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Charlotte's Web - Medical Marijuana
lilitalienboi16:
--- Quote from: John from Kentucky on March 12, 2014, 03:14:21 PM ---
--- Quote from: largeli on March 12, 2014, 02:43:46 PM ---The whole concept of deeming a plant 'illegal' is stupid. God didn't make a mistake when He created the poppy flower, coca plant, cannabis, etc. He created ALL these and said they are.. GOOD.
Cannabis is a gift from God and I say Amen!
--- End quote ---
Being a dopehead is not blessed by God.
While the Scriptures allow the use of alcoholic drinks, drunkenness is condemned.
By implication, getting stoned on drugs is not approved by God either.
The Spirit of God is the spirit of a sound mind.
--- End quote ---
Amen John!
lilitalienboi16:
--- Quote from: Dave in Tenn on March 12, 2014, 10:29:51 PM ---This is kinda what happens when we veer off the purpose of this little section of the forum. Loretta, please consider not bringing every thing that interests you to the forum (and everybody else also). We all know that All is of God. Pharaoh not letting the children of Israel go was of God until He did all He determined to do. Pharaoh paid the price of disobedience. That TOO is of God. Judas betrayed the Lord. That is also of God. Are we to follow his example? Should we also "go out and hang" ourselves?
The salvation of the world is FUTURE. Until then, the world is a roiling cauldron of contradiction and self-interest. And yes, that TOO is of God, but EVERYTHING that IS of God is for HIM and HIS purpose...including you and me.
--- End quote ---
Many great posts in here, amen to you as well dave!
lilitalienboi16:
--- Quote from: Kat on March 18, 2014, 12:39:02 AM ---
I would like to make a distinction here, what I am talking about is that God does cause all the "GOOD works" in believers through His Spirit indwelling, but I am not saying God actually causes all things, good and evil.
--- End quote ---
Kat I do have contention with one thing you said in bold.
Is not God the ULTIMATE CAUSE of all things? Isn't that why He has taken responsibility for the creation and died for its sins? God is the ultimate cause of evil, He said He creates it, frames it, "is there evil in a city and has not the Lord done it" ... "shall we receive good at the hands of God and not also evil..." how can he NOT cause it then?
Can you clarify please?
Thanks,
Alex
Kat:
Hi Alex, I have compiled a few of Ray's emails that I think will answer your question.
http://forums.bible-truths.com/index.php?topic=2354.0 ---------------------
Dear Whirlwind:
You are not understanding this subject and the principle behind it. You ask: "Is it man making the choices or is it God's predestination of things?" It is BOTH. Listen: God is SOVEREIGN! Man therefore has NO FREE WILL OR NO FREE CHOICE. That's it. That's all there is to it. That IS the principle. That IS the Truth. That IS what the Bible teaches. It is not a contradiction to say that "Man makes his own choices." You and millions of other just think it is a contradiction to say man makes his own choices if indeed God is sovereign and God is behind all in His creation. It is not a contradiction. It only sounds like a contradiction for those who do not believe that "God is Sovereign, and Man has no free will."
I hardly know what else to tell you. God made man's heart. Man did not make his own heart, or his body, or his mind, or his brain, or his will, or his hopes and dreams. They are all PREDESTINATED by the foreknowledge of God. So then we don't make choices, right? NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO....WE DO MAKE CHOICES. It's just that they are CAUSED by things we can't always see. Sometimes we can see what makes our choices and some times we can't, but either way THEY ARE CAUSED. And God, not us, already knows in advance the outcome of all of those caused choices. How does He do that? He is very smart (has over a 150 IQ), plus HE IS SOVEREIGN, ALL WISE, AND ALL POWERFUL.....and don't forget LOVE.
So, does God FORCE EVIL MEN TO RAPE LITTLE GIRLS? Well, does He? Does God being Sovereign prove that God forces evil men to rape little girls? That's what evil theologians deduce from the truth of no free will. They turn the Sovereignty of God into one of the biggest evils in the universe. If God is Sovereign, then God must be EVIL, because there is so much evil in the world, and God is in control of all things, right? Wrong, wrong, wrong!
