Does God know the future?

[eccl3_6]

I can remember trying to read the bible as a child and not getting too far. The words seemed to belong to another time, I didn't understand how it was composed and it was too long a read for a wee kid. So I just kinda accepted what I was told. Now I don't have a problem. I've obviously learnt something since then. And then I read your post....

He knows possibilities as such, and certainties/actualities as such. The possible future only becomes actual when the potential future becomes the fixed past through the real present.

AND SO TO SUMMARISE YOU ARE SAYING IN ENGLISH: The future only becomes known to God once it becomes the present and the present has become the past!

Its like I'm looking at the same bible as an adult that I once looked at as a child. I can see people just accpeting what you are saying because it looks so authorative. But the words when you break them down don't make any sense. You are saying "God can see the future but only when it is in the present......THEN ITS NOT FUTURE ANYMORE!"

(see "The God who Risks" by John Sanders...I have not read it).
This must be how Fred Flintstone felt...

I will read the book but I can't believe you're quoting books you admit you haven't read!!!

Fred Flintstone is a cartoon character based in the stone age....I can see how in the face of reality and science how you feel like poor Fed.

I have a great deal of respect for you when it comes to scripture. Its obvious that you are very well read and versed. The reason why I'm using this site is to actually read and learn from posts by people just as yourself. Why you marry this with science I don't know because your science is way off......


..........now for Clete.

 

[Poly]

Yeah, but to do that, He has to change your heart and mind first. Because if He doesn't, we'll just continue on hating Him and rejecting Him.

He has to? Are you telling God what He has to do? Was He not powerful enough to create for Himself the same thing that we desire out of love in that it is not forced?

 

[Clete]

I've been thinking about the whole idea of God being "in time", and there are some inherent logical problems that I'd like to address.

Consider the following:

A) God has always existed.
B) God exists in time.
C) From A and B, an infite amount of time must have passed before the present time. An infinite amount of time cannot be transversed, thus premise A or premise B must be rejected.

The problem you present is thousands of years old but your syllogism is flawed.
Premise A assumes premise B thus you are question begging. If you exist then you have duration whether infinite or otherwise thus you exist "in time". Time is not really a thing to exist within or outside of in the first place and so your premise B is also flawed for that reason.
I agree with you however that this ancient problem is a significant one for theism in general but not specifically for Open Theism. Even Closed Theists beleive that God has always existed and so still have the difficulty of explaining how there has been enough time for an enternity to have passed.

Resting in Him,
Clete

 

[eccl3_6]

So says you. You cannot prove this.

I can prove this {that time is a real thing} and many people have. A GPS signal from satellites orbitting the aerth wouldn't work if time wasn't a thing. We have to account for its properties which change in order to read a clear signal

Rarely? How often do you see it from more than one perspective?

Thats the point you don't often see the time from more than one perspective which is why we find it hard to comprehend. However we proved this theory by sending an atomic clock into space whilst a sister clock was kept on earth. When the space clock was returned it was proved that time had run relatively 'slower' it. This dilation can be worked out using Lorentz's transformation formulas.....which had been discovered wey before space flight (Lorentz died in 1928). Once more experiment had proven theory.

Exactly my point. If God was "outside of time" He couldn't do anything.

Ok keep to one side which of the street...which is it gonna be...science....or religion?

What was that? Both? Ok....here goes.....yes if God were outside time then He would find it hard to do anything so you conclude He is inside it. If you believe God to be without boundaries, limitless, all powerful, OMNIPRESENT....then by definition He has to be everywhere.....inside time and outside time. Anything less and surely you don't believe in an all powerful God because I can foresee a God which would be more powerful....one who exists in both states.

No it has not.

Time is a product of physicallity, from Einstein's special realtivity we pass into his General Relativity. If this wasn't working as we thought all those pretty pictures you get from the Hubble telescope they'd disappear in a puff of non-existent smoke for starters.

But the prize for the 'most startling display of ignorance quote' goes to....

