Apsinthos: wormwood

Original Word: ἄψινθος, οῦ, ὁ

Part of Speech: Noun, Feminine; Noun, Masculine

Transliteration: apsinthos

Phonetic Spelling: (ap'-sin-thos) Short Definition: wormwood

Apsinthos – a bitter plant known as "wormwood"; (figuratively) what is intensely bitter (grievous), bringing on very sad results. Wormwood (n.) c.1400, folk etymology of Old English wermod "wormwood," related to vermouth, but the ultimate etymology is unknown. Worm-wood is a contraction of two words, wyrm, and wod.

Worm (n.) Old English wurm, variant of wyrm "serpent, dragon," also in later Old English "earthworm," from Proto-Germanic *wurmiz (cf. Old Saxon, Old High German, German wurm, Old Frisian and Dutch worm, Old Norse ormr, Gothic waurms "serpent, worm"), from PIE *wrmi-*wrmo- "worm" (cf. Greek rhomos, Latin vermis "worm").

wood (adj.) "violently insane" (now obsolete), from Old English wod "mad, frenzied," from Proto-Germanic *woth- (cf. Gothic woþs "possessed, mad," Old High German wuot "mad, madness," German wut "rage, fury"), from PIE *wet- "to blow, inspire, spiritually arouse;" source of Latin vates "seer, poet," Old Irish faith "poet;" "with a common element of mental excitement" [Buck]. Cf. Old English woþ "sound, melody, song," and Old Norse oðr "poetry," and the god-name Odin.

From a word etymology understanding, “Wormwood” literally means “serpent or dragon” “violently insane,” with "rage, fury.”  A star in Bible prophecy represents a created angelic being, and in this case, the fallen angel is Lucifer. Well, we know Lucifer is really upset.

And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter. Revelation 8:11

And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.  Revelation 12:17

In Jeremiah 9:15; 23:15; Lamentations 3:15 Lamentations 3:19 wormwood is symbolical of bitter calamity and sorrow; unrighteous judges are said to "turn judgment to wormwood." (Amos 5:7) The Orientals typified sorrows, cruelties, and calamities of any kind by plants of a poisonous or bitter nature. It is a type of bitterness, affliction, remorse, punitive suffering. In Amos 6:12 this Hebrew word is rendered "hemlock" (RSV, "wormwood"). In the symbolical language of the Apocalypse (Revelation 8:10 -11) a star is represented as falling on the waters of the earth, causing the third part of the waters to turn wormwood, or bitter.

"Solomon uses the word wormwood in the very same context as did Jeremiah and Amos the Prophet. Solomon wrote that “the lips of a forbidden woman drip honey, and her speech is smoother than oil, but in the end she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword” and “Her feet go down to death; her steps follow the path to Sheol” (Prov 5:3-5). Solomon used the word wormwood as something that leads to a bitter ending. The “forbidden” woman is obviously someone who the man is forbidden to have sexual relationships with but he does it anyway and it could well lead to sexually transmitted diseases, divorce, and even death (Sheol). That’s a very bitter ending as a two-edged sword can be fatal. The Hebrew word Solomon uses is “la`anah” which means “bitterness.” Jeremiah uses the same, exact word when he writes “He has filled me with bitterness; he has sated me with wormwood” (Lam 3:15). Jeremiah uses the word bitterness and wormwood interchangeably. The only other author in the Old Testament to use this word is Amos, and speaking for God to Israel, he writes, “Seek the Lord and live, lest he break out like fire in the house of Joseph, O you who turn justice to wormwood and cast down righteousness to the earth” (Amos 5:6-7) and in Amos 6 where God tells Israel, “you have turned justice into poison and the fruit of righteousness into wormwood” (6:12). In every case where it is used, the authors of the Old Testament used wormwood in association with bitterness and this lead to a bitter ending, every time."¹

What are the ‘waters’? And why did it fall on only a third part of the waters? Water is a transparent, tasteless, odorless, and nearly colorless physical substance. Are the waters simply a metaphor for truth? Or, a metaphor for the Spirit? Both? Is wormwood the spirit of injustice? O you who turn justice to wormwood, and cast down righteousness to the earth! ~ Amos 5:7.

What is the star? This “star” is part of the Third Trumpet or woes of God as these trumpets are also referred to as “woes” which is a word that means judgment, but more than judgment, it’s the giving of the verdict and punishment and there are yet three more to come (Rev 8:13).

1. by Jack Wellman https://www.patheos.com/blogs/christiancrier/2015/12/27/what-is-the-meaning-of-wormwood-from-the-book-of-revelation/

Where Adam and Eve self-aware?

Genesis 2:16-17, 

And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” 

What was the effect of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil on Adam and Eve?

Genesis 3:8-10,

And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?” And he said, “I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.”

It appears from Genesis 3:10 when Adam says to the Lord, “… I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself” that Adam and Eve gained self-awareness from receiving the knowledge of good and evil. Adam became aware that he was naked, and that there was now something wrong with being naked. He was also afraid, feeling fear or anxiety; frightened of God. Fear is an unpleasant emotion caused by the belief that someone or something is dangerous, likely to cause emotional pain or a threat. Adam became aware. He understood that he now perceived others as something separate from himself, hence self-awareness. Self-awareness involves being aware of different aspects of self-including traits, behaviors, and feelings. Essentially, it is a psychological state in which oneself becomes the focus of attention, hence his fear of God. He was now able to perceive the consequences of his action, hence cause and effect. Adam could understand just as we understand today. Adam understood that the effect caused by him was the result of, or a consequence of an action or other cause. Adam knew there was going to be a consequence of both their actions. 

Adam and Eve gained conscious knowledge of one's own character, feelings, motives, and desires. The self is an individual person as the object of his or her own reflective consciousness. I like the deep insight of Paul’s own perceptive acuity between the nature of man in contrast to the spirit. 

Ephesians 4:22-24, 

To put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.

Is Faith A Gift From God? Or The Mechanations Of The Synergist?

A big problem with synergism, specifically, the belief that faith comes prior to regeneration in the salvific order, hence the accusation: does a work by man inserted into the salvific process render grace ineffective? Since the synergist must maintain the absence of any effect by God prior to the agent coming to faith. It is the agent who is doing the work to achieve salvation. What the synergist is actually saying; God must adhere to the will of the agent, and the agent's will must be autonomous from God's effect to maintain indeterminism and continue the notion that man believes in Christ and receives the gift of salvation, and the reprobate receives hell. How does the synergist view God's foreknowledge, or more specifically, how did God know from eternity past (before time existed) who would choose Christ, and who wouldn't?

Synergistic View Of God's Foreknowledge

Most synergists hold to a prescient view of God's foreknowledge. This view assumes "that God passively discovers what his creatures would decide in the future apart from his sovereign control, and then he makes a decision regarding the status of these creatures on the basis of this awareness. But this means that God's decision regarding the status of these creatures is in a real sense determined by these creatures themselves, and the difference between these creatures and other creatures are in the creatures themselves, apart from God's sovereign decision to make a distinction between them.

It may be said that God is still the one who determines the principles by which men must be saved, but it is the men themselves who decide which ones would receive salvation. The problem with this view is that, even if we allow foreknowledge to mean a passive prescience, the argument remains incomplete and rather futile. Synergists now have to deal with the fact that this view is heretical, namely, that faith is not a gift from God, but that it is something generated by the creatures themselves. Otherwise, if faith is a sovereign gift from God as the Bible teaches, then for God to base election on foreseen faith would be just another way of saying that he bases election on what he himself will do in the future.

The Accusation Of A Work Salvation

The definition of a 'work' is any activity involving mental or physical effort done in order to achieve a purpose or result.

What does Paul say in Romans 11:6, But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis {the underlying support or foundation for an idea, argument, or process} of works; otherwise grace would no longer be grace.

The synergist will assert that faith isn't meritorious, and I would agree, faith in-and-of-itself isn't a work, but you would be missing the whole point. If Paul assumes election, then faith isn't a work, because it stems from God, not from man. It is God's work in us. The synergist doesn't assume election. Therefore, from the monergists perspective, this violates everything scripture says on the subject of faith and grace.

Dr. John Eadie did an excellent exegetical study of Ephesians 2:8-10:

(Ephesians 2:8.) τῇ γὰρ χάριτί ἐστε σεσωσμένοι διὰ τῆς πίστεως—“For by grace ye have been saved, through your faith.” The particle γάρ explains why the apostle has said that the exceeding riches of God's grace are shown forth in man's salvation, and glances back to the interjectional clause at the end of Ephesians 2:5. Salvation must display grace, for it is wholly of grace. The dative χάριτι, on which from its position the emphasis lies, expresses the source of our salvation, and the genitive πίστεως with διά denotes its subjective means or instrument. Salvation is of grace by faith-the one being the efficient, the other the modal cause; the former the origin, the latter the method, of its operation. The grace of God which exists without us, takes its place as an active principle within us, being introduced into the heart and kept there by the connecting or conducting instrumentality of faith.

χάρις—“favour,” is opposed to necessity on the part of God, and to merit on the part of man. God was under no obligation to save man, for His law might have taken its natural course, and the penalty menaced and deserved might have been fully inflicted. Grace springs from His sovereign will, not from His essential nature. It is not an attribute which must always manifest itself, but a prerogative that may either be exercised or held in abeyance. Salvation is an abnormal process, and “grace is no more grace” if it is of necessary exhibition. Grace is also opposed to merit on man's part. Had he any title, salvation would be “of debt.” The two following verses are meant to state and prove that salvation is not and cannot be of human merit. In short, the human race had no plea with God, but God's justice had a high and holy claim on them. The conditions of the first economy had been violated, and the guilty transgressor had only to anticipate the infliction of the penalty which he had so wantonly incurred. The failure of the first covenant did not either naturally or necessarily lead to a new experiment. While man had no right to expect, God was under no necessity to provide salvation. It is “by grace.”

But this grace does not operate immediately and universally. Its medium is faith - διὰ τῆς πίστεως. The two nouns “grace” and “faith” have each the article, as they express ideas which are at once familiar, distinctive, and monadic in their nature; the article before χάριτι, referring us at the same time to the anarthrous term at the close of the fifth verse, and that before πίστεως, giving it a subjective reference, is best rendered, as Alford says, by a possessive. Lachmann, after B, D1, F, G, omits the second article, but the majority of MSS. are in its favour. It is the uniform doctrine of the New Testament, that no man is saved against his will; and his desire to be saved is proved by his belief of the Divine testimony. Salvation by grace is not arbitrarily attached to faith by the mere sovereign dictate of the Most High, for man's willing acceptance of salvation is essential to his possession of it, and the operation of faith is just the sinner's appreciation of the Divine mercy, and his acquiescence in the goodness and wisdom of the plan of recovery, followed by a cordial appropriation of its needed and adapted blessings, or, as Augustine tersely and quaintly phrases it-Qui creavit te sine te, non salvabit te sine te. Justification by faith alone, is simply pardon enjoyed on the one condition of taking it.