Man makes all his own choices. Just because they are CAUSED does not mean that he does not make them. He is, in fact, CAUSED TO MAKE HIS CHOICES. But God does not directly do this. He is responsible, but He does not directly cause those choices. Things like the Devil do such things. And who created the Devil? That's right, that One Who is Sovereign and in charge of all things. Evil men like raping just like evil theologians like stealing widow's social security money. God doesn't make them do it--THEY LIKE TO DO IT. They volunteer with little outside influence. God made humanity this way. He created them spiritually weak. Eve couldn't help but sin. God has a good purpose and God will straighten it all out in the end.
I guess I could just keep writing and writing and writing and one day someone will say................OHHHHHH, now I get it. Maybe today is your day. I'm pulling for ya!!!
http://www.forums.bible-truths.com/index.php/topic,1744.0.html --------------------
I understand that these things are "spiritually discerned," and that people frustrate themselves over trying to understand spiritual things with a carnal mind. When a man rapes a little girl, IT ASSUREDLY IS NOT GOD! When one prays to be rich and famous, IT ASSUREDLY IS NOT GOD! ALL IS OF GOD, but not is all of God directly. God created man--man SINS, God if free from sin and never sins or MAKES OR FORCES anyone to sin. Neither does He FORCE people to be rich or famous. God created man and man chooses what he does based on the strongest motivation in his heart.
And most people's heart consists of lust, lies, blasphemy and the like.
"Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempts he any man: but every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of HIS OWN LUSTS [whether for bad and evil things or for for what we may perceive as good things which may not be good or righteous things], and enticed" (James 1:13-14).
Man has the ability to make choices. He does not have the ability to make choices that are free from any cause. The "cause" of most of our choices is our mind and heart. And of the abundance of our heart, our mind thinks, our tongue speaks, and in our body we take physical action. Only God can give us a "new" and pure heart.
http://www.forums.bible-truths.com/index.php?topic=253.msg2134#msg2134 -------
Until we come to realize that we are all just as evil as John Calvin or Adolph Hitler, we will never ever understand evil in the world. I thank God that I have never slowly burned another man or woman at the stake over a low heat fire, but I also know that under the same circumstances, I could have done such a thing. It is within the carnal mind to do ALL the evils of the universe, and that is why carnal-minded people do such things.
Ask yourself what kinda of a God would allow YOU to be led to these same crimes of eating your own children? PEOPLE rape little girls, not God! Some people WANT to rape little girls. Others just want to DECEIVE their fellow brothers and sisters into thinking that they are powerful, or great, or spiritual, or wise, or loving, etc., but are just as evil inside as Adolph Hitler. Given the opportunity we would have all been Calvin and Hitler. But is it necessary? Yes, it is necessary. Do we think that God is playing a game?
I once placed a board across a little stream that I crossed going to school in the first grade. However, laying a board across San Francisco Bay is a bit more involved. Creating a cat that will sit and purr on your lap is one thing, but creating creatures into the very IMAGE OF GOD HIMSELF, is quite another. Even the miracle of the Golden Gate Bridge compared to a wooden board cannot compare to what we see now and what we will be when God is through with us.
It takes incredible powers of good and evil to accomplish this. Christians cannot justify God's use of evil, and hence attribute it to what they perceive to be a greater force than God--SATAN. Supposedly God doesn't want evil, but He just can't stop Satan. Nonsense.
http://www.forums.bible-truths.com/index.php/topic,1493.0.html ------------------
As it is absolutely Scripturally true that man has no free will, and therefore is always subject to the higther powers that be, when people begin to see this truth, they often balk at it and feel that God is unfair and that man is being judged for things that God MADE HIM DO AGAINST HIS WILL. When in reality, NOTHING COULD BE FURTHER FROM THE TRUTH!!
Most of the human race has always believed that it possesses "free will." And so as long as any man believes this falsehood, he is operating in his own little world with absolutely no grudge against God for his personal decisions. But when he begins to see that he has no free will, he then does begin to think that he has a justifiable grudge against God for MAKING HIM SIN. He was wrong when he thought that he had free will, and he is just as wrong when he thinks that the only alternative is that God MAKES HIM SIN AGAINST HIS OWN WILL.
