Quote:
Originally Posted by dnlgfnk
Well, I think you know I was referring to the "analogy of faith"... https://www.monergism.com/thethresho...logyfaith.html ...and that you are dodging. But yes, you also take the verse out of context, as well as inserting your own word "unrepentant". At least Augustine would have said so...
"He speaks still as one only anointed. For God hears even sinners. For if God heard not sinners, in vain would the publican, casting his eyes on the ground, and smiting on his breast, have said, Lord, be merciful to me a sinner. And that confession merited justification, as this blind man enlightenment" (Homilies on John, 44:13).
In the context of the whole of ch.9, if Jesus were a sinner (the claim of his opponents in ch.9) God would not have "heard" him and allowed the miracle.
I'm going with the "Doctor of Grace". Have the last word. |
Oy vey...okay, let's do this...slowly.
First of all, I qualified my question with the word "unrepentant" sinner for purpose of clarity. I know what the healed blind man meant when he said, "God doesn't hear sinners...", but many others here might not have. They might have thought that God doesn't hear the prayers of any sinner, which is not true (Lk 18:10-14). (I'm happy as a little piglet rolling in the mud that Augustine agrees with me.
) Not only this, but the healed blind man did rightly add that God
listens to the godly man who does his will! And Jesus taught this, as well, in his parable in Luke 18! So, it isn't as though God doesn't hear any sinner whatsoever, but he only hears the one whose
heart is right before the Almighty -- in other words, a
repentant sinner.
Now, if you had used the "analogy of faith" hermeneutical principle to interpret Jn 9:31, you would have known that the man was 100% on the mark! This man's understanding of prayer was solidly grounded in many OT scriptures (cf. Job 27:8-9; 35:12; 42:8; Ps 18:41; 34:15; 66:18-20; Prov 1:29-29; 15:29; 21:13; 28:9; Isa 1:15; 58:9; Jer 11:11; 14:12; Ezk 8:18; Mic 3:4, Zech 7:13) God hears only sinners with a contrite heart and broken spirit (Ps 51:17). The acceptable sacrifices of God are precisely this kind of spiritual condition.
The one passage that jumps out to me the most among all the ones cited above is this one because it speaks directly and poignantly to the heart issue:
Ps 66:18-20
8
If I had cherished sin in my heart,
the Lord would not have listened;
19 but God has surely listened
and heard my voice in prayer.
20 Praise be to God,
who has not rejected my prayer
or withheld his love from me!
NIV
So, not only was the psalmist confident that God heard his prayer, but he was equally confident that God loved him! Why did God love him?
Because the psalmist did not cherish sin in his heart! This is, yet, another qualified statement pertaining to God's love!
And this is what I have argued from the beginning. From the start I have maintained that God
cannot love an unrepentant sinner any more than he can love sin because sin resides in the human heart and proceeds from it (Mat 15:18-20). Man's heart is the home to all sin. Yeah...it is the polluted fountain of all sin! It's the dark cesspool of all sin! It's impossible, therefore, to separate sin from the human heart! This is why scripture teaches that God "hates" sinners and why there are so many other passages that qualify God's love.
Given what we have seen, thus far, is it any wonder why a key New Covenant promise made by God to his covenant people is that he would give them a
new heart and a new spirit (Ezek 36:26)? God has to give his chosen people a new heart and the Holy Spirit in order that they be made acceptable to him!
One last thing since you accused me of taking Jn 9:31 out of context. The passage makes it abundantly plain that the healed blind man didn't know who Jesus really was until his second encounter with him, which he had
after his encounter with the Pharisees! The healed blind man thought that Jesus was just a prophet of God (Jn 9:17). He certainly acknowledged that God must have been with Jesus, otherwise how could he have performed such a miracle? So up to that point, this man thought Jesus was just another man -- a godly man to be sure but nonetheless still a sinner.
