"Choose You This Day Whom You Will Serve!" Free Will? Part 1 of Arminian Proof Texts.
It has been some 2000 years since the New Testament was written and men and women who should know all the Scriptures are still willfully ignorant of what they say, still use them to prove their own fantasies, and still wrest them to their own condemnation.
Joshua 24:15 Is the account of Joshua giving final warning to the Children of Israel after they were ready to receive their allotments of the promised land; a reiteration of something God told both Moses and Joshua privately in the tabernacle of the congregation as recorded in Deuteronomy 31:14 seven years prior.
In Deuteronomy 30 the Lord spoke through Moses the same warnings after the procession on the Mountains Gerizim and Ebal; the blessings and cursings (De 27:12-13.)
Deuteronomy 30:11-21 to 31:1*,
"11 ¶ For this commandment which I command thee this day, it is not hidden from thee, neither is it far off.
12 It is not in heaven, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go up for us to heaven, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it?
13 Neither is it beyond the sea, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go over the sea for us, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it?
14 But the word is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart, that thou mayest do it.
15 ¶ See, I have set before thee this day life and good, and death and evil;
16 In that I command thee this day to love the LORD thy God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commandments and his statutes and his judgments, that thou mayest live and multiply: and the LORD thy God shall bless thee in the land whither thou goest to possess it.
17 But if thine heart turn away, so that thou wilt not hear, but shalt be drawn away, and worship other gods, and serve them;
18 I denounce unto you this day, that ye shall surely perish, and that ye shall not prolong your days upon the land, whither thou passest over Jordan to go to possess it.
19 I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:
20 That thou mayest love the LORD thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him: for he is thy life, and the length of thy days: that thou mayest dwell in the land which the LORD sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.
1 ¶ And Moses went and spake these words unto all Israel."
Immediately after God spoke these things from Deuteronomy 27 through the summarization of these warning recorded in Deuteronomy 30:11-21 to 31:11 God called Moses (who was about to die) and Joshua (who was to lead them into the promised land) into the tabernacle of the congregation and told them the following, as recorded in Deuteronomy 31:14-21:
"14 ¶ And the LORD said unto Moses, Behold, thy days approach that thou must die: call Joshua, and present yourselves in the tabernacle of the congregation, that I may give him a charge. And Moses and Joshua went, and presented themselves in the tabernacle of the congregation.
15 And the LORD appeared in the tabernacle in a pillar of a cloud: and the pillar of the cloud stood over the door of the tabernacle.
16 And the LORD said unto Moses, Behold, thou shalt sleep with thy fathers; and this people will rise up, and go a whoring after the gods of the strangers of the land, whither they go to be among them, and will forsake me, and break my covenant which I have made with them.
17 Then my anger shall be kindled against them in that day, and I will forsake them, and I will hide my face from them, and they shall be devoured, and many evils and troubles shall befall them; so that they will say in that day, Are not these evils come upon us, because our God is not among us?
18 And I will surely hide my face in that day for all the evils which they shall have wrought, in that they are turned unto other gods.
19 Now therefore write ye this song for you, and teach it the children of Israel: put it in their mouths, that this song may be a witness for me against the children of Israel.
20 For when I shall have brought them into the land which I sware unto their fathers, that floweth with milk and honey; and they shall have eaten and filled themselves, and waxen fat; then will they turn unto other gods, and serve them, and provoke me, and break my covenant.
21 And it shall come to pass, when many evils and troubles are befallen them, that this song shall testify against them as a witness; for it shall not be forgotten out of the mouths of their seed: for I know their imagination which they go about, even now, before I have brought them into the land which I sware."
After Joshua had led the Children of Israel through the promised land he reiterated the following very memorable warning obviously mindful of what God had told them (Moses and Joshua) in the tabernacle not more than 7 years prior:
"And if it seem evil unto you to serve the LORD, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD." - Joshua 24:15*
*Both Deuteronomy 30:11-21 to 31:1 and Joshua 24:15 are misused passages for many who wish to prove free moral agency (free will) in the Bible (e.g. Arminians, Pelagians, Roman Catholics, Mormons, etc.)
God not only knew they would serve other Gods after they took the promised land, God also commanded them to abstain from worshiping other Gods in the promised land knowing full well they would, and knowing they would break His covenant during the taking of it by not killing off the inhabitants they were commended to.
God had ordained all of this.
So much for 'Choose you this day!,' or any of the above to prove free will in the Bible.
But these things were recorded to prove the opposite, and something far more relevant and comforting to the believer:
Daniel 4:35 "And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?"
The answer to "What doest thou"? Anything He wants to.
And this is of great comfort to the believer because if men and women decided the future by their pretend free will choices, this world would be ordered by God's creatures and not Him; a frightening thought.
~David Hobson.
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