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| Open Theism Discussion Board > Public Forums > The raging debate continues here... > God’s Two Wills in Openness – March 19 debate | Forum Quick Jump
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Laika
Registered Member
Date Joined Mar 2003
Total Posts : 2433
| Posted 4/5/2004 2:19 AM (GMT -6) |   | quote:
Originally posted by spenlake
Thus you have "ungodded" God and state that God cannot intervene to prevent evil. I ask a question, "Can God create a rock so big He couldn't lift it." Your solution poses the identical implications. Can God will somthing so separated from His will that He couldn't intervene with His will." Rote intervention accounts for the creator's unique and unaltered right to intervene in His creation.
spen lake, why did God send Jesus to die for us? He's so powerful and sovereign, why didn't He just forgive us?
Are there some things God can physically do but NOT legally do?
Once He created a world of free moral agents governed by His moral laws, does He have to play by the rules of that world Himself?
When He ceded this world to Satan [count how many times in scripture Satan is called the god of this world/the god of this age], can He NOT intervene in this world unless some human cede Him authority to do so through prayer?
Calvinists, to me, infantilely say, "God can do ANYTHING". They think ANY step down from that blanket statement, "limits God".
Yet would they say, God can make a square circle?
Would they say, God can make a murderer go free?
Would they say, God can replace His rule with Satan's rule?
Would they say, God knows the names of all the unicorns on all the planets?
Would they say, God can sin?
There are some things God cannot do. Because they are illogical, because they are illegal, because they violate the kind of world He created.
inside you the time moves and she don't fade
the ghost in you she don't fade | | Back to Top | | |
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johnmd
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Date Joined May 2002
Total Posts : 154
| Posted 4/5/2004 5:19 AM (GMT -6) | | POW said[quote]Originally posted by PotOnWheel
John, a "body count" of an acting-Governor of a powerful city, sometimes carrying out capital punishement on crimes condemned by the Empire is COMPLETELY BESIDES THE POINT. Except to you.
You are not going to be worth trying to reason with.
[/quote]
John says:
Are moral judgemnts not required of governor's Indeed aren't government officials to be above reproach. Do God's standards change with history and culture with regard to killing under such petty circumstances? Are these not "reasonable questions to ask in regard to the "father" of a movent which undergirds much of evengelical thinking.
Where is my unreasonableness? We may disagree but that is no excuse for you to cop out without exposing my flaw in logic.
BTW
My intent is not to offend. My intent is to expose flawed arguments. Bad arguments with logical falicies should be killed. That is the nature of debate debate. My sole intent is to provide a coherent rebuttle to a systematic theology that appears to me to damage the holy character of the God revealed in Scripture.
However, my comments are not personal, intended to personally offend or kill the person as it were. If in the same town I would welcome the opportunity to buy you lunch or just pal around with a brother in Christ. Friends can disagee and remain friends. In fact that is one characteristic of friendship.
Now I realize this Board does not offer that context. So my comments necessarily occur in somewhat of a vaccumn. If you will point out the language you want me to be "careful" with I will try and avoid it.
Blessings
John
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johnmd
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Date Joined May 2002
Total Posts : 154
| Posted 4/5/2004 9:54 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by BJS
John and Laika, you're doing a great job here. And thanks, Spenlake, for being willing to represent your views here on a site that doesn't generally agree with you. Good discussion.
Oh, and I see that POW is back. Now he's exasperating Johnmd. Consider it an initiation rite here on CVM.org, John. Most of us experienced his voluminous and mostly incomprehensible rants early on, and have learned to avoid them. Don't get too bogged down.
John
Thanks for the heads up. I have three girls in the house...I like a good "rant. This Board is like stress relief for me...Like a good jog. i can get my heart rate up reading this stuff without leaving the recliner.
John | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 4/5/2004 11:12 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by John Earp
However, in PoW, we have someone who would defend the murderous tyranny of Calvin. No doubt he would also defend Hitler's murderous tyranny. Simply amazing.
THIS IS WHERE THE MODERATOR/SITE ADMINISTRATOR SHOULD STEP IN. | | Back to Top | | |
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John Earp
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Date Joined Oct 2002
Total Posts : 1715
| Posted 4/5/2004 11:13 AM (GMT -6) | | | | |
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Truth Aficionado
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Date Joined Dec 2003
Total Posts : 1544
| Posted 4/5/2004 11:32 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by John Earp
So you DON'T defend Calvin's actions?