I have stated many times that God DOES NOT MAKE OR FORCE ANYONE TO SIN AGAINST HIS OWN WILL--MAN DESIRES TO SIN, WANTS TO SIN, AND THEREFORE VOLUNTEERS TO SIN. God did not FORCE or MAKE Eve eat of the forbidden fruit. Her own DESIRES caused her to lust and eat of the forbidden fruit.
And so the real question is: "Does God have the right to make mankind subject to the desires of their own heart?" Think about it, as I have, for a few thousand hours, and maybe God will grant to you the spiritual understanding of this matter.
Hundreds of totally deceived and spiritually blind Christians have told me that: "God does not want robots to love Him--He desires people to love Him by their OWN FREE WILL." Oh really? And can the carnal mind indeed love God by its own nature; its own heart; its own desires? NO IT CAN'T. And so the very thing that Christians demand as necessary for our love for God to be genuine, is the very thing that totally disqualifies it from being genuine. The natural mind is totally incapable of loving God: "For the carnal mind is enmity [deep-seated HATRED] AGAINST GOD..." (Rom. 8:7).
It all starts with God, not with us: "We love Him [God] because He FIRST LOVED US" (I John 4:19).
God created mankind spiritually WEAK--subject to the lusts and sins of his own heart, so that man will learn that he CANNOT love God first; he cannot obey spiritual laws and commandments; he cannot please God; he cannot accomplish anything of lasting value through his wicked and deceitful heart. (Jer. 17:9). And therefore God's ways will justify His means. The rewards and the blessings are not even to be compared with the glory that God is creating in the human race (Rom. 8:18).
God be with you,
Ray
lilitalienboi16:
--- Quote from: Kat on March 19, 2014, 06:09:10 PM ---
Hi Alex, I have compiled a few of Ray's emails that I think will answer your question.
http://forums.bible-truths.com/index.php?topic=2354.0 ---------------------
Dear Whirlwind:
You are not understanding this subject and the principle behind it. You ask: "Is it man making the choices or is it God's predestination of things?" It is BOTH. Listen: God is SOVEREIGN! Man therefore has NO FREE WILL OR NO FREE CHOICE. That's it. That's all there is to it. That IS the principle. That IS the Truth. That IS what the Bible teaches. It is not a contradiction to say that "Man makes his own choices." You and millions of other just think it is a contradiction to say man makes his own choices if indeed God is sovereign and God is behind all in His creation. It is not a contradiction. It only sounds like a contradiction for those who do not believe that "God is Sovereign, and Man has no free will."
I hardly know what else to tell you. God made man's heart. Man did not make his own heart, or his body, or his mind, or his brain, or his will, or his hopes and dreams. They are all PREDESTINATED by the foreknowledge of God. So then we don't make choices, right? NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO....WE DO MAKE CHOICES. It's just that they are CAUSED by things we can't always see. Sometimes we can see what makes our choices and some times we can't, but either way THEY ARE CAUSED. And God, not us, already knows in advance the outcome of all of those caused choices. How does He do that? He is very smart (has over a 150 IQ), plus HE IS SOVEREIGN, ALL WISE, AND ALL POWERFUL.....and don't forget LOVE.
So, does God FORCE EVIL MEN TO RAPE LITTLE GIRLS? Well, does He? Does God being Sovereign prove that God forces evil men to rape little girls? That's what evil theologians deduce from the truth of no free will. They turn the Sovereignty of God into one of the biggest evils in the universe. If God is Sovereign, then God must be EVIL, because there is so much evil in the world, and God is in control of all things, right? Wrong, wrong, wrong!
Man makes all his own choices. Just because they are CAUSED does not mean that he does not make them. He is, in fact, CAUSED TO MAKE HIS CHOICES. But God does not directly do this. He is responsible, but He does not directly cause those choices. Things like the Devil do such things. And who created the Devil? That's right, that One Who is Sovereign and in charge of all things. Evil men like raping just like evil theologians like stealing widow's social security money. God doesn't make them do it--THEY LIKE TO DO IT. They volunteer with little outside influence. God made humanity this way. He created them spiritually weak. Eve couldn't help but sin. God has a good purpose and God will straighten it all out in the end.
