BATTLE TALK ~ BRX (rounds 8 thru 10)

[patman]

Scripture

Scripture

I wish to apologize for the sloppiness of my last post. That time restriction is harsh. Everything is shuts down at once, and I hate starting over on something.

Oh well, beggars can't be choosers, I suppose. What am I doing at a public library anyway?

With the time restriction, I am unable to really take in other posts and form GOOD arguements. Now I am on my own Powerbook, and have all the time I need.

My last few posts have been more or less my own thoughts. I hope that someone with reason would be caused to at least think about the logic of Settled View thinking. Now I would like just to go through the Bible.

I am going to make some observations that should be apparent to anyone about without bias. And from the observation, draw a logical conclusion.


WARNING. IF YOU REALLY WANT TO BELIEVE THE SETTLED VIEW, DO NOT READ ON! THIS COULD HARM YOUR FAITH. IF YOU FEEL THE NEED TO DOUBT THE OBVIOUS MEANINGS OF THESE VERSES, PLEASE READ “QUASI-GOGGLES” FIRST!!!!!

Ezekiel 26:7,14
"For thus says the LORD God: 'Behold, I will bring against Tyre from the north Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, king of kings, with horses, with chariots, and with horsemen, and an army with many people. He will slay with the sword your daughter villages in the fields; he will heap up a siege mound against you, build a wall against you, and raise a defense against you."

"I will make you like the top of a rock; you shall be a place for spreading nets, and you shall never be rebuilt, for I the LORD have spoken,' Says the LORD"

Ezekiel 29: 17-20
"And it came to pass in the twenty-seventh year, in the first month, on the first day of the month, that the word of the LORD came to me, saying, (18) Son of man, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon caused his army to labor strenuously against Tyre; every head was made bald, and every shoulder rubbed raw; yet neither he nor his army received wages from Tyre, for the labor which they expended on it. Therefore thus says the Lord God: 'Surely I will give the land of Egypt to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon; he shall take away her wealth, carry off her spoil, and remove her pillage; and that will be the wages for his army. I have given him the land of Egypt for his labor because they worked for Me,' says the LORD God. "

Observation:
God proclaims Tyre will be utterly destroyed and shall never be rebuilt. It will also provide great blunder for the invading army of Nebuchadnezzar. But, by God's own unashamed admission, Tyre was spared from this ultimate destruction. It was never utterly destroyed! According to history, it remained for more than 200 years, when Alexander the Great defeated it. Yet, even then, it remained standing, as it were, under new management for hundreds of years there after.

Even more interesting is that God then say's he will give the land of Egypt to Nebuchadnezzar. This, too, didn't happen. Egypt was never a Babylonian territory. It is that simple, it didn't happen.

Conclusion:
If God knew the future he could see the true outcome of Tyre and Egypt concerning their battles with Nebuchadnezzar. If he were to honestly predict these events, it would have sounded more like "Nebuchadnezzar will attempt to take Tyre and Egypt, but he will fail." Nonetheless, it did not happen. God said without stuttering, "They are going down! Thus says the LORD God," and it didn't happen.

God does not know the future because he did not accurately foretell the events involving Tyre, Egypt, and Nebuchadnezzar, and because he does not lie. If you still believe God knows the future, the only answer for this dilemma is that God lied to his faithful prophet. That I, and the Bible, reject.

There is one other conclusion - pretend all that means something else, despite its obvious meaning. But if you wish to live in a fairy-tale faith, I am sad for you. Please read “Quasi-Goggles” now, before you go on.

Jeremiah 3:19
"...And I said: 'You shall call Me, "My Father," And not turn away from Me.''"

Jeremiah 3:20
"Surely, as a Wife treacherously departs from her husband, so have you dealt treacherously with Me, O house of Israel," Says the LORD.

Observation:
Whoa! God predicted they would call him father, and not turn away from him! Yet, again by God's own admission, they did exactly the opposite.

Conclusion:
If God knew the future, he would have expected their reaction, knowing they would turn from him, he would have never said they would call him "My Father". Yet, he did say it. God does not show the ability to see into the future. Instead he shows HOPE that they would call him "My Father." Ouch, that must have really hurt God! God shows so much desire and passion.

Desire (Matthew 23:37-39)? If for God, the future is today, how can God desire something that he already has? That’s a tough one.

Jeremiah 12:16,17
"And it shall be, if they will learn carefully the ways of My people, to swear by My name, 'As the LORD lives,' as they taught My people to swear by Baal, then they shall be established in the midst of My people. (17) But if they do not obey, I will utterly pluck up and destroy that nation," says the LORD

Observation:
There are a lot of IF's in that one. In fact, God uses IF through out the Bible!

Conclusion:
If God knows the future he would not use IF in his prophecies. Instead he would use WHEN. The verse above should read something like "I will utterly pluck up that nation WHEN they will refuse to swear by My name...." The use of the word IF by God shows that God understands the possibility that they could one thing, or another, and neither thing has been established as of yet and is thus not knowable. God’s using of the word IF leads one to the conclusion that God did not know the absolute outcome of that particular event.

Isaiah 5:1-4
Now let me sing to my Well-beloved a song of my Beloved regarding His vineyard:
My Well-beloved has a vineyard on a very fruitful hill. (2) He dug it up and cleared out its stones, and planted it with the choicest vine. He built a tower in its midst, and also made a winepress in it; So He expected it to bring forth good grapes, But it brought forth wild grapes. (3) "And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge, please, between Me and My vineyard. (4) What more could have been done to My vineyard that I have not done in it? Why then, when I expected it to bring forth good grapes, did it bring forth wild grapes?"

Observation:
God, by his own admission, expected "good grapes" from his "vineyard" but instead got "wild grapes". God, notice, is expecting these “good grapes” to be real. He is so certain that he will get "good grapes", he goes through the trouble of putting an expensive "winepress" up! He could almost taste those "good grapes" (as a figure of speech). He is not only expressing his desires, he said he was really expecting this to happen! No Joke!

Conclusion:
Because God is not lying, he expected one thing and that thing did not happen. Since God is not lying, he is telling the truth that what he expected and what he got were two different things. If God knew the future, it would be impossible for God to expect something to happen and it not. Therefore, God does not know the future because he expected one event to happen, and that event didn't happen.

Hosea 9:11,12
"As for Ephraim, their glory shall fly away like a bird - no birth, no pregnancy, and no conception! (12) Though they bring up their children, yet I will bereave them to the last man. Yes, woe to them when I depart from them!"

Hosea 11: 8,9
"How can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I hand you over, Israel? How can I make you like Admah? How can I set you like Zeboiim? My heart churns (changes) within Me; My sympathy is stirred.(9) I will not execute the fierceness of My anger; I will not again destroy Ephraim. For I am God, and not man, The Holy One in your midst; And I will not come with terror."

Observation:
God is showing how his compassion and sympathy can change his plans for destruction. At First, Ephraim is doomed, then out of a moment of love, God changes his mind!

Conclusion:
God tells the truth. If God knows the future, and does not lie, he will know what he will ultimately do, despite his sympathy. If God were telling the truth, it would be impossible for him to proclaim wrath when he knows he isn't going to go through with it (because he knows the future). Furthermore he wouldn't proclaim grace when he knows he won't be giving any. Yet this passage shows clearly that God would proclaim one thing, and then out of grace, proclaim another, therefore he cannot know the future.

I could go on with more verses. And Perhaps I will later. But I feel I better stop here. These really raise some serious questions about God’s word always being truth. Some may even say it is impossible for God to be wrong, yet these verses are probably playing with their heads and faith in a huge way.

Because of blind faith to old ideas it is harmful to my argument if all I do is seemingly undermine what people have believed for years. So allow me to show you that I am not contradicting that we have a trustworthy God.

I have been using the phrase "God does not know the future," very loosely. He actually knows a good deal of it. For example: He knows that one day justice will be served. He knows the devil will pay. He knows that the righteous will inherit the earth. He knows that we believers will be happy in the end. He knows that if you profess his name, you will be saved. He knows all that because he will make it happen. But what he doesn't know are all those little choices we make, that have yet to be made.

A child is born; will he be a Christian one day? God cannot look into the future to see that because it hasn't happened yet, and most importantly because he has not ordained his salvation, or damnation. But the instant he becomes a Christian, God knows that happy days that await him on that great day.

God, in order to be truthful and trustworthy, must make true statements based on facts of the moment and not back down on his word. God, in none of the verses above, backed down from his word. Even though it seems he did, he really did not.

God, in Jeremiah 18:7-9 says:

The instant I speak concerning a nation... to destroy it, if that nation against whom I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent of the disaster that I thought to bring upon it. And the instant I speak concerning a nation.... to build and to plant it, if it does evil in My sight...then I will relent concerning the good with which I said I would benefit it.

Huh, so it depends on the people? God can tell someone he will do something bad to him or her, and if he/she straightens up, he wont do it. And because he said he would change his mind under those circumstances, he didn't lie.

This verse in Jeremiah is a principle that God lives by. Anytime he speaks that something will happen, it does not have to happen if circumstances change. God is telling the truth despite the way things look. He is indeed true to his word.

God being Wrong/Mistaken?
This is the biggest fear from the Settled View. If God is wrong about one thing, what else is he wrong about? They want him to be right all the time no matter what because their fragile faith is shaken otherwise. They cannot put faith in a God who is the most powerful being in all of creationdom if he was wrong with good reason!

By God's own admission, he said on many occasions this event would happen, when something else happened instead. The verses above clearly show that! He said Israel would call him "My Father" but that didn't happen. It is really that simple. It didn't happen. And it hurt him bad! He didn’t expect that to happen. He was truly rejected, thinking one thing would happen, then getting the other.

But what does that mean? God can be wrong? How far does that go? Is he wrong about what heaven will be like? God makes it clear about what he can be wrong about... a being's will to obey him or not. That’s not a weakness. It is a gift from God, to choose one thing or another, and because our spirits are made free, God will not pave our actions for us.

We can take God's perfection to the extreme – especially in how we define it. Perfect has many different definitions. No mistakes, no fault, 100% good, 100% complet, exactly right, never wrong, and so on.

God is perfect in that he does not sin. That’s what he says about himself, why add more? Some Christians try to add on to the Bible and its meaning. They take a word like perfect or powerful and apply every possible meaning to it! We mustn’t go on adding to the Word, we should only let the Word add on to us.

Jesus was described as being perfect. Yet, as human, do you believe he never tripped? Do you think he never got hungry? Do you think he was never tempted? Do you think, as a baby, he was so perfect he just knew how to walk and did it? Do you think he was so perfect that nothing could penetrate his flesh, such as a nail? After all, if you take perfection as far as it can go, Jesus would have been so perfect that even a nail would not harm him, because that nail hole would be imperfection... right? Nothing perfect can die, right? I mean, if you are going to add on to the Bible so much, please make your own religion and stop calling it Christianity.

The Quasi-Goggles.

We have all heard of beer-goggles. When someone gets drunk, they see the world through the window of alcohol. Thus, you have goggles that make you see things as beer would. Beer-goggles.

Today, I am proclaiming the latest fashion wear: Quasi-Goggles. Dr. Evil told his son Scotty that he rejected him because he was only "quasi-evil." Everyone wants to be quasi-something. Now, with Quasi-Goggles, you can get rid of thos pesky verses you disagree with and interpret the Bible with your very own meaning simply by inserting the word "quasi!" You can only do that with Quasi-Goggles.

For example, someone can take a verse like

Jeremiah 3:19,20
"...And I said: 'You shall call Me, "My Father," And not turn away from Me.' (20) Surely, as a Wife treacherously departs from her husband, So have you dealt treacherously with Me, O house of Israel," Says the LORD.

and with Quasi-Goggles, completely change its meaning because you don't like what it really says!

For example, you can take the word "shall". Insert quasi before the word, and get "quasi-shall."

Now you have your own make-yourself-feel-good-about-______(fill in the blank) verse. You can add "quasi" before any other word that displeases you. AND, for a limited time only, you are not limited to only "quasi," you can use other words like "sorta" and "NOT"(remember, emphasis added!) In the end, you get your very own bible verse that reads something like this:

"...And I said: 'You quasi-shall call Me, "My Father… sorta," And sorta-not turn away from Me.' Surely, as a Wife treacherously departs from her husband, So have you dealt treacherously with Me, O house of Israel,...NOT!!!!" Quasi-says the LORD.

OK. Enough sarcasm. My biggest complaint about the Settled View attitude is their constant over use of their Quasi-Goggles.

If something seems to completely go against what they believe, and the Bible verse is stated in black and white, they just pretend that it isn't REALLY talking about that. God gave you a brain to process information, use it.

God said he wouldn't lie! He is able to communicate exactly what he means with no need for translation from Heaven to Earth. If God said, "I thought they would call me Father, and they didn't. They dealt treacherously with me instead." then you can bet that's exactly what he meant. He didn't stutter! He didn't lie. This isn't a figure of speech; there is no room for idioms in this verse.

One can proclaim "God stretched out his hand" is an idiom, because God has no "hands." Well just take that to the extreme by saying everything God says is a figure of speech! It makes you feel good about yourself/God, right?

God has made clear his that he can be quite literal and that the meanings of his words are exactly as he said.

Take for example, this verse:

Numbers 12:6-8
Then He said," Hear not My words: If there is a prophet among you I, the LORD, make Myself known to him in a vision; I speak to him in a dream. (7) Not so with My servant Moses; He is faithful in all My house. (8) I speak to him face to face, even plainly, and not in dark sayings; and he sees the form of the LORD. Why then were you not afraid to speak against My servant Moses?"

What? So God is REALLY able to speak to someone without crazy twisted meanings! He can truly say what he means and the reader does not have to use their imagination to understand.

Notice that he wonders why they weren’t afraid to question Moses. “So you don’t really think I meant what I said when I told Moses eh? Shouldn’t you be afraid to question me via questioning Moses?” And at the very same time, Settled Viewers question if God really meant what he said in the above verses; all while being unafraid of the implications.

Going on, if God were to, hypothetically speaking, tell Moses "I am going to destroy all the Israelites except for you," God really would really mean it. Right? Because God speaks to Moses face to face. Remember? But if Moses asks him not to do that, and God does not do it... well that's a change of mind on God's part! Right? And, If God knew that his future self would change his mind, he would have never said he would do it. Right? A lie is when you know one thing to be true, but you say another.

By the way, I am not really speaking hypothetically here. I lied. It actually happened.

Read all about it in Exodus 32:7-14 . And as you read, remember, God was speaking to Moses face to face! He really was going to "consume them" and in the end, he really did "relent" from the harm! No Joke! Because God really means exactly what he says to Moses! No trick talk, no “dark sayings.” No test, no quiz.

As you read, Quasi-Goggles are not allowed.

Remember, Moses wasn’t the only person to talk to God face to face. He isn’t the only prophet to get clear understandable un-messed-with information from God. Stop second-guessing the meaning of his prophet’s words.

Conclusion:
Because God admits he is able to communicate without “dark sayings”, and “face to face”, we cannot assume every verse is a figure of speech. God makes clear his visions and their meanings!

