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One Love
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| Posted 2/12/2009 11:25 AM (GMT -6) |   | Tom:
You say God is our only “reward to seek.” Who wants to disagree with that sentiment? Not me. I’m with ya. But there’s an equivocation on the term “reward” here. I’m not disputing the singular nature of our passion and love for God and I’m not ‘seeking’ extra jewels in my crown. We love and worship God alone. Whatever biblical rewards are, they don’t displace that. But I don’t see how we can say they just ARE God.
1) Isn't it truth that God's Energies and God's Grace just "ARE" God?
2) Is there any "rewards" that we could receive in heaven that are not essentially of God's Energies and God's Grace?
Do the math. 
Why care about the images when you can see the Presence GROUNDING the images? To see Creation as "theophany" takes an interesting turn when you think about God's Energies and God's Grace.
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Tom:
If God just is what he NT describes as various rewards, and if all of us get the same intensity of experience of God (i.e., we get the same “God” and all do so with the same “getting” ), then we all get the same reward. Given what the NT texts say about rewards, D, does that make sense to you? Does the NT say all get one and the same reward? Or does the NT discriminate between reward and reward? I think we have to say the latter. But if the latter…
See? I’m not gonna pretend to have the answer. I just wanna get the question right for now. But you seem very committed to a view of fulfilled human existence in Christ that precludes any real abiding distinction between rewards. It’s like you sewed it all up before taking all the biblical evidence into consideration…maybe?
1) My description of theosis. Does is make LOGICAL sense and is it METAPHYSICALLY feasible? It's completely compatible with Greg's dispositional view in "Trinity and Process"
2) There is distinction between rewards and you see that. It's just that the Infinity and Eternity of God make those genuinely retained distinctions of those "rewards" without functional difference before God.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.
"I love, therefore I am in I Am. God is my life." Post Edited (One Love) : 2/12/2009 10:38:22 AM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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| Posted 2/12/2009 1:16 PM (GMT -6) | | Tom:
Your understanding of what the NT calls rewards is vacuous in that your rewards aren't meaningfully discriminatory or abiding in existential terms.
In other words, having the "reward" and/or "losses" be the memory (and irreducibly individual, personal reflection of such) of the human hypostasis and how they contributed (or failed to contribute) to the Kingdom of God on earth is NOT ENOUGH for you. These distinctions ARE discriminatory and abiding, as I've laid out with the Hitler/Mother Teresa thing. But that ain't enough. It seems like you want to say this:
Unless the rewards affect our level of "intensities of experience" that we have with God (not necessarily expressive abilities), then the rewards are NOT "meaningful". Is this what you are saying?
In short, if both Hitler and Mother Teresa, at the end of All Things, enjoy an "unsurpassbly intense beautiful experience" of loving sociality with the Triune God in the human-spirit-to-Holy-Spirit relationship in their souls that brings about complete aesthetic satisfaction, both experiencing the Supreme Joy of the Lord...then the rewards and losses are relatively meaningless, even though they are ACTUAL contributions to the enduring and unique individual experiences and life histories of Hitler and Mother Teresa.
Just want to make sure I got this straight...
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.
"I love, therefore I am in I Am. God is my life." Post Edited (One Love) : 2/12/2009 12:31:17 PM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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| Posted 2/12/2009 1:40 PM (GMT -6) | | | Here's a quote from Jonathon Edwards I found. Whatcha think?
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“As there are degrees among the angels, viz. thrones, dominions, principalities, and powers; so there are degrees among the saints. In heaven are many mansions, and of different degrees of dignity. The glory of the saints above will be in some proportion to their eminency in holiness and good works here. Christ will reward all according to their works. He that gained ten pounds was made ruler over ten cities, and he that gained five pounds over five cities. Luke 19:17; 2 Cor. 9:6, “He that soweth sparingly, shall reap sparingly; and he that soweth bountifully shall reap also bountifully.” And the apostle Paul tells us that, as one star differs from another star in glory, so also it shall be in the resurrection of the dead. 1 Cor. 15:41.