John, what fruit of the Spirit to you bear here? | | Back to Top | | |
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John Earp
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Date Joined Oct 2002
Total Posts : 1715
| Posted 4/5/2004 11:34 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by sparknheart
quote:
Originally posted by John Earp
So you DON'T defend Calvin's actions?
John, what fruit of the Spirit to you bear here?
I suppose the same spirit by which Christ rebuked the Pharisees (who also condemned and killed the just without remorse). Anyway, how is it wrong to simply ask PoW a straightforward question? Either he approves of John Calvin's actions or not.
My perception is that PoW has persistently tried to paint Calvin as some kind of super-saint here, who should be ABOVE any and all criticism. I find it amazing that MY motives are being called into question for simply pointing out the historical FACTS of what kind of "Christianity" John Calvin actually practiced.
In calling for righteous living if a person is to be held up as virtually the greatest Bible teacher/theologian in all history, I am displaying a "bad spirit?" This is amazing to me. | | Back to Top | | |
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Truth Aficionado
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Date Joined Dec 2003
Total Posts : 1544
| Posted 4/5/2004 11:36 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by John Earp
quote:
Originally posted by sparknheart
quote:
Originally posted by John Earp
So you DON'T defend Calvin's actions?
John, what fruit of the Spirit to you bear here?
I suppose the same spirit by which Christ rebuked the Pharisees (who also condemned and killed the just without remorse). Anyway, how is it wrong to simply ask PoW a straightforward question? Either he approves of John Calvin's actions or not.
John, did you not link POW to supporting Hitler? | | Back to Top | | |
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John Earp
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Date Joined Oct 2002
Total Posts : 1715
| Posted 4/5/2004 11:40 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by sparknheart
John, did you not link POW to supporting Hitler?
Did you not read how many people Calvin had executed, oppressed, and suppressed simply for disagreeing with him?!?! How is this not tyranny?
I am merely drawing the conclusion that if one supports Calvin's tyranny, why wouldn't they also support ANY tyrant? Hitler is merely a vivid example. | | Back to Top | | |
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Truth Aficionado
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Date Joined Dec 2003
Total Posts : 1544
| Posted 4/5/2004 11:44 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by John Earp
quote:
Originally posted by sparknheart
John, did you not link POW to supporting Hitler?
Did you not read how many people Calvin had executed, oppressed, and suppressed simply for disagreeing with his Institutes? How is this not tyranny? I am merely drawing the conclusion that if one supports Calvin's tyranny, why wouldn't they also support ANY tyrant? Hitler is merely a vivid example.
Have you ever heard of a anti-Pharisee Pharisee?
Shalom | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 4/5/2004 11:46 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by John Earp
quote:
Originally posted by sparknheart
John, did you not link POW to supporting Hitler?
Did you not read how many people Calvin had executed, oppressed, and suppressed simply for disagreeing with his Institutes? How is this not tyranny? I am merely drawing the conclusion that if one supports Calvin's tyranny, why wouldn't they also support ANY tyrant? Hitler is merely a vivid example.
Your post did not say "one," you accused, condemned ME! | | Back to Top | | |
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John Earp
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Date Joined Oct 2002
Total Posts : 1715
| Posted 4/5/2004 11:49 AM (GMT -6) | | How is it wrong to point out how evil a man like Calvin was? How is it wrong to demonstrate that he bore nothing but evil fruit towards his detractors? How is it wrong to point out how tyrannical his rule in Geneva was? And how is it wrong to show how self-contradictory someone can be to support Calvin's actions while purportedly condemning the actions of Adolf Hitler?
And how is it being "an anti-Pharisee Pharisee" by pointing out such hypocrisy by Calvin and those who adore him? | | Back to Top | | |
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John Earp
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Date Joined Oct 2002
Total Posts : 1715
| Posted 4/5/2004 11:52 AM (GMT -6) | | I should say a few things, I suppose.