I will end with that. I hope that I am beginning to make everyone see the truth about God and his knowledge of the future. At the very least, please think about it. Pray about it. And do not let yourself be deceived. I have presented you with the word, heed it’s wisdom.

 

[patman]

Reply

Reply

Why do you speak of time as if it were a creation or some object that God can't be patient without? It's probably because of the limitations of our language, but I know what you're trying to convey by it. Lee was trying to convey something along the same lines, but all you could hear was the literal interpretaion of his thought. Now let's try it your way: How can God be patient without a sequence of events? Lee was just saying that our Lord isn't subjected to the constraints of time(a sequence of events) like you are.

You are not trying it my way at all. If God claims that he is patient, we do not need some supernatural translator to understand it. If God is patient, he really means it.

You must remember that I am responding to lee_merril's post about God being timeless, which I personally think is silly in contrast to the whole bible. And Patience was supposed to be my simple example; one that anyone could understand. But I also said that my argument would not be good enough for some because of a mystical answers that they would come up with. They would try and say "oooh, God didn't really mean patient.. it is his own kind of patient, we can't understand what he really means ever. It is just a figure of speech."

Patience, by definition requires time. If God is outside of time, he has everything in his possession now. He also has nothing now. He also has half and half now. But it doesn't matter; it all is now to him. Patience is a none issue to someone outside of time.

Why do I speak of time as if it were created? It is simple. We both agree that God knows all things worth knowing. But you believe that includes God knows the future. You consider the future as something knowable to God because of the "all things" passage.

I do not believe time is a thing. God didn't create time. Just like God didn't create "nothing." If time, namley the future, isn't a thing, God has no way of knowing anything about it.

If God knows something, it has to be "a thing." For you to claim that God knows all things, thus he knows the future, then the future must also be a thing, by that explination. And if it is a thing, GOD CREATED IT.

Which leads us to the logical conclusion of all Calvinist, that God ordained all things, having created the future.

PLEASE, I beg you, quit insulting people who feel that Jesus foresees the future by saying we(even for one moment) consider that our Lord, Jesus Christ, would author such atrocities.

We only believe that he created beings with a free will to choose good or evil for themselves, and not that he authored evil. After all, isn't evil direct rebellion against God? I wonder if Lucifer thought God didn't know what he was doing(OV) when he decided to rebel? I don't know. Maybe God wasn't suprised(CV) because he set him up. If he saw the sequence of actions you would take after(before) he created you, would he be responsible for those actions or would those be yours alone. Before the judgement seat would you be able to say that God(or the devil) made me do it or would you have to answer for yourself. Maybe we have a friend who can answer the hard questions for us. This is our hope.

The Lord surpasses my understanding.

Thanks for your insight,

RobE

Your questions do not have to be thought of as "hard" when you think about it. God loved Lucifer before he fell, just like he loves all his creation. God wouldn't cause Lucifer to fall. Lucifer simply had envy for God's power, and that made him fall.

I do not intend for you to feel insulted. However, the fact that you feel insulted might be a sign to rethink things!

The fact is that we have no Bible verse that says God knows the future. We use reasoning to come up with that idea because God predicted the future a good number of times. That is really the only reason people think he knows the future.

But when light is shed that God also miss-predicted the future... well that throws a wrench into things doesn't it?

The only way someone can dismiss the verses is to admit that they don't understand these problem verses, hold on to ignorance, and live by that. That is a shame. Yet they never turn the table on the verses they think they do understand.

For example, If God said he thought one thing would happen, and then another did instead, and admits to it, you can claim you don't get it, or it's a figure of speech. But you read a verse where God says "you will deny me 3 times," and that is no way is a figure of speech. Heck, thats just true. I think that is a shame.

 

[lee_merrill]

Hi everyone,

JHodgeIII: Is Jesus ending his own authority?

No, "when He delivers the kingdom to God the Father," this does not imply that Jesus was not submissive to the Father before this! There is a transfer here, and I believe God gives authority to Jesus, and Jesus gives it back:

John 5:22 Moreover, the Father judges no one, but has entrusted all judgment to the Son...

John 5:30 By myself I can do nothing; I judge only as I hear, and my judgment is just, for I seek not to please myself but him who sent me.

So there is reciprocation here, this is not independent exercise of power on the part of either the Father or the Son, and I believe this is exemplified in 1 Cor. 15:24-28.

How can authority of man or any other being be ended when according to you they have none?

That's a good question! Well, let's read on here in 1 Corinthians...

1 Corinthians 15:25 For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet.

So Jesus does have all authority! "He must reign," and yet all enemies are not under his feet. But they are under his control, this must mean they do his will, and also do evil, and this second part must stop, when it is God's will that their acts of rebellion cease. Then they will be under his feet, and in that sense, their authority will be over.

Lee: I believe when Jesus was on earth, he was dependent on the Father's power, in some ways, just as he was dependent on the Father's knowledge. After the resurrection, he resumed these divine attributes...

JHodgeIII: This proves that God the Son changed His attributes. There goes Immutability.

But God as "in the Trinity" did not change, though. One member of the Trinity may be able to limit himself, yet God has not changed, if God as a whole still has all these attributes.

Patman: God proclaims Tyre will be utterly destroyed and shall never be rebuilt. It will also provide great blunder for the invading army of Nebuchadnezzar. But, by God's own unashamed admission, Tyre was spared from this ultimate destruction. It was never utterly destroyed! According to history, it remained for more than 200 years, when Alexander the Great defeated it. Yet, even then, it remained standing, as it were, under new management for hundreds of years there after.

Even more interesting is that God then say's he will give the land of Egypt to Nebuchadnezzar. This, too, didn't happen. Egypt was never a Babylonian territory. It is that simple, it didn't happen.

Mr. Patman! Where are the answers to my post? We can't just open a dozen more questions in response, this is not a way to have a discussion. Now there are answers to the unfufilled prophecy objections, for instance, the prediction was that Tyre was "not be built more," so the prophecy could be satisfied by all the building projects in Tyre being stopped, and then Tyre being demolished (does it matter if it took a long time?), and "Tyre Through the Ages" says it was indeed destroyed, and about Egypt, can we really argue from silence in archaeology? That is rather risky, like saying (as people once did) there were no Hittites.

Jeremiah 3:19
"...And I said: 'You shall call Me, "My Father," And not turn away from Me.''"

Jeremiah 3:20
"Surely, as a Wife treacherously departs from her husband, so have you dealt treacherously with Me, O house of Israel," Says the LORD.

Yes, and if Israel is faithful in the future, that fulfills Jer. 3:19. God said it will happen, and it will:

Romans 11:26-27 And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written: "The deliverer will come from Zion; he will turn godlessness away from Jacob. And this is my covenant with them when I take away their sins."

If God knows the future he would not use IF in his prophecies.

Well, this might be conditional from our perspective, but not from God's perspective, such as a dad asking his child "Now where do we put the spoons?"

God, by his own admission, expected "good grapes" from his "vineyard" but instead got "wild grapes".

But I just responded to this in my previous post. Now your job (should you choose to accept it) is to refute my response.

I will leave off here...

Blessings,
Lee

 

[patman]

Reply to Lee

Reply to Lee

Lee.

You got me on the hovering thing. Good catch. But I did make sure that I had a back up argument at the time of the posting. That is why I wrote that God planned the redemption before creation.

Scripture tells us that the Body of Christ was foreordained by God from the foundations of the earth. He planed it before creation! He is wise enough to know that some would fall, and some would need a savior. He didn't admit to know who those individuals were, but he had a plan for those, because he loves his creation!'