And thus “ye have been saved;” not-ye will be finally saved; not-ye are brought into a state in which salvation is possible, or put into a condition in which you might “work and win” for yourselves, but-ye are actually saved. The words denote a present state, and not merely “an established process.” Green's Gram. of New Test. 317. Thus Tyndale translates—“By grace ye are made safe thorowe faith.” The context shows the truth of this interpretation, and that the verb denotes a terminated action. If men have been spiritually dead, and if they now enjoy spiritual life, then surely they are saved. So soon as a man is out of danger, he is safe or “saved.” Salvation is a present blessing, though it may not be fully realized. The man who has escaped from the wreck, and has been taken into the lifeboat, is from that moment a saved man. Even though he scarce feel his safety or be relieved from his tremor, he is still a saved man; yea, though the angry winds may howl around him, and though hours may elapse ere he set his feet on the firm land. The apostle adds more precisely and fully- καὶ τοῦτο οὐκ ἐξ ὑμῶν—“and that not of yourselves”- ἐκ, as it often does, referring to source or cause. Winer, § 47, b. The pronoun τοῦτο does not grammatically agree with πίστεως, the nearest preceding noun, and this discrepancy has originated various interpretations. The words καὶ τοῦτο are rendered “and indeed” by Wahl, Rückert, and Matthies. This emphatic sense belongs to the word in certain connections. Romans 13:11; 1 Corinthians 6:6; Philippians 1:28. The plural is also similarly used. 1 Corinthians 6:8; Hebrews 11:12; Matthiae, § 470, 6. The meaning of the idiom may here be—“Ay, and this” is not of yourselves. But what is the point of reference?

Many refer it directly to πίστις—“And this faith is not of yourselves.” Such is the interpretation of the fathers Chrysostom, Theodoret, and Jerome. Chrysostom says- οὐδὲ ἡ πίστις ἐξ ἡμῶν, εἰ γὰρ οὐκ ἦλθεν, εἰ γὰρ μὴ ἐκάλεσε, πῶς ἠδυνάμεθα πιστεῦσαι. Jerome thus explains-Et haec ipsa fides non est ex vobis, sed ex eo qui vocavit vos. The same view is taken by Erasmus, Beza, Crocius, Cocceius, Grotius, Estius, Bengel, Meier, Baumgarten-Crusius, Bisping, and Hodge. Bloomfield says that “all the Calvinistic commentators hold this view,” and yet Calvin himself was an exception. There are several objections to this, not as a point of doctrine, but of exegesis. 1. If the apostle meant to refer to faith- πίστις, why change the gender? why not write καὶ αὕτη? To say, with some, that faith is viewed in the abstract as τὸ πιστεύειν, does not, as we shall see, relieve us of the difficulty. 2. Granting that καὶ τοῦτο is an idiomatic expression, and that its gender is not to be strictly taken into account, still the question recurs, What is the precise reference of δῶρον? 3. Again, πίστις does not seem to be the immediate reference, as the following verse indicates. You may say—“And this faith is not of yourselves: it is God's gift;” but you cannot say—“And this faith is not of yourselves, but it is God's gift; not of works, lest any man should boast.” You would thus be obliged, without any cause, to change the reference in Ephesians 2:9, for you may declare that salvation is not of works, but cannot with propriety say that faith is not of works. The phrase οὐκ ἐξ ἔργων must have salvation, and not faith, as its reference. The words from καὶ τοῦτο to the end of the verse may be read parenthetically—“By grace are ye saved, through faith (and t hat not of yourselves: it is the gift of God), not of works;” that is, “By grace ye are saved, through faith,” “not of works.” Even with this understanding of the paragraph, the difficulty still remains, and the idea of such a parenthesis cannot be well entertained, for the ἐξ ὑμῶν corresponds to the ἐξ ἔργων. Baumgarten-Crusius argues that the allusion is to πίστις, because the word δῶρον proves that the reference must be to something internal-auf Innerliches. But is not salvation as internal as faith? So that we adopt the opinion of Calvin, Zachariae, Rückert, Harless, Matthies, Meyer, Scholz, de Wette, Stier, Alford, and Ellicott, who make καὶ τοῦτο refer to ἐστε σεσωσμένοι—“and this state of safety is not of yourselves.” This exegesis is presented in a modified form by Theophylact, Zanchius, Holzhausen, Chandler, and Macknight, who refer καὶ τοῦτο to the entire clause—“this salvation by faith is not of yourselves.” Theophylact says- οὐ τὴν πίστιν λέγει δῶρον θεοῦ, ἀλλὰ τὸ διὰ πίστεως σωθῆναι, τοῦτο δῶρον ἐστι θεοῦ. But some of the difficulties of the first method of interpretation attach to this. The καὶ τοῦτο refers to the idea contained in the verb, and presents that idea in an abstract form. At the same time, as Ellicott shrewdly remarks, “the clause καὶ τοῦτο, etc., was suggested by the mention of the subjective medium- πίστις, which might be thought to imply some independent action on the part of the subject.” This condition of safety is not of yourselves-is not of your own origination or procurement, though it be of your reception. It did not spring from you, nor did you suggest it to God; but-

θεοῦ τὸ δῶρον—“God's is the gift.” God's gift is the gift-the genitive θεοῦ being the emphatic predicate in opposition to ὑμῶν. Bernhardy, p. 315. Lachmann and Harless place this clause in a parenthesis. The only objection against the general view of the passage which we have taken is, that it is somewhat tautological. The apostle says—“By grace ye are saved,” and then—“It is the gift of God;” the same idea being virtually repeated. True so far, but the insertion of the contrasted οὐκ ἐξ ὑμῶν suggested the repetition. And there is really no tautology. In chap. Ephesians 3:7 occur the words- κατὰ τὴν δωρεὰν τῆς χάριτος τοῦ θεοῦ … χάρις being the thing given, and δωρεάν pointing out its mode of bestowment. Men are saved by grace- τῇ χάριτι; and that salvation which has its origin in grace is not won from God, nor is it wrung from Him; “His is the gift.” Look at salvation in its origin-it is “by grace.” Look at it in its reception-it is “through faith.” Look at it in its manner of conferment-it is a “gift.” For faith, though an indispensable instrument, does not merit salvation as a reward; and grace operating only through faith, does not suit itself to congruous worth, nor single it out as its sole recipient. Salvation, in its broadest sense, is God's gift. While, then, καὶ τοῦτο seems to refer to the idea contained in the participle only, it would seem that in θεοῦ τὸ δῶρον there is allusion to the entire clause-God's is the whole gift. The complex idea of the verse is compressed into this brief ejaculation. The three clauses, as Meyer has remarked, form a species of asyndeton-that is, the connecting particles are omitted, and the style acquires greater liveliness and force. Dissen, Exc. ii. ad Pind. p. 273; Stallbaum, Plato-Crit. p. 144.