This is not so. You CANNOT convert mass to energy or vise versa.

Try telling that to the 140,000 Japanese that died in Hiroshima.
Converting mass into energy is the premise of E=mc2.
Can't convert mass into energy.....no nuclear weapons,no nuclear power, no radiation, no SUN!!! NO STARS!!!!!!! NO UNIVERSE AS WE KNOW IT!!!!!!

Here is just one of probably thousands off shoots of Einstein's theories. All of which make completely different predictions about what happens and why at Relativistic speeds. Einstien's theories are brilliant but they are not proof that time is any more than a frame of reference by which events are kept track of.

Back to general relativity and the spacetime curves class for you.....

This is just outright false. Not even Einstein's therories have anything to do with quantifing time. The closest thing you get to that is a theory I personally came up with in high school based on Zeno's paradox. But I'm sure you couldn't care less about that.

Back to Lorentz's formulae for time dilation......(On the side.....HIGH SCHOOL? Personal theories??? This is post graduate stuff.) You quantify time by looking at it relatively. Lorentz's formulae again and the two atomic clocks.....

Again, saying it doesn't make it so. This concept is not Biblical and you have no way of even formulating a testable hypothisis by which such a statement could be verified in the slightest degree and so it isn't scientific either.

Well past the hypothesis stage mate...look at all the practical uses we have for it already that I've quoted above....didn't even brush on the Quantum side of things because then things really do start going strange in the world on physics. But uses of Quantum theory are already well established. It goes to show that even if something doesn't seem to make sense it shouldn't be dismissed out of hand until it has be proven otherwise. This was the mistake that the church made with Galileo....or do you still believe the sun goes round the Earth.

 

[Z Man]

Bolded by me..

Already done for jew and gentile.


Heb 8:10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people:


Heb 10:16 This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord, I will put my laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them;


Love and Peace

JCAtheist

Yeah, but that obviously didn't happen for everyone, unless you believe in Universalism.

 

[JCAtheist]

Yeah, but that obviously didn't happen for everyone, unless you believe in Universalism.

It has crossed my mind.

However, you can't say "yeah" and then say "not for everyone". By definition, Jew and Gentile means those of Jewish faith, and those who are not. Seems pretty all encompassing to me.

Rom 2:9 Tribulation and anguish, upon every soul of man that doeth evil, of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile;
Rom 2:10 But glory, honor, and peace, to every man that worketh good, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile:
Rom 2:11 For there is no respect of persons with God.


gen·tile
n. often Gentile

1. One who is not of the Jewish faith or is of a non-Jewish nation.
2. A Christian.
3. Archaic. A pagan or heathen.
4. Mormon Church. A non-Mormon.


adj.

1. often Gentile Of or relating to a Gentile.
2. Of or relating to a gens, tribe, or people.
3. Grammar. Expressing national or local origins.


Love and Peace

JCAtheist

 

[Z Man]

Well of course they don't believe that. I didn't say they believed it but my logic is sound and shows a serious flaw in closed theistism logic. Closed theism generally has effectively been falsified by this line of reasoning and as a result so has Calvinism.

Your logic as follows:

A) Men cannot choose to love God
B) To love, you must be able to choose
C) God must force us to love Him, which is meaningless

You major flaw is in A. Where do you get the ridiculous idea that you must choose in order to love??? That's silly. Choice isn't even part of the definition of love! I already gave you an analogy that clearly makes the point that you don't have to 'choose' in order to love.

If people do not love God of their own free will, they do not love Him at all. That's just the way love works.

Says you.

This is not "my belief" so much as it is simply the definition of what it means to love. It would still be true if Clete Pfeiffer didn't exist.

Choice is not a part of the definition of love.

Let me give you another analogy to clear up your noggin' :

Let's say that you're in jail awaiting death row. Suddenly one day, the jailer opens your cell and tells you that you're a free man. Someone else had come in and requested your release, and even took your place in the death chamber. How would that make you feel? Loving the person who took your place required no choice at all.

Hate is also impossible without free will.

