ARCHIVE: Open Theism part 3

[DFT_Dave]

I ask again, "what container is big enough to hold God? Why is this important? Because God would have to 'move/be active' inside of something greater than Himself. What we have then is God's actions without a containter that is beyond measurement. This includes duration.

Look above, do you see why this is pertinent?

Pay attention: He created that which is finite (has parameters and definition) but is beyond and outside of His creation (is understood by His involvement in the parameters but exceeds them).

For me to answer this meaningful, I need to know where you are going, what you are looking for. It was in His nature to create so whether or not He could seems moot to me upon the observation that He did indeed do it.

Again we are looking at His nature. It is like saying did I have to paint the picture this way. Well yes and no. Yes, as I made it, it is the way I made it and no, it is not the only render available in my repetiore. When we are talking about earth, it is the medium necessary for plants, animals and man to exist.

It would appear to us as all at once because it happens within a God with no limitations. God can use any medium within his repetiore but the OV constrains Him to one medium to act without realizing He is the definition of all movements (backwards, forwards, sideways, vertical and beyond) because He is beyond all movement into infinity.

Time restricts his freedom? No, nothing restricts God because no container holds Him. He is immeasurably beyond it all into infiinity. Ultimately you have to entertain the question of "how big is God?" When you answer that question, He'll be eternally past your observations.

Does Genesis appear as though God does everything all at once/timelessly?

Movement involves more then a change of location, it is also activity. Communication is activity, my words from my mind to your mind. God spoke and said "Let there be light", had God ever said this before? The spirit of God moved over the waters. God formed man from the dust of the earth, this is activity/movement, yes?

The incarnation of Christ happens after the creation, right?

You don't seem to believe God is free and your concept of God seems structured more from the idea of what infinite size means more than what the Bible says about God.

--Dave

 

[Clete]

*
I will never swap simple faith for human philosophy...mere human wisdom. And faith is a higher knowledge and wholly a gift. I also count an honour to be in the company of Nang, Amr and Lon...though they might not quite agree.

You have bought a lie.

The lie that says there is a choice one must make between "simple faith" and "human philosophy", which terms, in your mind, name the concepts of "blind belief" and "one's ability to think" respectively. No such choice can be made without the action of a human mind. A choice in favor of "simple faith" is an act of "human philosophy"!

You have exchanged your mind for a zero, a blank, a negation. You've thrown away the only tool, and I do mean the only tool, you have to know anything, including whether or not your own theology is true or false. You've traded the firm ground of knowledge for the nothing of ______ (blank out). You've traded sound reason for the whims of the month which emanate from the teacher of the month, none any more valid or invalid than the last so far as your arrested mind can detect. You've thrown away every standard of truth possible to you by discarding the only tool you have by which to gauge anything by a standard, that tool being your God given mind and the skills honed to utilize it.

I feel sorry for you, I really do. You're like a fish out of water who thinks he's swimming.

Resting in Him,
Clete

 

[Lon]

Does Genesis appear as though God does everything all at once/timelessly?

No problem here, again you confuse duration of creation with an infinite God.
Psa 147:5 Great is our LORD, and of great power; There is no limit to His understanding. *(Literally - Not Finite!)

Movement involves more then a change of location, it is also activity. Communication is activity, my words from my mind to your mind. God spoke and said "Let there be light", had God ever said this before? The spirit of God moved over the waters. God formed man from the dust of the earth, this is activity/movement, yes?

I'll ask again, where can an infinite God move to? There is no question God moves, but you perceive it to mean (incorrectly) something quite different. Your God is too small in your thinking.

The incarnation of Christ happens after the creation, right?

Yes, pay attention (you have never paid attention to this to date):
God can act and move within our constraints but is not at all limited by them. They are created/constructed parameters for our existence, not His.
This is truth whether it is understood or recognized. Anybody who gets this, gets this. It is logical and applies consistently for assessment.

You don't seem to believe God is free and your concept of God seems structured more from the idea of what infinite size means more than what the Bible says about God.

--Dave

Psa 147:5 Great is our LORD, and of great power; There is no limit to His understanding.

Eph 3:18 may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height,
Eph 3:19 and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you might be filled with all the fullness of God.

Exo 33:18 And he said, I beseech You, let me see Your glory.
Exo 33:19 And He said, I will make all My goodness pass before you, and I will proclaim the name of Jehovah before you. And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will have mercy on whom I will have mercy.
Exo 33:20 And He said, You cannot see My face. For there no man can see Me and live.