First, while I find John Calvin's actions towards his detractors morally reprehensible to the nth degree, I fully realize that many Calvinists in history have been quite godly and morally upright (in contradistinction to Calvin himself). So I do not mean to say that anyone who is a Calvinist is by definition of the same spirit which he was of, nor that all in the Reformed camp share the same moral likeness as did their founder. Thankfully, that is not the case.
What I am offended by is that someone would ever try to defend John Calvin as a great Christian teacher. What I am stupefied by is when someone else gets so highly offended by my telling it like it is about Calvin's morally reprehensible lifestyle while Calvin was claiming to be reforming the Christian church to her pristine purity.
Why PoW is so offended by legitimate criticism of the life John Calvin lived, I am truly at a loss to know. I am definitely not trying to paint all Calvinists with a broad brush, but am merely trying to point out the obvious, that a teacher of God's word should actually live like a true Christian should, and that doesn't include having one's enemies put to death.
And that if one defends Calvin's actions, on what grounds would they condemn Hitler's? | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 4/5/2004 12:14 PM (GMT -6) | |
SUBSTANCE.
Unlike one tradition that recognizes debt to Cavin as influence, there is another, as old and as established. Continental Calvinists (Reformed) are unlike Westminster/Scottish-Realist Calvinism. The Later is a SYSTEM, and the former follows a STORY.
Lane (PhD. and teaching at St. Louis Univeristy), and Nicholas Woterstorff (Faculty at BOTH Calvin College AND Princeton University) are of the Reformed, the Story tradition of Calvinism.
One of you on this thread simply dismissed these, like Wolterstorff, as probably not existing. Poof! (Where's the substantive debate in that?)
In a response to the same Lane quote I put here, a Reformed pastor friend had THIS to recall:
quote:
When as a student I was doing research for a paper on Calvin many years ago, I noticed that there was a period in Calvin studies that emphasized that (unlike Catholic scholasticism) his thought was not a system but closely related to biblical themes and then came a generation of studies that praised the systematicity of Calvin and Calvinism. (Kuyper praised its coherence and completeness.)
At the time I suspected that either the word "system" took on different meanings or as it became valorized calvinists were eager to claim its virtues.
Similarly, when science and capitalism were seen as good, progressive things, Calvinists loved to associate them both with Calvinism. Now that science has become closely associated with scientism and the ruination of the environment and capitalism with greed and exploitation, Calvinists have changed their tune.
But that's no big deal. It's part of rationalizing one's faith and doing apologetics and evangelism. You want to show that all good things come from God. Your faith and beliefs come from God (more or less). So you introduce your faith to people by calling on their experience of what is good and associating it with the benefits of the faith.
It may actually weaken one's defence of the faith by focusing on the side-products (a functionalist view of religion) rather than on its truth, but that's a rather purist comment. Witnessing seems to be a very messy, mixed sort of thing in which the people with the perfect package often do a worse job than those who do everything wrong but humanly right.
Calvin told STORIES. And what he told stories about he got from Scripture and from the Church Fathers. CREATION he called "Creation Law" -- and Reformed thinkers and theologians now call that "structure" while the subsequent activity, either "thetically" followins God's will or "antithetically" against it they call "direction."
Structure and Direction provide an understanding of the REAL STORY that we find ourselves in. We have TWO apsects to account with.
The Scottish way of dealing with this is to say that there are "Two minds" in God. (Calvin might have used those words too -- I don't know, and its besides the point.) Reformed says that there are two ASPECTS in creation: structure and direction.
Even "total depravity" in Reformed is understood much less as a "System" than a Story. God's Creation-Law establishes his will in creation. But God is "open" in creating mankind as intended to be prophet/priest/kind over creation and to God's glory. Sin and the fall does NOT change that. "Total depravity" in Reformed describes the EXTENT of the sickening influence of sin. But the Creation0Law of everything does not change. (To illustrate: "sinful nature" means that the good nature is sick. It does not mean that the nature we are created with is changed in its nature.)
SO............
As far as the debate on this thread goes, one can easily sustain attention JUST ON ONE descendent of Calvin -- that spread by Hodges, and the Westminster Confession: A SYSTEM.
Or you can consider the STORY that Calvin himself worked in, and the many Reformed thinkers and Philosophers like Abraham Kuyper, Vollenhoeven, Wolters, Calvin Seervelt, etc. And THAT tradition does NOT see two views, but one single, united view.