Griesbach places in a parenthesis the entire clause from καὶ τοῦτο to ἐξ ἔργων, connecting the words ἵνα μὴ τις καυχήσηται with διὰ τῆς πίστεως, but the words οὐκ ἐξ ἔργων have an immediate connection with the ἵνα-a connection which cannot be set aside. Matthies again joins οὐκ ἐξ ἔργων to the foregoing clause—“and that not of yourselves; the gift of God is not of works.” Such an arrangement is artificial and inexact. The apostle now presents the truth in a negative contrast.

Verse 9

(Ephesians 2:9.) οὐκ ἐξ ἔργων—“Not of works”-the explanation of οὐκ ἐξ ὑμῶν. The apostle uses διά with the article before πιστεως in the previous verse, but here ἐξ without the article before ἔργων-the former referring to the subjective instrument, or causa apprehendens; the latter to the source, and excluding works of every kind and character. ᾿εκ again refers to source or cause. Schweighaüser, Lex. Herodot. p. 192. Salvation is by grace, and therefore not of us; it is through faith, and therefore not of works; it is God's gift, and therefore not of man's origination. Such works belong not to fallen and condemned humanity. It has not, and by no possibility can it have any of them, for it has failed to render prescribed obedience; and though it should now or from this time be perfect in action, such conformity could only suffice for present acceptance. How, then, shall it atone for former delinquencies? The first duty of a sinner is faith, and what merit can there be where there is no confidence in God? “Without faith it is impossible to please Him.” The theory that represents God as having for Christ's sake lowered the terms of His law so as to accept of sincere endeavours for perfect obedience, is surely inconsistent in its commixture of merit and grace. For if God dispense with the claims of His law now, why not for ever-if to one point, why not altogether-if to one class of creatures, why not to all? On such a theory, the moral bonds of the universe would be dissolved. The distinction made by Thomas Aquinas between meritum ex congruo and meritum ex condigno, was too subtle to be popularly apprehended, and it did not arrest the Pelagian tendencies of the mediaeval church.

ἵνα μή τις καυχήσηται—“lest any one should boast.” According to the just view of Rückert, Harless, Meyer, and Stier, the conjunction marks design, or is telic; according to others, such as Koppe, Flatt, Holzhausen, Macknight, Chandler, and Bloomfield, it indicates result—“so as that no one may boast.” So also Theophylact- τὸ, γὰρ, ἵνα, οὐκ αἰτιολογικόν ἐστι, ἀλλ᾿ ἐκ τῆς ἀποβάσεως τοῦ πράγματος; that is, the ἵνα is not causal, but eventual in its meaning. Koppe suggests as an alternative to give the words an imperative sense—“Not of works: beware then of boasting.” Stier proposes that the ἵνα be viewed from a human standpoint, and as indicative of the writer's own purpose; as if the apostle had said—“Not of works, I repeat it, lest any one should boast.” This exegesis is certainly original, as its author has indeed mentioned; but it is as certainly unnatural and far-fetched. Macknight has argued that ἵνα cannot have its telic force, for it would represent God as appointing our salvation to be by faith, merely to prevent men's boasting, “which certainly is an end unworthy of God in so great an affair;” but this is not a full view of the matter, for the apostle does not characterize the prevention of boasting as God's only end, but as one of His purposes. For what would boasting imply? Would it not imply fancied merit, independence of God, and that self-deification which is the very essence of sin? A pure and perfect creature has nothing to boast of; for what has he that he has not received? “Now, if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?” When God purposes to preclude boasting, or even the possibility of it, He resolves to effect His design in this one way, by filling the mind with such emotions as shall infallibly banish it. He furnishes the re deemed spirit with humility and gratitude-such humility as ever induces man to confess his emptiness, and such gratitude as ever impels him to ascribe every blessing to the one source of Divine generosity. We see no reason, therefore, to withhold from ἵνα its natural and primary sense, especially as in the mind and theology of the apostle, event is so often viewed in unison with its source, and result is traced to its original design, in the Divine idea and motive. And truly boasting is effectually stopped. For if man be guilty, and being unable to win a pardon, simply receive it; if, being dead, he get life only as a Divine endowment; if favour, and nothing but favour, have originated his safety, and the only possible act on his part be that of reception; if what he has be but a gift to him in his weak and meritless state-then surely nothing can be further from him than boasting, for he will glorify God for all, 1 Corinthians 1:29-31. Ambrosiaster truly remarks-haec superbia omni peccato nocentior omni genere est elationis insanior. And further, salvation cannot be of ourselves or of works-

Verse 10

(Ephesians 2:10.) αὐτοῦ γὰρ ἐσμεν ποίημα—“For we are His workmanship.” The γάρ has its common meaning. It renders the reason for the statement in the two previous verses. It does not signifiy “yet,” as Macknight has it. Others carelessly overlook it altogether. Nor can we accede to the opinion of Theophylact, Photius, and Bloomfield, that this verse is introduced to prevent misconception, as if the meaning were—“Salvation is not of works,” yet do them we must, “for we are His workmanship.” This notion does not tally with the simple reasoning of the apostle, and helps itself out by an unwarranted assumption. Rückert and Meier join this verse in thought to the last clause of the preceding one—“No man who works can boast, for the man himself is God's workmanship.” But the apostle has affirmed that salvation is not of works, so that such works are not supposed to exist at all; and therefore there is no ground for boasting. Nor can we, with Harless, view the verse as connected simply with the phrase- θεοῦ τὸ δῶρον. We regard it, with Meyer, as designed to prove and illustrate the great truth of the 9th verse, that salvation is not of works. “By grace ye are saved, through faith, and that not of yourselves-not of works, for we are His workmanship.” Hooker, vol. 2.601; Oxford, 1841.

