@Kermos, your soteriology assigns to God such strikingly absurd character traits as to be offensive to any believer. It makes God the author, reason and cause of all, and I mean all, of what is wrong in the world. It is a real shame.
Whoops, you lied with "
offensive to any believer" because God granted me agreement from others in this very thread.
Now, to you and
@Eternally-Grateful (your "Like" of Jim's aspersion against Almighty God), you who convey God is evil to save even one person:
18 He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.
19 You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?” 20 On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, “Why did you make me like this,” will it? 21Or does not the Potter have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for common use? 22 What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction? 23 And He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory
So, faithful, glorious, and graceful Lord and God Jesus Christ fills us
vessels of mercy with God's works of
mercy which
God prepared beforehand for glory!
Paul declares God's Sovereign control of man with "
He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires" (Romans 9:18).
Immediately after writing that God is in control, Paul continued with "
You will say to me then, 'Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?'" (Romans 9:19) - herein resides your wrongly assigning man's accountability for sin to God - the fault question.
Romans 9:18 segues right into Romans 9:19-23.
Bringing these together:
Paul conveyed "God is in control" (Romans 9:18) then the "
you" defiantly mocks God's control with "
Why does He still find fault since your soteriology assigns to God such strikingly absurd character traits as to be offensive to any believer? For who resists His will?" (the book of Second Opinions 9:19).
The "
you" in Romans 9:19-20 is the person who rejects God by way of rejecting God's exclusive control of man's salvation; in other words, the "
you" is the person that claims man has a free will.
Do not forget that it is written that no purpose of God's can be thwarted (Job 42:2), so scripture reveals that man cannot resist God's will, and Paul knows scripture.
Notice the "
you" questioning why God still finds fault. Paul conveys that the "
you" asks the fault question in a mocking manner, and the subsequent question about God's will continues with the "
you" mocking God who is entirely in control of man's salvation according to Paul (
Ephesians 2:8-10 for example).
The "
you" is certainly mocking because immediately after the question about God's will, Paul wrote:
On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, "Why did you make me like this," will it? (Romans 9:20)
See the "
On the contrary" which is indicative that the following statement of Paul refutes the mocking questions of the "
you" about the fault question and the question about God's will (in Romans 9:19).
Paul continues immediately after "
On the contrary" in Romans 9:20 showing that the thing molded cannot resist the will of the Molder.
The thing molded represents the "
you".
The Molder represents God.
IN TRUTH, PAUL CONVEYS THAT MAN CANNOT RESIST GOD'S WILL (ROMANS 9:19-20)!
Behold the parallel of the defiant "
you" as adversary against God (in Romans 9:19-20) to free-willians based upon the content of free-willian philosophical writings - look at your post, Jim.
My brother Paul wrote "
it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy" (
Romans 9:16).
