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JEE
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Date Joined Jul 2004
Total Posts : 1466
| Posted 9/12/2004 7:14 PM (GMT -6) |   | quote:
Originally posted by lock
I know this may be different for each individual, but in the OT view, how much does God do, if anything, to influence a person's choice to believe in God or not?
I don't think we can reduce it down to an exact percentage, lock. My post in the "Could The Terrorists Have Chosen To Do Otherwise?" thread, in which I delineate how no one has a valid excuse for not serving God, based on Rom. 1, 2, & 3, gives a good basic summary of how God influences everybody in some way.
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Tom
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| Posted 9/12/2004 7:57 PM (GMT -6) | | Lock: In the OT view, how much does God do, if anything, to influence a person's choice to believe in God or not?
Tom: I wouldn't know what meaning to give to the claim that God is love if he didn't do all within his power given the sort of limitations he agreed to when he created this world (whatever those are) to win us to himself short of eradicating the very freedom that makes possible the loving relationship to which God wants to win us.
Provided you believe that much about God, you don't need to specify any more. God's character revealed in the Cross IS your answer. That's how far God goes to win us.
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Tom
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| Posted 9/14/2004 4:58 AM (GMT -6) | | Lock-
You mean Eph. 1.11.
I suggest that you not ask us to meet a standard you don’t require of yourself with respect to many beliefs you (and we) already hold. Take the Trinity for example. God doesn’t come right out and declare explicitly “Hey guys, I’m triune. Get it? T-r-i-u-n-e.” We have to actually t-h-i-n-k our way through to much of what we believe—about God, the world, ourselves, etc. So no, the explicit divine declaration “I limit myself in the following ways ____, and the correct metaphysics behind this is as follows ____” isn’t in the Bible. But then neither is there the explicit divine declaration “I never in any way limit myself.” To get Eph. 1.11 to mean this, you’re actually doing what I’m suggesting we have to do all the time, namely, THINK our way through to an interpretation of Scripture. As categorical as we might thing some statements are, there really is no meaning apart from context and interpretation. Frege was right. So I might suggest that Eph. 1.11, when considered in the context of the wider message of Scripture, doesn’t mean God unconditionally determines everything that happens in the world. While “all” may not present the limits, perhaps other words and context do. Perhaps it’s the case that “all” that God does he does in harmony with his purposes and will. Or perhaps the point is that God is to be understood as at work redemptively in “all” that occurs, which would include his acting to prevent evil in accordance with his purposes. Perhaps the point is that God, unlike us, never acts out of character in ways that jeopardize the fulfillment of his purposes. He always and everywhere acts in all situations to actualize his purposes. But that doesn’t mean everything that happens was brought about by God to fulfill some specific purpose. It might only mean that we can be confident that in everything that happens, good or bad, God is at work to fulfill his purposes. It’s only if one assumes God always gets what God wants, that God’s will and purposes never fail to be fulfilled, that one then sees this verse as proof of that belief.
Now, covenants are impossible (I think) to make sense of if entering into them for God doesn’t amount to a free self-limitation. God’s creating the world entailed at least one limitation on God, namely, it meant God no longer exists without relating to creation. He no longer exists alone. Not even God can pretend the world’s not there. This is a genuine limitation on God that he chose for himself. Does Scripture actually say this in so many words? No. So just use a bit of thinking. What has to be true about God in order for it also to be true that God created the world (which Scripture does explicitly claim)?
Taking it a step farther, what has to be true about the God-human relationship if other things God says about us, the world, about loving us, about our being responsible for our actions, etc., are in fact true. Conclusions reached by thinking THIS way are not invalid simply because they aren’t explicitly spelled out in the Bible. If that were true, we wouldn’t believe in very much.
So, where does it say God limited himself when he created? It says he created. It’s there IN the act of creation IF you reason your way through to the implications of such an act. If you decide to have children, you’re NOT free to NOT stand in relation to your children as a parent. You can be a good parent or a lousy one, but you can’t refuse the relation since it is by definition a consequence of the choice to have children. Choices delimit us with respect to their consequences. We must assume this is true for God as well, or else all meaning is lost to us. So the choice to create, the choice to have as at least one purpose of creating us the enjoyment of freely chosen loving relationships, the choice to enter into covenants, the choice to make us morally responsible beings, and on and on, all are choices with inescapable consequences for God as well as for us.