But the terms may be first explained. The apostle changes from the second to the first person without any other apparent reason than the varied momentary impulse one yields to in writing a letter. The noun ποίημα, as the following clause shows, plainly refers to the spiritual re-formation of believers, and it is as plainly contrary to the course of thought to give it a physical reference, as did Gregory of Nazianzus, Tertullian, Basil, Photius, and Jerome. The same opinion, modified by including also the notion of spiritual creation, is followed by Pelagius, Erasmus, Bullinger, Rückert, and Matthies. The process of workmanship is next pointed out- κτισθέντες ἐν χριστῷ ᾿ιησοῦ—“created in Christ Jesus.” This added phrase explains and bounds the meaning of ποίημα. The reference here is to the καινὴ κτίσις (2 Corinthians 5:17; Galatians 6:15), and the form of expression carries us back to many portions of the Hebrew prophets, and to the use of בָּרָא, H1343, in Psalms 51:10, and in Psalms 102:18 (Schoettgen, Horae Hebraicae, i. p. 328). See also Ephesians 2:15 of this chapter. Chrysostom adds, with peculiar and appropriate emphasis- ἐκ τοῦ μὴ ὄντος, εἰς τὸ εἶναι παρήχθημεν. Again is it ἐν χριστῷ ᾿ιησοῦ, for Christ Jesus is ever the sphere of creation, or, through their vital union with Him, men are formed anew, and the spiritual change that passes over them has its best emblem and most expressive name in the physical creation, when out of chaos sprang light, harmony, beauty, and life. The object of this spiritual creation in Christ is declared to be- ἐπὶ ἔργοις ἀγαθοῖς—“in order to,” or “for good works.” This meaning of ἐπί may be seen in Galatians 5:13; 1 Thessalonians 4:7. Winer, § 48, c; Kühner, § 612, 3, c; Phrynichus, ed. Lobeck, p. 474. Palairet, in his Observat. Sac. in loc., has given several good examples of ἐπί with such a sense. Our entire renovation, while it is of God in its origin, and in Christ as its medium, has good works for its object.

Now, as already intimated, we understand this verse as a proof that salvation is not of works. For, 1. The statement that salvation is of works involves an anachronism. Works, in order to procure salvation, must precede it, but the good works described by the apostle come after it, for they only appear after a man is in Christ, believes and lives. 2. The statement that salvation is of works involves the fallacy of mistaking the effect for the cause. Good works are not the cause of salvation; they are only the result of it. Salvation causes them; they do not cause it. This workmanship of God-this creation in Christ Jesus-is their true source, implying a previous salvation. Thus runs the well-known confessional formula-Bona opera non praecedunt justificandum, sed sequuntur justificatum. The law says—“Do this and live;” but the gospel says—“Live and do this.” 3. And even such good works can have in them no saving merit, for we are His workmanship. Talia non nos efficimus, says Bugenhagen, sed Spiritus Dei in nobis; or, as Augustine puts it-ipso in nobis et per nos operante, merita tua nusquam jactes, quia et ipsa tua merita Dei dona sunt. Comment. in Psalms 144. The power and the desire to perform good works are alike from God, for they are only fruits and manifestations of Divine grace in man; and as they are not self-produced, they cannot entitle us to reward. Such, we apprehend, is the apostle's argument. Salvation is not ἐξ ἔργων; yet it is ἐπὶ ἔργοις ἀγαθοῖς—“in order to good works”-the fruits of salvation and acceptance with God, proofs of holy obedience, tokens of the possession of Christ's image, elements of the imitation of Christ's example, and the indices of that holiness which adorns the new creation, and “without which no man can see the Lord.” Peter Lombard says well-Sola bona opera dicenda sunt , quae fiunt per dilectionem Dei. But there can be no productive love of God where there is no faith in His Son, and where that faith does exist, salvation is already possessed. The disputes on this point at the period of the Reformation were truly lamentable; Solifidians and Synergists battled with mischievous fury: Major arguing that salvation was dependent on good works, and Amsdorf reprobating them as prejudicial to it; while Agricola maintained the Antinomian absurdity, that the law itself was abolished, and no longer claimed obedience from believers. And these “good” works are no novelty nor accident- οἷς προητοίμασεν ὁ θεὸς, ἵνα ἐν αὐτοῖς περιπατήσωμεν—“which God before prepared that we should walk in them.” The interpretation of this sentence depends upon the opinion formed as to the regimen of the pronoun οἷς.

1. Some, taking the word as a dative, render—“To which God hath afore ordained us, in order that we should walk in them.” Such is the view of Luther, Semler, Zachariae, Morus, Flatt, Meier, Bretschneider, and virtually of Fritzsche, Alt, and Wahl. But the omission of the pronoun ἡμᾶς is fatal to this opinion. The idea, too, which in such a connection is here expressed by a dative, is usually expressed by the accusative with εἰς. Romans 9:23; 2 Timothy 2:21; Revelation 9:7.

