From: kilroy@gboro.glassboro.edu (Dust In The Wind)
Subject: On Reading Minds
Organization: Rowan College of New Jersey
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1992 15:42:04 GMT


This is not an article about free will, predestination, or any other aspect
of that now-silenced topic.  This article is about claiming to know why other
people think what they do.  It's a meta-article on the discussion.

Tom Brewer wrote:

> The unregenerate man hates the notion that God sovereignly controls all
> things.  [...]
>
> If God controls all things, that means His will is in control of man's will.
> Man hates this because it strips man of any claim to good.  It shows man does
> not even have the tendency for good. [...]  The proud man rejects this
> sovereign control of Almighty God.  Man does not want to be at the disposal
> of God.
>
> Man hates that his own salvation cannot be determined by his own will.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but what you have written is garbage.

My disagreement with predestinarians has nothing to do with supposed `hatred'
of God's sovereignty or with pride about wanting to fix my own salvation.  The
reason I disagree with predestinarians is because I have not seen sufficient
evidence to support their claims, and because they I have not seen adequate
replies to objections made by others.

Posting articles which claim that those who disagree with you are encumbered
by some character defect is both a waste of time and rather idiotic.  To see
why, try a variation: "Those who don't believe in Free Will are not yet grown
up enough to face responsibility for their actions.  They hate the idea that
they are to blame when they choose to do wrong, so they deny that they choose
anything."

Does that convince you?  Are you now going to dump what you think and
convert?  If not, why do you believe that such tactics will work on others?

If you want people to agree with you, I suggest you post articles containing
only evidence and well-reasoned arguments.  Post articles with no guesses
about why others do not agree, no sniping nasty remarks about how they are
more sinful than you and they'd agree if they were purer, no sarcasm, no
"my reading of the Bible is the only right one", none of that junk.


> Much of the above comes from my reading of "God's Will and Man's Will" by
> Horatius Bonar.
>
> And finally, Mr. Bonar writes, "Man's dislike at God's sovereignty arises
> from his suspicion of God's heart."

I do not believe that Mr Bonar could read other people's hearts.  But I am
curious to know whether he wrote anything about men's _disbelief_ in his
ideas, as opposed to _dislike_ of them -- they are two entirely different
things.  Does he address both topics, or does he just lump them into one?

I don't much dislike Predestination, any more than I dislike flat-earth ideas
or phlogiston theories.  I don't agree with those things either.  (Ooooh, it
must be sinful pride that makes me refuse to acknowledge the truth of the
Flat Earth!)


[ BTW: When I made an earlier comment about how lots of the would-be
  `arguments' on Christia are rubbish, this kind of supposed-mind-reading
  is the sort of thing I had in mind. ]


Darren F Provine / kilroy@gboro.glassboro.edu
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia