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To: kosta50; Kolokotronis; Quix; betty boop; hosepipe; Forest Keeper; annalex; jo kus
Thank you so very much for those beautiful astronomic pictures, dear kosta50! And thank you for your encouragements!

It is shackeling God with anthropomorphic terms that places Him into a human-sized box. The Age of reason did that very well, when it humanized God and deified man.

Indeed. Mankind has a terrible tendency to anthropomorphize God. And when he does that, he misses the power of God.

That is the spiritual truth which is always underscored for me in the book of Job. Starting in chapter 38 God spurns Job harshly for speaking words without knowledge.

Returning to the astronomy… if I may assert another aspect for your meditation.

What appears to us to be such an awesome display in the universe can instead be understood as no more than the phenomenon of the mathematics of observation.

Please take a few minutes and experiment with this interactive display of the powers of 10.

At 10+0 meters, you’ll see a bush – but decrease the powers of ten and you’ll see a universe of molecular detail. Increase it, and you’ll see astronomical vistas.

This is part of what betty boop and I call the “observer problem.” What we presume to be “real” is strongly biased to our position as an observer.

All 1080 particles in the perceptible universe, for instance, may be multiply imaged from a single particle in a fifth, time-like dimension. Matter may be a shadow of extra-dimensional momentum components we cannot yet detect. Etc.

But even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not therefore: ye are of more value than many sparrows. - Luke 12:7

Only God knows objective truth, because all beings - whether physical or spiritual - are "in" Creation but He is the Creator.

When I say that corruption predates mankind, I mean it. We did not usher corruption as the Bible says. God did not create just the heaven and the earth. That much is obvious.

My spiritual understanding is probably different from yours, but I do not find anything irreconcilable concerning corruption and the age of the universe v. the age of man.

IOW, "all that there is" is God's revelation of Himself, His will and unknowable in its fullness. The revelation is not for this heaven and earth but rather, for the next heaven and earth.

Adam was to observe good and evil. The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was placed where he could see it in the Garden of Eden. But he was not to feed on it, not to make it part of himself. By observing good fruits v evil fruits, he would have gained a better understanding of what it means that "God is good". Ditto for Light v. darkness, etc.

To use a modern metaphor, it is as if Adam was being shown a stage play [the physical universe] so that he could understand the difference between good and evil to comprehend that God is good and not evil. But instead of watching the show to absorb this revelation of God, he jumped onstage and became a part of it. He couldn’t step off the stage to be just a spectator again and thus he was banned to mortality, doomed to be an actor in the play he was intended to watch (Genesis 4.) He did it to himself. The only way Adam can get off that stage is to be born anew as a spectator, that is what Christ accomplished in the Resurrection.

So also [is] the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption: It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power: It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam [was made] a quickening spirit. – I Cor 15:42-45

This mortal life with all the good and evil, right and wrong, Light and darkness, is a detour wherein we build our own scales of justice by which we will be weighed. But it is just a stage play (to follow the metaphor) - what it is "about" is the next heaven and earth.

12,610 posted on 04/14/2007 10:11:37 AM PDT by Alamo-Girl
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To: Alamo-Girl
[.. The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam [was made] a quickening(moving/active) spirit. – I Cor 15:45 ..]
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[.. This mortal life with all the good and evil, right and wrong, Light and darkness, is a detour wherein we build our own scales of justice by which we will be weighed. But it is just a stage play (to follow the metaphor) - what it is "about" is the next heaven and earth...]
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WOO- WEE.. the metaphor adds to the truth/power of it..

12,628 posted on 04/14/2007 11:21:11 AM PDT by hosepipe (CAUTION: This propaganda is laced with hyperbole....)
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To: Alamo-Girl
. . . the mathematics of observation . . .

. . . though as I recall from an FR thread not that long ago, the old business of light being a particle or a wave DEPENDING ON whether it is observed or not--HAS NOW BEEN PROVEN FALSE.

I don't know that it matters. Perhaps all of observed aspects of the 'multi-verse' are 'mere' lights projected on God's living room wall by God's computer for God's children.

I don't know that it matters what REALITY IS. We are, in our EXISTENTIAL THROWNNESS tasked with dealing with what we observe as though it were a tangible reality that we are responsible for making choices amidst and performing actions within.

And, somehow, those choices and actions in this bootcamp will have SOME INFLUENCE on SOME ASPECTS of our RULING AND REIGNING WITH CHRIST throughout endless ages and perhaps countless multi-verses.

12,756 posted on 04/15/2007 7:37:22 PM PDT by Quix (GOD ALONE IS GOD; WORTHY; PAID THE PRICE; IS COMING AGAIN; KNOWS ALL; IS LOVING; IS ALTOGETHER GOOD!)
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