2. Valla, Erasmus, Er. Schmidt, and Rückert give οἷς a personal reference, as if it stood for ὅσοις ἡμῶν—“among whom God before prepared us.”-But the antecedent ἡμεῖς is too remote, and the οἷς appears to agree in gender with ἐν αὐτοῖς.

3. Bengel, Koppe, Rosenmüller, and Baumgarten-Crusius take the phrase as a kind of Hebraism, or as a special idiom, in which, along with the relative pronoun, there is also repeated the personal pronoun and the preposition- אֲשֶׁרבָּם - ἐν οἷς ἵνα περιπατήσωμεν ἐν αὐτοῖς, προητοίμασεν ὁ θεός. But this exegesis is about as intricate as the original clause.

4. The large body of interpreters take the οἷς for ἅ by attraction. Winer, § 24, 1. This opinion is simple, the change of case by attraction is common, and a similar use of ἵνα is found in John 5:36. So the Vulgate-Quae praeparavit.

5. Acting upon a hint of Bengel's, Stier suggests that the verb may be taken in a neuter or intransitive sense, as the simple verb thus occurs in 2 Chronicles 1:4, and in Luke 9:52. Could this exegesis be fully justified, we should be inclined to adopt it—“For which God has made previous preparation, that we should walk in them.” The fourth opinion supposes the preparation to belong to the works also, but in a more direct form-the works being prepared for our performance of them. In this last view, the preparation refers more to the persons-preparation to enable them to walk in the works. The fourth interpretation is the best grammatically, and the meaning of the phrase, “which God has before prepared,” seems to be—“in order that we should walk in those works,” they have been prescribed, defined, and adapted to us.

It is wrong to ignore the προ in προητοίμασεν, as is done by Flatt and Baumgarten-Crusius. Wisdom of Solomon 9:8; Philo, De Opif. § 25. Nor can we, with Augustine, de Wette, and Harless, give the verb the same meaning as προορίζειν, or assign it, with Koppe and Rosenmüller, the sense of velle, or jubere; Harless saying that it is used of things as the verb last referred to is used of persons, but without sufficient proof; and Olshausen supposing that the two verbs differ thus-that προετοιμάζειν refers to a working of the Divine eternal will which is occupied more with details. Perhaps the difference is more accurately brought out in this way:- προορίζειν marks appointment or destination, in which the end is primarily kept in view, while in προετοιμάζειν the means by which the end is secured are specially regarded as of Divine arrangement, the προ referring to a period anterior to that implied in κτισθέντες. We could not walk in these works unless they had been prepared for us. And, therefore, by prearranging the works in their sphere, character, and suitability, and also by preordaining the law which commands, the inducement or appliances which impel, and the creation in Christ which qualifies and empowers us, God hath shown it to be His purpose that “we should walk in them.” Tersely does Bengel say, ambularemus, non salvaremur aut viveremus. These good works, though they do not secure salvation, are by God's eternal purpose essentially connected with it, and are not a mere offshoot accidentally united to it. Nor are they only joined to it correctionally, as if to counteract the abuses of the doctrine that it is not of works. The figure in the verb περιπατήσωμεν is a Hebraism occurring also in Ephesians 2:2. See under it. Titus 2:14; Titus 3:8. Though in such works there be no merit, yet faith shows it s genuineness by them. In direct antagonism to the Pauline theology is the strange remark of Whitby—“that these works of righteousness God hath prepared us to walk in, are conditions requisite to make faith saving.” The same view in substance has been elaborately maintained by Bishop Bull in his Harmonia Apostolica. Works, vol. iii. ed. Oxford, 1827. Nor is the expression less unphilosophical. Works cannot impart any element to faith, as they are not of the same nature with it. The saving power of faith consists in its acceptance and continued possession of God's salvation. Works only prove that the faith we have is a saving faith. And while Christians are to abound in works, such works are merely demonstrative, not in any sense supplemental in their nature. καὶ ἐκτίσθης οὐκ ἵνα ἀργῇς, ἀλλ᾿ ἵνα ἐργαζῃ (Theophylact). But the Council of Trent-Sess. vi. cap. 16-declares “that the Lord's goodness to all men is so great that He will have the things which are His own gifts to be their merits”-ut eorum velit esse merita quae sunt ipsius dona. See Hare, Mission of the Comforter, 1.359.

A new look at the White Horse

This white horse is the first of four horses of different colors, similar to the horses seen by Zechariah (Zec. 1:8; Zec. 6:2-6). See Zechariah’s Horses for a discussion of the relationship between Zechariah’s visions and the horsemen shown John. Within the context of the book of Revelation, white represents righteousness. “The white horse . . . emerges as an emblem of righteousness.”

he who sat on it
The similarities between this rider and Christ are striking:

1. Riding a White Horse - Both ride upon a white horse indicating victory (Rev. 6:2+; Rev. 19:11+).
2. Wearing a Crown - Both wear a crown (Rev. 6:2+; Rev. 19:12+). But Christ wears multiple crowns, so I don't see this rider being Jesus. Instead, a crown is a symbol of honor and of the power given Michael, "the great prince who stands guard over the sons of your people" as a triumphant culmination of an effort or endeavor, especially a prolonged one to watch over those written in the book of life.
3. Overcome - Both are “overcomers”—victorious in their pursuits (Rev. 6:2+; John 16:33; 1Jn. 4:4; Rev. 3:21+; Rev. 17:14+).

I believe the rider on the White Horse is Michael the Arch-Angel. We see in Daniel 12:1, "Now at that time Michael, the great prince who stands guard over the sons of your people, will arise. And there will be a time of distress such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time; and at that time your people, everyone who is found written in the book, will be rescued. This would also align with the next horse which is red that takes peace from the earth, to which sounds a lot like Satan cast to the earth after the war with Michael and his angels.