II Chronicles 2:5 & 6
And the house that I build is great: for great is our God above all Gods. But who is able to build him an house, seeing the heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain him? who am I then, that I should build him an house, save only to burn sacrifice before him?

I Kings 8:27
But will God indeed dwell on the earth? behold, the heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain thee; how much less this house that I have builded.

 

[Totton Linnet]

You have bought a lie.

The lie that says there is a choice one must make between "simple faith" and "human philosophy", which terms, in your mind, name the concepts of "blind belief" and "one's ability to think" respectively. No such choice can be made without the action of a human mind. A choice in favor of "simple faith" is an act of "human philosophy"!

You have exchanged your mind for a zero, a blank, a negation. You've thrown away the only tool, and I do mean the only tool, you have to know anything, including whether or not your own theology is true or false. You've traded the firm ground of knowledge for the nothing of ______ (blank out). You've traded sound reason for the whims of the month which emanate from the teacher of the month, none any more valid or invalid than the last so far as your arrested mind can detect. You've thrown away every standard of truth possible to you by discarding the only tool you have by which to gauge anything by a standard, that tool being your God given mind and the skills honed to utilize it.

I feel sorry for you, I really do. You're like a fish out of water who thinks he's swimming.

Resting in Him,
Clete

*
It is your concept of what faith is that is at fault...it is never blind. It sees God word and subjects human wisdom to it. Human wisdom is never absent...mine functions [I feel sure] every bit as well as yours but when I see a contradiction between human wisdonm and God's word, I subject human wisdom.

This works for example with Predestination, I abhor the negative take Calvin put upon it but whereas others then allow their human wisdom to jettison God's word concerning Predestination I admit that Predestination must be true...so now I cry to the Lord for HIS wisdom to understand it.

Faith is simply believing God's word. Nor is there any reason for you to pity me, I have overflowing joy and peace that abides.

 

[assuranceagent]

Do you mean that God is actually an impersonal force as in pantheism? Are you a panentheist?

--Dave

Not in the slightest, Dave.

What I mean is that we cannot judge the veracity of a truth claim on our ability to understand it. When we attempt to call God to the bar of human reason, we make ourselves the sovereign and try to force finitude on God.

Clete, I believe, would assert that anything that doesn't make perfect logical sense to him must therefore be false or invalid. I admit to making an assumption there, but it is one based on prior conversations and my observations of his current conversations and arguments in this very thread.

But human reason is not the litmus of truth. The Word of God is the litmus.

Though I am not able to logically comprehend the fullness of the Trinity, I no less accept it as truth because it is clearly taught in the Word. I need not be able to utterly aprehend that truth by virtue of my own "rationality" in order to accept its veracity.

God is personal. And relational. But He is not finite.

As much as I love her and study her, I cannot comprehend all there is to be known about my own wife. How arrogant, then, for me to assume I could do so about the things of God, and require my comprehension as a condition of the truth.

A god I can fully apprehend by way of my fallen reason is no god at all.

 

[patman]

I believe this is the Achilles heel (deadly weakeness) for Open Theism.
With or without realizing it, you've made God a slave to His creation because you are constraining Him to linear durative movement.

Someone, can't remember who, argued with me over whether God could or could not obliterate past history. They suggested what is done is done and cannot be undone. I disagree. Whatever we call the power to obliterate Abraham Lincoln from our memories and all physical evidence, is in fact an obliteration of history (I'm dealing with can vs. would and acquiesce problems with would, but am entertaining 'could' only).
Why? Because even though he was technically right, that Abraham Lincoln would have existed still, it doesn't matter to the new reality. Nobody concerned with Abraham Lincoln would know and thus, history for them is obliterated and as far as they are concerned, "It never happened."

In repeat, not would, but could. We all must acquiesce the 'could' of this else God is not potent ("Almighty"- ALL-Mighty). If we accept the premise, He has complete control over His creation and could do this.

To the point: if God is restricted to forward durative progression, then He could not have an endless beginning. These two propositions are diametrically opposed to each other. You cannot have God stuck in durative progression and also acquiesce or recognize that He has no beginning. To say "God has no beginning" is exactly the same as saying "God is not subject to durative progression." If you embrace one truth, the other is unalterably and logically connected because "God has no beginning" is a description of God disconnected from durative progression. Literally, there is no point A which is necessary for any measurement whatsoever. In fact, you cannot apply ANY measure, physical or mental construct, to any property of God. He is beyond the measure of the universe, He cannot be quantified our quantified by finite measurements from finite man. God is infinite, we -finite and our inadequate terms do not apply. This, precisely, is why the OV gets labelled with humanizing the infinite God, restricted to concepts of finite man.