Men cannot choose to love God while in their flesh. Our nature is corrupt because it hates. There's no choice about it. You don't come out of your mother's womb with a choice to love God or to hate Him. We are all born in the corruption of sin. We all reject God. There is NO ONE who seeks after Him.

Slaves don't have the luxary of choices, and as long as sin has it's grip on humanity, we'll never choose to love.

No one asked God to die for our sins; He did it to save us, even though we rejected God and didn't want anything to do with Him. Even while we were sinners, God loved us and had a plan for us the whole time. He knew that in our sinful state, we didn't want anything to do with Him, or would ever 'choose' Him. But He saves us anyways! That's amazing grace.

Would you agree that this was God's free will choice?

Of course. It's His Sovereign will. He does as He pleases.

The problem with you little story here is that Joe would still not be able to love John because he has (according to your theology) no ability to do otherwise, even after he sobers up.

The point of my analogy was to illustrate how love does not require a choice. My theology works perfectly with this analogy. Let's say Joe's drunkeness is our capativity in sin. During this state, men reject God's will; they only want their way. They hate God and everything He stands for. In the analogy, John represents God's mercies and grace. Even though we reject Him and hate His ways, He still has compassion on us, so much so that He 'forces' us into the car and drives us home to safety, where we awaken to the knowledge of His perfect and most beautiful glory. In the same manner in that Joe awakens to realize how much John really loved him by getting him home safely despite Joe's fight against John, so it is with our reaction when God saves us from damnation. When He gives us the faith to believe, and opens our eyes and hearts and minds to His glory by His grace, we are blown away and amazed by His tremendous love for us, despite our sinfulness and rebellion against Him.

That's true love, and it doesn't require a choice.

 

[Johnny]

Does not Open Theism reject premise B while affirming that God has always existed as the uncreated Creator? Johnny's logic is faulty.

Where?

How about saying that time is an aspect or experience of any personal being, including God.

Ok.

A) God has always existed.
B) God experiences time.
C) If God has always existed, and God experiences time, then an infinite amount of time has passed before the present. An infinite amount of time cannot be transversed, thus A or B must be rejected.

C is also weak logically/philosophically

It's not weak logically.

I'll rephrase it as a question: If God has always existed and experienced time, how much time has He experienced before He created us?

 

[eccl3_6]

A) God has always existed.
B) God experiences time.
C) If God has always existed, and God experiences time, then an infinite amount of time has passed before the present. An infinite amount of time cannot be transversed, thus A or B must be rejected.

Finally a Christian that talk scientifically, about science, without being a doofus......

 

[godrulz]

Where?

Ok.

A) God has always existed.
B) God experiences time.
C) If God has always existed, and God experiences time, then an infinite amount of time has passed before the present. An infinite amount of time cannot be transversed, thus A or B must be rejected.

It's not weak logically.

I'll rephrase it as a question: If God has always existed and experienced time, how much time has He experienced before He created us?

God is from everlasting to everlasting. He is uncreated with no beginning or end. You might say that time is eternal/everlasting. Duration has always existed and is as uncreated as God. This does not make time greater than God anymore than love, truth, fellowship, communication, feelings, thoughts, etc, are greater than the eternal, Holy God. God experienced an infinite amount of time before He created. At some point on the unidirectional continuum, He created the material universe. Duration must have preceded this moment or the universe is eternal or God never created (both wrong ideas). Everlasting to everlasting duration, not timelessness. What is so difficult about this?

 

[godrulz]

Finally a Christian that talk scientifically, about science, without being a doofus......

Clarify point C/transverses?

 

[justchristian]

Duration has always existed and is as uncreated as God. This does not make time greater than God anymore than love, truth, fellowship, communication, feelings, thoughts, etc, are greater than the eternal, Holy God.

But love, truth, fellowship, communication, feelings, thoughts, etc, are ultimately intrustic to God. What we experience are created expressions of these intrustic natures that are extrusic to God. Just like time.