Christ tells us that he who gives a cup of cold water unto a disciple in the name of a disciple, shall in no wise lose his reward. But this could not be true, if a person should have no greater reward for doing many good works than if he did but few.
It will be no damp to the happiness of those who have lower degrees of happiness and glory, that there are others advanced in glory above them. For all shall be perfectly happy, every one shall be perfectly satisfied. Every vessel that is cast into this ocean of happiness is full, though there are some vessels far larger than others. And there shall be no such thing as envy in heaven, but perfect love shall reign through the whole society. Those who are not so high in glory as other, will not envy those that are higher, but they will have so great, and strong, and pure love to them, that they will rejoice in their superior happiness. Their love to them will be such that they will rejoice that they are happier than themselves; so that instead of having a damp to their own happiness, it will add to it. They will see it to be fit that they that have been most eminent in works of righteousness should be most highly exalted in glory. And they will rejoice in having that done, that is fittest to be done.
There will be a perfect harmony in that society; those that are most happy will also be most holy, and all will be both perfectly holy and perfectly happy. But yet there will be different degrees of both holiness and happiness according to the measure of each one’s capacity, and therefore those that are lowest in glory will have the greatest love to those that are highest in happiness, because they will see most of the image of God in them. And having the greatest love to them, they will rejoice to see them the most happy and the highest in glory. And so, on the other hand, those that are highest in glory, as they will be the most lovely, so they will be fullest of love. As they will excel in happiness, they will proportionally excel in divine benevolence and love to others, and will have more love to God and to the saints than those that are lower in holiness and happiness. And besides, those that will excel in glory will also excel in humility.
Here in this world, those that are above others are the objects of envy, because that others conceive of them as being lifted up with it. But in heaven it will not be so, but those saints in heaven who excel in happiness will also in holiness, and consequently in humility. The saints in heaven are more humble than the saints on earth, and still the higher we go among them the greater humility there is. The highest orders of saints, who know most of God, see most of the distinction between God and them, and consequently are comparatively least in their own eyes, and so are more humble. The exaltation of some in heaven above the rest will be so far from diminishing the perfect happiness and joy of the rest who are inferior, that they will be the happier for it.
Such will be the union in their society that they will be partakers of each other’s happiness. Then will be fulfilled in its perfection that which is declared in 1 Cor. 12:26, “If one of the members be honored all the members rejoice with it.”
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.
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One Love
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| Posted 2/12/2009 1:45 PM (GMT -6) | | Ok. Let's break it down a bit...
"For all shall be perfectly happy, every one shall be perfectly satisfied."
(This is linked to the aesthetically satisfying "spirit-to-Spirit" relationship with the Triune God shared by ALL restored in God.)
"The exaltation of some in heaven above the rest will be so far from diminishing the perfect happiness and joy of the rest who are inferior, that they will be the happier for it."
(This would be the functional relativization of the actual "rewards" and/or "losses" due to the "perfect happiness" in all restored in God)
Feel me? 
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.
"I love, therefore I am in I Am. God is my life." Post Edited (One Love) : 2/12/2009 12:59:54 PM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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| Posted 2/12/2009 1:57 PM (GMT -6) | | This is what I imagine: a world full of particular people exhibiting perfect "empathetic joy" to everyone else in God's Love
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Mudita is a Buddhist (Pali and Sanskrit: मुदित) word meaning rejoicing in others' joy. Mudita is sometimes considered to be the opposite of schadenfreude.
The term mudita is usually translated as "sympathetic" or "altruistic" joy, the pleasure that comes from delighting in other people's well-being rather than begrudging it. Many Buddhist teachers interpret mudita more broadly as referring to an inner spring of infinite joy that is available to everyone at all times, regardless of circumstances. The more deeply one drinks of this spring, the more secure one becomes in one's own abundant happiness, and the easier it then becomes to relish the joy of other people as well.
The traditional example of the mind-state of mudita is the attitude of a parent observing a growing child's accomplishments and successes.
Mudita is also traditionally regarded as the most difficult of the brahmaviharas to cultivate. To show mudita is to celebrate happiness and achievement in others even when we are facing tragedy ourselves.
The "far enemies" of mudita are jealousy and envy, two mind-states in obvious opposition. Mudita's "near enemy," or quality which superficially resembles mudita but is in fact more subtly in opposition to it, is exhilaration, perceived as a grasping at pleasant experience out of a sense of insufficiency or lack.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.
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One Love
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| Posted 2/12/2009 2:21 PM (GMT -6) | | For another take, let's go Piperian, dude.
Now we know that John Piper is ALL about finding one's sole joy and satisfaction in God. To Piper, our chief duty is to glorify God through fulfilling our desires for happiness/satisfaction in God forever. So, let's say you have the two people (Hitler and Teresa again) post-mortem already at this point. From that stance, they not only express the consummate joy and satisfaction that they feel from that, but they are free to experience the joy and satisfaction from delighting in the well-being of OTHER God's Images (human brothers and sisters) around them.
When Hitler remembers his life, he sees the futility of the lack of God-centeredness he had in his earthly existence...so he doesn't get to "remember" all the joy and satisfaction he contributed during that time, nor the "empathetic joy" from that memory. Mother Teresa, I'm thinking, would have that in spades. Not only would she be saved, but also the work that she had done would be tested and proven by fire. Hitler, however, would be saved, but like as one through the flames, losing much
Do you see how NEITHER Teresa or Hitler lose their fulfilled joy and satisfaction in God alone...while AT THE SAME TIME...they have distinct personal experiences of the Holy Spirit's interpretation of their lives that are directly related to their earthly lives?
Is this not sufficient?
PS: This was good.  All for the Glory of God and the Healing of Creation...
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.
"I love, therefore I am in I Am. God is my life." Post Edited (One Love) : 2/12/2009 2:19:58 PM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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| Posted 2/12/2009 3:26 PM (GMT -6) | | Seriously, though. What happens when people really start believing that God indwells all human "hearts", even those of the rankest of sinners? The implications of God's omnipresence as Creator, basically. Hence, loving one's enemies, neighbors, and our very selves unconditionally is a self-evident practice to the "spiritually minded" who live lives being lead by the Creator Spiritus of the One Truine God who always loves Himself. We naturally live the Great Commandments, constantly empowered by God's very activity within us. (God's Grace which is God himself working in us.). This could ground the perfection of love and the acquistion of dispassion (apatheia).
Wouldn't it be cool if this just became common human knowledge and practice? For real.
Just theological anthropology 101.
PS: Why do I like this so much? 
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.
"I love, therefore I am in I Am. God is my life." Post Edited (One Love) : 2/12/2009 2:35:07 PM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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Similitude
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| Posted 2/12/2009 8:56 PM (GMT -6) | | | Edwards: Such will be the union in their society that they will be partakers of each other’s happiness. Then will be fulfilled in its perfection that which is declared in 1 Cor. 12:26, “If one of the members be honored all the members rejoice with it.”
Jeff: Good stuff. And I would go further. I posit the possibility that the whole reward-thing is temporal. Age-abiding, for sure, but temporal. I posit the possibility that what is called the " kingdom" is, itself, temporal. That reigning and rewards may have a time of fulfillment, after which there will be only family. And the only hierarchical distinction will be that of the natural, non-industrial family--Father, first-born son, and subsequent-born siblings.
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One Love
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| Posted 2/12/2009 9:02 PM (GMT -6) | | Sweet stuff, Jeff! 
I see it as a family of "Abba, Father" crying spiritual beings, to the Father through the Son in the Spirit.
Romans 8:15 TNIV Chapter
The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, "Abba, Father."
Galatians 4:6 TNIV Chapter
Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, "Abba, Father."
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.
"I love, therefore I am in I Am. God is my life." Post Edited (One Love) : 2/12/2009 8:08:37 PM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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| Posted 2/13/2009 3:22 AM (GMT -6) | | Edwards: It will be no damp to the happiness of those who have lower degrees of happiness and glory, that there are others advanced in glory above them. For all shall be perfectly happy, every one shall be perfectly satisfied. Every vessel that is cast into this ocean of happiness is full, though there are some vessels far larger than others.
Tom: This is what "I" have been arguing. All are full. All are satisfied. All are happy with their satisfaction. The joy of the fullness of others partakes in constituting my own fullness and happiness. All of it. But some vessels are larger than others. The difference is both discriminatory and abiding. But where you, D, seem to essentially erase any felt or experienced dimension to this reality by having them overcome in the infinity of God, I can't see any way to meaningfully posit them EXCEPT in terms of experience. What other category would you like to place them in? There are none.
Now, when Edwards says there's no "damp" to the happiness of those who have lower degrees of happiness and glory, "damp" can only specify the difference between one's own capacity for happiness and glory-reflection and one's actual experience of happiness and glory. Edwards is saying there is no gap between capacity and fulfillment in a single person--not that there are no differences in capacity beteen persons. Each person's capacity for happiness is fully actualized. It's just that capacities VARY (Edwards' "lower degrees of happiness" = various capacities of total fulfillment/satiation). The questions are:
(1) What should the varying degrees of individual capacity be linked to? How should they be determined? I'd suggest they be the result of creaturly freedom. We shape/determine our capacities.
(2) How are we to relate the difference in capacity to the felt/experienced infinity of God common to all? In terms of intensity of experience? D feels like that would essentially differentiate between the 'quality' of life, and that's problematic. OK. If not in terms of intensity of experience, in terms of expressive form then. I'm just thinking out loud.
(3) If all forever progress into the infinity of God, does this mean an unceasing enlarging of Edwards' "capacity for happiness"? If the capacities are ever enlarging, is it not the case that the varying differences in capacity between persons are essentially meaningless? I think so. Edwards seems to think the varying degrees of happiness and glory are abiding and discriminatory in the sense that those (his words) who "have lower degrees of happiness" don't eventually rise to the degrees of happiness of others who have higher degrees of happiness. All are fully happy according their capacity, but their capacities varying and are unchanging. I'm not agreeing or disagreeing. Just clarifying.
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Tom
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| Posted 2/13/2009 3:25 AM (GMT -6) | | Edwards: It will be no damp to the happiness of those who have lower degrees of happiness and glory, that there are others advanced in glory above them. For all shall be perfectly happy, every one shall be perfectly satisfied. Every vessel that is cast into this ocean of happiness is full, though there are some vessels far larger than others. And there shall be no such thing as envy in heaven, but perfect love shall reign through the whole society. Those who are not so high in glory as other, will not envy those that are higher, but they will have so great, and strong, and pure love to them, that they will rejoice in their superior happiness. Their love to them will be such that they will rejoice that they are happier than themselves; so that instead of having a damp to their own happiness, it will add to it.
Tom: I'm fine with this. But note, Edwards doesn't talk about Nyssa's eternal progress into God's infinity, an idea that, arguably, jeopardizes Edwards' view.
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Tom
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| Posted 2/13/2009 8:40 AM (GMT -6) | | Jeff: Our whole discussion of annihilation and UR were based upon the fact that the "age-abiding" language need not be "eternal" language. That's all I'm going with. If rewards are necessarily eternal, then so is "torment," as far as I can tell from the texts, per se.
Tom: You're concluding that heavenly rewards are temporary and fading SIMPLY BECAUSE the language used to describe hell is best taken to describe a temporary period of time given the nature of hell?
I'm not drawing on any age-abiding language per se. I'm talking about "rewards" that are said to characterize heaven. You do think heaven is temporally unending existence, right? Sure you do. But this can't be based on any of the age-abiding language used to describe it since that same language is used to describe hell. But you don't limit heaven temporally as you do hell. Why not? Because the nature of thing described, i.e. the nature of that divine life which is shared with us. So we conclude temporal endurance from the nature of the life or gift or reward, not the eternity of the thing from the presence of the word "aionios." Equally, we conclude hell is temporary given the nature of what hell is, not from anything in the word 'aionios' per se. So just as suffering and pain are definitive of hell SO LONG AS HELL LASTS, rewards share in defining heaven SO LONG AS HEAVEN LASTS. But how long each lasts isn't gotten from the use of, say, 'aionios'. It's the nature of the thing qualified (life vs death).