Nobody, nobody, nobody, accepting the above as fact will ever appreciate the OV position.

Hi Lon,

Time does not trap God. It's just a measurement, but simplifying it to that is tripping up this conversation... so instead of time how about we talk about the direction of events?

Linear events do not trap God. If 5 minutes ago Dr. Evil flipped a switch to blow up the planet with his "death" "star" do you think God would have a problem? He could just say the word "stop" and the "laser" would have no other option but to stop.

God doesn't need to travel back in time to say "stop." He doesn't have to look into the future to say "stop." He can do it on the fly!

There is a BIG problem by saying God is outside of time. You illustrated it well with the word "could" in your above post. God "could" go back and rearrange past events. But does scripture say he can do that?

When Jesus was about to be crucified, he prayed to God about stopping the crucifixion.

Matthew 26:42
Again, a second time, He went away and prayed, saying, “O My Father, if this cup cannot pass away from Me unless I drink it, Your will be done.”

Jesus made a VERY telling statement about events. This event could not pass unless Jesus went through it. Do you think that is true?

If you think God is outside of time, and he could arrange things in the past, why not put the Tree that Adam ate from on a different hill that day? You see, there are thousands of ways God could have kept Jesus from going through that crucifixion. He could have went back in time and stopped himself from ever creating - because after all, that would have stopped the need for a crucifixion, and all this would have just been God's bad dream or a list of unwanted possibilities.

God himself wished he didn't make man at one point... a wish he could have granted for himself if he were outside of time.

Do you see the can of worms that making time on a different plane opens up?

 

[godrulz]

This is like saying the guy who built construction robots didn't build the house. Technically true, but we give the guy credit for the house as well and marvel more that he did it so elaborately. Therefore we can give God credit for Apple computers and Ford cars. He not only built the biological beings that made this possible, He sustained them in their ability to do so. Without Him, the house or computer or car doesn't exist.

You negate free will? Self-determination? Love? The image of God? I am arguing against omnicausality. It is lame to say that God is typing my sentence on TOL. This is an insult to common sense. Your view is wrong. Change it.

 

[Lon]

Hi Lon,

Time does not trap God. It's just a measurement, but simplifying it to that is tripping up this conversation... so instead of time how about we talk about the direction of events?

Linear events do not trap God. If 5 minutes ago Dr. Evil flipped a switch to blow up the planet with his "death" "star" do you think God would have a problem? He could just say the word "stop" and the "laser" would have no other option but to stop.

God doesn't need to travel back in time to say "stop." He doesn't have to look into the future to say "stop." He can do it on the fly!

Trapped is trapped no matter the positive spin.

There is a BIG problem by saying God is outside of time. You illustrated it well with the word "could" in your above post. God "could" go back and rearrange past events. But does scripture say he can do that?

No problem. The bottom line here is that I believe measurement and perceptionm, of duration is strictly applied to that which is created.
Think again on the immensity of God by Whom all things exist. If we were able to put all things into a jar with nothing left over, whatever moves is inside the jar and nothing moves outside of it (which proves God is relational and moves in our parameters but is outside of His creation as has been adequately shown from scriptures on the previous page.

When Jesus was about to be crucified, he prayed to God about stopping the crucifixion.

Matthew 26:42
Again, a second time, He went away and prayed, saying, “O My Father, if this cup cannot pass away from Me unless I drink it, Your will be done.”

Jesus made a VERY telling statement about events. This event could not pass unless Jesus went through it. Do you think that is true?

If you think God is outside of time, and he could arrange things in the past, why not put the Tree that Adam ate from on a different hill that day? You see, there are thousands of ways God could have kept Jesus from going through that crucifixion. He could have went back in time and stopped himself from ever creating - because after all, that would have stopped the need for a crucifixion, and all this would have just been God's bad dream or a list of unwanted possibilities.

God himself wished he didn't make man at one point... a wish he could have granted for himself if he were outside of time.

Do you see the can of worms that making time on a different plane opens up?

No. You are describing things within the jar where measurement is possible but God is not restricted to inside the jar and is impossible to measure. Time is simply how long it takes to get from point A to point B. God doesn't have to travel incrementally to get to either point because He is apart from His creation. He relationally chooses to progress this way to our benefit but isn't duratively constrained. This is a limitation upon creation, not Him.

 

[Totton Linnet]

Isaiah 46:9 remember the former things of old; for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me, 10 declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, 'My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose,' 11 calling a bird of prey from the east, the man of my counsel from a far country. I have spoken, and I will bring it to pass; I have purposed, and I will do it.

God states here that he has a future of "things not yet done".

The Day of judgment has not yet come for us or for God--open theism.

--Dave

*
I look and look at this and cannot see how that it does not declare God's omniscience and ominpotence. In verse 11. He is saying that it is He who raised up the king who was besides responsible for carrying the Jews into captivity was responsible the slaughter of whole peoples and nations.

I acknowledge that it is a hard doctrine, but this king was raised up by God to accomplish His will....but in carrying off the Jews did not the light of true knowledge come to Babylon? were not decrees sent out that the God of Daniel was the one true God and must only be worshipped? i.e. there is always a merciful purpose and outcome to God's plans.

God is not responsible for evil but He manages it and overcomes it with good...He could by no means accomplish this without ALL knowledge and wisdom.

 

[godrulz]

Is. 46 and 48 is a specific context. It explicitly says how God declares some aspects of the future: it is by His ability to bring things to pass, not crystal ball prescience. The mistake is to proof text this and extrapolate it to mean exhaustive definite foreknowledge not linked to His ability (vs simple foreknowledge or exhaustive foreknowledge).

God unilaterally prophesies and brings to pass the first and second coming of Christ. This does not mean that He sees and knows every outcome of every sports event from eternity past (if it was objectively knowable, He would; if contingencies are real, then the future has an element of uncertainty unless God is deterministic/omnicausal vs just omnicompetent).

 

[Nang]

You negate free will? Self-determination? Love? The image of God? I am arguing against omnicausality. It is lame to say that God is typing my sentence on TOL. This is an insult to common sense. Your view is wrong. Change it.

You have missed Lon's point altogether.

It appears you are unable to see beyond your own artificial constructs.

 

[Nang]

Is. 46 and 48 is a specific context. It explicitly says how God declares some aspects of the future: it is by His ability to bring things to pass, not crystal ball prescience. The mistake is to proof text this and extrapolate it to mean exhaustive definite foreknowledge not linked to His ability (vs simple foreknowledge or exhaustive foreknowledge).

God unilaterally prophesies and brings to pass the first and second coming of Christ. This does not mean that He sees and knows every outcome of every sports event from eternity past (if it was objectively knowable, He would; if contingencies are real, then the future has an element of uncertainty unless God is deterministic/omnicausal vs just omnicompetent).

You really need to get past analyzing what you think God sees and does not see, and meditate on the fact that all things in creation have occurred according to the will of God.

God is not a mere "observer" of events. Contingencies only exist in the experiences of finite creatures. There is no such thing as chance in the mind and will of God.

Nang

 

[godrulz]

You really need to get past analyzing what you think God sees and does not see, and meditate on the fact that all things in creation have occurred according to the will of God.

God is not a mere "observer" of events. Contingencies only exist in the experiences of finite creatures. There is no such thing as chance in the mind and will of God.

Nang

I reject your straw man Deist view. In Open Theism, God can and does intervene in our affairs as the transcendent/immanent God. This does not mean He is omnicausal or deterministic since this would lead to attributing evil to a holy God, contrary to Scripture.

 

[Totton Linnet]

I reject your straw man Deist view. In Open Theism, God can and does intervene in our affairs as the transcendent/immanent God. This does not mean He is omnicausal or deterministic since this would lead to attributing evil to a holy God, contrary to Scripture.

But that is to deny scripture, for God says He raised up Cyrus and He raised up Pharoah...He had foretold to Abe four hundred years previously the evil that would befall Israel in Egypt. I agree that it is paradoxical in that God will hold men responsible for the evil that they do....evil is man's choice, he would have knowledge of it, and knowledge here means more than mental cognizance. But God undertakes to manage evil and work it to His own good purposes.

God [I do not doubt for a moment] raised up Hitler to his place of power...the evil was there in society, a seething mass of criminality, anti semitism was there. What God does by means of FEDERAL HEADSHIP [i.e. bringing Hitler to power] He brings the poisonous mass to a head and so destroys it and in the mean time He gathers His ancient people into a nation in preparation for the end-times.

