Posted on 01/27/2008 7:56:14 PM PST by Manfred the Wonder Dawg
In which case, the answer is not so much as some.
As to wave/particle duality - it stands as a great example of the observer problem. What the observer sees depends on the observation made.
So does the uncertainty principle, by the way, stand as a great example. The observer can know momentum or location but not both.
Man is not the measure of God.
That sounds fair enough to me, MD. It has been a pet theory of mine that even though AT LEAST one of our respective theologies is filled with problems, that God might nevertheless wish us to hold the beliefs that we do.
I just don't see how God can go from being impersonal to personal (Incarnation), presumably back to impersonal today. If God is impersonal there can be no meaningful relationship. Since I know I HAVE a meaningful relationship, this cannot be. Spiritually, I think we humans have an innate need for a meaningful relationship with something real. I think the Bible reveals that this relationship is to be between God and the believer. Do you agree that there is such a need, and if so how is it fulfilled in Orthodoxy?
A Blessed Pascha to you, FK.
Thank you brother. I wish you both a most Blessed Pascha for yours upcoming. :)
More generally star differs from star in glory, and I dare guess that saint differs from saint in kind and "amount" of sanctification.
(Just a wild conjecture, but it's suggested by Dante)
LOLOL.
By the grace of God for His glory.
For whether we live, we live unto the Lord; and whether we die, we die unto the Lord: whether we live therefore, or die, we are the Lord's." -- Romans 14:7-8"For none of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself.
If we look at life as suffering, we will find suffering.
If we look at life as God's creation, eternally given to us in order to glorify His name forever, we will find joy among the thorns.
"And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose." -- Romans 8:28
A. Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.Q. 1. What is the chief end of man?
Perhaps our different perspectives are again summed up by the RCC's use of the crucifix, while Bible-believing Christians prefer the victory of the empty cross. He has risen. We are saved. Christ is King.
"Happy is that people, that is in such a case: yea, happy is that people, whose God is the LORD." -- Psalm 144:15
It's another difference in emphasis , I guess. I'm not in the confessional, in the pew, before the Sacrament, saying my prayers, studying my Bible, writing checks to charities, restraining myself from reaching right down through the phone wires and strangling the solicitation-caller or (in the real world) being nice to him before I hang up in order, or WHATEVER in order to be saved or to skew the odds or because I'm worried about being saved, or because being saved, as such, is in my mind at all.
I also don't praise the sunset or the emerald spring grass to get on God's good side.
If I have a moment of doubt or a temptation, and as soon as I'm aware of it, I cross myself and mutter "In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit." This is Catholic-speak for,"Take over, God, you have the conn."
Maybe, in terms of objective, so to speak, theology, I am just assuming that I am "saved". But, suppose I get angry and misbehave somehow. As soon as I "notice" I tell God that I know I did it and I'm sorry and ask for help to avoid messing up like that again AND I talk about it the next time I make a private confession. I just don't "worry" about being saved.
Okay: here's an image: Life is a war. I'm like a colonel. I'm doing my best to win and I'm doing my best with my troops. Sometimes I make a heck of a misjudgment -- could be for any number of reasons. That's terrible. Good soldiers died, and it's my fault -- terrible! MY failure led to horrible outcomes. BUT the war is not over. I have to take seriously how severe the mistake was, I have to understand it and to learn what I can to keep from doing it again. But I don't have time to indulge in a severe case of the dithers, to wring my hands, to get into a funk about whether this will cost us the war. It would be an even greater failure if I did do those things. So, instead, I turn back to the battle, resolved to do better next time.
I try, in the paradoxical way of working with Him who works in me both to will and to do, to hold up my end of the relationship -- which mostly means begin grateful for it.
It's the whole "hag-ridden" think again. Evidently some are hag-ridden and draw no comfort from their relationship with God. So far, since I "got" in 1971 that it was for me that He died, it has not been that way at all for me.
“Bible-believing Christians prefer the victory of the empty cross. He has risen. We are saved. Christ is King.”
“Happy is that people, that is in such a case: yea, happy is that people, whose God is the LORD.” — Psalm 144:15
There ya go - tellin’ the secrets of the TRUTH. Aren’t you sposed to keep those things hidden?
Impossible!
But that is not what the Scriptures say. Men feel a lot better and think more clearly if and when they actually read the words of God. By knowing the truth, the truth itself sustains us, as God intends.
"For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure." -- Philippians 2:13
God Bless you brother, me to! Don't say it too loud though, there was a time when people were killed for doing that. ;-0
Amen. Jn. 10:10.
10 The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.
And what a beautiful passage to underscore the point! Thank you!
It would have been great to have you me in the time from Xmas '74 to mid February '75 when we had two kids dying per week in the PICU.
"Hey people, The only reason you're feeling bad about losing your child is that you don't think properly. After all, Scripture says, '... as he thinketh in his heart, so he is.' So chin up. Your suffering at the loss of your child is just faithlessness."
Personally, I wouldn't have the nerve to try that on somebody in REAL pain.
But, for all that, it's not all entirely bad. We are obliged to conclude, I think, the Jesus was happy on the cross.
I hope you don't mind me jumping in, but do you quote any of the Donatist's as well? I think their view of historical events and their causes might differ.
Gosh, with a mesSage like this, I'd think that there'd be a lot of business in Darfur and Rwanda right now.
Y'all! You're not thinking right. So your baby's arm was cut off by some lunatic, so what? You're suffering is because you have the wrong world view. Now just sit down a minute and I'll explain the right world view to you, and your suffering will go away. Of course, you have to figure out how to explain it to your baby."
I think we might have to review our thinking on suffering. Should Jesus just have said to the ruler of the synagogue, "So your daughter's dying. But how are you thinking?" Why didn't the lady who touched the fringe of his garment just experience a sudden clarity of thought?
Your post reminds me of Rev. Wurmbrand, a Lutheran Pastor, who spent 14 years in captivity, and whom Bishop Sheen called “my very good friend”. When beaten severely by his Communist tormentors, he was then given a mirror and his persecutors said to him: “Now—do you think you look like your Jesus?” And he responded: “Yes, now I do look like Him.”
I was privileged to meet Rev. Wurmbrand.
I also often think of Saul on the road to Damascus meeting Christ, Who said to him: “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?”
Paul was persecuting the new believers. Were they Christ that he was told he was persecuting? If we are told later by Paul (Saul) that “we are the Body of Christ member for member”, then there is a profund mystery here as regards human suffering under the “New and Eternal Covenant”.
Isn’t it Scripturally sound to understand that our human sufferings have eternal value and that “if we suffer with Him, we shall also reign with Him?”
If we allow Him to come into our hearts as He promised, (”My Father and I will come and make our abode in you”) then our sufferings, offered to us by His will and providence, have infinite value. They are not lost sufferings as would be the case of those who would curse because of what they suffer.
“Master, remember me when You come into your kingdom”.
“Amen, amen I say to you, this day you shall be with Me in Paradise.”
Beautifully stated,thank you!
We should be willing to take on suffering,even ask Our Blessed Lord to allow us to suffer out of love for others who have strayed into heresies, fallen away and have wronged us.
This is true unconditional love in its purest form.
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