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Bobber
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Date Joined Jun 2004
Total Posts : 199
| Posted 9/14/2004 9:22 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
I know this may be different for each individual, but in the OT view, how much does God do, if anything, to influence a person's choice to believe in God or not?
I don't hold to a total open theism view but I think God does influence people in relation sometimes to how people are praying for others. | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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| Posted 9/14/2004 9:30 AM (GMT -6) | | Lock: Tom- Thank you for the correction. You have explained this well in the OT view. There is much I disagree with in that I do not hold to the OT view and I feel that many assumptions are drawn out of scripture, but if I did hold to the OT view, I would agree that your post was convincing.
Tom: Don’t hurry off just yet Lock. There’s a bit of circular reasoning here that’s making me dizzy. There’s much you don’t agree with because you don’t hold to OT, and you don’t hold to the OT because you didn’t find my post “convincing.” Which comes first?
My post didn’t even mention open theism and there are many people who are not open theists who agree with what I said. Forget open theism for a moment, OK? Just walk through the argument about how choices by definition have consequences the chooser cannot but stand in relation to and that this delimits and defines the chooser. If you disagree with this, argue it. Show it. Walk me through it. Show me how God can choose to create the world and not stand in relation to the limits of that choice. If you can’t show this, at least have the intellectual integrity to concede the point: God is free to limit himself and has done so in choosing to create this world with whatever limits/consequences it entails.
Just to clarify. By “limit” I don’t mean “beyond the ability of” in the sense that, say, a weight lifter can lift 200 lbs but not 201 lbs and so 200 lbs is his “limit” because he’s simply incapable—all else taken into consideration—of lifting 201 lbs. God may have the “muscle” in the absolute sense of the word to unconditionally determine that Fred meet, propose to, and marry Sally and that Sally would agree. The limits come when we add the additional claim that this relationship is both a “personal” and “loving” one. If God chooses as a purpose or goal for Fred and Sally that they “love” each other “responsibly” and that their relationship be a genuinely “interpersonal” one, then God and his purposes must stand in relation to the realities of such love, moral responsibility, and personhood.
This is where many of us say, “You know, my love is not MY love if it’s determined by somebody other than ME,” and wonder, “Is it not the case that to the extent agent A unconditionally determines agent B that A objectifies B and treats B as less than personal?” Just food for thought.
These are the sorts of limits open theists AND OTHERS have in mind when they say God limits himself. Just as God accepts the consequences (i.e., limits) which, say, incarnate existence has for him, shouldn’t we be encouraged to ask what might be the consequences for God and for us of God's creating at all, of God's exhaustively determining us, of his not exhaustively determining us, of his creating us to be morally responsible, of God's loving us and purposing us to love responsibly and freely in return, and on and on. That creating us for morally resposible loving relationships entails consequences for God that limit him in the sense I've described is something open theists and many non-open theists (like Bill Craig for example) agree upon. That such limits include a partly open future is an entirely separate debate.
You brought up the issue of whether or not God’s free choices ever limit God in any way. Don’t run off now by just saying, “Oh well, I don’t agree the future is at all open, so I don’t find your comments convincing.” That won’t work. What does your not being an open theist have to do with your finding my comments unconvincing? Other non-open theists would find my last post rather convincing, and they dislike open theism perhaps more than you do, though they would agree that God is conditioned and limited by his own free choice in choosing to create and in choosing to make us morally responsible.
So, Lock, how is it that God can create and not be delimited by standing in relation to what he creates? Moreover, how is it that God can create beings who are morally responsible for their choices to love or not and not himself stand in relation to the consequences of creating THIS sort of world?
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Tom
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| Posted 9/14/2004 9:32 AM (GMT -6) | | Bobber: I don't hold to a total open theism view but I think God does influence people in relation sometimes to how people are praying for others.
Tom: Sounds to me like you're saying God is "limited" in such situations, not against his will, but because of his will to create a world of such consequence to himself.
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lock
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Date Joined Jul 2004
Total Posts : 701
| Posted 9/14/2004 5:39 PM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by TGB
So, Lock, how is it that God can create and not be delimited by standing in relation to what he creates? Moreover, how is it that God can create beings who are morally responsible for their choices to love or not and not himself stand in relation to the consequences of creating THIS sort of world?