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Tom
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| Posted 2/13/2009 9:04 AM (GMT -6) | | | | |
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One Love
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| Posted 2/13/2009 9:06 AM (GMT -6) | | Anyways...
Tom:
(1) What should the varying degrees of individual capacity be linked to? How should they be determined? I'd suggest they be the result of creaturly freedom. We shape/determine our capacities.
Our personal histories/memories/developed perspectives are a significant result of our creaturely freedom. I don't know why this ain't sufficient for you.
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Tom:
(2) How are we to relate the difference in capacity to the felt/experienced infinity of God common to all? In terms of intensity of experience? D feels like that would essentially differentiate between the 'quality' of life, and that's problematic. OK. If not in terms of intensity of experience, in terms of expressive form then. I'm just thinking out loud.
In terms of expressive form, yeah.
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Tom:
(3) If all forever progress into the infinity of God, does this mean an unceasing enlarging of Edwards' "capacity for happiness"? If the capacities are ever enlarging, is it not the case that the varying differences in capacity between persons are essentially meaningless? I think so. Edwards seems to think the varying degrees of happiness and glory are abiding and discriminatory in the sense that those (his words) who "have lower degrees of happiness" don't eventually rise to the degrees of happiness of others who have higher degrees of happiness. All are fully happy according their capacity, but their capacities varying and are unchanging. I'm not agreeing or disagreeing. Just clarifying.
I agree with this. But that's the thing, even in Edwards stuff, the "rewards" are RELATIVIZED by the "perfect happiness" shared by all, and the empathetic joy felt by all. Even there, homie.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.
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One Love
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| Posted 2/13/2009 9:12 AM (GMT -6) | | And you never DID answer the question about Satan. He's the ultimate test case. By your logic, he should have the smallest capacity for God-enjoyment possible, post consummation. The "spiritual retard". How does that play out, dude? Seriously.
Does he or does he NOT recover any of the glory that he had before he fell? Does he have the ability to GROW IN his ability to lovingly serve God at all? If so, then...
I got it! 
What does it look like for SATAN to be "perfectly satiated and happy" in God...as opposed to say, yourself, at the Consummation? Let's assume that you have more rewards that him (and Hitler, too...HA!  ) Can you help me with the difference? Is it something like you'll be able to sing more songs to God than him or something? See more colors? Laugh more loudly? Just wondering...
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.
"I love, therefore I am in I Am. God is my life." Post Edited (One Love) : 2/13/2009 8:22:09 AM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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| Posted 2/13/2009 9:25 AM (GMT -6) | | D: Our personal histories/memories/developed perspectives are a significant result of our creaturely freedom. I don't know why this ain't sufficient for you.
T: It just seems a pretty ad hoc definition of “reward.” My reward is my memories? Anything remotely suggestive of this in the NT? Developed perspectives? Now that’s closer. But D, perspectives determine how life is lived forward.
D: In terms of expressive form, yeah.
T: Tell me how different memories determine the shape of expressive form (the future)?
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Tom: (3) If all forever progress into the infinity of God, does this mean an unceasing enlarging of Edwards' "capacity for happiness"? If the capacities are ever enlarging, is it not the case that the varying differences in capacity between persons are essentially meaningless? I think so. Edwards seems to think the varying degrees of happiness and glory are abiding and discriminatory in the sense that those (his words) who "have lower degrees of happiness" don't eventually rise to the degrees of happiness of others who have higher degrees of happiness. All are fully happy according their capacity, but their capacities varying and are unchanging. I'm not agreeing or disagreeing. Just clarifying.
D: I agree with this. But that's the thing, even in Edwards stuff, the "rewards" are RELATIVIZED by the "perfect happiness" shared by all, and the empathetic joy felt by all. Even there, homie.
T: They’re “relativized” by “perfect happiness” in the sense that those who are less happy (because their capacity is less) are happy to be so. Happiness is relevant to capacity, and capacity is both a consequent of our past choices (and memories) and fixed. BUT all capacities are perfectly satiated. That’s what Edwards is saying.
