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Tuesday, October 23, 2018

Problem Verses - Part 1

You know this verse, or, at least, the significant part of it, I'm sure.
The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not willing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance. (2 Peter 3:9)
We love that verse. "God is not willing for any to perish." Love it! What is God's will? "All should come to repentance." Yes! We love that!! Except ... there's a problem.

This verse comes up a lot in the "Elect" versus "Individual Free Will" debates. One side says "God chooses whom He will save" and the other throws this grenade back: "God is not willing that any should perish." There ya go. Proof. God doesn't choose. Except that Scripture says He does (e.g., 1 Peter 2:9; Eph 1:3-4; John 6:44; Eph 1:11; John 15:16; Matt 22:14; 2 Thess 2:13). Well, that's a problem. But, look, surely God chooses those whom He knows will choose Him, right? I'll tell you what; let's go with that for a moment.

Let's just leave that alone for now, because there's a much bigger problem here. Are you ready? Here it is. If God is not willing that any should perish, why do any perish? The problem, in fact, only gets worse if we factor in Paul's letter to Timothy where he says that God "desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth" (1 Tim 2:3-4). I mean, for a moment there we could have done a dodge on the 2 Peter verse by simply pointing out that the "any" that He wishes won't perish doesn't have an object, so "people" wasn't required. It could be "any of the elect" or something like it, but this one is clear -- "all people." No help at all. Apparently, then, we have a contradiction. While God "works all things according to the counsel of His will" (Eph 1:11), that "all things" does not include this.

We might explain it that God has tied His own hands. He won't violate our free will. Word it carefully that way, and you come to a "The Sovereign God sovereignly surrenders Sovereignty to human free will" kind of view. Maybe that works for you, but in terms of reason and logic, it's neither. It doesn't get us out of the contradiction. God cannot be both Sovereign and not.

Maybe it's in the word, "desires." You know, "God wishes that all will be saved, but God doesn't always get what He wishes." It's true; He doesn't. He wishes you wouldn't sin, but you do. He takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but they die (Ezek 33:11). As it turns out, the word in 1 Tim 2:4 (thelō) is the same word as in Eph 1:11 and we're back to the problem of God's will, not His wishes. Some will point out that the Greek word in 1 Tim 2:4 is not the same word used in the 2 Peter passage (boulomai). "That one," they will point out, "is more at 'will' than 'desire'." And, of course, I hope you can see that this doesn't help either. We're still left with God's will not being fulfilled.1

And this problem gets worse when we consider that Paul wrote that God grants repentance (2 Tim 2:25), so if repentance is granted by God, it would seem that humans wouldn't be standing in the way of God's wishes in this regard. And we, once again, have these two ideas standing in opposition. God wills that all come to repentance but only "may perhaps grant repentance" (2 Tim 2:25) to them ... or may perhaps not.

I've seen a lot of people talking on both sides of this question. They hold forth on their own side of the question and assure me that the other side is wrong. It seems, however, that they do so by ignoring the other side. It's a rare person who tries to put these together to come up with a comprehensive answer. They are typically satisfied with holding a contradictory notion in each hand and calling them "done." So how does it work? Is God Sovereign or not? Does He actually will that all be saved? If they are not, how is He Sovereign? (There are those who argue that all are saved. We call that particular heresy "Universalism".) If He chooses to save some and not others, in what sense does He "will/wish/desire" all to be saved? Seems like there is a problem here.
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1 Greek commentators indicate that thelō is impulsive and boulomai is rational. They seem to agree here. Then they break down. One says that thelō is simple desire, but boulomai is deliberate resolve, so the latter is the more forceful term. Others say that boulomai isn't as strong as thelō because thelō means "to desire" while boulomai means "to will" and obviously "to desire" is a stronger impulse than "reasoned resolve." This side says that thelō is the choice of the spirit while boulomai is the choice of the mind, so thelō is stronger. Thank you, Greek commentators. No help there.

4 comments:

Bob said...

To those who have obtained a faith of equal privilege with ours through the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ.

i would venture that because the letter is addressed to believers, that the will of God is also addressed to believers as well. God is not willing that any of the elect should perish.

Hense: To those who have obtained a faith...ect.

David said...

Not sure I agree that desire is stronger than reasoned resolve. Maybe sometimes in us mere mortals. But God isn't controlled by His desires, but by His nature. He desires that all people come to Him, but His need for justice and to demonstrate His glory prevent Him from doing what He wants. In other words, His reasoned resolve is stronger than His urgent desire.

David said...

Or were you going to give the answer in part 2.

Stan said...

Bob, that might work for the Peter passage, but not the Timothy one.

No, David, I'm not sure, either. I would suggest that this kind of distinction ("desire is stronger than resolve") doesn't help at all because 1) it's not biblical and 2) it's not clear. We'll have to look elsewhere. (And, yes, I hope to supply a better answer in the 2nd installment, but wanted to see if anyone else would come up with one ... like you did.)