Open Theism Discussion Board

Zach: I'm not sure what you mean. How could anyone volitionally know anything? Are you asking if I choose to know? Same with naturally. What do you mean by "naturally know"? Do you mean knowledge that I'm born with? As far as I understand the question, I think I'd have to say, "Neither".

Jeff: What I CAN do volitionally is apply concentration to a specific object or subject matter. What I can not do volitionally is eradicate the laws of thought that will regulate how my conclusions will be formed once I concentrate thus. Granted, I can volitionally live in denial of the truth of those laws of thought for limited time periods. But I've never known anyone who can continuously believe contradictions about all matters indefinitely. It's too unnatural.

Zach: What do you mean? You've never made the decision to accept Jesus' lordship? I don't mean to imply that there's an actual piece of paper to sign. But for me, I verbally acknowledged that Jesus is Lord.

Jeff: To my memory, I never verbally acknowledged that Jesus is Lord in some statement that I thought was the equivalent of contracting myself to anything. I wouldn't even have known WHAT I was contracting myself to at the time. Thereafter, I read the NT. I believed the NT. Jesus says that "acceptance" of his lordship means DOING WHAT HE SAID. I assumed, and still do, that the gospels and the teachings of his chosen apostles in the epistles are essentially what he is telling me to do (and a lot more additional facts, to boot).

In that sense, I can only "accept" his lordship one choice at a time. I can not "accept" his lordship at one point in time and then disobey him thereafter and still claim to be "accepting" his lordship in that sense. THat's the meaning of Christ's statement as far as I can tell. But it is also true that I can BELIEVE that Christ is lord even IF I disobey him. If one disobedient act to Christ means we're no longer christians, then I suspect there aren't but a handful of christians in the whole world.

Zach: If I did that not understanding what I was getting myself into, then I've got no one to blame but myself. Jesus and the New Testament in general are pretty clear about expecting suffering for disciples.

Jeff: If you didn't know what you were getting into prior to reading the NT, whose fault was that? Not yours. God didn't zap the knowledge of the NT into the heads of pagan Gentiles at the time they believed the gospel preached to them by Paul, did He?

The suffering that goes with obedience is suffering brought on voluntarily by ourselves when experienced in the form of self-discipline and by other humans and created spirits otherwise. It is not God volitionally CAUSING that suffering. What we are talking about is GOD volitionally causing suffering because, per your view, of some contract that someone made with God. That's different. I have yet to hear from you a verse that conveys any such idea.

In man-made bi-lateral contracts, penalties for violations of one's oath ARE agreed to up front. And this is all VERY explicit. I see nothing in the NT that even hints at that. Nor do most humans who believe in the propriety of contracts believe that ONLY what we verbally commit to doing grounds moral obligation with the possibility of negative consequences for violations. So it doesn't seem to be a self-evident belief.

J: An intended end, to my mind, implies a final cause. That is to say, an end exists because of some original intention that occurred IN TIME.

Z: Why? Why can't God intend an end for himself "before creation"? Is he too weak? Is he too near-sighted to plan ahead? Is divine forethought before creation a logical impossibility? I have no reason to accept your premise. And furthermore, were I to agree with you, my main point would remain unchanged. Self-determination, self-telos-making can be done by God at any time.

J: Nothing I said there is in disagreement with what you are saying in response. "At any time" means "IN TIME." Which is to say, there are no such things as ETERNAL purposes. That seems like nonsense to my mind.

J: So when I say we exist FOR God, I'm saying we exist BECAUSE of His intention/purpose for us AND we have a point of origin, temporally speaking.

Z: You've packed a lot of meaning into one preposition. By your definition of FOR, I must agree that the Father is not FOR anything. Because definitionally, you've limited FOR to only created beings.

J: No Zach. I said there is another SENSE in which the word "for" is used. This is undeniable. And I didn't limit it to created beings, either. It's just that that's how it's used in statements like "FOR whom all things were created."

Z: A person need not be FOR (your usage) something to set one's own goals.

J: How can a person have a goal without being for it? If I say I went to the store FOR milk, then I'm saying I purposed the attainment of milk because, sentiently, I'm FOR it. If God says He creates all things FOR Himself, then He's saying He purposed my existence because, sentiently, He's FOR it. But this latter means, does it not, that I came into existence because of His purpose. This is not true of the Father and the Son simply because they did not come into existence to fulfill anyone's purpose. That's not to say that they can't have purposes FOR each other. For that is just what creation is. All things are OUT of the Father and FOR the Son, e.g.

But note the difference. If I'm created for the Son, then I exist for the Son. But this also means, to the extent that what God means by that is that my choices are meant to be of a certain nature, that I am for the Son in the sense that I am to choose according to God's intent for my choices. But if I say I went to the store to get a gift for my friend, the gift is not to perform any specific choices to fulfil that purpose. Nor did I have to create the gift. So in one case, both my existence and my volitional behavior is what is FOR God's satisfaction. In the latter, neither of these is what is FOR my friend. But in both cases, it's the satisfaction of the one who the thing is for that is the motivation for the means (in some cases, one mean is creation itself) being deployed in the first place.

So the reason why there is sin is because I exist FOR THE PURPOSE OF choosing and acting in certain ways, and yet I am capable of choosing/acting the contrary (which is sin). If that were not the case, sin is meaningless. For, in that case, there is no purpose for my choices to render them right or wrong (or, equivalently, fit or unfit to attain the purpose). No purpose for my EXISTENCE and choices, no sin and no morality.

But relativism is an ethical theory (I'm trying, but probably not successfully, to keep a distinction between ethical and moral, with moral having to do with duty) that doesn't even take into effect that there is purpose to each person's existence/life. Hence, the only thing that renders a relativist's actions right or wrong (as far as he knows) is the extent to which they are fitted to the ends he has proposed for himself. In this scenario, he can't actually wrong another. Because the other has no rights. Because a person that does not exist for some purpose of the creator of the mutual world of both persons can't have rights except those we talk about from government. But these are not certain. Consequently, a "right" (in this sense) in an uncreated world is a virtually meaningless notion. And this is why most people think government is supposed to secure GOD-GIVEN rights.

So if there are no purposes, there are no rights, and therefore no one can be wronged by another, per relativism. Per relativism, each actor can only succeed or fail to attain their own ends. End of story. In this case, humans are just very intelligent beings. But they are amoral in the more conventional sense of the term.