D: Well, let me ask you this: Are you going to chunk G. of Nyssa's epektasis idea to keep your current view? Is that what you want to do?
T:What I want is to find the truth. And I don’t have “a current view” as yet. I’m the one who lives in the in-between position, remember? You’re the one who needs to ‘settle’ on ‘a’ view. Ha!
D: And you never DID answer the question about Satan. He's the ultimate test case. Does he or does he NOT recover any of the glory that he had before he fell? If so, then...
T: Then what? Sure he comes to glorify God with capacities that are in some respects shaped by his past.
But apply your memories thing to Satan. What kind of memories will Satan live with? Dang.
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Tom
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| Posted 2/13/2009 9:31 AM (GMT -6) | | I don't know what it'll mean. I'm just suggesting that it mean SOMETHING, as opposed to your view in which rewards seem to end up meaning NOTHING really.
Maybe that's the answer. They mean nothing. Like Jeff said, we get rewards up front to party with for a while, but as soon as we start progressing in God, rewards are put out on the curb to be picked up. Rewards are just Horse-de-oeuvres to the main meal. Some get them. Some don't. Some get little Horse-de-oeuvres while others get fancy better tasting Horse-de-oeuvres. But everybody sits down to the same main dish, and eventually forgets the Horse-de-oeuvres anyhow.
I think that comes close to mocking the NT. But if that's what it is, then it is what it is.
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One Love
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| Posted 2/13/2009 9:35 AM (GMT -6) | | D: Our personal histories/memories/developed perspectives are a significant result of our creaturely freedom. I don't know why this ain't sufficient for you.
T: It just seems a pretty ad hoc definition of “reward.” My reward is my memories? Anything remotely suggestive of this in the NT? Developed perspectives? Now that’s closer. But D, perspectives determine how life is lived forward.
All we are talking about here is the preserved human ego (the cradle of human personal historical perspective, the center of identity formation) that will be active in the shaping of how life will be lived. How is this ad-hoc?
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D: In terms of expressive form, yeah.
T: Tell me how different memories determine the shape of expressive form (the future)?
I described that with the difference between Mother Teresa and Hitler.
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D: I agree with this. But that's the thing, even in Edwards stuff, the "rewards" are RELATIVIZED by the "perfect happiness" shared by all, and the empathetic joy felt by all. Even there, homie.
T: They’re “relativized” by “perfect happiness” in the sense that those who are less happy (because their capacity is less) are happy to be so. Happiness is relevant to capacity, and capacity is both a consequent of our past choices (and memories) and fixed. BUT all capacities are perfectly satiated. That’s what Edwards is saying.
The bottom line is that the perfect happiness relativizes things such that NO one feels more or less "satisfied" than any one else. This would be like unto saying that every individual has an unsurpassable level of satisfaction in their relationship to God and all others.
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D: Well, let me ask you this: Are you going to chunk G. of Nyssa's epektasis idea to keep your current view? Is that what you want to do?
T:What I want is to find the truth. And I don’t have “a current view” as yet. I’m the one who lives in the in-between position, remember? You’re the one who needs to ‘settle’ on ‘a’ view. Ha!
Do you.
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D: And you never DID answer the question about Satan. He's the ultimate test case. Does he or does he NOT recover any of the glory that he had before he fell? If so, then...
T: Then what? Sure he comes to glorify God with capacities that are in some respects shaped by his past.
But apply your memories thing to Satan. What kind of memories will Satan live with? Dang.
He will live with the memories of how much love and service he DIDN'T contribute to Creation(a lot!)...and how much Grace and Love from God he received during that time. And YOU and I will be REJOICING that God saved him...right? 
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.
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Tom
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| Posted 2/13/2009 9:36 AM (GMT -6) | | D's view is that when we're all eating the SAME main meal, some will remember the little Horse-de-oeuvres they got while others will remember the better Horse-de-oeuvres they got. But those who got the little ones will be just as happy about this as those who got the better ones. And both groups won't care about what Horse-de-oeuvres they got because the main dish will be so good.
That's the sort of theology we're doing nowadays. Mmmwahahaha.
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