But as far as the hovering thing. I humbly admit to my failure. I hope that you too can do the same in your mistakes.

Hi everyone,


But Jesus didn't appear "as if slain" when he appeared to the disciples after the resurrection, there are many pictures of Christ, none of which involve him appearing as slain, and even when he appears as a lamb, appearing as slain does not seem to be necessarily required. Yet he will indeed appear in that way, which does seem to show that Christ's dying as a lamb had a timeless aspect.

I must not be clear in my responses to you, or you are not thinking about what I am saying.

You said that a certain verse shows that Christ is crucified for all time? You say that verse shows him in heaven, being slain, so that means he is always slain.

I say that this thinking is wrong for two reasons. 1.) That verse uses a symbol to depict Jesus for sake of a vision. 2.) God is not outside of time. I sought to prove my ideas. Maybe you should go back and re-read it. I will do the same.

Lee: Jesus says "truly, truly" about Peter's denial, so how can this be possibly wrong? This is Jesus' way of saying this is quite firm, and quite solemn. Then, while Peter is being reminded of his denial, Jesus confirms Peter's statement "you know all things" with another prediction about Peter's future! Again saying, "truly, truly."

Patman: The logic seems to imply that there is no other possible way for Jesus to know, and be positive, that the said events would occure with out future knowledge. It is simply a faulty conclusion.

Yes, but why is my conclusion incorrect here? We cannot just quote some other verse, and not deal with this one.

Your train of thought has errors in it. You assume that there is no other way for Jesus to know that Peter would deny him. How? You do not understand that there is a possibility that Jesus could know things about Peter that would lead him to the conclusion of Peters denial.

Remember, in Job, a heavenly wager was placed on Job's denial of God. God allowed Job to be tested. The same happened for Peter. Jesus told Peter that he was praying for Peter's faith because Peter was going to be handed over for testing.

Jesus, having heard from God the test Peter would go through, knew Peter well enough to be certain about his reaction. Peter was a pretty thickel guy at that time. Jesus knew that Peter wouldn't pass the test, it was obvious to Jesus.

If you don't agree with me, you have to see that there is more than one possibility for an answer. You HAVE to agree. Your way is not the only answer. The future is not the only answer.

Isaiah 5:4 What more was there to do for my vineyard, that I have not done in it? When I looked for it to yield grapes, why did it yield wild grapes?

God is not asking for advice on gardening!

ISA 5:5 Now I will tell you what I am going to do to my vineyard...

God doesn't wait for their opinion! He tells us what more he could do, in fact. Thus I think we should conclude from this that good fruit in peoples' lives does not come from pleasant circumstances:

HEB 12:11 No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.

This vineyard will be restored, too, and it will even bear good fruit:

ISA 27:6 In days to come Jacob will take root, Israel will bud and blossom and fill all the world with fruit.

So then God's expectation of good fruit from this vineyard will not be disappointed.


But this statement also will be fulfilled:

Hebrews 8:10 This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.

Nice twisting of God's word. Apparently, for you, God expecting one thing to happen then getting another thing is dismissible. God's power is not in question. It is his knowledge of the future. Did god expect one thing, and then another happened? Yes.

God expected ALL OF ISRAEL to be righteous. Not just some of them. He expected the entire nation to love him. He did everything he could do to insure it. And when he expected it, it fell through. It doesn't matter how much you twist this word, you cannot deny the truth. God, by his own addition, didn't get what he expected.

Patman: Jonah is another great example of the Open View. God clearly stated that they had 40 days. Yet, because of their repenting, God retracted his statement and they lived many years beyond the original 40 days. If God knew the outcome, he would have not lied.
Well, then I have some questions...

Why didn't God destroy the Ninevites right away, if that was his plan?
Why did God send Jonah, and spoil his plan?
How can we trust God, if he can take action, and spoil his own plan himself?
How can we say that God didn't lie to the Ninevites, if he threatened unconditional destruction, yet he knew it might not happen?
Why did Jonah seem to have a better grasp of the situation than God did? He thought the Ninevites would probably repent, and thus he ran.
Why did the Ninevites seem to know better than God did? They thought they could repent, and God, apparently, did not.
Why didn't God keep the Ninevites from repenting after Jonah preached to them, like he did with the sons of Eli (1 Sam. 2:25) and with Amaziah (2 Chr. 25:16)?
Now we have to question God's unconditional promises, for the situation may change, and God may have to change his plan.

I would turn these questions around to you, and watch you struggle to explain how God ordains evil, but not really. Or how God is patient, but not really.

These questions are of no problem to me. They help to illustrate how loving, and good our God in heaven is.

Why didn't God destroy the Ninevites right away, if that was his plan?
God's PLAN was to threaten the Ninevites with destruction in hopes that they would repent. If they repented, God would be extremely happy that his children had returned to him. If they did not repent, he would be exercising justice and judgment, as he as the right.

Why did God send Jonah, and spoil his plan?
This is a question that you should be answering isn't it? I'd think you would already know my answer. After all, If God know his plan would be spoiled by Jonah's preaching... why do it if he really wanted to destroy them?

Here is the thing, God NEVER wants to destroy anyone. He hates having to punish. He wanted the Ninevites to be righteous! That's why Jonah went, to teach them to be holy. His plan is that all be saved! That is his will!

How can we trust God, if he can take action, and spoil his own plan himself?
Good question. Again, shouldn't you answer this? If God knew that Jonah was going to spoil his plan..... why do it? God didn't know what they Ninevites would do. So he proclaimed 40 days for them. They repented, and so did he.

How can we say that God didn't lie to the Ninevites, if he threatened unconditional destruction, yet he knew it might not happen?
Just to recycle some:
God, in Jeremiah 18:7-9 says:

The instant I speak concerning a nation... to destroy it, if that nation against whom I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent of the disaster that I thought to bring upon it. And the instant I speak concerning a nation.... to build and to plant it, if it does evil in My sight...then I will relent concerning the good with which I said I would benefit it.

It isn't a lie if God allows for it.

Why did Jonah seem to have a better grasp of the situation than God did? He thought the Ninevites would probably repent, and thus he ran.
God thought they would repent too. that's why he sent Jonah. He wanted them to repent for heavens sake! And if they didn’t... well he had to do what he had to do.

Why did the Ninevites seem to know better than God did? They thought they could repent, and God, apparently, did not.
This is another question you should be asking yourself. The answer is pretty clear. God, not knowing the future, but knowing their hearts, had a good idea that they might repent! But they always could just ignore him, and God would have to take care of things in 40 days. God has to declare disaster so they might repent. God never said he didn't think they would repent. I don't know why you would think that.

Why didn't God keep the Ninevites from repenting after Jonah preached to them, like he did with the sons of Eli (1 Sam. 2:25) and with Amaziah (2 Chr. 25:16)?
God, at times, has no patience left. Ninevites were not at that point. And God did not prevent anyone from repenting, nor did he cause repenting. That comes the will of the sinner.

Now we have to question God's unconditional promises, for the situation may change, and God may have to change his plan.
No. If your faith is shaken by the Bible's stories, better stop reading them. God's words are true. If he says he will do one thing, and does another instead, and tells us he will allow for that... what is the problem? How is God lying?

This is all the time I have for today. I ask you to re-read my posts carefully.

God bless,
Pat

 

[patman]

Lee. Patience is not with you. I can only type so fast.

I have only one quick thing to say. EGYPT WAS NOT TAKEN BY BABYLON! It's true. really really really true. No tricks, no kidding. You are in no place to make historical claims if you do not know this. Your arguments depend on this statement, and yet again, you show that all you can do is shrug them off with ignorance.

 

[RobE]

Rob, did Jesus ever "empty himself" of this authority? Yes or no?

If you mean did Jesus ever quit being God. The answer is no.

If you mean did an emptied Jesus descend into hell and over come death. The answer is no.

If you mean did he ever extend mercy to us and not come as a judge 2000 years ago. The answer is no.

I guess that just because he didn't exercise his authority, I still believe he was God.

I hope this answers the question. Otherwise, I need you to define "empty himself" more clearly for me.

Your Friend,

RobE

 

[bling]

Patman said: God has made clear his that he can be quite literal and that the meanings of his words are exactly as he said.

. Peter 2:24He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree,
Also to show the difference in the body and the blood: In Heb. 13: 11The high priest carries the blood of animals into the Most Holy Place as a sin offering, but the bodies are burned outside the camp. 12And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through his own blood. Using what Patman said, JONAH and Bob Enyart’s guide to understanding scripture quoted, “Literal interpretation is best, and correct when it fits the immediate and greater contexts, and is consistent with the nature of God.” The questions:
Should we take 1 Peter 2:24 literally? If not why not?
Do you believe your sins were bore by Christ on the cross?
Can Christ bare something that does not and may not exist?

Patman said: God, in order to be truthful and trustworthy, must make true statements based on facts of the moment and not back down on his word. God, in none of the verses above, backed down from his word. Even though it seems he did, he really did not.

I agree with this statement except I would say change statements with communication. For if God is making an unequivocal promises of destruction and communicating that to those it was written to and yet He knows He might change His mine, then He is communicating a possibility as a fact which is miss leading ( not like God). If God is communicating in total (which we have only the piece of what we need) to those it is written to, that God can under go a Godly repent if the people repent and this statement is a warning. You understand it as one of many warnings, and you are saying God understands it that way, so the question is how do the people it was written to, understand it? We don’t have enough information to know.

 

[RobE]

You are not trying it my way at all. If God claims that he is patient, we do not need some supernatural translator to understand it. If God is patient, he really means it..

I was simply pointing out that Lee also sees time as a series of events and that your argument was in my mind somewhat meaningless. Let's ask ourselves why you have stated "Patience, by definition requires time"(below) if you "do not believe time is a thing" (below). That's what I was trying to point out. It would seem you argue against your own understanding. It's semantics only -- unimportant. [As an aside --- What's the object in the sentence--Patience, by definition requires time. Is time a person, place, or thing in this sentence.]

Patience, by definition requires time. If God is outside of time, he has everything in his possession now. He also has nothing now. He also has half and half now. But it doesn't matter; it all is now to him. Patience is a none issue to someone outside of time.

Why do I speak of time as if it were created? It is simple. We both agree that God knows all things worth knowing. But you believe that includes God knows the future. You consider the future as something knowable to God because of the "all things" passage.

I do not believe time is a thing. God didn't create time. Just like God didn't create "nothing." If time, namley the future, isn't a thing, God has no way of knowing anything about it.

If God knows something, it has to be "a thing." For you to claim that God knows all things, thus he knows the future, then the future must also be a thing, by that explination. And if it is a thing, GOD CREATED IT.

Which leads us to the logical conclusion of all Calvinist, that God ordained all things, having created the future...

I would say it leads us to the logical conclustion, that God created all things, having created everything in creation which can happen sequentially within His creation. After all, He is the creator and He understands the parameters(limits) of his creation. He also created some creations which have excercise of their own free will to choose Him or not. It's not within their power to alter or change creation or the Creator. This is the very thing that distinguishes them from each other.

Your questions do not have to be thought of as "hard" when you think about it. God loved Lucifer before he fell, just like he loves all his creation. God wouldn't cause Lucifer to fall. Lucifer simply had envy for God's power, and that made him fall.

I do not intend for you to feel insulted. However, the fact that you feel insulted might be a sign to rethink things!

I'm not insulted just interested. I hope you aren't insulted when I ask you a simple question. Why do open viewers continually frame a foreknowing God as the author of sin, while maintaining the lovingness of the Open View God in comparison? I've now asked this question 2-3 times in this thread without a response.

Questions to open viewers:

1. If God lives, day by day, without knowing the future then he's responsible for the events that happen around him. He's responsible that they're killing children at 20th & Vine(abortion), he's responsible for the hungry, the poor, this sick, etc..., ;whether he did it to them or not. We all agree that he could stop it if he wanted to. He thus becomes the God who walks among us and in his loving kindness allows murders, rapes, child abuse, abortion, homosexuality, etc.... to occur. Doesn't he know they're aborting human life? Hasn't he turned the TV on yet? This is the open view. God is the good Samaritan who walked on by. Is this less terrible than the closed view argument that God has a reason for his actions. That the Lord might have a plan and some insight into our future. Why do these things happen? Isn't this the same arguments that Atheists use to denounce Him?

2. Who is responsible for sin in a system where free will resides despite the ability to foresee the future?

This is my question.

RobE

 

[RobE]

Clete, Patman, or anyone else who liked this post.

Clete, Patman, or anyone else who liked this post.

How can God be patient without time? Wait, never mind that question, because the only answer I'll get is some mystical reasoning that you have to be Plato to 1.) make up and 2.) believe. I am sorry for the harshness, but we do not have to twist all reasoning around to understand God.

Built into the word "patience" is the concept of time. It's the same with "longsuffering." The fallacy of understanding these attributes in literal terms is that we are talking about God's attributes, whether He ever expressed them or manifested them or not. Was God patient and longsuffering BEFORE creation? Did the Father have to express or manifest patience with the Spirit or the Son? Of course not. But does that mean God didn't know He Himself was patient and longsuffering BEFORE He created man? Of course not. God probably has myriad other attributes that we could not possibly understand this side of glory, but we'll get to enjoy in eternity with Christ.

The same argument can be made for God's attributes of being forgiving and merciful. Was the Father forgiving and merciful BEFORE creation? Of course He was. But to whom would He be forgiving and merciful? The Son? The Spirit? Open Deists are existentialists, but they don't even know it. There is a pervasive dualism that pollutes their thinking, and this is yet another example. "God cannot be patient without time," they say. Will they say, "God cannot be forgiving without sin?" I've never asked them directly. I'm curious to know their response to that question.

A friend of mine wanted me to ask this question. I know I've already responded to this post, but I felt this might give me some valuable insight into the open view.

Thanks for you patience and especially your time,

RobE

A Prophecy Against Assyria Isa 14:24

24 The LORD Almighty has sworn,
"Surely, as I have planned, so it will be,
and as I have purposed, so it will stand.
25 I will crush the Assyrian in my land;
on my mountains I will trample him down.
His yoke will be taken from my people,
and his burden removed from their shoulders."

26 This is the plan determined for the whole world;
this is the hand stretched out over all nations.

27 For the LORD Almighty has purposed, and who can thwart him?
His hand is stretched out, and who can turn it back?

 

[godrulz]

Questions to open viewers:

1. If God lives, day by day, without knowing the future then he's responsible for the events that happen around him. He's responsible that they're killing children at 20th & Vine(abortion), he's responsible for the hungry, the poor, this sick, etc..., ;whether he did it to them or not. We all agree that he could stop it if he wanted to. He thus becomes the God who walks among us and in his loving kindness allows murders, rapes, child abuse, abortion, homosexuality, etc.... to occur. Doesn't he know they're aborting human life? Hasn't he turned the TV on yet? This is the open view. God is the good Samaritan who walked on by. Is this less terrible than the closed view argument that God has a reason for his actions. That the Lord might have a plan and some insight into our future. Why do these things happen? Isn't this the same arguments that Atheists use to denounce Him?

2. Who is responsible for sin in a system where free will resides despite the ability to foresee the future?

This is my question.

RobE

1. Sin and heinous evil is inherently horrific. There is no good reason for the brutal rape and murder of a child. God allows these things without causing them or being unaffected by them. Justice will take place in the end. Rebellion and evil will be judged. If He was to stop and deal with evil as it happens, the whole planet would have been wiped out centuries ago. Both views recognize the overall wisdom and plan of God and ability to bring some good out of some bad. Evil is part of the temporary warfare and consequence of allowing genuine freedom. This does not mean all details are part of a master blueprint and orchestrated for a higher good. Evil breaks God's heart. Jesus came to oppose evil, not affirm it as part of God's will or plan.

Knowing that the terrorists were going to bomb things does not make God culpable and them not. This is why He will judge in truth and righteousness. All judgment does not happen instantly, but God will not be mocked. The exact terrorist acts were not known as a certainty from before creation. The possibility was known and an element of divine risk was inevitable in the creation of other free moral agents besides God.

God knows the past and present perfectly. He is not taken by surprise day by day, nor is He a Deist God who sits by with His hands crossed. He can and does intervene now, even before the final judgment. Prayer does change things.

Determinism would explain how God could know the future in detail, but at the expense of genuine freedom. It would also make God responsible for evil and must be rejected as a view. You reject determinism, but fail to see that simple foreknowledge is logically incompatible with freedom. The alternate view satisfies a literal interpretation of all the relevant verses: God can and does change in response to changing contingencies; He settles some of the future without meticulously controlling or knowing all of the future.

2. The problem is with exhaustive foreknowledge of all future free will contingencies. If the future is partially settled and partially unsettled (biblical evidence), then the uncertain acts of evil have a degree of unknowability until the choices are made. Man, not God, is strictly responsible for sin. The exact sins we would commit were not known before we existed (possible vs actual). Your question cannot be answered without assuming a preconceived theology that is incoherent. So, God can foreknow some of the future while retaining culpability by free moral agents. If God foreknew all of the future, it must be fixed or caused by God. He would thus be responsible. Retaining self-evident free will and rejecting philosophical simple foreknowledge and 'eternal now' allows one to remain biblical without compromising the revelation of God's attributes.

God does have foreknowledge, but it is often generic, not specific. He knows He will send the Messiah after the Fall and is able to bring this to pass. This cannot be extrapolated to mean He knows who will win the 2010 Superbowl from before creation.

 

[chatmaggot]

Was God the creator BEFORE He created? Yes. Why? Because He knew He had the capacity to create.

Was God forgiving BEFORE sin? Yes. Why? Because He knew He had the capacity to forgive when or if the situation arose.

God isn't an idiot. He knew that IF He created beings and gave them their own wills they would probably screw up from time to time. IF some of them did screwed up He had the capacity to forgive them...even before He created them...if He ever did create them. Which we all know He did create them...and He was then able to exercise His forgiveness. Can you have something without ever using it? Sure! Did God posses Love before He created people to love? Of Course He did.

Does a parent have love for their child even if they yet to have a child? I would say so. Once the child is brought into this world...that love then manifests.

 

[RobE]

1. Sin and heinous evil is inherently horrific. There is no good reason for the brutal rape and murder of a child. God allows these things without causing them or being unaffected by them. Justice will take place in the end. Rebellion and evil will be judged. If He was to stop and deal with evil as it happens, the whole planet would have been wiped out centuries ago. Both views recognize the overall wisdom and plan of God and ability to bring some good out of some bad. Evil is part of the temporary warfare and consequence of allowing genuine freedom. This does not mean all details are part of a master blueprint and orchestrated for a higher good. Evil breaks God's heart. Jesus came to oppose evil, not affirm it as part of God's will or plan.

How can you have a plan without foresight? Maybe an educated guess? Is our Lord a mad experimentalist? Does he sit home at night and say 'you can't make an omellete without breaking a few eggs? Does he have a plan or not?

Knowing that the terrorists were going to bomb things does not make God culpable and them not. This is why He will judge in truth and righteousness. All judgment does not happen instantly, but God will not be mocked. The exact terrorist acts were not known as a certainty from before creation. The possibility was known and an element of divine risk was inevitable in the creation of other free moral agents besides God.

Divine risk? A loving parent who risks his children? Are you sure? What 'other free moral agents' are we talking about? If the terrorists set up shop and advertised on TV, Billboards, etc... and he still did not act, does this make Him culpable. It's a certainty that abortions will occur tommorrow at a specified time/place in Denver. What will he do and why? Love? or, maybe, plan?

God knows the past and present perfectly. He is not taken by surprise day by day, nor is He a Deist God who sits by with His hands crossed. He can and does intervene now, even before the final judgment. Prayer does change things.

But the future puzzles him? Bob Enyart says our choices suprise him. Isn't this the center piece to the open view?

Determinism would explain how God could know the future in detail, but at the expense of genuine freedom. It would also make God responsible for evil and must be rejected as a view.

That's my question. Why would it make him responsible for evil anymore than standing by and allowing evil to continue in a systematic way? Is he waiting for something to happen in the future? Mercy? How about the ones who are lost?

You reject determinism, but fail to see that simple foreknowledge is logically incompatible with freedom.

If you foresaw me writing this; it wouldn't have interfered with my choice to write it. Right?

2. The problem is with exhaustive foreknowledge of all future free will contingencies. If the future is partially settled and partially unsettled (biblical evidence), then the uncertain acts of evil have a degree of unknowability until the choices are made. Man, not God, is strictly responsible for sin. The exact sins we would commit were not known before we existed (possible vs actual).

Is there some new sin under the sun?

Your question cannot be answered without assuming a preconceived theology that is incoherent. So, God can foreknow some of the future while retaining culpability by free moral agents. If God foreknew all of the future, it must be fixed or caused by God. He would thus be responsible. Retaining self-evident free will and rejecting philosophical simple foreknowledge and 'eternal now' allows one to remain biblical without compromising the revelation of God's attributes.

Is the bible omniscient or infallible? Which is greater the Creator or the creation?

If either one of these are true then how about the subject of the bible? Could He be mistaken?

God does have foreknowledge, but it is often generic, not specific. He knows He will send the Messiah after the Fall and is able to bring this to pass. This cannot be extrapolated to mean He knows who will win the 2010 Superbowl from before creation.

So he's only limited in his ability to foresee the future, right? Can it be extrapolated from this that HIS foreknowledge is incomplete or that He is imperfect in some way. Is he limited in his power or in any other capacity that you know of?


Respectfully wondering?

RobE

I'm sorry I seem a little incoherent at times but I have to squeeze in a couple of sentences when time allows. The real answer I want is why an 'Open View' God isn't as guilty as a closed view God. I know he isn't guilty either way. I want you to tell me why he would be?

 

[godrulz]

God has a redemptive plan and purpose, but that does not mean it includes what I will eat, wear, or do in any given hour or day. There is much freedom within His moral will. I can marry x or y and still be in His will as long as they are believers. Having a general plan does not mean He dictates every detail in the universe nor does He need to in order to remain sovereign.

It is His will that no one perishes, yet many perish. TULIP is an inadequate explanation for this. God's will can be resisted at times, but He will triumph in the end. Love, relationship, and freedom necessitate the possibility of His creatures rebelling and going to hell. This breaks His heart and was never His intention. His provision is efficacious for all who believe, but not everyone believes (contrary to His will for them).

 

[patman]

Reply to Bling

Reply to Bling

. Peter 2:24He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree,
Should we take 1 Peter 2:24 literally? If not why not?
Do you believe your sins were bore by Christ on the cross?
Can Christ bare something that does not and may not exist?

I must scratch my head as to why this is relevant to my very long post involving God proclaiming one thing, yet another thing happens, or how this offers a problem with the literal interpretation of scripture.

If this is a challenge, if you are challenging me at all even, to my interpretation of scriptures that I have made on this thread, I submit that we should focus on the verses that you disagree with directly. If you disagree with a literal interpretation of those verses, please state why and we can discuss it.

As I read your verse, I do not read a lot into it. I think it is self explanatory really. Sin can be a verb. Just like Run. I can say I run a lot. I can also say I sin a lot. So, you wonder if I think Jesus can bare my sin? Well, can I bare to run? Can I bare to run the Boston?

So, question is, can I bare running? It depends, how heavy are the consequences of running for me? Hang on... I think I am describing a verb as thought it were a thing with weight? How is that possible? Did I ask a literal question?

When I asked "how heavy are the consequences of running for me?", I wasn't really asking for the number of pounds running was. I don't think anyone thought I was. I think the clear meaning of the my question was apparent.

So if you can so easily understand my question, why can’t you easily understand a question out of the Bible? Why do we make the reading the Bible so hard? If God says he is angry… OK, there ya’ go. If God says we are like sheep without a shepherd, I think that is pretty straight forward.

I hope you are reading me ok. This verse you question me on is of no problem to me or my ability to understand it. So, too, are the other verses I quote.

 

[Clete]

Built into the word "patience" is the concept of time. It's the same with "longsuffering." The fallacy of understanding these attributes in literal terms is that we are talking about God's attributes, whether He ever expressed them or manifested them or not.

How does the fact that we are talking about God's attributes indicate a logical fallacy?

Note, however, the logical fallacy that you commit in the next sentence by forming comments about what happened "before" creation in the context of God being "timeless". Your entire thesis is self-contradictory.

Was God patient and longsuffering BEFORE creation? Did the Father have to express or manifest patience with the Spirit or the Son? Of course not. But does that mean God didn't know He Himself was patient and longsuffering BEFORE He created man? Of course not. God probably has myriad other attributes that we could not possibly understand this side of glory, but we'll get to enjoy in eternity with Christ.

If God does not experience time, it is meaningless to say that He is patient. If you are patient, you have to be willing to wait on something without it bothering you. The longer you can tolerate waiting, the more patient you are. If there was no time and every event happened all at once in some rationally incoherent "eternal now" moment, there would be no need for God to wait and thus it would be quite meaningless to say He was patient.
You can attempt to redefine the term patient if you like but that won't help solve the problem.

The same argument can be made for God's attributes of being forgiving and merciful. Was the Father forgiving and merciful BEFORE creation? Of course He was. But to whom would He be forgiving and merciful? The Son? The Spirit? Open Deists are existentialists, but they don't even know it. There is a pervasive dualism that pollutes their thinking, and this is yet another example. "God cannot be patient without time," they say. Will they say, "God cannot be forgiving without sin?" I've never asked them directly. I'm curious to know their response to that question.

God was both merciful and forgiving in the sense that He was willing to forgive and show mercy but neither His forgiveness nor His mercy was manifest until such time as an opportunity arose that called for it. We can know that God has always been the same sort of person He is now because the Bible tells us explicitly that who God is does not change ever; that He is the same yesterday, today and forever. So if God is forgiving now, He must always have been. Really the willingness to forgive and mercy and patience and all such attributes of God are summed up in saying simply that God is righteous. Righteousness manifests itself in different ways depending on the circumstances but it is still righteousness and God has always been righteous even if there hasn't always been reason for that righteousness to manifest itself in every imaginable way.

A friend of mine wanted me to ask this question. I know I've already responded to this post, but I felt this might give me some valuable insight into the open view.

Thanks for you patience and especially your time,

RobE

Are you saying that you aren't presenting this argument because you agree with it? I can't really remember which side of this debate you were on!

A Prophecy Against Assyria Isa 14:24

24 The LORD Almighty has sworn,
"Surely, as I have planned, so it will be,
and as I have purposed, so it will stand.
25 I will crush the Assyrian in my land;
on my mountains I will trample him down.
His yoke will be taken from my people,
and his burden removed from their shoulders."

26 This is the plan determined for the whole world;
this is the hand stretched out over all nations.

27 For the LORD Almighty has purposed, and who can thwart him?
His hand is stretched out, and who can turn it back?

What does this Scripture say about the idea of an open future?
Nothing, if you ask me; nothing at all. This passage teaches that God is able to do what He wants and no one can stop Him. That's sort of a no-brainer though, isn't it? I mean you'd have to be one serious knuckle head to thing that you've got arms long enough to box with God. But I don't see how that applies to open theism. It's not as if the open view discounts the existence of prophecy or God's ability to carry it out.

Resting in Him,
Clete

 

[RobE]

God has a redemptive plan and purpose, but that does not mean it includes what I will eat, wear, or do in any given hour or day. There is much freedom within His moral will. I can marry x or y and still be in His will as long as they are believers. Having a general plan does not mean He dictates every detail in the universe nor does He need to in order to remain sovereign.

It is His will that no one perishes, yet many perish. TULIP is an inadequate explanation for this. God's will can be resisted at times, but He will triumph in the end. Love, relationship, and freedom necessitate the possibility of His creatures rebelling and going to hell. This breaks His heart and was never His intention. His provision is efficacious for all who believe, but not everyone believes (contrary to His will for them).

Does he have any foresight/knowledge about that plan or is he just guessing? Did he create the universe? Make all the small details in nature that you see everyday? He did dictate every detail in creation, right? Who will resist the Lord?

I think Lee was trying to say that He exists outside of time being present in the past, present, and future. You say he only knows the past and present and sometimes the future, is that right? Or does he just have a best guess at what will happen and he can predict reliable outcomes because of his extensive knowledge of man. That's why mankind can suprise him, right?

Let me see.

1. Would it be fair to say that everything God thought or spoke is NOT in the Bible?

2. Is it possible that God exists in the past, present, and future and is not limited to a
sequence of events like we are?

3. Is God love as Bob Enyart said in the debate or merely loving?

Thanks,

RobE

Now man has become as we are --- with the knowledge of good and evil.

 

[patman]

Reply to RobE

Reply to RobE

I'm not insulted just interested. I hope you aren't insulted when I ask you a simple question. Why do open viewers continually frame a foreknowing God as the author of sin, while maintaining the lovingness of the Open View God in comparison? I've now asked this question 2-3 times in this thread without a response.
RobE

RobE, just forget the patience in time thing. If you didn't get the joke the first time, I am not going to explain it yet again. It was only 1 sentence in hundreds that I have written, of which I wish got more attention, and of which I am much more interested in getting responses for.

I am a little disappointed in myself that I have humored you and Lee in something that is such a small point / half joke, that it has taken your eyes away from what I really want to say.

I find it curious that it is the only thing you will talk about regarding the volumes of points I have made aside from it. If you think all my post rest on this one silly quote, you are very wrong. A lot of other people expressed that they got the joke, now you picking it apart just makes it not funny (I am sure you were not amused anyway).

Your understanding of my patience in time has no bearing on what is the true heart of the issue. If you don’t get it, that is fine, just move on to another point, such as the scripture I quoted a few posts back. I think that most Christians would be interested in seeing how God thinks and feels through his own word rather than mine. But, hey, lets talk about Patman’s quote on patience!

You said you were interested in the open viewer’s opinions. I must admit, that I feel like I am being studied by you rather than listened to. And you assume because your question has not been answered that it a handicap for us open viewers? It’s bad to assume RobE!

Your question compares two different things and draws an unfit conclusion based on the first thought. It is like asking “If the sky is cloudy and it rains, when the sky is not cloudy it how can the sun still shine?” It makes about as much since as that.

You take this conclusion that Calvinist make:
A God who knows the future ordained all evil.

And made up this conclusion
A God who does not know the future is responsible for all evil.

Just like that. You say “God is the Good Samaritan who just walked by.” And that is your evidence to support it?

God’s allowance of freewill is not an obligation for him to prevent sin, RobE. Think of this as a parable; If a father allows his son to borrow his car, and then his son wrecks the car, the fault does not lie with the father who gave him the keys. The answer is that simple. And I HOPE you get that one. AND PLEASE, please realize that arguing that God could control us to keep us from sinning will be futile. After all, freewill requires that God not boss us around!

Our theology is in no way intimidated by the question you submitted, add that to your study notes on the open view, please.

I will post my opinions on the "creation" of sin later. But for now, I think this post is long enough. I hope you "feel" me and do not require me to spell it out for you. I do not wish to sound harsh, but for as much work as I have put into other things, I wish we could really get into the meat of it.

At least Lee attempted to answer all my other posts.

 

[bling]

From, 1 Peter 2:24He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree,

Patman asked:

As I read your verse, I do not read a lot into it. I think it is self explanatory really. Sin can be a verb. Just like Run. I can say I run a lot. I can also say I sin a lot. So, you wonder if I think Jesus can bare my sin? Well, can I bare to run? Can I bare to run the Boston?

Sin is not a verb in 1 Peter 2:24 it is a plural thing. Also from Heb. 13:11-12 Jesus is a sin offering which if we go back to the Old Testament we find sin offerings were for committed sins not sinful nature or being a sinner and sinning. The Hebrew writer was writing to people that understood sacrifices and Jesus is shown to be the replacement for those sin offerings of the past.

To take 1 Peter 2:24 literally would mean our sins travel through time back to the cross to be bore by Christ on the cross. We have no problem with sins of the pre Christ people being rolled forward to the cross, but going back conflicts with the O.V. doctrine.
At the time of the cross could Jesus feel the burden of your sins?
Do you believe your sins could travel back in time to the cross?

 

[godrulz]

Sins are wrong moral choices. They are not substances or things. The passage is metaphorical and should not be taken as a wooden literalism. Murder cannot hang on the cross. It is an action, not an object.

 

[RobE]

RobE, just forget the patience in time thing. If you didn't get the joke the first time, I am not going to explain it yet again. It was only 1 sentence in hundreds that I have written, of which I wish got more attention, and of which I am much more interested in getting responses for.

I am a little disappointed in myself that I have humored you and Lee in something that is such a small point / half joke, that it has taken your eyes away from what I really want to say.

I find it curious that it is the only thing you will talk about regarding the volumes of points I have made aside from it. If you think all my post rest on this one silly quote, you are very wrong. A lot of other people expressed that they got the joke, now you picking it apart just makes it not funny (I am sure you were not amused anyway).

Your understanding of my patience in time has no bearing on what is the true heart of the issue. If you don’t get it, that is fine, just move on to another point, such as the scripture I quoted a few posts back. I think that most Christians would be interested in seeing how God thinks and feels through his own word rather than mine. But, hey, lets talk about Patman’s quote on patience!

I got the joke, but Patman losing patience is funnier. I think I said so in the beginning, but your right, I didn't think it humorous because this is a serious topic.

You said you were interested in the open viewer’s opinions. I must admit, that I feel like I am being studied by you rather than listened to. And you assume because your question has not been answered that it a handicap for us open viewers? It’s bad to assume RobE!

Your question compares two different things and draws an unfit conclusion based on the first thought. It is like asking “If the sky is cloudy and it rains, when the sky is not cloudy it how can the sun still shine?” It makes about as much since as that.

You take this conclusion that Calvinist make:
A God who knows the future ordained all evil.

My conclusion is that people who hold the open view say this and it's a poor accusation to make against Calvinists.

BECAUSE........

And made up this conclusion
A God who does not know the future is responsible for all evil.

....... Calvinists could simply point out that the open viewers see God living day by day.....

...1. If God lives, day by day, without knowing the future then he's responsible for the events that happen around him. He's responsible that they're killing children at 20th & Vine(abortion), he's responsible for the hungry, the poor, this sick, etc..., ;whether he did it to them or not. We all agree that he could stop it if he wanted to. He thus becomes the God who walks among us and in his loving kindness allows murders, rapes, child abuse, abortion, homosexuality, etc.... to occur. Doesn't he know they're aborting human life? Hasn't he turned the TV on yet? This is the open view. God is the good Samaritan who walked on by. Is this less terrible than the closed view argument that God has a reason for his actions. That the Lord might have a plan and some insight into our future. Why do these things happen? Isn't this the same arguments that Atheists use to denounce Him? be his love, mercy, etc..

I didn't say a God who does not know the future is responsible for all evil only that he ignores evil around him. It's no truer than open viewers saying the Calvinist God sins, right? Both are sins as you well know.

Just like that. You say “God is the Good Samaritan who just walked by.” And that is your evidence to support it?

Have you known anyone on this rock we live on who needed some serious help(besides me, of course)?

God’s allowance of freewill is not an obligation for him to prevent sin, RobE. Think of this as a parable; If a father allows his son to borrow his car, and then his son wrecks the car, the fault does not lie with the father who gave him the keys. The answer is that simple. And I HOPE you get that one. AND PLEASE, please realize that arguing that God could control us to keep us from sinning will be futile. After all, freewill requires that God not boss us around!

It would seem that you argue here saying that God is not responsible in this case even though he knew his son had the ability to wreck the car, but is only responsible if he knew that the car would wreck. Isn't he somewhat responsible either way even though his son did actually do the wrecking?

What if the father put the car on a track so that no matter what the son did; he would have a way out? All he had to do was to ask for help to receive it. Would that alleviate his responsibility a little. Maybe if he told his son he would take his place in the wreck to atone for that responsibility? Would that work?

Your parable is correct for Open Viewers and Closed Viewers. Now, is it not true if a father waits quietly in the next room while his child is molested by his other child: is he responsible? Could he bear it? Not an open view loving God. What are the five attributes Bob Enyart used to replace the omni's? Wouldn't it appear He knows more than us about the future and us; or is his immutable ability to love fail when it confronts evil. Maybe he loves you so much he wouldn't want to hurt your free will.

And only Jeremiah, Jonah, Nebachannezar, and a few others would ever argue that God could control us. He could never boss you or me around. Perfectly logical.

My point here is that God is God! He does as he pleases when he pleases. I'm not saying He's a tyrant, I'm saying that Open Viewers mis-represent the beliefs of people who believe God knows the future. That's all.

Our theology is in no way intimidated by the question you submitted, add that to your study notes on the open view, please.

I will post my opinions on the "creation" of sin later. But for now, I think this post is long enough. I hope you "feel" me and do not require me to spell it out for you. I do not wish to sound harsh, but for as much work as I have put into other things, I wish we could really get into the meat of it.

At least Lee attempted to answer all my other posts.

I never expected it to intimidate your theology, I just wanted you to understand why sin does not apply to a God who can foresee the future anymore than it applies to an open view God. It's hard to speak with people on a subject when they keep saying things like 'the god you believe in authors sin', 'the Calvinist god harbors all kinds of wicked thoughts', etc.,etc.,etc.,.....

All your other posts were in answer to Lee not me, I thought. Maybe not. Forgive me if you addressed me and I didn't respond. I try to respond everytime. Sorry.

I appreciate your straighforewardness
Yours,

RobE