In the past I called the doctine of predistiny “Calvinism” (of John Calvin), but I do not like using this term as it may confuse people into thinking they worship John Calvin and that he is the only one to have realized the teachings he came up with regarding salvation. The teachings are in Scripture and the New Testament made it clear and John Calvin summarized them well. However I think a trap formed as the summary of his good teachings became so associated with his name it caused confusion and aggravation to those simply wanting to identify as saved Christians, or non-denonimational and to not to be associated with as being somehow birthed from the Catholic cult. I believe it better to simply be known as a Christian now, a follower of Christ, who is the head of thr true Church, and not John Calvin. Some may think, “Well how then to explain to someone quickly who believes their free will can defeat God’s salvation? Simply point out your doctrine is that God is God and his love is invincible, and as such, how can man’s hatred or choice to not follow Him defeat Him? It is like blasphemy to say God can be defeated.
Again: the most simple proof that God’s will is invincible is by virtue of who He is: He is love and His love is invincible. He is all powerful and all knowing and his wisdom is perfect. Further, Jesus, also called “Yeshua” by Jews and those wishing to say his name in Hebrew (which is “Joshua” in Hebrew to English), made it clear that eternal life (in spirit can be had now, by being created by God by His Spirit).
The Old Testament, Tanakh as Jews call it made it clear this way:
“Know therefore that the Lord your God is God; he is the faithful God, keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commandments.” – Deuteronomy 7:9
He said,
Click here to learn the difference between the phrases “free will” and “free agency”.
Click here to read why, as Calvinism teaches, God must first “regenerate” you out of a “dead” and “fallen” state (a state in which you always reject God’s will in some way due to a love of sin and hatred for everything God is) so we will have the ability to make the correct choice to have faith in God to be saved by Him. See why God doesn’t simply “gives you a choice”/”gives us a choice” and doesn’t let anyone live however they choose and Bible verses that contradict the overgeneralization and inaccurate claim (which confused people keep repeating) that “God doesn’t send us to Hell” but that is is we who send ourselves there because we chose to.
“Free agency” simply means that when we make a choice we are the ones making it (how obvious is that?). “Free will”, in the way the average not-saved person/pagan or ignorant Christian would use it, means simply the ability to choose anything you think of choosing to do, like to believe the Bible is true AND OBEY IT’S LAWS, or even to become God or change your biological sex. It’s akin to denying what Jesus said when he said that we cannot change the natural color of our hair (we can mask the color, but at the genetic level it is what it is).
When some people say, “God gives us a choice” (sometimes they mean “choices” as in a choice between disobeying his laws or pleasing Him by repenting and submitting fully to His commands (though some incorrectly mean choosing to do “His will” rather than simply “obey His laws” because they think they can break His will with their will, which is impossible and a sign of their spiritual blindless) they are saying, “God gives us a free will so we can, without any influence, or unasked-for change of our heart or mind choose to do good or evil, which they seem to me to be confusing with “free agency”, which as I said, simply means “the ability to make a decision”.
Even if we had a free will
that alone wouldn’t be sufficient to make good choices that God desires. All it would be is just what it is, a will that cannot be influenced, or at least by anyrhing other than our own feelings. So to insist we have a free will as if that somehow causes us to be able to claim an inherent God-pleasing goodness doesn’t make sense, and if you haven’t even used your free will to please God you would be a worthless person who isn’t even worth listening to. But God wouldn’t be God if he had no ultimate control over everything including wills as He would then not be able to guarantee the outcome of anything to do with the beings He has created and will continue creating.
Before reading on, please donate to me if you find this explanation about God’s eternal will and plans, mankinds’ and angel kinds’ will and the topic of predestinstion helpful. I can receive money via PayPal or Wells Fargo bank using their Zelle phone and email payment method using my email cheetalynx@gmail.com. I am disabled and have no income and no house, and as a result my cat, 11 chickens and 5 ducks are homeless too and may die from coyote attacks. I’ve lost probably four chickens to wild animals, a duck to a stray dog, and many chicks to ants and cruel police who arrested me without caring for how the chicks would survive by themselves in a container.
Pardon the little redunacy of topics below as I used a smallish phone to write and edit this page and am in misery when I write, and very weary, so makes it hard to remember and focus well.
