I'm not trying to deify the guy or anything, but you got to admit, the guy always seems to get it right:-). This is out of "Biblical Ethics" by Oswald Chambers.In this, he deals with the other often cited event, when dealing with predestionation, the hardening of Pharoah's heart.
Oswald Chambers wrote:God has ordained that man is to govern man, whether he wants to or not. This keeps socialism from being it; the socialistic scheme falls to pieces because it ignores the fact that human institutions are not utilitarian, that is, they do not spring from the ingenuity of man, but were deliberately ordained by God for the government of man by man. Peter brings this out when he says, Be subject to every ordinance of man, but he is careful to add for the Lords sake (1 Peter 2:13 rv).Man is responsible to God for the government of the whole world, but if a man succumbs to the temptations of his official position, that very position will have the effect of hardening his heart away from God. We read in the Old Testament that Pharaoh hardened his heart (Exodus 7:14 et seq.); and we read also that God hardened his heart (Exodus 4:21 et seq.). The difficulty of this apparent contradiction is purely superficial. It must not be interpreted to mean that God hardened a mans heart and then condemned him for being hardened. The hardening of Pharaohs heart by himself and by God is the expression of the working of one of Gods laws, and Gods laws do not alter. Any ruler or ordinary man who refuses to obey the right law will find himself distinctly hardened away from God. If a man is to govern rightly he must see that the institutions he builds up are based on the stabilities of human nature as God created it; otherwise havoc will be produced.
_________________Aaron Ireland
Jimbob said:
Your theology mirrors that of mormonism, not Christianity. God did not desire us to fall.
