Posted on 08/12/2002 1:15:54 PM PDT by DittoJed2
You really are a "Johnny-one-note" aren't you? And a sour one at that.
Of course not. Jesus was metaphorically criticizing Bethsaida and Chorazin, not offering hypothetical commentary on an alternative history of Tire and Sidon. He was emphasizing the unusual force and power of the miracles which B & C had seen. This is a rebuke to B & C: in effect, "Even these notorious bad actors would have responded when you did not."
There is no predictive element here at all.
P.S. There are some better arguments to be raised against OT, but your pet hobby-horse verse isn't one of them.
Oh, yeah, it would have to... Adam's Sin was an infinite offense against a Holy God; Sin requires an Infinite Atonement. Abraham's Faith was counted to him for righteousness, but Faith in what? In the promised Messiah, the proto-evangelium of Genesis 3.
"The Atonement is, strictly speaking, an Infinite transaction" -- Loraine Boettner (a quote with which both Calvinists and Amyrauldians can certainly agree)
GWB: No, that is not the case at all. Even if it were true, the Bible instructs us that the prayers of the faithful are a sweet savor to God. Even if it were true, we are commanded to pray to the Father in the name of the Son and that is enough for anyone to obey.
Well, which horse do you wish to ride? Does your volleyball god answer, waver or respond? Or, do you pray to the volleyball god because you are "commanded to"?
GWB: I'll ask how anyone should consider the God you are praying to be a divine idiot, since He requires the instruction and pleading of the faithful, beings infinitely more ignorant than Himself, in order to do that which is just and righteous and holy.
So, in your exalted view, when the Lord God listened to the prayer of Moses in Ex 32:9-14 and "... relented over the evil that He had said He was going to do to His people," He was a "divine idiot"? Is that it?
Well, my foolish, foolish friend, God is not an idiot. But the Bible does tell us that He listens to His servants.
But it is probably safer for you to keep communing with "Wilson", the volleyball god. That way you never have to risk a response. You might not like what you hear.
So, when Jesus repeatedly cited the OT as Scripture, it was "a steady indicator of theological weakness"?
does it matter to anyone what God is thinking if you're just going to run around persuading Him to change His mind every couple of minutes?
Tell me, why did Paul specifically enjoin the Ephesians to petition God? Was it just so they could have all the fun of saying rote prayers to the immutable volleyball god of the Greeks? I don't think so. But that's just one man's opinion.
ROTFL!! Oh, that's too good... just as I anticipated.
Of course I presumed that the Open-Theists would DENY the Inerrant Facticity of Jesus' statements in Matthew 11; I just wanted to see their Denial in black and white.
Naturally, they have obliged me.
The reason that I am such a "Johnny One-Note" on Matthew 11 is that, as an old Collegiate Debater, I know an airtight Logical Syllogism when I see one.
And the Words of Jesus in Matthew 11 -- which attend uniquely to the omnitemporal breadth of God's Omniscience in a way which even His Prophets (Isaiah, Job, the Psalms) do not, attending as they do to the temporal depth of God's Omniscience -- are a perfectly airtight Logical Syllogism. (But then, what would we really expect from the very mouth of the Logos Incarnate?)
They can twist the "omniscience" passages of Isaiah into strange and contrived contortions if they must, but they can't twist Matthew 11.
They must Deny the Words of Jesus outright.
And indeed -- they do.
To this, is what their theological position amounts -- precisely as I expected.
And should serve as a Warning of the heresies which await those who would deny the Sovereignty of God.
'Nuff said.
LOL!! On occasion, your apologetic sarcasm can be positively... Luther-an... in it's poignancy.
Indeed, the Prayers of the Faithful are already incorporated therein!!
"Attempt great things for God, Expect great things from God" -- William Carey, Calvinist Baptist
I think it means those sins which are not covered at all by the blood. Not every sin is forgiven.
Hank
Honestly I'm not fond of that expression, but as for not believing it, I would first have to know what it means. There is no explanation I have ever seen or heard capable of human comprehension. At some point in every explanation, there is always the phrase (or a reasonable facsimile thereor), "well we can't understand everything and you just have to accept what is taught," but we do not have to accept what is taught by men, only what is taught in the Bible.
Can you not explain what you believe using only the language of the Bible uses. Don't you think it is odd you cannot understand the Bible without the addition of some words and concepts God Himself did not deem necessary?
The word Trinity is not in the Bible. Why do you insist on it, if God never even mentions it. Do you think God forgot?
Hank
Those who are able to remember that God, who in addition to being omniscient is also omnipotent and omnipresent, has the power to bring about anything He determines or PLANS to bring about. I don't have any problem with predictive prophesy, at all.
Look at it this way. Imagine for a moment that God has ZERO foreknowledge but does have PERFECT, ABSOLUTE POWER. He could plan to bring about a thing, he could announce his plan, and he could bring it about by means of his power. His power, being absolute and perfect, could not be thwarted by anything. He could announce his plan hundreds of years ahead of time, and we would see it as prophetic, which it would be. It would certainly come about, but it would come about because of God's power driving it to completion.
Due to our previous discussions on this topic, and my ignorance of it, I purchased and just received Boyd's book, "God of the Possible" from Amazon.com. Initially, I'm most attracted simply to the problem passages that give rise to the "open theist" position (I tend to read back to front or to jump around).
To date, despite reading another's ideas, I find myself still an advocate of simple foreknowledge. Without referencing the book, let me say that Boyd hasn't really tied the ends together for me yet in terms of "WHY" God chooses not to know IF he knows all contingencies. (So far, open theism is striking me as simply a variation of the "God chooses not to look" school of theology.)
He has pointed out some interesting passages that I'd not considered, and that must be taken literally. The one that sticks in my mind the most is God telling Hezekiah that Hezekiah would die. That, clearly, was not an "anthropomorphism."
I mention the passages because I am unsatisfied with the way either calvinism or arminianism has handled these passages. They leave the literal to explain them -- and I am a literalist.
THOSE WHO ARE ABLE TO REMEMBER THAT GOD, WHO IN ADDITION TO BEING OMNISCIENT IS ALSO OMNIPOTENT AND OMNIPRESENT, HAS THE POWER TO BRING ABOUT ANYTHING HE DETERMINES OR PLANS TO BRING ABOUT, DON'T HAVE ANY PROBLEM WITH PREDICTIVE PROPHESY, AT ALL.
You treat God as if he doesn't plan and follow through on his plans. "Holy men of old were MOVED..." God initiates scripture.
Paul didn't initiate the writing of Romans, God did. As part of fulfilling His plan, he must necessarily overcome any opposition.
Accepting at face value the stories of God changing plan, regarding both Hezekiah's death and starting over in Moses, seems to me to better support an inerrant position.
It is a presupposed theology that requires these things be explained away rather than any necessity in the stories themselves.
Hank's gettin' down.
How do you understand, "He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world."
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