Now for the proof that God has predestined the future of all beings regardless of the wills of his creatures and their desires and even God’s own desires. Remember too that God’s will and what he chooses to do does not always match his desires. For example his will is that every sinner repents and asks for mercy from the punishment of God’s eternal hatred/wrath/gets his forgiveness, but as is obvious to many people it is clear that he has chosen the majority of unforgiven people and all the demons to serve as eternal examples of the consequence of unrepentance and sin and God’s free choice not to save them from Hell, so that they will be an Irrefutable example that man by his will and desires alone cannot save himself from sin and Hell apart from God’s will. Also keep in mind that obviously God’s will does match some of his desires and that of other beings, and especially his children’s will be fulfilled one day (once they are in total harmony with God’s will):
First: When does salvation (from a corrupt heart/an addiction to sinfulness/sin and forgiveness of all of them from past to future so that there will not be any punishment in Hell) happen? Is it before or after death? Notice in 2 Corinthians 6:2 below that it points out that salvation (from eternal punishment in Hell and a sin-addicted heart) comes whenever you ask for it according God. Salvation is not as a gay Catholic who suffered demon possession each night (he told me this) something completed after you die (or after suffering purgatory, which Catholics may tell you you must go through, which is an imaginary place of sin-cleansing–Jesus pointed out that all sin is paid for by Him and our behavior is straightened out on earth (John 13:10), not Heaven, and only the body is sinful anyways, not the new spirit God gives those He forgives):
“For He says, “In the time of my favor I heard you, and in the day of salvation I helped you.” I tell you, now is the time of God’s favor, now is the day of salvation.” (2 Corinthians 6:2)
Next ask yourself these questions:
1. Does God have the right to change hearts using direct action by his Spirit without a person’s permission? For example did Jesus need the permission of the demon-possessed man in Mark 5:1-20 to cast the demons out of him, the demons who had combined their minds to form a being called “Legion”? Jesus cast them out without his permission and healed his heart so he could become saved. If he has not been saved immediately after then why would Jesus have said to him,“Go home to your own people and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he has had mercy on you.”? If all Jesus did was cast out a mighty horde of demons then why did he say, “how much… and” as in doing two distinct things? Clearly God removed these strong demons forever from him/the “much” Jesus spoke of, AND saved him/”had mercy” on him. But if as Catholic teach, salvation comes after, then the man wouldn’t have much of a story. It would only be, “God for the moment removed demons from me that no one else could, but they may be back at any time.”
2. Does God have the right to cause a person to feel something without their permission?
3. Does God have a right to convince someone of anything without their permission?
4. Does God need your permission for anything?
If the answer to each is “yes” and the last “no”, then why would anyone reply with: “But God gives us a choice and free will, he doesn’t force us to do anything”? Because literally you disagreed four times to your own reply. What the blind and unsaved don’t see is that they are overgeneralizing “gives us a choice” and ignoring God’s will cannot fail, three that the human will is not free of God’s will and therefore of his plans and four: merely because there are choices in your mind or in reality doesn’t give you the ability to control what choice you make, or, five, give you the ability or power to make the best or correct choice. Six, if God perfects a person and causes them to be in perfect harmony with His will why is it that these ignorant and confused people who treasure a “free will” above God’s will, love, Son and salvation respond with, “But God gives us a choice, He gave us free will.”? If God loves them, saved them, and they “accepted” and chose to be saved, why would their reply afterwards be what apparently is the main focus in their heart and mind rather than repentance be, “But I can reject God any time I want.”?And why do they never complete their point when saying such things? Why don’t they properly finish it with, “But we still have a choice to abandon God and be in Hell forever if we choose.”? Are they somehow forgetting or is it that that sounds so inappropriate, illogical, absurd, shallow and rebellious that they refrain from saying it lest it be obvious they never repented and are still stubborn and obstinate and evil inside, that God never changed their heart? Such Christians use nice clothing, verse copy-pasting and the phrase “born again” in ignorance as a mask and fill in for actually loving and obeying God and in place of desiring to truly understand his word, that includes the meaning of “born again”, which they seem to think is merely a metaphor meaning, “changed from bad to good” and “saved from my sins”.That’s all for now. I hope God opens the eyes of all the anti-Calvinists who are trying to understand what I’ve written here, and it’s not as if it is complicated being that I’ve made the reality very clear. Rememeber Scripture says that before we are saved we are blind, bound by Satan the strong man, enslaved to sin, hard hearted and dead inside (we have no good spirit) and that no one does good or understands (how to be saved or how to please God). So, anyone who claims, as false Christians do, that God merely “nudges” them or makes their mind clear so they can can choose to be saved from sin and Hell and understand the consequences of not being saved from Hell still have logical explanation as to how even then a person then may get saved as THEY STILL LACK A GOOD HEART. Not only that, to say or imply that, “But God sit gives us a choice (to end up in Hell and betray him forever, note they’ll never put it that way), and so we still have a free will” are showing that Satan still has them mentally bound and is removing the obvious from their memory as soon as they “accept Christ into their hearts” (that’s their shallow, insincere and repentance-avoidant phrase for fooling themselves or others into thinking they’ve repented): because they’ve agreed God may forever save them by fully agreeing to commit themselves to his eternal will just by their attempt to get saved. In other words, repenting is to stop sinning, and asking for mercy and accepting Jesus died for all your sins is agreeing to be saved and changed forever. There’s no, “And you can make an eye wink or wish to get out of this contract whenever you feel like” clause, or exception. But the way these evil people rationalize that is to think, “But we still sin, we can make bad choices because God lets us.” In other words, they ignore the contract they’ve pledged themselves too and just call it sin if they decide to reject salvation all together afterward supposedly getting saved or being in the process of being saved, and further contradict themselves as by calling it just any other sin to abandon God have admitted that Christ would cover that sin too, as it’s still a sin and not an unforgivable one. So there is no way to undo Jesus’ suffering, salvation, contract/covenant or heart-change and process of perfecting a person or predestined plan of salvation for anyone.
