Thank you for answering my personal question to you.

I would like it if you would requote Ellen White.

The following statement seems typical to me of her thought:

None will ever come to Christ, save those who respond to the drawing of the Father's love. But God is drawing all hearts unto Him, and only those who resist His drawing will refuse to come to Christ.(DA 387)

Do you understand Luther's and Zwingl's teaching to be in harmony with this? Don't they teach instead that God's will is irrestible? Isn't that what the doctine of election is about? God elects who He will, and then draws them with irresitible grace, so that they are saved? And this is how it is that God is fully responsible for the salvation of the elect?

Does God elect some to be saved, and then irresitibly call those whom He has elected? Or does God elect all to be saved in Christ, draw all, and only those who resist the drawing are lost? How can you reconcile these two schools of thought which are so diametrically opposed to one another?

I'm not aware of any reformer from that time who believed in irresitible grace. Later Calvin may have believed that, I'm not sure.

How would you express the thought then, Mark? What do you see as different in Calvin's presentation of irresitible grace and what Luther and the other Reformers believed in regards to the salvation of the elect?

What the term is called doesn't really matter. What I'm concerned with is the process. Is it a unilateral process, or is it one which involves the free will of the one responding? You do agree that Luther taught that human free will is not involved in salvation, don't you?

Since God's foreknowledge is not uncertain, "free-will" is non-existent

It is fundamentally necessary and healthy for Christians to acknowledge that God foreknows nothing uncertainly, but that He foresees, purposes, and does all things according to His own immutable, eternal and infallible will. This bombshell knocks "free-will" flat, and utterly shatters it; so that those who want to assert it must either deny my bombshell, or pretend not to notice it, or find some other way of dodging it.

This is from Luther's "The bondage of the will."

This does not appear to me to be saying the same thing you are saying, Mark. It appears to me to be saying the same thing I'm saying.

From time to time Luther made emphatic statements like this because he wanted people to see that scripture does not teach free will as most people think of it. But his view of free will is summarized in Article 18 of the Confession. Historians tell us that he fully concurred with Melancthon the author on everything of any importance. In fact, Luther, while he didn't attend the Augsburg conference of 1530 (or 31?) where the Confession was drafted, coached the movements of the Protestant theologians and princes from a lodging just far enough away from Augsburg so that his presence wouldn't be a distraction to the catholic princes who mortally hated him, but close enough so that he could be in almost daily communication with his followers.

Mark, I'm not following your reasoning here. Luther's statement was not dealing with how people see free will so much as an argument which was based on Luther's percpetions of God's attributes. Luther reasoned from the premise that God's will is immutable and all-powerful, accepting Augustine's premises. From the premises of Augusting, the rest follows. Luther was not illogical; just his premises were wrong.

Article 18 was dealing with a different issue. If you want to know what Luther thought, just look at the Lutheran church! Look at what they teach about election and predestination. They have faithfully preserved his teachings on these subjects.

"The human doctrine of free will and of our spiritual powers is futile. The matter (salvation) does not depend on our will but on God’s will and election." (Martin Luther)

Either Luther was right about this or he wasn't.

What do you think, Mark? Is our salvation dependent upon our will to any extent? Or it is totally dependent upon God's will as Luther, Calvin, and reformed theology asserts?

Again, you mistate Luther's position as you do many other passages by Ellen White and scripture. Luther and scripture agree that the human will plays a vital role. We all need to be born again, and we cannot be born again against our wills. The Holy Spirit is always an invited guest. He can be greived away by our unbelief. We can choose to believe or to not believe. Abraham chose to believe God and it was counted to him for righteousness. Isn't that true?

Mark, how am I misstating Luther's position? I quoted him. He stated his position. I'm not following you.

What do you think Luther's position was? Perhaps you could quote him.

Do you understand what Reformed theology believes regarding the will? The Reformed position has been quite well defined and is well known. I'm getting the impression that you're not really aware of the actual positions of people you have been discussing. Do you understand the difference between the compatible and incompatible positions? I've tried to make these clear. The two positions really are diametrically opposed to one another. I don't see how one can lump EGW's position with Luther's unless one is not aware of the respective positions. Luther was fully compatibilistic and EGW libertarian.

Let me just ask the following questions.

1.What do you think Luther's position was?
2.What do you think Calvin's position was?
3.What do you think Ellen White's position was?
4.In what way do you think Adventists have in general a wrong position regarding human free will?