Revelation 12:7-9, sums it up: Now war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon. And the dragon and his angels fought back, but he was defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. And the great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.

Some issues with Leighton Flowers view of God's Foreknowledge

pre·des·ti·na·tion

/prēˌdestəˈnāSH(ə)n/

noun

noun: predestination; noun: pre-destination

1. (as a doctrine in Christian theology) the divine foreordaining of all that will happen, especially with regard to the salvation of some and not others."the action of God in foreordaining certain of mankind through grace to salvation or eternal life," from Old French predestinacion and directly from Church Latin praedestinationem (nominative praedestinatio) "a determining beforehand," noun of action from past participle stem of praedestinare "set before as a goal; appoint or determine beforehand," from Latin prae "before" (pre-) + destinare "appoint, determine" (destiny).

The Reformed notion of predestination as explained by Paul, who notes that we were elected πρὸ καταβολῆς κόσμου, εἶναι ἡμᾶς ἁγίους καὶ ἀμώμους κατενώπιον αὐτοῦ (chosen before the foundation of the world with a purpose of becoming holy and without blame before Him).

Leighton Flowers will use the expression “in Him” to smuggle a work of the believer who renders himself separate “in Christ,” when Paul decidedly excludes such a notion indicating that election was pre-temporal “by Christ or through Christ.” But the issue comes when you ask how did God know who would come to faith before the foundation of the world? This is where the stammering starts. The synergist has three views they can take: Prescience (simple-foreknowledge) view, or an Open-Theistic view, or a Molinistic view of how God’s foreknowledge works in time.

Prescience view: If the synergist says that God looked down time and seen who would come to faith, prior to time beginning, this is called the Prescience (simple-foreknowledge) view. This was the most popular view until Monergist point out what the synergist is saying is God learns. How could God learn from that to which He created?

Open-Theistic view: Dr. Tim Challies characterized this view as:

·    God’s greatest attribute is love. God’s love so overshadows His other characteristics that He could never allow or condone evil or suffering to befall mankind.

·    Man has libertarian free will. Man’s will have not been so effected by the Fall that he is unable to make a choice to follow God. God respects man’s freedom of choice and would not infringe upon it.

·    God does not have exhaustive knowledge of the future. Indeed, He cannot know certain future events because the future exists only as a possibility. God is unable to see what depends on the choices of free will agents simply because this future does not yet exist, so it unknowable. In this way, open theists attempt to reconcile this doctrine with God’s omniscience.

·    God takes risks. Because God cannot know the future, He takes risks in many ways – creating people, giving them gifts and abilities, and so on. Where possibilities exist, so does risk.

·    God learns. Because God does not know the future exhaustively, He learns, just as we do.

·    God is reactive. Because He is learning, God is constantly reacting to the decisions we make.

·    God makes mistakes. Because He is learning and reacting, always dealing with limited information, God can and does make errors in judgment which later require re-evaluation.

·    God can change His mind. When God realizes He has made an error in judgment or that things did not unfold as He supposed, He can change His mind.

The main concerns with Open-Theism are:

1. A Denial of God's Omniscience. While men like Greg Boyd deny that open-theism denies God’s omniscience, this is simply not true. Even if it is true that the future exists only as possibilities, something that is not adequately proven by open-theists, we are still putting a limit on God’s knowledge when we state that He cannot know these possibilities. This view of God’s knowledge of the future is unique in that it is at odds with every other Judeo-Christian tradition.

2. God’s goodness, greatness and glory are at stake. The God of the Open-Theists is, in the words of Bruce Ware, too small. He is not the all-knowing, all-powerful God revealed so clearly in the pages of the Bible. Christians need to always be concerned that both they and God are making poor decisions based on inadequate information. Thus we cannot always count on God to do what is best, because even He does not always know what this is.

3. The Christian’s confidence in God is at stake. If open- theism is true, the Christian cannot put his full trust and confidence in God. “The God of open-theism will always want our best, but since he may not in fact know what is best, it becomes impossible to give him our unreserved and unquestioning trust” (Bruce Ware, Their God is Too Small, page 20. When hardships arise we will have to ask if God anticipated these, or if He is as shocked and distressed as we are.

Molinistic view, synergists who are so frustrated with the Prescience and Open-Theistic view, turn to Molinism so that those “prideful” Calvinists will get off their backs about their inconsistent views of God’s foreknowledge. 

Dr. D. Wallace's View of Election

"I'm so glad that God chose me before the foundation of the world, because he never would have chosen me after I was born!" Charles Haddon Spurgeon

1. Election does not mean that God merely knew who would believe and on that basis elected them. D. L. Moody thought that election meant this: "God chose me for himself, but the devil chose me for himself. My choice is the tie-breaker."

This really would not be election or "choice." God would not be choosing us; rather, we would be choosing him and he would simply know about it. (Further, the devil, a creature, would be put on a plane equal to God.) The consistent testimony of scripture is that God is the one doing the choosing, not us. Cf. Romans 9:6-21; Ephesians 1:4; 1 Thessalonians 1:4.

2. Election does not obliterate human responsibility. Each person is held responsible before Almighty God as to what they will do with his Son. "There are unsaved people alive today, who, though elect, are now lost and will not be saved until they believe."¹ Cf. Ephesians 2:3.

3. Election is necessary because we are totally depraved sinners.² In other words, we would not choose God unless he first chose us.

Non-believers are portrayed as unable to do or think anything which would move them one step closer to God. There is nothing they can do or say which would please God. Cf. Romans 3:10-23; Ephesians 4:17-19. In fact, non-believers are spiritually dead until the Spirit of God calls them: that is, they are unresponsive to anything outside the realm of sin (Ephesians 2:1-3). Just as Lazarus was dead until Jesus called his name, so unbelievers are dead until the Spirit of God calls them. And just as Lazarus could not boast, "Jesus couldn't have done it without me!", neither can we. Dead men don't have much to bargain with. It is important to note that Ephesians 2:8-9 is in the context of God raising us from the dead spiritually.