Beneath the surface of society today this same seething poison of evil is there, God will not let it alone He will raise up a leader to bring it to the surface. And He will cause it to work His purposes out for His people.

Christ is Head over ALL things for His church.

 

[godrulz]

Does God arbitrarily decree/elect some to heaven and others to hell in eternity past?

Your e.g. can be understood in a providential vs deterministic way. As well, exceptions and responses of God (Pharaoh hardened his own heart before God further judicially hardened it) cannot be extrapolated from specific to general principle (including omnicausality/EDF).

 

[Totton Linnet]

Does God arbitrarily decree/elect some to heaven and others to hell in eternity past?

Your e.g. can be understood in a providential vs deterministic way. As well, exceptions and responses of God (Pharaoh hardened his own heart before God further judicially hardened it) cannot be extrapolated from specific to general principle (including omnicausality/EDF).

I believe God foreknew before all worlds began that Pharoah would be wicked, Caiphas a viper, Herod a man slayer, Hitler etc etc...you miss the point with Pharoah, you miss the mercy God had on Egyptians because of him. Some disobeyed Pharoah, some heeded the warnings of Moses, Moses and Aaron were held in high esteem at court.

When the Jews left they were enriched by their Egyptian neighbours.

Just as there are hiarchies and ranks of principalities and powers and angels so there is among men. The debates between Jesus and the authorities brought about a division among the people, after pentecost these masses piled into the church and the church was held in honour but the Jewish leadership remained in bitter opposition.

This is how God has mercy upon the great masses, while separating the goats.

 

[Lon]

God can and does intervene in our affairs as the transcendent/immanent God.

Again, this is double-speak for the OVer. OV doesn't realize by saying God must move in incremental steps, that it denies the transcendent. A simple question: If God is transcendent in the OV, how is He transcendent? Your estimations all point to a God who is constrained within His creation.

Time, as I said is created. Why? Because 'forward' is from a reference point A to a reference point B. Despite what anybody says contrary, each and every measurement and concept of such measurements is contrained to creation. If God can only move, like we, from point A to B in duration, then He is inside something greater than Himself. God defines measures (thus they necessarily must be finite). Measures do not define God wholly but only what we can see and apprehend within our finite confines. He isn't only Love, Just, powerful, etc. He is much much more and we know Him only as He is relational to us, revealing Himself in our finite universe.

 

[Nang]

But that is to deny scripture, for God says He raised up Cyrus and He raised up Pharoah...He had foretold to Abe four hundred years previously the evil that would befall Israel in Egypt. I agree that it is paradoxical in that God will hold men responsible for the evil that they do....evil is man's choice, he would have knowledge of it, and knowledge here means more than mental cognizance. But God undertakes to manage evil and work it to His own good purposes.

God [I do not doubt for a moment] raised up Hitler to his place of power...the evil was there in society, a seething mass of criminality, anti semitism was there. What God does by means of FEDERAL HEADSHIP [i.e. bringing Hitler to power] He brings the poisonous mass to a head and so destroys it and in the mean time He gathers His ancient people into a nation in preparation for the end-times.

Beneath the surface of society today this same seething poison of evil is there, God will not let it alone He will raise up a leader to bring it to the surface. And He will cause it to work His purposes out for His people.

Christ is Head over ALL things for His church.

"The wicked shall be a ransom for the righteous and the unfaithful for the upright." Proverbs 21:18

 

[Clete]

*
It is your concept of what faith is that is at fault...it is never blind.

Yours is. Any rejection of sound reason or the acceptance of the irrational is an intentional shutting of your eyes, your ability to see (i.e. to understand).

You believe in spite of reason, the more irrational the dogma the more stubbornly you cling to it in the name of faith. Indeed, that which makes sense does not require faith according to your view, faith is the absence of reason, the opposite of knowledge, it is BLIND belief, which is to say that it is belief in the absence of sound reason.

It sees God word and subjects human wisdom to it.

What "sees" it? By God's word I presume you mean the bible. Faith does not read and understand the bible, the mind does. It is your mind that understands the things of God which are read in the bible which produces your faith. You cling to the effect (faith) while denying the cause, your mind (i.e. the reading (or hearing) of scripture).

Human wisdom is never absent...mine functions [I feel sure] every bit as well as yours but when I see a contradiction between human wisdom and God's word, I subject human wisdom.

This is the lie you've bought. The idea that what you call "human wisdom" and sound reason are the same thing.

They are not the same thing.

