This makes no sense. If we are deliberately programed to succeed or fail before our great, great, great grandparents were born, as Calvin says we are, free will is out the window, regardless of what any angels might be doing. Predestination means that God does more than "move our hearts", which could be done by persuasion. Yes, God is way above our level of comprehension, but that's the dilemma. Our natural minds are all we have to make sense of reality. Of course we have the Bible, but that needs to be approached intelligently--not according to whatever notions some sixteenth century puritanical theologian might have had about it. If black is really white, heavy is really light, cold is really hot, dark is really light, etc., what to do? I go by evidence, logic, experience, intuition, etc., to try to figure it out as best I can. If Somebody Upstairs doesn't like it, I guess (S)he can do with me whatever (S)he wants. Your approach seems to be more in line with the Jabberwocy in Meagain's poem (Post #12). Pulling "proof texts" out of contexts from the Bible doesn't really solve the problem, since you can get it to say anything you want that way.
drink more? no... I don't think so... I do not think that way anymore. To drink isn't to indulge for me. I think of it like suicide or embezzlement; I just know better, and it feels stupid; like beating my emotions to death only to suit my skin. I see the vice... My belief system does so much to correct for those tendencies, and when I look at America and sigh without acknowledging the beauty of it but only making a quite superficial appraisal of her problems without embracing her freedom, her hope, her destiny, and her extraordinary potential, but only seeing laziness and complacency and with them the statistics mentioned here and quoted, I commit a disservice; we are abundantly equipped to overcome these. And what remains often unsaid is that religion does so much to divest from them; forbidding us from becoming numb and apathetic about these behaviors and social problems and informing us not so much that we'll suffer in the afterlife if we succumb to them, but to the point we don't emulate creation; we pale to compare. I relocate my soul through prayer; no matter how lost I become my heart knows the way home. That is the power of faith. That is the power of belief systems, worldviews, values, morals, and spirituality too; to the extent we embrace our spiritual side, we know ourselves better.
The pre-existence of Jesus, the Logos, doesn't have any bearing on pre-destination. Obviously, if God always existed, so did Jesus, since according to orthodox Christian theology they were the same entity in Three Persons. As our Creator, God probably had knowledge that if He was giving the creature free will some would stray. That's a lot different from saying God knew from the beginning of time that particular people would inevitably be damned to hell for all eternity and they couldn't do anything about it. That God would be an evil monster, not deserving of worship. To test Abraham's faith? Or perhaps all that "foreshadowing" was something the gospel writers drew on in shaping their conception of Jesus' resurrection?
