[TheRealThing]

^^ Without excuse:  Choice

So we are without excuse where it comes to that inevitable day when every last one of us will stand before God in Judgment.

But as mentioned above just as Satan, as well as those angels who willfully chose to follow his example and rebel against God:  so too did Adam and Eve choose to rebel against God. You see Adam and Eve were born into perfection, living their lives on a perfect world in a place called Eden. Same thing was true for the heavenly host of which Satan and his angels were part. They lived in perfection in the presence of God Himself and incredibly, chose to defy Him of their own free will. God can do anything and with respect to men, He could certainly have created them in such a fashion that they would have been incapable of sinning. So why did our Creator give man free will?

I believe God explained Himself to that end in the the following scripture.
Revelation 19:5-9
6 And I heard as it were the voice of a great multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying, Alleluia: for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.
7 Let us be glad and rejoice, and give honour to him: for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready.
8 And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white: for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints.
9 And he saith unto me, Write, Blessed are they which are called unto the marriage supper of the Lamb. And he saith unto me, These are the true sayings of God.

In the scene above Jesus Christ is the Groom, and His bride is the Church. He chose us first, even before we were born. And in return, as in the case of the perspective bride, every person must decide whether to bow before Christ, or reject Him. We the Church will join the Groom, Jesus Christ, at the marriage supper of the lamb. And what an incredible affair of eternal ramification that will will be!! But if you take free will out of the equation, people would be little more than robots. Who'd want to spend eternity like that? I believe there is nothing on this earth more rewarding than being with someone who returns your love unconditionally, of their own free will. And I believe to some degree the same thing is true with our God. Hence the validation of free will as well as the just condemnation of those who insist on redefining what the Lord clearly set forth in Scripture.

Sadly many people intend to 'get right' with God (for lack of a better way to put it)--- but death always catches up to them before they do so. Men wrongly believe they have plenty of time, but the Scripture says "life is a vapor."

James 4:14
14 Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.

Like a breath on a cold morning, life is here for such a brief time. But in addition to the above there is another problem in man's being stubborn about facing his own responsibility before God. For an abundant duration of time relative to the number of our days on earth the Holy Spirit strives with the hearts of men, convicting them of their need to repent and be saved. But God's patience is not unlimited, and a man's conscience can and will after a time, become so desensitized that he can no longer discern God's call.

In keeping with the spirit of this thread the scientific community are wrong where it comes to global warming, and mankind are wrong where it comes to the importance and eternal ramifications of ignoring God's unmistakable tug on their hearts. There is a saying in this country where it comes to death which says--- "You can't take it with you."
1 Timothy 6:6
6 Now godliness with contentment is great gain. 7 For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out.

We all came here with only one thing, the right to choose. As the knight said to Indiana Jones, "choose wisely."