I guess I could just keep writing and writing and writing and one day someone will say................OHHHHHH, now I get it. Maybe today is your day. I'm pulling for ya!!!
http://www.forums.bible-truths.com/index.php/topic,1744.0.html --------------------
I understand that these things are "spiritually discerned," and that people frustrate themselves over trying to understand spiritual things with a carnal mind. When a man rapes a little girl, IT ASSUREDLY IS NOT GOD! When one prays to be rich and famous, IT ASSUREDLY IS NOT GOD! ALL IS OF GOD, but not is all of God directly. God created man--man SINS, God if free from sin and never sins or MAKES OR FORCES anyone to sin. Neither does He FORCE people to be rich or famous. God created man and man chooses what he does based on the strongest motivation in his heart.
And most people's heart consists of lust, lies, blasphemy and the like.
"Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempts he any man: but every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of HIS OWN LUSTS [whether for bad and evil things or for for what we may perceive as good things which may not be good or righteous things], and enticed" (James 1:13-14).
Man has the ability to make choices. He does not have the ability to make choices that are free from any cause. The "cause" of most of our choices is our mind and heart. And of the abundance of our heart, our mind thinks, our tongue speaks, and in our body we take physical action. Only God can give us a "new" and pure heart.
http://www.forums.bible-truths.com/index.php?topic=253.msg2134#msg2134 -------
Until we come to realize that we are all just as evil as John Calvin or Adolph Hitler, we will never ever understand evil in the world. I thank God that I have never slowly burned another man or woman at the stake over a low heat fire, but I also know that under the same circumstances, I could have done such a thing. It is within the carnal mind to do ALL the evils of the universe, and that is why carnal-minded people do such things.
Ask yourself what kinda of a God would allow YOU to be led to these same crimes of eating your own children? PEOPLE rape little girls, not God! Some people WANT to rape little girls. Others just want to DECEIVE their fellow brothers and sisters into thinking that they are powerful, or great, or spiritual, or wise, or loving, etc., but are just as evil inside as Adolph Hitler. Given the opportunity we would have all been Calvin and Hitler. But is it necessary? Yes, it is necessary. Do we think that God is playing a game?
I once placed a board across a little stream that I crossed going to school in the first grade. However, laying a board across San Francisco Bay is a bit more involved. Creating a cat that will sit and purr on your lap is one thing, but creating creatures into the very IMAGE OF GOD HIMSELF, is quite another. Even the miracle of the Golden Gate Bridge compared to a wooden board cannot compare to what we see now and what we will be when God is through with us.
It takes incredible powers of good and evil to accomplish this. Christians cannot justify God's use of evil, and hence attribute it to what they perceive to be a greater force than God--SATAN. Supposedly God doesn't want evil, but He just can't stop Satan. Nonsense.
http://www.forums.bible-truths.com/index.php/topic,1493.0.html ------------------
As it is absolutely Scripturally true that man has no free will, and therefore is always subject to the higther powers that be, when people begin to see this truth, they often balk at it and feel that God is unfair and that man is being judged for things that God MADE HIM DO AGAINST HIS WILL. When in reality, NOTHING COULD BE FURTHER FROM THE TRUTH!!
Most of the human race has always believed that it possesses "free will." And so as long as any man believes this falsehood, he is operating in his own little world with absolutely no grudge against God for his personal decisions. But when he begins to see that he has no free will, he then does begin to think that he has a justifiable grudge against God for MAKING HIM SIN. He was wrong when he thought that he had free will, and he is just as wrong when he thinks that the only alternative is that God MAKES HIM SIN AGAINST HIS OWN WILL.
I have stated many times that God DOES NOT MAKE OR FORCE ANYONE TO SIN AGAINST HIS OWN WILL--MAN DESIRES TO SIN, WANTS TO SIN, AND THEREFORE VOLUNTEERS TO SIN. God did not FORCE or MAKE Eve eat of the forbidden fruit. Her own DESIRES caused her to lust and eat of the forbidden fruit.
