Is, Was and Will Be – The Unknown Character of Christ and His Word

Pray Without Ceasing

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Hi M____,
Thank you for your question, and thank you for your conclusion to your question.

The answer to both questions is, yes, God knows all things. The only reason He asked Adam “Where are you” was for Adam to see that He was not where he belonged.  It was not so God could determine behind which tree Adam was hiding.

Moses’ petition to God to not destroy Israel was also predestined before the foundation of the world. God was working Israel’s rebellion, God’s own anger, and Moses’ “fervent prayer” for God’s mercy on Israel in spite of their rebellion.

It was all of God:

Eph 1:11  In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:

But I like your conclusion that our lives are to be a continual prayer. It’s a scriptural conclusion:

1Th 2:13  For this cause also thank we God without ceasing, because, when ye received the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received [ it] not [ as] the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe.

Then just a couple of chapters later, Paul comes right out and makes this admonition:

1Th 5:17  Pray without ceasing.

Such an admonition would be impossible if he is not telling us that we must acknowledge that our will is wrapped up in “God’s own will.”

To which I will say, Amen, so long as we do not draw from what you say here or what Paul says in Eph 1:11 that we can now do nothing. Here rather is what we are to conclude from being given the knowledge of God’s sovereignty will in our lives. It may seem like a contradiction, but that just indicates that the natural man cannot receive the things of the spirit:

Php 2:12  Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.

And why does Paul admonish us to “work out our own salvation, with fear and trembling?” The answer is that seeming contradiction, I spoke of, and it is in the very next verse:

Php 2:13  For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.

Our will is wrapped up in His will yet we are admonished to “work out your own salvation because…” our will is wrapped up in His. I pray that the Lord gives you the eyes to see and the ears to hear what is deliberately “not given unto the multitudes of Christians to see and hear” (Mt. 13:10-11).
You seem to have a good understanding of that truth already.
Your brother in Christ.
Mike

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