FREEWILL DESTROYED IN ACTS CHAPTER 3

There is a lot going on in the opening chapters of the book of Acts. Christ had just been sacrificed on the bloody cross. Three days later, he presents Himself alive to the disciples. He spends 40 days with them, making sure they know it’s Him, and telling them things concerning the Kingdom of God.
Finally, He’s taken up from them and as He’s leaving He tells them to wait for Holy Spirit.
And they wait in the upper room.
Well, as they are praying some big things start happening, left and right. The whole town is aware that Christ’s disciples have something going on. And even the invalid man, who was always laying on the street pestering everyone — begging for handouts — is totally healed by Peter’s command.
Talk about a commotion. Now the whole town is atwitter.
Now… Peter’s got their attention.
Guess what he tell them?
He tells them —
YOU KILLED “THE INAUGURATOR OF LIFE”
He tells them —
YOU DISOWNED THE HOLY AND JUST ONE.
He tells them —
YOU GIVE UP ON GOD’S BOY, JESUS.

Then, Peter really lays down the law…
He tells them —
YOU DID IT IN IGNORANCE.
AND YOUR LEADERS WERE IGNORANT TOO.

And, as if they weren’t confused enough…
Next… Peter tells them…
THE WHOLE THING WAS STAGED BY GOD… WHO ANNOUNCED IT ALL BY THE MOUTH OF THE PROPHETS LONG AGO.

Can anyone really argue that we all have “a freewill”… if most of what we all do, we do in “ignorance?”

The teaching that humans have a totally freewill is a dirty trick really. We don’t have a freewill. Our will is very much influenced by many things.
Our will is not free of influences at all.
Causality — it’s a big concept.
AND — if our will is influenced by IGNORANCE — We most certainly must bow down and trust God’s operations.
We have no other “choice”.
Who are we to think we contribute one whit to God’s great purpose and plan? (Eph 3:11)
All is of God says Romans 11:36.
Human pride is based on nothing, really.
What do we have that we did not receive?
The freewiller’s message that “if you go to hell you can only blame yourself” — seems utterly silly when you factor in that we all disowned the Holy and Just one. That we all killed the Inaugurator of Life. And that the prophets told us it was all going to happen.

Yet, God raises His Boy from the dead. And thus, we can now see the outcome of this great battle.
Christ’s resurrection is the great foreshadowing of the final chapter in creation’s long story.
We win. God wins. Christ wins. Every knee will bow at that time. Every tongue will acclaim, “Oh my”.
What a site to behold on that day.
The glory of the Father will illumine every corner of the universe. And every heart. Wow.

Just thinkin’
Ace.

FROM ACTS, CHAPTER 3….

Peter answers the people: “Men! Israelites! Why are you marveling at this? Or why at us are you looking so intently, as if by our own power or devoutness we had made him walk?
13 The God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob, the God of our fathers, glorifies His Boy Jesus, Whom you, indeed, give up and disown before the face of Pilate, when he decides to release Him.
14 Now you disown the holy and just One, and request a man, a murderer, to be surrendered to you as a favor.
15 Yet the Inaugurator of Life you kill, Whom God rouses from among the dead, of which we are witnesses.
16 And in the faith of His name, His name gives stability to this man whom you are beholding, with whom, also, you are acquainted, and the faith which is through Him, gives him this unimpaired soundness in front of you all.
17 “And now, brethren, I am aware that in ignorance you commit it, even as your chiefs also. (FREEWILL?)
18 Yet what God announces before through the mouth of all the prophets — the suffering of His Christ — He thus fulfills. (FREEWILL?)
19 Repent, then, and turn about for the erasure of your sins, so that seasons of refreshing should be coming from the face of the Lord,
20 and He should dispatch the One fixed upon before for you, Christ Jesus,
21 Whom heaven must indeed receive until the times of restoration of all which God speaks through the mouth of His holy prophets who are from the eon.
22 “Moses, indeed, said that: A Prophet will the Lord your God, be raising up to you from among your brethren, as me. Him you shall hear,