And so the real question is: "Does God have the right to make mankind subject to the desires of their own heart?" Think about it, as I have, for a few thousand hours, and maybe God will grant to you the spiritual understanding of this matter.
Hundreds of totally deceived and spiritually blind Christians have told me that: "God does not want robots to love Him--He desires people to love Him by their OWN FREE WILL." Oh really? And can the carnal mind indeed love God by its own nature; its own heart; its own desires? NO IT CAN'T. And so the very thing that Christians demand as necessary for our love for God to be genuine, is the very thing that totally disqualifies it from being genuine. The natural mind is totally incapable of loving God: "For the carnal mind is enmity [deep-seated HATRED] AGAINST GOD..." (Rom. 8:7).
It all starts with God, not with us: "We love Him [God] because He FIRST LOVED US" (I John 4:19).
God created mankind spiritually WEAK--subject to the lusts and sins of his own heart, so that man will learn that he CANNOT love God first; he cannot obey spiritual laws and commandments; he cannot please God; he cannot accomplish anything of lasting value through his wicked and deceitful heart. (Jer. 17:9). And therefore God's ways will justify His means. The rewards and the blessings are not even to be compared with the glory that God is creating in the human race (Rom. 8:18).
God be with you,
Ray
--- End quote ---
Hello Kat,
Thank you for the reply. I've read all these things by ray and I seem them as he does; however, I do not see him saying anywhere that God is not the ULTIMATE cause of all evil in the world. He created it. He died for the sins of the world because He was taking responsibility for the fact that He created humanity with a weak heart and thereby causing humanity to sin voluntarily.
As ray said; "God created mankind spiritually WEAK--subject to the lusts and sins of his own heart, so that man will learn that he CANNOT love God first; he cannot obey spiritual laws and commandments; he cannot please God; he cannot accomplish anything of lasting value through his wicked and deceitful heart. (Jer. 17:9). And therefore God's ways will justify His means. The rewards and the blessings are not even to be compared with the glory that God is creating in the human race (Rom. 8:18)."
Who was it that made man subject to vanity and with a spiritually weak heart? Man himself? No , GOD. Therefor HE IS the ultimate CAUSE. God takes responsbility for His actions and emphatically declares He is the creator of evil. So how can you say he is not the cause of all good and evil? Or am I misunderstanding what you wrote originally?
Just to clarify, I agree that God does not FORCE anyone to sin, man does it voluntarily, he doesn't need to be coerced one bit; but, to say that God is somehow not the cause of evil just because he doesn't FORCE people, that he doesn't act as the DIRECT and IMMEDIATE CAUSE, to do evil, is trying to split hairs and take the responsibility away from God for the way the world is. God CREATED Evil and He CREATED MAN WEAK incapable of doing good. He is absolutely, totally, responsible and the cause. Without God, none of this universe would exist let alone the evil people do as they too would not exist. In the beginning was the Word... it all started with Him. The ultimate cause. The CAUSE of ALL THINGS.
Isaiah 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things.
Jeremiah 18:11 Now therefore go to, speak to the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying, Thus saith the Lord; Behold, I FRAME EVIL against you, and devise a device against you: return ye now every one from his evil way, and make your ways and your doings good.
Amos 3:6 Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? shall there be evil in a city, and the Lord hath not done it?
Job 2:10 But he said unto her, Thou speakest as one of the foolish women speaketh. What? shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil? In all this did not Job sin with his lips.
I don't see God as a onlooker in His creation but rather very active in it from the good to the evil. Its an experience of EVIL that ELOHIM has GIVEN unto the sons of men, to humble them thereby it.
I should add too, that, Joe Schmo who raped 10 little girls before brutally murdering them doesn't die for his own sins because God takes responsibility for the fact that He created joe Schmo, weak and incapable of doing good, full well knowing what this guy would do, the evil he would do. Joe SChmo wasn't forced to do the evil, he gladly volunteered for it but it was by nature of how he was created. God was the cause of him being spiritually weak and incapable of doing good, therefor GOd was also the cause of the evil he ultimately committed. Perhaps not directly but certainly indirectly.
Again... maybe I am misunderstanding you Kat. Apologies if I am.
Blessings,
Alex
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