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CR18Day_02 @ nkjv@Genesis:2 @ RandyP comments: Of every tree but one... Did God make us to sin? He gave us every opportunity not to sin rather. Man was created in God's image. In HIS image resides the inherent choice whether to bear that image or not. God had the choice whether or not to create us in HIS image, so then we had the choice whether to bear HIS image, the choice had to be given else we were not then created in HIS image. God made HIS choice. Now sadly we have made ours too.

CR18Day_04 @ nkjv@Genesis:6 @ RandyP comments: "All flesh had corrupted their way on the earth". Since the time of the fall things have only gotten worse. The dominant feature at this time now is violence, the earth is filled with it through them. This then can be said to be the outcome of seeking to be gods in our own eyes knowing good and evil. Given the choice between good and evil, the deceptive heart will more than likely choose evil even when the mind believes that it is choosing good (evil being any other desire than God's). Evil is like a river current. to do good requires turning about and planting a foothold against it's momentous flow, advancing one's opposition forward step by step. Often in this effort we are all alone and going up against all odds. It is not necessarily that we don't intend to do good, it is that we fail to sustain the effort long enough to make any lasting impact. This human inability also is compounded by the fact that males of this age likely were in an violent struggle with/against the sons of God for their own women folk and livelihoods.

CR18Day_05 @ nkjv@Genesis:11 @ RandyP comments: There are two remarks to be made drawn out by the this and the last chapter regarding human choice whether it is free or not. We have the issue of a curse Noah placed on grandson Canaan in response to Ham's actions. Canaan is being directly effected by something his father was guilty of doing. This curse effects human will and self determination on a man to grandson level with God's own involvement unclear. Then there is the splintering of human language into several diverse languages having a direct/purposeful effect upon the will and ability of man as a whole; God seeking to keep human self determination from harming itself. Though human will and self determination apparently remains in both cases, it has thus become limited/restricted to some extent either by man in the first case or else by God in the second (perhaps in the first). Perhaps the will was never completely unrestricted from the Fall. Perhaps the will is free, but the options available for it to chose from are limited. From just the text of two chapters nothing can be said for certain except that there are early indications that man's will is somehow being imposed upon to some mysterious extent, perhaps from various sources.

CR18Day_11 @ nkjv@Genesis:21 @ RandyP comments: Young men will scoff. It is just what they do, not understanding the bigger picture and not seeing anything other than their own self interests. Can't blame the kid for that. It is obvious though that a time has to come where the two lineages are going to have to part ways. Both will be blessed beyond measure but, only one line will be the redemptive line that God will work mankind's salvation through. There is no heroic contest to be waged, no one child better than the other/rest, it is simply a choice God has made long before either child was born, it simply is part of a plan that God has been working Abraham (and therefore true believers) through little by little to bring him (us) into the right mode of faith. In our regular everyday lives between ourselves it really is more about who is the most athletic, the most educated, the most assertive and hungry, or the one with the best family name; or as Ishmael would understand it the one who can hit the bullseye and split that arrow in the very next shot. That is the world that even young men grow to understand. The world of godliness is an entirely different matter however. It is not about this man or the other, it is about our one Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and what has transpired because of Him on our mutual behalf. This all important pathway leading to Jesus is now beginning to transpire upon Abraham through quite young babbling toddler named Isaac.

CR18Day_12 @ nkjv@Psalms:4 @ RandyP comments: How long? That is the real question in a nut shell. We were created in God's image, to capably reflect HIS holiness glory and light but, for our desire to be wise in our own eyes reflect nothing but our own shame and guilt. We were created capable of love yet what is it that we love? Worthlessness in a word, something if anything that only gets eaten by moth and rust. Created to partake of God's truth yet all that is squandered away for a whole lot of falsehood. How long? That is the question. How long will this be the choice? How long will this be the consequence? How long will this be the blindness, the hardness, the casualty? Another year? Another month? Another day? "..know that the LORD has set apart for Himself him who is godly...". "Offer the sacrifices of righteousness, And put your trust in the LORD."

CR18Day_19 @ nkjv@Mark:14 @ RandyP comments: I sense that even though Judas has already been to the chief priests to field their offers to turn Jesus over, that Jesus does not yet see this as "the betrayal". Jesus says that one here "will" betray Him. The actual betrayal is still an option for Judas that he will have to decide on. Note that Jesus as much as tells Judas in the other men's hearing that it would be better for him (if that is his decision to betray) to have been never born than to suffer the woe he is about to to suffer as a consequence; and yet Judas decides to betray him any way. Some would say that Judas does not have a choice in the matter, some even that he was predestined/born to do this. Why then would it be said that it would be better for him not to be born? Why then must he suffer for that which he had no choice in doing? One possible explanation for us to consider is that God does not violate man's choices, but knows what those choices are going to be with perfect foreknowledge. God uses the foreknowledge of our choices to direct the accomplishment of HIS perfect will. Another explanation is that God is always in action, man is always responding to God's action, man is free to react however he chooses but it is never any surprise to God how a particular individual does in fact react; man's free reaction thus can be reliably be counted on. This theory essentially holds that God does not make a man to do any particular thing, HE simply counts on it. Some would look at this as the ability to predict, I look at it as the ability to know a man better than he can know himself.

CR18Day_23 @ nkjv@Genesis:41 @ RandyP comments: "..the thing is established by God, and God will shortly bring it to pass". We can remember back to Abraham where he was told by the LORD that his descendents will be brought into Egypt and that they would find favor, but the heart of the Egyptians would turn and they would be placed in bondage for many years. This storyline is part of that greater storyline and we are basically only into the first act. These men Joseph and Pharaoh for as much of a role as they play are only playing a part in a story much bigger than either of them written long before either were born. As much as we like to give preference in our theories to an individual's abilities and choices, very little in this chapter can be proved as being anything remotely concerned with that. God gives a dream to one man, HE gives the interpretation to another; HE gives it in such a way that the one man gives to the other (a complete stranger/a prisoner/a Hebrew) governorship over his vast empire. God gives seven years of plenty to fill the storehouses, gives seven years of severe famine, drives Joseph's brothers without their knowing to Joseph's feet to plead for wheat to survive the widespread famine. Yes, there is the individual's ability and choice involved to an extent but, it has only a secondary importance to God's choice and ability and some promises made three generations ago. And God is not yet finished. The story of Abraham's descendents in Egypt is only a part of an even larger story of the descendents being given the land of Canaan for their own, a story that will lead them all the way to a promised Messiah (going back to Adam and Eve) and the eternal salvation of their very souls.