We run our website the way we wished the whole internet worked: we provide high quality original content with no ads. We are funded solely by your direct support. Please consider supporting this project.
How do you respond to Jeremiah 25:8–12?
The Lord says to the nations: “Because you have not obeyed my words” (vs. 8), “this whole land shall become a ruin and a waste, and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years. Then after seventy years are completed, I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation, the land of the Chaldeans, for their iniquity, says he Lord…”
This is another splendid example of the sovereign Lord foreknowing what he is going to do and of how the Lord ingeniously weaves the freely chosen character of morally responsible agents into his providential plan. The Lord declares that he is going to punish the iniquity of various nations, including Israel, by allowing the malicious king Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon to conquer them. He will allow this for seventy years and will then punish Babylon for its evil. The Lord who gives agents their freedom also sets the parameters of this freedom and even influences how they use it (Prov. 21:1). But this truth does not warrant the conclusion that he either controls or foreknows everything that free agents shall ever do.
Category: Q&A
Tags: Open Theism, Q&A
Topics: Open Theism, Responding to Objections
Verse: Jeremiah 25
Related Reading
Love and Free Will
God could have easily created a world in which nothing evil could ever happen. But this world would not have been capable of love. God could have preprogrammed agents to say loving things and to act in loving ways. He could even have preprogrammed these automatons to believe they were choosing to love. But these…
How do you respond to Romans 8:29?
“For whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn within a large family.” One of the greatest treasures given to believers when they open their hearts to the Lord is the promise that they shall certainly be “conformed to the…
What about the thief on the cross?
Question: You hold that most people who are saved will nevertheless have to go through a “purging fire” to have their character refined and fit for heaven. Whatever is unfinished in our “sanctification” in this epoch must be completed in the next. But how does this square with Jesus telling the thief on the cross,…
Predestination Part 2: Seeing Destiny Rightly
For Part 1, click here. In Ephesians Paul teaches that God “chose us in [Christ] before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight” (Eph 1:4). In Christ, Paul continues, God “predestined us for adoption to sonship…to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in…
Can Christians serve in the military?
Question: Jesus ministered to military people (e.g. a centurion) and didn’t tell them to leave their military post. So do you think Christians can serve in the military? I believe it’s a Christians duty is to serve their country, aid the wounded, defend the oppressed, protect our families, stand for truth and justice, and kill…