4. The process of election, as worked out in our own lives, does not violate our will. That is, the doctrine of "irresistible grace" does not mean "divine coercion," as if God bullies you into submission to do his will. Rather, it is compelling persuasion. The devil has blinded the eyes of the world (2 Cor. 4:4) and once our eyes have been enlightened by the Spirit of God, we see clearly what God has done for us. Further, if grace were resistible, this would mean that the person who can resist God's will is a strong and powerful individual and those who can't (and thus those who get saved) are weaklings. That is not the biblical picture.

5. The means of election is always through human agency. That is, God uses other believers to communicate the gospel to the lost. Cf. Romans 10:14-17. Therefore, we cannot excuse ourselves from sharing the gospel by saying, "If he's elect, God's going to save him anyway. He doesn't need me to do the job." It's true that God doesn't need any of us to do his will, but it is equally true that God uses those who are willing to obey him. Consequently, the doctrine of election should motivate us to share the gospel--not out of fear but because we want to be used by God to do his will.

6. Election does not contradict any of God's attributes and, in fact, is a direct outgrowth of his love (Eph. 1:4-5). (See point 10 for further elaboration.)

7. Election is not just to salvation, but to sanctification and glorification. Cf. Eph. 1:4-5; Rom. 8:28-30. In other words, those whom God has chosen are chosen not just to be saved, but also to be sanctified.

8. The question of whether God is fair or not in choosing some but not others diminishes how great our salvation is--and how much our sin permeates us. If God were fair, we would all go to hell. If he saves one person, he is infinitely merciful.

9. Actually, three basic questions arise when discussing election:

• Is God fair?
• Doesn't this make us robots?
• Why should I evangelize?

All three questions are answered in Romans 9-11, the great passage in the Bible which deals with this doctrine. Romans 9 answers the question of our choice, Rom 10 answers the question of the need for evangelism, and Rom 11 answers the question of God's fairness. It should be noted as well that Paul's theology here is not in a vacuum; he begins (vv 1-3) by almost wishing that he could go to hell if it would mean that just one of his Jewish brothers would get saved!

10. Many folks want to seek a balance between God's sovereignty and human free will. A balance needs to be sought, but this is not the place. Nowhere do we read in the Bible that God is not sovereign over our wills. Further, we have the explicit testimony of Romans 9 to the opposite effect. As well, there is an inherent imbalance between a creature's will and the Creator's will. What right do we have to claim that these two are equal?

The real balance comes between the two broad categories of God's attributes. God has moral attributes (goodness, love, mercy, justice, etc.) and amoral attributes (he is infinite, eternal, omniscient, omnipresent, etc.). In short, the balance is between his sovereignty and his goodness. If God only had amoral attributes, he may well be a tyrant. If he only had moral attributes, he would be incapable of effecting change in the world; he would be impotent.

Putting all this together we see the majesty and mystery of God. God's attributes cannot be compartmentalized. That is, he is good in his sovereignty, infinite in his mercy, loving in his omnipotence. However, we as mere finite creatures cannot comprehend the grandeur of his plan. Isaiah 55:8-9 says: "My ways are not your ways, and my thoughts are not your thoughts; but just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts." There is no contradiction in God, but there is finite understanding in us.

11. The doctrine of election is analogous to that of inspiration. God has inspired the very words of scripture (2 Tim 3:16), yet his modus operandi was not verbal dictation. Isaiah was the Shakespeare of his day; Amos was the Mark Twain. Both had widely divergent vocabularies and styles of writing, yet what each wrote was inspired by God. Luke’s style of writing and Greek syntax is quite different from John’s, yet both penned the Word of God. We read in 2 Peter 1:20-21 that no prophet originated his own prophecies, but was borne along by the Holy Spirit: “1:20 Above all, you do well if you recognize this: no prophecy of Scripture ever comes about by the prophet's own imagination, 1:21 for no prophecy was ever borne of human impulse; rather, men carried along by the Holy Spirit spoke from God” (NET Bible).

Thus, we are presented with a mystery: Each biblical writer wrote the very words of God, yet each exercised his own personality and will in the process. The message originated with God, yet the process involved human volition. The miracle of inspiration, as Lewis Sperry Chafer long ago noted, is that God did not violate anyone’s personality, yet what was written was exactly what he wanted to say.

This finds parallels with election. The mystery of election is that God can choose unconditionally, yet our wills are not coerced. We are persuaded by the Holy Spirit to believe. Further, we have the sense of free will in the process, just as the biblical authors did. That is, the biblical authors did not always know that they were even writing scripture, even though God was directing their thoughts.

12. Summary: the biblical doctrine of election is that it is unconditional, irresistible, and irrevocable. All this to the glory of God--without in any way diminishing the dignity or responsibility of man. To put this another way: A large part of maturing in the faith is this: we each need to make the progressively Copernican discovery encapsulated in the words, “I am not the center of the universe.” Or, as John the Baptist put it, “That he might increase and I might decrease.”

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¹Charles C. Ryrie, A Survey of Bible Doctrine (Chicago: Moody Press, 1972), 118.

² Total depravity does not mean that we are as bad as we could be. Rather, it means that (1) sin has tainted every aspect of our being--our hearts, bodies, and minds; (2) we would be as bad as we could be if it were not for God's common grace (by which he protects humans in general from becoming as wicked as possible); and (3) there is no spark of the divine within us, nothing good that moves God toward that person, as though he or she deserves to be saved.