This is difficult because the Bible is so clear over and over again about God living "IN" us. While God is of course omnipresent, maybe that presence is much more pronounced in His children that have come to faith.
Also, it's not entirely facetious to say that Jesus is here "in Spirit".
I agree. I just stumbled across these together:
Rom 8:11 : And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you.
Gal 2:20 : I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
Getting a little crowded in there, so this would support your take.
It looks like the big distinction is irrevocability.
Yes, I fully agree.
It's nice that in Works of Love, if I recall correctly, Kierkegaard says that if you ever don't love God, you never loved Him.
Oh my goodness! This is SCARY weird. The first time in my life I have ever heard of Kierkegaard was 6 hours ago (in the middle of the night) while I was preparing for a Bible study next week. My deacon and I are studying the works of Francis Schaeffer and in his treatment of the history of philosophy he speaks about Kierkegaard as someone who was very important. Unfortunately, it wasn't very complimentary. :) Here are my exact notes, paraphrasing what I took from Schaeffer:
Now, this is the first time I have even dipped into philosophy so Kierkegaard, and men like Hegel, Jaspers, Sartre, and Heidegger are all brand new to me. However, I "think" I have accurately captured Schaeffer's opinion above. I'd welcome any comment. :) (I am just amazed that I read your post 6 hours after seeing his name for the first time in my whole life, and it's totally unrelated. :)
There is, I would maintain, a dynamic aspect to life in Christ. Things change over time, maybe not today, but much later I see that the prayers of my childhood were steps on the journey that led through my... well to all the stuff I've been through since then. And the leading wasn't merely a sequence in time, but there was something LIKE (not identical to, but like) causation.
Oh, I have no doubt of it. It is a lifelong building process for sure. The magic word that pops into my head for this is sanctification.
Briefly,
Kiekegaard is wrong but VERY good.
Hegel is wrong but important.
Heidegger is wrong but very very very good.
I don’t know from Jaspers.
Sartre doesn’t float my boat at all.
Yes. “Sanctification”. Yes. Eternal Justification projected onto/into time.
I’d like to bring notice of the Philosophy Department of the University of Wallamaloo, and their opinions of various philosophers, brought to you by Monty Python:
Immanuel Kant was a real pissant
Who was very rarely stable.
Heidegger, Heidegger was a boozy beggar
Who could think you under the table.
David Hume could out-consume
Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, [some versions have ‘Schopenhauer and Hegel’]
And Wittgenstein was a beery swine
Who was just as schloshed as Schlegel.
There’s nothing Nietzsche couldn’t teach ya
‘Bout the raising of the wrist.
Socrates, himself, was permanently pissed.
John Stuart Mill, of his own free will,
On half a pint of shandy was particularly ill.
Plato, they say, could stick it away—
Half a crate of whisky every day.
Aristotle, Aristotle was a bugger for the bottle.
Hobbes was fond of his dram,
And René Descartes was a drunken fart.
‘I drink, therefore I am.’
Yes, Socrates, himself, is particularly missed,
A lovely little thinker,
But a bugger when he’s pissed.
http://www.adelaide.edu.au/library/guide/hum/philosophy/philos_song.au alleged contains the audio.