In the Reformed view Structure and Direction can not be switched. The structural-nature of a thing and the obedience-direction of a thing are two separate but sumultaneous things.
.
Were Calvin to be the first, or the last in this recognition of our own presence INSIDE this story, his reputation would be relevant.
But this is the Gospel, from Genesis to Revelation. God speaking in Genesis one, to Christ's presence in the New Jerusalem. And in this is ONE. | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 4/5/2004 12:21 PM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by John Earp
Why PoW is so offended by legitimate criticism of the life John Calvin lived...
I'm not offended by that. I'm just not even engaged by it--its irrelevant to the discussion. And it was merely a smoke screed for avoiding addressing the issues.
What IS offensive is your doing thisin a personally attacking manner. From your saying that my posts were vomit (agina, a kind of avoidance of subrance) to the impunning or my morality, THAT is offensive. Stop it. | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 4/5/2004 12:24 PM (GMT -6) | | Again, STRUCTURE and DIRECTION replace the "two minds."
Story replaces System.
THAT markedly redirects the debate. | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 4/5/2004 12:29 PM (GMT -6) | | I sent my Reformed minster friend a copy of Lane's article. Here is his reply:
quote:
Thanks. I've been reading Nussbaum's book on passion and ethics, so this essay on Calvin and desire is apropos.
Some years ago I wrote a paper on the so-called courtly love tradition in poetry and its relationship to the theology of the times. I struggled to articulate a position that the poetic tradition and genre created a space in which to explore a cluster of images and metaphors in which there was a deep continuity between divine and human, bodily, passionate love in the context of a theologically dominant discourse that stressed the discontinuity (while conceding that all human love could have no other source than divine love).
My prof, a Marxist, kind of like it because it posited the poetry as a sort of counter-cultural discourse over against the dominant one, but he didn't like the fact that it actually "saved" the theology (or tried to ).
I got in over my head as I always did as a student, biting off more than I could chew, but it gave me something to think about for the rest of my life.
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 4/5/2004 12:31 PM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by PotOnWheel
Again, STRUCTURE and DIRECTION replace the "two minds."
Story replaces System.
THAT markedly redirects the debate.
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johnmd
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Date Joined May 2002
Total Posts : 154
| Posted 4/5/2004 12:41 PM (GMT -6) | | Hello again Lee
John
Remember the WAR motif was the Spirit's choosing to communicate to man the nature of the case of this world. That is just what Scripture says. There is no such thing in man’s experience as a war where battles are not lost.
Lee
Scripture says "there was war in heaven" (Rev. 12:7), and that was a complete victory, apparently, no mention of any success by the devil there
John
One small problem…PAUL SAYS “WE” fight not against fleash and blood…Now “WE” are not yet in Heaven. The Spirit does not use bad grammar. “WE are NOW fighting against… is the tense of the verb. Since we are not in Heaven NOW and since WE are fighting now there must be more to the exegesis of the concept of Spiritual War than you site in Revelation.
Regardless, a WAR that Scripture reveals that man is involved in must correlate with man’s concept and definition of the term (inspired by the Spirit) “WAR.” You submit a war that man is not “really” involved in a that rebuts not my comments, but Scripture,.
John
A man with his head cut off for the sake of the gospel has just encountered a “real battle.” If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s a duck. If it looks like a war it is a war.
Lee
REV 12:11 They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death.
They were killed, and "they overcame him," that's a victory, and not a defeat!
John
Sure I agree, kinda' sorta'... I just say it this way in order to remain consistent with the Spirit inspired concept of War and not minimize the very real grief and sense of loss that occurs with death. Ever had anyone close to you die. The pain and anguish of grief can be really real. This is what man understands of death and war. Now with Revelation 12 I say that despite the “loss” in death they were ultimately victorious because of they were faithful to the end. That is what intuitively occurs with the experience of victory. There must be a real contrast in order to compehend what victory is all about.