The Bible makes this clear:
There is no wisdom, no insight, no plan that can succeed against the Yahweh. (Proverbs 21:30)
“Can you bind the chains of the Pleiades? Can you loosen Orion’s belt?” (Job 38:31)
Consider what God has done: Who can straighten what he has made crooked? (Ecclesiastes 7:13)
“I know that You can do all things and that no plan of Yours can be thwarted.” (Job 42:2)
Therefore if anyone claims to have lost their salvation or gotten it back: they were never saved in the first place. Instead, the Bible says of such a person:”They are like unreasoning animals, creatures of instinct, born only to be caught and destroyed, and like animals they too will perish. … It would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than to have known it and then to turn their backs on the sacred command that was passed on to them.” – 2 Peter 2:12, 21
“these people slander whatever they do not understand, and the very things they do understand by instinct—as irrational animals do—will destroy them.” – Jude
“If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God. Anyone who rejected the law of Moses died without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much more severely do you think someone deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified them, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace? For we know him who said, “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,” and again, “The Lord will judge his people.” It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” – Hebrews 10:26-31
More evidence that the will of all creatures is under God’s passive and active control is that Scripture implies that it is by God’s initial and ultimate pre-planning, His free choice, and not because of actions by any creature apart from His control or in response to it, that a creature will stay good, has become evil and becomes good, including forever. For example, no animal has been observed to do anything outside of what God made them for. And no angel has ever switched sides after their first decision to stay or rebel. For example there is no evidence that any angel which became a demon or an evil spirit rather has ever repented and become saved, including among the so called “Watcher” type. Likewise angels that didn’t sin are not known to ever sin. So, if there is such thing as a free will as in a will that is free from not just God’s influence and control but ANY influence or control, including Satan’s, then there should be chaos. There should not be any consistency in the behavior of anyone who is saved by God or not as there wouldn’t be anything causing them to be one way or the other. It is because of that fact that God’s control is a necessity for everything to have any order, consistency and predictability. Without God’s control there would be no reason to put trust in anyone or anything for consistent behavior. Why would I trust a person who is saved if the next moment they could and eventually would, being unhinged/unglued/not bound to God’s goodnesses, be a liar, thief and murderer? Is there any evidence that Satan loves God at one moment and the next hates Him? This is why Jesus said,
“to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.” (John 1:12-13) and
“No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him [giving him the desire to come to Me]; and I will raise him up [from the dead] on the last day.” (John 6:44) and
“No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. … You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last”.
More evidence of a non-works-based and non-man’s-choice-to-obey-God destiny-based eternal salvation, (besides that Scripture outright says so and isn’t based on man’s uninfluenced choice that He be with God forever, or some “innate goodness”) is Jesus’ explanation of his sower and the seeds parable, in which he explains the spiritual state of all mankind and future mankind. In his explanation there is no mention of anyone getting a second chance to be saved or who loses their salvation. There instead are only two kinds of people among the types he describes: those who don’t obtain salvation and never produce a single good work, and those who do, and they never stop doing good deeds as a result of this gift of salvation:
“18 Listen then to what the parable of the sower means: 19 When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in their heart. This is the seed sown along the path. 20 The seed falling on rocky ground refers to someone who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. 21 But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away. 22 The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, making it unfruitful. 23 But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the word and understands it. This is the one who produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.”