Tom
Tom-
I will try to keep this short and simple, but if there are areas in which you would like me to expound on, by all means, let me know.
I believe that before the eons, when it was just God alone, He put together His divine plan for His creation, which mankind is a part of. I believe the redemption process is a part of this divine plan. In order for God to display His love for the world (John 3:16) He design a backdrop of evil to compare with.
God created man in the flesh (sarx). Man is unable to please God due to the weakness of this flesh (sarx). I believe that the first few chapters of Romans explain to us what man does when influenced by the flesh and Satan. Not only is man guilty of denying God as the Creator, but even when given His truth, man has distorted the it. Throughout the eons God has kept to Himself a faithful remnant. God has brought this faithful remnant into the realization that they are unable to meet the expectations for God’s glory and they must rely totally on Him and His salvation. An excellent example is found in Paul. Early in his life, he had knowledge of God through the law. Paul genuinely thought that he was meeting the expectations for eonian life by keeping the law in his flesh. Paul thought he was doing the work of God when he persecuted believers in Christ. God graciously brought Paul to a realization that all that he had done in his life was dung compared to what he had in Christ.
Those, whom God has chosen not to be a part of this elect group, will stand before the white throne and be judged according to their acts. I see this judgment as not punitive, but corrective. This is where they will come to a realization that their righteous does not measure up to God’s expectations. They will then be cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, which is the second death. I believe this is what the bible describes; death, or in other words, a state of unconsciousness. They will not enjoy the glorious eons of the eons with Christ and the elect. At the end of the eons, though, they will be vivified in Christ.
I thought it was important to know where I stand in the eternal destiny of mankind because I believe it helps develop our view of God and His dealings with His creation. I believe God will reconcile all mankind (and the universe for that matter) to Himself through Christ. Because of this I see no problem with election, or God choosing who will take part in the eons of the eons and who will not. On the other hand, if I believed that a majority of mankind, who are created in the image of God, were going to spend eternity either destroyed or tortured, then I would have to justify it be saying it is due to the choice they make, because the God of love, Who wills that all men to be saved, would never send them there just to meet His purposes. Also if I believed that evil was eternal (as in the case of an eternal hell) then I would have to justify it by saying God never intended for evil to enter His creation. But since I believe that evil is not eternal and that it will be around just long enough to meet God’s purpose, I have no problem pointing out scriptures that say God brings about evil to meet His purposes, nor do I have a problem saying God created man in the flesh knowing the limits of the flesh, because He had a Savior all lined up.
I see the limits God has put on the flesh (sarx). I see the limits God has put on the creation when He subjected it to vanity. You could look at God promising not to destroy mankind with water again as a self-set limitation, but the limitation lies in the means used, because later God will do it with fire. I believe that all is falling into place according to God’s divine plan for His creation.
Now to answer your last questions...
quote:
how is it that God can create and not be delimited by standing in relation to what he creates?
You spoke of God molding morally responsible, loving humans. God is molding all of mankind to be responsible and loving. He will deal with the elect at this time and the majority of mankind at the end of the eons. I do not believe that we can meet the expectation of love that God sets in our flesh (sarx). It can only be ejoyed now in Christ (in Whom we are a new creation) and after we are resurrected and vivified in the spiritual body God will gives us at that time. The rest of manking will meet this expectation at the end of the eons when they are vivified in Christ.
quote:
how is it that God can create beings who are morally responsible for their choices to love or not and not himself stand in relation to the consequences of creating THIS sort of world?
I hope I have answered this question above when I spoke of what I hold to be the eternal destiny of all mankind.
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Tom
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Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 9/14/2004 6:06 PM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by jefscott
Lock,
From a minimal Open Theistic point of view, even traditional election could be true. It would just have to be election within time, as opposed to an election which was predetermined before the Fall.
I've thought about this too. Two things:
(1) The future can be partly open even if God unconditionally elects some to salvation and others to hell in the traditional sense of election. All this would mean is that the future of all persons with respect to salvation, and of all events necessary to their being saved (like their being born!) would not be "open." That much of the future would be determined. But God could conceivably choose not to unconditionally determine other things about the world (like what they chose to eat, dress, who to marry, etc., lots of stuff) and so the world would be open in those respects. So, one can be an open theist right down the line with respect to cosmology but just argue that who gets born and saved is determined (in the traditional "eternal" sense) by God.
