According to what is actually written in scriptures, Adam and Eve were given Laws by God, in His Love and Mercy, to place boundaries and limits on their own free will, to keep their own flesh from destroying them. Just as God placed limits on His Own Free will, which if not fettered, would destroy everything, just as all beings with free will
, must have limits. This is undeniable Truth. God is a Just God, and Merciful. HE "Chooses" these things. No one "makes" God be just and Merciful.
All of these Truths are shields and swords God gives to me, to discard, mortify, resist to pulls of a flesh I fed for years.
According to what is actually written, Adam and Eve were created with the ability to "Choose" to have faith in, and be thankful for, Gods instruction, as they were created the perfect free will mortal human.
And also, they were created with the ability to "choose" of their free will, to reject Gods instruction, and have faith instead
in their own flesh, as they were created the perfect free will mortal human. This is the reality of Free will.
They had these abilities "
before" God placed them in a garden with a talking snake.
God gave them a Law "
before" God placed them in the garden with a talking snake. These are undeniable Biblical Truths.
I too, was born the perfect free will mortal human, after the image of God, no different than Adam. I am given boundaries by my parents God placed over me, in their love and mercy for me, to save me from my own free will choices, until I learn how to wield it. Without boundaries,
all humans would destroy themselves "by their own free will choices".
This is why Law exists in every society. This is why Christ gave Laws to His People, as HE Himself tells us, if we could only believe him.
Deut. 4:
39 Know therefore this day, and consider it in thine heart, that the LORD he is God in heaven above, and upon the earth beneath: there is none else.
40 Thou shalt keep therefore his statutes, and his commandments, which I command thee this day, that it may go well with thee, and with thy children after thee, and that thou mayest prolong thy days upon the earth, which the LORD thy God giveth thee, for ever.
Adam and Eve were given the power to choose to obey and believe God. How can a man
who doesn't believe God, "
be born of God?"
Will you also answer my questions? Or do you place burdens on others that you will not lift with even one of your fingers?
I believe what Paul teaches, I don't believe what you preach. They are two completely different gospels.
I am happy to do just that.
I have found that to understand the message of someone, anyone, it is best to consider all of the message, not just a sentence here or a sentence there. Eve encountered the exact same thing Red, that you promote to me. Here, lets look at what Paul really teaches in Rom. 7&8, and see if "total depravity" is wrought in God or the imagination of the heart of man that you have adopted.
Rom. 7:
24 O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
25 I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then "with the mind" I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.
Rom. 8:
1 There is therefore now (Because Paul; serves the Law of God from the heart/mind) no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk "not after the flesh", but after the Spirit.
That is the exact same free will choice Adam and Eve had. Whose words are we to choose to "live by"? Doesn't the Christ tell Adam, Eve, you and I the answer to this question? You don't preach anything that even resembles what Paul is teaching here.
Lets continue.
2 For the law "of the Spirit of life" (That is) in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the "law of sin and death".
So isn't Paul saying that the choice of "Serving the Law of God", that Christ Jesus served, "with his mind", causes him to be free, from Law of sin, death.
How is that different from Adam and Eve? Had Eve "Served the Law of God" in her mind, she would have been free from the Law of Sin/death. Didn't she have a free will choice to do just that?
3 For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh:
Eve ate of the forbidden fruit, the wages of which was death. If she never ate the fruit again for the rest of her life, is she then free of the penalty? Can this Law, or any Law take away her sin? No, only by Mercy and Grace, the barriers God Chose, of HIS OWN Free will, to limit His Own free Will, can the death "EVE Chose" be annulled. And HE chooses to do this for the repentant.
Do you think Eve ever ate of that tree again? I would say no. She Chose to adopt God's Law, walking in the flesh, serving the Law of God in her mind, not walking in the Flesh, serving the imaginations of here own heart.
4 That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who (Choose to) walk "not" after the flesh, (as she did in times past) but (instead, choose to walk) after the Spirit.
5 For they that are "after the flesh" (serve the Flesh) do mind the things of the flesh (Fleshy lust, works of the flesh) but they that are after the Spirit (Serve the Law of God with their minds) the things of the Spirit. (God's Laws)
6 For to (Choose to) be carnally minded (Reject God's Laws)is death; (Like Eve chose) but to (Choose to) be spiritually minded (Serve God's Laws) (like Jesus did) is life and peace.
7 Because the carnal mind (Unfettered free will) is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. 8 So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.
9 But ye (Who choose to serve the Law of God with your mind) are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, "if so be" that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.
So then if we refuse the Spirit of LIFE that was in Christ Jesus, if a man refuses to "Serve the Law of God with his mind", like Eve did, that we are not walking in the Spirit.
10 And if Christ be in you, the body (Flesh) is dead (Mortified, no longer rules over your thoughts and deeds, as it did with Eve) because of (our own free will) sin; but the Spirit is life (That is in Jesus) because of (The free Will choosing of) righteousness.
Total depravity is no different than Eve blaming God for her sins, or Adam blaming God for his sins. God Himself said you are going to be judged by "Your Works". Eve was Judged by "Her works", Adam was judged by His Works". Paul taught the opposite of "total depravity". It is a wicked and deceitful doctrine and is crated by fleshy men, to justify fleshy works.