As for those who claim God saved certain people due to a “kernel of goodness”, that is a baseless claim. Nothing in Scripture teaches this, in fact it repeatedly says, “2 The Lord looks down from heaven on all mankind to see if there are any who understand, any who seek God. 3 All have turned away, all have become corrupt; there is no one who does good, not even one.” (Psalm 14:2-3) and “Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior.” (Colossians 1:21). Besides that, Scripture says that faith without works is dead and vice versa, so why would God care about some magical speck of goodness in anyone? It also says “10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” So it is not, “This is love: not that we had a speck of goodness in us…” but that God was good to us who were evil to Him and not fully paying attention to His goodness or recognizing it fully, or totally ignoring Him. Again, “I revealed myself to those who did not ask for me; I was found by those who did not seek me. To a nation that did not call on my name, I said, ‘Here am I, here am I.’” (Isaiah 65:1).
Did Yeshuah triumph prematurely if as those who deny salvation is eternal if it can be negated at any time due to the potential for man’s so called “free will” as they call it to do so? No. And notice the finally of this passage which doesn’t speak of anyone becoming dead and unforgiven again: “11 Your whole self ruled by the flesh was put off when you were circumcised by Christ, 12 having been buried with him in baptism… 13 When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, 14 having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross. And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.” (Colossians 2:11-15)
And so there can be no doubt that God forgave whoever it is He felt like forgiving if there is still doubt, the apostle Paul made it very clear God didn’t forgive anyone because, “He saw they would choose salvation” as an Assembly of God pastor named Galen Woodward once told me. His claim was nonsensical because a “free will” wouldn’t be predictable and if “free will” leads to rejecting salvation why would God ignore the eventual rejection to come after they are saved and have eternal life? Free will believers even say God will reject the person that rejects Him! It’s also a contradiction because if God ignores the rejections that the “free will” cultists claim are hiding in the bushes ready to pounce at any moment to negate God’s convenant, then why do they deny: “once (we are) saved (we are) always saved” if eternal life is a permanent state of salvation? It also contradicts in a third way: If there exists some sort of goodness in a sinner apart from God’s goodness, and it causes them to choose to be saved when they hear the gospel, then of what need doed such a person have if they have such an invincible goodness in them that they can use it to save themselves, and even without needing Jesus to save them via his sacrifice? It also contradicts this teaching Jesus gave:
“It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. 32 I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” (Luke 5:31-32)
So the very doctrine of a salvation that hinges on a “free will” (as in what a confused or blind person means, and that is a will that God has no influence or ultimate control over so that the will chooses what His will wants it to) is a contradiction by the way those who hold it teach it, besides it also being a futile teaching leading to eternal sadness and no hope of permanent peace and joy with God. Some heretics say it like this (as I point out elsewhere here),
Some falsely claim that “God destines us based on the choices He sees we will make, and doesn’t send us to Hell (because we choose to go there).”, but first, notice you’ll never hear them say “God doesn’t send us to Heaven against our will”, as in “force us in while hate for Him is in our hearts. They don’t understand that God first changes/unhardens a person’s heart, as in regenerates it.
Second, what verses support this claim that God merely accomadates our choices? Some may say, “God is love” and that is why. But that doesn’t explain anything specificly. It’s out of context to simpy say, “God is love”.
Some accept Hell exists and will go there, but to keep their delusion of sovereignty they say, “We choose to go to Hell, so we send ourselves there,” as if they controlled their destiny and can simply becomd good apart from God. That is not true as many other Christians have shown and as I do here. God It’s almost exactly a line I heard from an inmate in jail decades ago. Obviously it is an overgeneralization and an attempt at making a metaphor a truth, like saying, “Criminals accept they may be caught breaking a law and end up punished for it”, but that is not the same as ” Crimimals accept Hell and God exist and will walk politely into a burning lake of fire when God politely asks them to.” Since when does everyone believe in God and Hell? Further, even acceptance something like that earthly judgment may occur from human judges isn’t the same as “choosing” to be punished let alone to walk into Hell. It’s obviously then very delusonal thinking and a gross denial of reality or gross assumption and a gross show of pride to claim God won’t send anyone to Hell Even to claim that “we send ourselves to Hell by sinning” is a proof that God doesn’t have the right to send us to Hell or plays no part in destining our life so that there’s no way we can not be sent there is clearly wrong.
“From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands.” (Acts 17:26).
Paul said in Romans 9 that the potential for goodness and good deeds or even doing such deeds (if it were possible to do then apart from God’s goodness don’t determine who God decides to save
“8 …it is not the children by physical descent [from Abraham] who are God’s children, but it is [based on] the children of the promise who are regarded as Abraham’s offspring. 9 For this was how the promise was stated: “At the appointed time I will return, and Sarah will have a son.”