 

[godrulz]

But love, truth, fellowship, communication, feelings, thoughts, etc, are ultimately intrustic to God. What we experience are created expressions of these intrustic natures that are extrusic to God. Just like time.

Intrinsic/extrinsic?

Clarify post?

Time is as fundamental to the triune God as love and holiness is. We share His moral, personal, and spiritual attributes, though to a lesser degree. We do not share His unique attributes: uncreated Creator, eternal, omnipotent/omnipresent/omniscient. God experiences the past/present/future similar to us without any limitations since He is also everlasting, every where present, and all-powerful. Duration is as meaningful to God as it is to us. If He was timeless or 'eternal now', He could not intersect with humanity and be a covenant God. He could not create, incarnate, think, feel, or act. Time/duration is part of His warp and woof.

 

[nancy]

And guess what, Godrulz.

The past has an ending so if you say God had no beginning or END then how can you say God is bound to the temporal universe.

 

[eccl3_6]

And guess what, Godrulz.

The past has an ending so if you say God had no beginning or END then how can you say God is bound to the temporal universe.

DING-DING And the bell rings to start the third round .Godrulz takes a 1-2 knockout punch in the third round by Nancy

 

[Nathon Detroit]

DING-DING And the bell rings to start the third round .Godrulz takes a 1-2 knockout punch in the third round by Nancy

OK, this is now your second warning. If you don't have anything to add to the topic please stay out of the thread.

 

[eccl3_6]

OK, this is now your second warning. If you don't have anything to add to the topic please stay out of the thread.

Posts 1101 and 1104 are mine, I have had a lot to contribute. All I was doing in the last post was acknowledging that Nancy had highlighted a logical error in Godrulz's argument. That insisting on temporal conditions on God is to deny the exist of all capable, omnipresent deity. I apologise if my point wasn't made clear but I think I have done that now.

 

[godrulz]

And guess what, Godrulz.

The past has an ending so if you say God had no beginning or END then how can you say God is bound to the temporal universe.

I never said God is bound to the temporal universe in the sense of being limited by it. He experiences the unfolding of history in real time, not in a specious 'eternal now' instant. The past for God does not have an ending.

Ps. 90:2 "Before (tensed) the mountains were born or you brought forth the earth and the world, form everlasting to everlasting you are God."

Before the creation of the universe (do not assume time was created, but that a new measure of duration=sun, moon, stars, was brought into being), God had an endless past of relations within the triune Godhead. If there was no past, then creation is eternal with God. Endless does not mean timeless.

The past of the material universe had a beginning. The past of the uncreated God had no beginning, but it is still an infinite succession of past instants/intervals (even though not measured by our sun).

Ps. 90:4; 2 Peter 3:8 is about perspective, not literal (note the figure of speech=simile).

Your imprecise assumption leads to a faulty conclusion.

Rev. 1:8 "I am the Alpha and Omega, says the Lord God, who is (present), and who was (past...not that He still was or is in the past, except by recall), and who is to come (future tense...not there yet or it would be a present or past tense), the Almighty." (endless time, not timelessness)

There is time in heaven/eternity: Rev. 8:1; 6:10; 22:1,2

 

[justchristian]

The past has an ending so if you say God had no beginning or END then how can you say God is bound to the temporal universe

As I understand godrulz position he says there is no such thing as a temporal universe, time isnt metaphysical.

But even if it is just succesion/duration God would have to exist within this eternal succesion/duration. Making God and time the ultimate reality instead of just God. From there you can move to other non-somethings like love, space, morality, relationship, and even natural laws. This is God as part of the ultimate reality instead of God being the ultimate reality.

 

[godrulz]

Posts 1101 and 1104 are mine, I have had a lot to contribute. All I was doing in the last post was acknowledging that Nancy had highlighted a logical error in Godrulz's argument. That insisting on temporal conditions on God is to deny the exist of all capable, omnipresent deity. I apologise if my point wasn't made clear but I think I have done that now.

I do not see it...help me. Anyone else think his point is self-evident?