(2) One could also step this up by arguing a bit MORE openness regarding who is born. Who is born could be contingent and foreknown by God as "might and might not's" as we often argue it is, but God would decide before creation what he would unconditionally determine with respect to the salvation of everyone. For example, God knows before creating that agent A might and might not be born (that's open) but make the following unconditional determination: "If agent A is born, then I unconditionally determine to save him" or "If agent B is born, then I unconditionally determine his damnation." In this scenario, much about the future is open, including who is born, but once someone is born God then actualizes his unconditional determination regarding that person. So when a person is born, although their birth was foreknown as contingent, God's unconditional predetermination of their future with respect to salvation was settled upon before he created. Like contingency planning, God determines ahead of time what will unconditionally transpire with respect to salvation in the event of any person's birth. (Squaring either (1) or (2) with Scripture is the problem, even if they describe something that is logically possible.)
In the end, though, it's not really election "in time." In either case, if God is omniscient and foreknows all possible futures, it still follows that election is set before creation because it a foreknown future even in the case of (2) above where the birth of people is a contingent matter. In neither (1) nor (2) does God "wait to elect." He couldn't if he foreknows all possibile futures and foreknows only ONE possible future with respect to every possible person. So it doesn't seem that a step-at-a-time determination of all persons is really possible for an omniscient God. In no case would God ever believe about any actual person "She might and might not be saved" becasue he had not yet decided what to elect that person to.
Why anybody would go with either (1) or (2) is another issue. If she's minimally "open" then she believes God knows some true "might and might not" propositions, in which case she rejects simple foreknowledge and holds to an open cosmology. But if she believes God can unconditionally determine the morally significant choice regarding salvation and justly condemn to hell those he unconditionally predetermines to hell, then what reasons could she have for wanting to argue that God has in fact NOT so determined everything? There are several answers she could give.
In the end, whether or not God unconditionally determines the salvaiton of every person isn't answered by whether the future is partly open or not. Nor is the question of whether or not the future is partly open answered by whether God unconditionally determines everybody's future with respect to salvation. Interesting.
Later,
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Tom
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| Posted 9/14/2004 6:50 PM (GMT -6) | | Lock-
Thanks for trying. I think we're reading off of enitrely different sheet music. Entirely different.
Oh well.
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Sahid
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Total Posts : 2013
| Posted 9/14/2004 10:55 PM (GMT -6) | | quote:
God graciously brought Paul to a realization that all that he had done in his life was dung compared to what he had in Christ.
quote:
This is where they will come to a realization that their righteous does not measure up to God’s expectations. They will then be cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, which is the second death. I believe this is what the bible describes; death, or in other words, a state of unconsciousness. They will not enjoy the glorious eons of the eons with Christ and the elect. At the end of the eons, though, they will be vivified in Christ.
Call me a pragmatist, but this seems to be a gospel of "who cares". If God gives you the realization, great! you're set. If not, too bad, you're still set. Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't our eathly (and/or unconscious fire and brimstone) existence pale to insignificance when compared with eternity? If God has determined who will receive the special knowledge, why bother with God? Why not live it up on earth, knowing that you can't change God's mind?
I'm being serious. This is gnosticism. Everything you said in that post is gnostic. The only thing that might not be is your view of Christ. You said, "Man is unable to please God due to the weakness of this flesh (psuche)." But if you think Jesus was in the flesh (psuche), you've got Jesus being as sinful as us. So while you haven't explicitly denied that Jesus was both God and man, that's the logical conclusion that your beliefs draw. Significant portions of the Bible were penned for the purpose of refuting gnosticism. That Christ became flesh and was still perfect refutes your claim that "Man is unable to please God due to the weakness of this flesh (psuche)." It not the flesh that's the problem. God declared it very good. Sin is the problem. To confuse psuche and hamartia is the same problem the gnostics got themselves into. When Paul talks about the flesh he is refering to a mindset or way of life that results from sin. "Flesh" is frequently used metaphorically. The problem comes when we remove the metaphor.
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