So, yeah…They were victorious. Exegesis is more than regurgatation. It must include grammar, note contrasts, maintain consistent definition of terms and concepts and often requires painting with fine strokes to tease out the meaning
John
Calvin had the same problem that Job’s friends had in trying to find security in a perfect world of concrete order where God’s “will” is always done. They could not handle that evil could just happen. That ambushes could happen. That battles could be lost. Surely Job must have sinned. Surely Job brought this upon himself. And they were all sharply rebuked by the Almighty for their ridiculous theology that disallows arbitrary evil.
Lee
God says to Job's friends "my servant Job, my servant Job." I think his rebuke to them was that Job was righteous, though his friends insisted he must be wicked. Evil doesn't just happen, either:
JOB 1:15 ... and the Sabeans attacked and carried them off.
JOB 1:21 ... and the Lord has taken away.
The Sabeans did it, God did it...
John:
Small problem. Read on….
Job 38:1Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind and said,
2 "Who is this that darkens counsel By words without knowledge?
God was talking to Job here.
Not only did God rebuke Job’s friends. He rebuked Job. Both of their “theologies” were wrong.
I have address your concern regarding ob 1:21 in the follow thread:
http://www.gregboyd.org/gbfront/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=3055&SearchTerms=Job
which also references 3 additional links if you are interested
Regarding the Sabeans, the question is not who did it but why they did it. Who “caused” them to do it? You “God did it” is an extrapolation of the text that rests on your preconceived notion of the nature of the case of this world (i.e., Determinism”). I say in the Job narrative God is responding to Stan’s charge that God has stacked the deck in His own favor. God did not do anything but place His confidence in His faithful Servant Job to endure to the end thus proving to the moral universe that faithfulness in the context of the fallen in the face of the tyranical Prince of the Power of the Air is indeed possible.
John
Your only other option is that man’s experience is a charade and the free will that you are accountable to God for is an illusion. This renders you a glorified puppet.
Lee
I believe that God's children have real freedom, that God's will allows real choices (John 8:36). But unbelievers are slaves to sin (Tit. 3:3), they are not free (John 8:34), they are puppets (2 Tim. 2:26), not glorified, either!
John:
So, would you punish your child if he was born with Down’s Syndrome (i.e., a slave to a disease he was born with) if he could not score 1300 on the S.A.T.? Your proposal violates thes sense of justice and fair play that God endowed men with. You say “they are” puppets. Who is pulling their strings? Is God pulling there strings prohibiting them from making the right choice. Is Satan or a separate entinity enslaving them preventing them from making the right choice? If so, does the omnibenevolent God do everything He can in the context of the fallen world to beckon them to make the right choice? You are mixing your “metaphors” with “real’ and “choice” and “freedom” in the same context of “slave.”
John
No one could have ever imagined that omnipotence would look like Calvary. He out smarted us all. The power of God to accomplish His purpose is in genuine love—Not the manmade notion of aristocratic dominion and “will.”
Lee
Yes, Paul calls the cross the weakness of God, ad the demonstration of God's love, but also the power of God, stronger than man's strength (1 Cor. 1:25). The weakest God can get, he overcomes with power, and it was his will (Acts 4:28).
John
How old are you. Are you old enough to remember the old Wendy’s commercial, “Where’s the beef?”
Well, I ask you “Where’s the power?” Fill in the blank…”To know Him and the POWER of His R____________n.
That’s where the power is. It is the Resurrection that vindicates the cross. It is the Resurrection that wins the day. It is the Resurrection that confers salvific property to the cross. The cross was the “battle” and for about three days it didn’t look good for our side. Satan was still celebrating. Then the victory came. That is an application of the essence of faith—Hope when all appears to be “lost.” We are really splitting hairs here.
John
Sure God wants and hopes all will come to repentance and faith. Indeed, He does everything He can to bring this to pass. But hope is different from certainty.
Lee
I believe all God's desires will be fulfilled, that he won't be frustrated. I don't think it's good to state categorically that all will be saved, for there are verses that lead us to fear that some will be lost forever. I'll let God work out the details! But I do think we may take the assurances with the warnings, and still hope that all will be saved.
John
Scripture documents there are specific people in Hell right this minute. Is God frustrated about that? Thw only “detail” to work out is Universalism or perhaps Anialation. Universalism is unjust which would also frustrate God and Anialation vs punishment doesn’t appear to offer comforting alternative either. What “details” are there for God to work out.
