response in Jeremiah 12:5. God does not deny or rebuke Jeremiah’s charge. He does not say that he doesn’t plant evil. Jeremiah makes the charge and it goes unanswered. That is a problem to say that God does not and cannot do evil. The Bible here has linked God as the author of sin in some manner.

   Then there is Pharaoh in Exodus 4-14. God told Moses in Exodus 4:21, “And the Lord said to Moses, ‘When you go back to Egypt, see that you do before Pharaoh all the amiracles that I have put in your power. But bI will harden his heart, so that he will not let the people go.’” God told Moses that he must call Pharaoh to release the people but he wasn’t going to because God wanted Moses to perform all of the plagues for the glory of God. Thus every time Pharaoh does not let the people go “as the Lord had said,” it is because God had moved in such a way that Pharaoh would not comply with Moses’ demand. Pharaoh calls this in in Exodus 9:27 and Exodus 10:16-17. God is moving Pharaoh to sin, and yet is not sinning in the process.

   Look at David’s life 2 Samuel 24:1, “Again the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he incited David against them, saying, ‘Go, number Israel and Judah.’” God moved David to take a census of the people. This is God’s doing here. Notice what David calls this census before God, “And David said to the Lord, ‘I have sinned greatly in what I have done’” (2 Samuel 24:10). Here again God has moved David to commit a sin. What is amazing about this is that God is doing this to a faithful king! It is one of his own people, not a Gentile or faithless Hebrew. It is King David doing this. We learn in 1 Chronicles that he used Satan to incite David. However the fact remains that God ordained this to take place.

   It is biblical to understand that God is somehow the author of sin. Here is a New Testament example. Why did the people of Jerusalem refuse to come to Jesus? Why instead did they crucify the only truly innocent man, thus they are guilty of murder? Acts 4:27-28 says that God predestined the people of Jerusalem, the Jews, Herod, Pilate and the Roman soldiers to crucify Jesus. God ordained that this sinful act occur. Isaiah 53 reminds us that this pleased God to do this.

   Why then does God ordain sin? Romans 9:22-23, “What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience evessels of wrath fprepared for destruction, in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory.” God elects a people to receive mercy so that they might see that mercy and glorify God for it. He passes over the rest and leaves them in their sin so that the glory of his wrath and judgment might be made know as well. In this way God’s glory, God’s name, is most wholy made known because all of his attributes are on display, not just some. God means to display his glory and he does it. The deepest and ultimate reason for ordaining sin is so that God’s glory might be shown most fully and most completely to the vessels of mercy.

5. Hank December 14th, 2006 1:49 pm

   I would challenge that - I would ask the hard questions, praying the whole while. These objections are not problems to have problems - they are real and honest questions about seeming contradictions this this thought-view. If you want one to adhere to it, it must be addressed.

   I agree with you on that we should ask the tough questions. But if the Bible teaches something, we must not try to wiggle our way out from under it. I mean, I must ask of you why do you pray when God really is powerless to do anything with certainty because he would inevitably violate someone’s free will to ensure that something happens. But, if free will is the teaching of the Bible, I would have to adhere to it. The same thing goes in the opposite direction. You should ask those questions, but not to the point that you refuse to believe what the Bible teaches because of a natural hangup that doesn’t want to conform to the Bible. I do not disapprove of the questions; I wouldn’t have posted this post if I did. That is why Piper says let us stop trying to ask questions and just start praying. The questions are an excuse to not believe what the Bible teaches, in the article that Piper wrote.

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