10 Not only that, but Rebekah’s children were conceived at the same time by our father Isaac. 11 Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad—in order that God’s purpose in election might stand: not by works but by him who calls—she was told, “The older will serve the younger.” 13 Just as it is written:
“Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”
14 What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! 15 For he says to Moses,
“I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”
16 It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. 17 For Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” 18 Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.
19 One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us?For who is able to resist his will?” 20 But who are you, a human being, to talk back to Go? “Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” 21 Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?””
37 Even after Jesus had performed so many signs in their presence, they still would not believe in him. 38 This was to fulfill the word of Isaiah the prophet:
“Lord, who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?”
39 For this reason they could not believe, because, as Isaiah says elsewhere:
40 “He has blinded their eyes
and hardened their hearts,
so they can neither see with their eyes,
nor understand with their hearts,
nor turn—and I would heal them.”” (John 12:37-40)
So, we have an impaired will (not a totally free will) under God’s direction, not a free will that can choose whatever it wants to. The only choices we can make are that which God allows, whether he allows it passively, or actively causes it by His Spirit. This is how it is with all things, from the smallest particle to the heart. And when we who are saved attain freedom from the flesh’s desires to sin, our will will no longer have any desire to disobey God, not because of innate goodness, but because of God’s innate goodness and His unchanging will and plans.
The covenant of salvation is also sealed by God’s Spirit:
“In him, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and in him, when you also believed, you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.” (Ephesians 1:13)
“Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the Lord your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.” (Deuteronomy 31:6)
“For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.” (1 Peter 1:23)
“No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God’s seed remains in them; they cannot go on sinning, because they have been born of God.” (1 John 3:9)
For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world: your faith. (1 John 5:4)
“11 As the Scripture says, “Anyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame.”
12 For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile–the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, 13 for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”” (Romans 10:11-13)
“Whoever hears my word and believes Him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life!” (John 5:24)
“38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God (that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:38-39)
“for though the righteous fall seven times, they rise again” (Proverbs 24:16)
“For those (who belong to God as good children forever) God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son” (Romans 8:29)
No one can cleanse themselves of their own sins by water their own suffering or money:
1 Hear this, all you peoples;
listen, all who live in this world,
2 both low and high,
rich and poor alike:
3 My mouth will speak words of wisdom;
the meditation of my heart will give you understanding.
4 I will turn my ear to a proverb;
with the harp I will expound my riddle:
5 Why should I fear when evil days come,
when wicked deceivers surround me—
6 those who trust in their wealth
and boast of their great riches?
7 No one can redeem the life of another
or give to God a ransom for them—the ransom for a life is costly,
no payment is ever enough—so that they should live on forever
and not see decay.
10 For all can see that the wise die,
that the foolish and the senseless also perish,
leaving their wealth to others.
11 Their tombs will remain their houses forever,
their dwellings for endless generations,
though they had named lands after themselves.
12 People, despite their wealth, do not endure;
they are like the beasts that perish.
13 This is the fate of those who trust in themselves,
and of their followers, who approve their sayings.
14 They are like sheep and are destined to die;
death will be their shepherd
(but the upright will prevail over them in the morning).
Their forms will decay in the grave,
far from their princely mansions.
15 But God will redeem me from the realm of the dead;
he will surely take me to himself.
16 Do not be overawed when others grow rich,
when the splendor of their houses increases;
17 for they will take nothing with them when they die,
their splendor will not descend with them.
18 Though while they live they count themselves blessed—and people praise you when you prosper—they will join those who have gone before them,
who will never again see the light of life.
20 People who have wealth but lack understanding are like the beasts that perish. (Psalm 49)
Even the Roman Catholic religion acknowledges that predestination is true: https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12378a.htm
Finally there’s the ancient confirmation and agreement of what I’ve said by great English theologians in the 1600s who decided to make it an official publicly stated belief in human words of what the true Church should believe regarding whether or not anyone can save themselves by their own will and power apart from God. They said,
“Man by his fall into a of sin hath wholly lost all ability of will to any spiritual good accompanying salvation; so as a natural man, being altogether averse from that good, and dead in sin, is not able, by his own strength, to convert himself, or to prepare himself thereto.” Westminster Confession of Faith, by the Westminster Assembly, Chapter IX, section 3, recorded in the year 1646.
If you are not yet saved but are now convinced the Bible is consistent and God’s word no matter what correct version it has been translated to, consider repenting and asking God to save you now, lest Satan prevent it from ever happening and you spend the rest of eternity suffering unimaginable pain with him and the worst criminals. This is how: How to get saved (page link).
How to Get to Heaven 