But I agree, we do hope and pray for the salvation of all men and work to that end. We just hope according to what is revealed in Scripture. The reason we pray and work toward the salvation of men is because a HOPELESS eternal peril is a very real option.
John
Revelation tells us there will be many cast into the lake of fire. In doing this the Father destroys all dominion and authority and power of selfishness and evil to challenge the way of benevolence. That is my take on I Cor 15:24…Not that all men will be saved.
Lee
1CO 15:28 When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all
"All in all" implies more to me than just unwilling subjection and punishment of unbelievers, though. It might mean that. But it might mean more...
John
SHOW YOURSELF! With all due respect and love we need not continue the debate if Universalism is a possibility for you. This places our assumptions too far apart to have meaningful dialogue. Why don’t you start another thread on the plausibility of Universalism and state your assumptions relative to Scripture and see if you get any takers.
John
God did not even allow Satan to rebel. Couching the discussion in these sorts of terms (esp. “allow”) misses the point, begs the question, and is counterintuitive.
Lee
I agree, I try to be careful not to say or imply that.
John
Hallelujah!!! BLESSED UNITY.
John:
Is God being disingenuous when He tells us He is grieved for that which He caused.
Lee
I can discipline a child, cause the punishment, and yet be grieved.
John
You miss the point here. The question IS NOT THAT you discipline your child.
The issue is: If God reveals in Scripture that He grieves when His children go astray (and He does) and he punishes them then He is being disingenuous in in both his grief and punishment if He is the one who caused His child to do that which He says grieved Him. You see how contorted that is?
You would not tell your child to shoplift a candy bar or worse put it in his pocket and then beat the tar out of Him or even scold him when he walked out of the store with the bar in hand unpurchased would you. I am not raising the issue of discipline. I am raising the issue of causation. Read the text more carefully and we can save some time.
John
From a comment to Spen: For a world of compatablistic robots is not the revelation of Scripture and does not achieve God's stated purpose of love.
Lee
I think God's children love him freely, we love our brothers and sisters freely, for sure:
GAL 5:13 You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love.
John:
More blessed unity… I agree but children who love God “FREELY” is not possible in a deterministic, compatablistic, or Calvinistic world. That is the context of my earlier comment to Spen.
FIH wrote: Again, whether or not God is "primary," or not,God not did not "allow" Joesph's brothers to sin.
Lee
This is a misunderstanding, I agree, God does not just allow sin. I think Scripture teaches that God is the primary cause of sin, with secondary causes being the source of the sin. Which we have discussed!
John
I deal with this on another thread
http://www.gregboyd.org/gbfront/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=3096&whichpage=7&SearchTerms=%2CJames
Go to page 7
POW: Doxology was for him the chief goal and delight of all created beings. [Calvin] knew that theology remains unfinished until it concludes itself in spirituality.
Lee
This is certainly true. But my examples of sinful actions having God as the primary cause comes from Calvin, actually. John's comment is certainly apt here, I think, is the current understanding of Calvinism true?
John
The issue is not whether Calvin’s beliefs have been reconstructed modified or distorted (I do not believe they have). The issue is that Determinism which in the Modern day is widely known as Calvinism is pervasive and must be rebutted because it smears the holy character of God. Who wants a relationship with a God who causes me to sin then offers to save me from it. What other dastardly deeds might he have up His sleeve. It is hard to trust a God represented in those terms.
To God alone be the glory,
John | | Back to Top | | |
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johnmd
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Date Joined May 2002
Total Posts : 154
| Posted 4/5/2004 12:51 PM (GMT -6) | | POW
Originally posted by PotOnWheel
Again, STRUCTURE and DIRECTION replace the "two minds."
Story replaces System.
THAT markedly redirects the debate.
John
This kind of abstraction is a manmade philosophical construct never found in scripture. The Scripture was writtenby simple men in some cases--you know, fishermen and the like, and written for simple men. They all had two feet firmly plnted on the earth. Not in the Ivory tower contemplating a second will of God never stated in Scripture and never manifested in the life of Jesus. They just believed that Scripture means what it says, that there is for instance no "hidden" God who causes sin all the while revealing to men that he hates sin.
The "two wills" does not direct the debate. It IS the debate.
Blessings
John
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