Human wisdom is superstitious, irrational, frightened and foolish. Sound reason is none of those things. Sound reason is nothing more than conforming your thoughts to reality. Sound reason is nothing more than being honest and consistent within your own mind.

Your religious beliefs seek (intentionally) to strip you of your mind. But that which is true, which is to say that which is rational, never asks you to disengage your mind in favor of faith (i.e. blind belief). Indeed, your faculty of reason is the only tool with which you have to tell the difference between what is truth and what is not. It is in your mind that you choose to accept the truth, it is in your mind where true faith resides for it is in your mind where understanding exists and after that the choice to act on that understanding.

This works for example with Predestination, I abhor the negative take Calvin put upon it but whereas others then allow their human wisdom to jettison God's word concerning Predestination I admit that Predestination must be true...so now I cry to the Lord for HIS wisdom to understand it.

Great example.

You take a doctrine which you've allowed the idiots around you to convince you is taught in Scripture (which it is not) and instead of being honest within your own mind and insisting that those same idiots explain to you how a God of justice can predestine people to Hell, you jettison your mind and submit to your teachers mindless ramblings. You blank out the clear and obvious contradiction that exists between a God of justice and the eternal punishment of unchosen and unavoidable actions that the self same 'God of justice' you believe in, not only predestined, but actively caused to come to pass!

The honest mind does the opposite of what you've done, the antithesis of what blind belief does. It says that the truth cannot be contradictory; that the Bible teaches that God is just; that the doctrine of predestination is unjust; and that therefore either the bible is false or the doctrine of predestination is false and that I therefore need to do some studying of my own to discover whether the Bible actually does teach predestination.

Then, hypothetically speaking, if it is found that the bible does teach predestination, the honest mind rejects the bible as false along with the god it speaks of, or if it is found that the bible does not teach predestination the honest mind rejects the doctrine.

Your religious beliefs would dictate that you take none of those steps. You simple believe and the more willing you are to believe in spite of your lack of understanding the more pious your teachers will credit you for being and the louder they will declare to you that in fact you do understand it and that it only feels like you don't, that the nagging feeling deep in the recesses of your mind that something is wrong, is your unregenerate flesh fighting to take dominance or that its Satan throwing his darts in your direction because Satan hates the truth.
In actual fact, just the opposite is the truth. It isn't Satan, and it isn't your flesh, it's what's left of that part of you which was created in God's image, and that God wishes to renew if you'll let Him, your rational thinking mind.

Romans 7:23 But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. 24 O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!
So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.​

Faith is simply believing God's word. Nor is there any reason for you to pity me, I have overflowing joy and peace that abides.

You're lying to yourself. The "overflowing joy and peace that abides" that you think you have is precisely the water you only think your swimming in!

A fish flopping on cold cement who believes himself to be full of joy and abiding peace would insist that there is no need to pity him nor to help him in any way. He's fine! He's terrific! He's happy!

He is deaf, dumb, blind and naked!

And so are you if you reject sound reason in favor of some slobbering morons doctrine that is specifically intended to strip you of your mind and make you a slave whose life is not about joy but about duty, not about self-esteem but self abasement and self loathing, not about love but about following the rules, not about peace but about fear, not about rest but of laboring for an unknowable and unattainable goal, not about living but about death, which is the premise and end result of ignoring reality by means of abdicating one's mind and the proper use thereof (i.e. sound reason)


Resting in Him,
Clete

 

[Nang]

Totten says: Faith is not blind. Faith has reasonable, Scriptural foundations.

Clete says: Faith is not blind, but Totton's reasonable foundations are not the same reasonable foundations as his, so Totton's faith is blind.

Applying the law of contradiction, I ask:

Which view is the most rational? (I vote Totton.)

Which view proves to be most irrational? (I vote Clete.)

Clete's argument is irrational. Because it is not objective, but purely subjective; arriving at his own conclusions that are then imposed and forced upon Totton's premise. That is logically backwards, isn't it?

If Clete does not base his faith on the doctrine of predestination because Clete thinks predestination is irrational, the onus is upon Clete to show how and why the biblical propositions that reveal and teach predestination, are unreasonable and irrational.

Of course, to approach with that argument, is much more difficult for Clete than accusing Totton of blind faith, for in effect, he is claiming that the bible, by teaching predestination, is unreasonable, illogical, and therefore untrue . . . simply because he denies the logical conclusions of the doctrine.

Yep, way too subjective to be truly reasonable . . .

Nang