Posted on 01/27/2008 7:56:14 PM PST by Manfred the Wonder Dawg
January 25, 2008
ESV Romans 1:16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
In recent days I have spent time in Lima and Sullana Peru and Mexico City and I have discovered that people by nature are the same. Man has a heart that is inclined to selfishness and idolatry. Sin abounds in the remotest parts of the land because the heart is desperately wicked. Thousands bow before statues of Mary and pray to her hoping for answers. I have seen these people stare hopelessly at Mary icons, Jesus icons, and a host of dead saints who will do nothing for them. I have talked with people who pray to the pope and say that they love him. I talked with one lady who said that she knew that Jesus was the Savior, but she loved the pope. Thousands bow before Santa Muerte (holy death angel) in hopes that she will do whatever they ask her. I have seen people bring money, burning cigarettes, beer, whiskey, chocolate, plants, and flowers to Santa Muerte in hopes of her answers. I have seen these people bowing on their knees on the concrete in the middle of public places to worship their idol. Millions of people come into the Basilica in Mexico City and pay their money, confess their sins, and stare hopelessly at relics in hope that their sins will be pardoned. In America countless thousands are chained to baseball games, football games, material possessions, and whatever else their heart of idols can produce to worship.
My heart has broken in these last weeks because the God of heaven is not honored as he ought to be honored. People worship the things that are created rather than worshiping the Creator. God has been gracious to all mankind and yet mankind has hardened their hearts against a loving God. God brings the rain on the just and unjust. God brings the beautiful sunrises and sunsets upon the just and unjust. God gives good gifts unto all and above all things he has given his Son that those who would believe in him would be saved. However, man has taken the good things of God and perverted them unto idols and turned their attention away from God. I get a feel for Jesus as he overlooked Jerusalem or Paul as he beseeched for God to save Israel. When you accept the reality of the truth of the glory of God is breaks your heart that people would turn away from the great and awesome God of heaven to serve lesser things. Moses was outraged by the golden calf, the prophets passionately preached against idolatry, Jesus was angered that the temple was changed in an idolatrous business, and Paul preached to the idolaters of Mars Hill by telling them of the unknown God.
I arrived back at home wondering how I should respond to all the idolatry that I have beheld in these last three weeks. I wondered how our church here in the states should respond to all of the idolatry in the world. What are the options? First, I suppose we could sit around and hope that people chose to get their life together and stop being idolaters. However, I do not know how that could ever happen apart from them hearing the truth. Second, I suppose we could spend a lifetime studying cultural issues and customs in hope that we could somehow learn to relate to the people of other countries. However, the bible is quite clear that all men are the same. Men are dead in sin, shaped in iniquity, and by nature are the enemies of God. Thirdly, we could pay other people or other agencies to go and do a work for us while we remain comfortably in the states. However, there is no way to insure that there will be doctrinal accuracy or integrity. If we only pay other people to take the gospel we will miss out on all of the benefits of being obedient to the mission of God. Lastly, we could seek where God would have us to do a lasting work and then invest our lives there for the glory of God. The gospel has the power to raise the dead in any culture and we must be willing to take the gospel wherever God would have us take it. It is for sure that our church cannot go to every country and reach every people group, so we must determine where God would have us work and seek to be obedient wherever that is.
It seems that some doors are opening in the Spanish speaking countries below us and perhaps God is beginning to reveal where we are to work. There are some options for work to be partnered with in Peru and there could be a couple of options in Mexico. The need is greater than I can express upon this paper for a biblical gospel to be proclaimed in Peru and Mexico. Oh, that God would glorify his great name in Peru and Mexico by using a small little church in a town that does not exist to proclaim his great gospel amongst a people who desperately need the truth.
I give thanks to the LORD for allowing me the privilege of going to these countries and broadening my horizons. The things that I have seen will be forever engraved upon my heart. I will long remember the pastors that I spent time with in Peru and I will never forget Adolfo who translated for me in Mexico. I will relish the time that I spent with Paul Washer and the others. When I think of church I will forever remember being on top of that mountain in Sullana at that church which had no electricity and no roof. I am convinced that heaven was looking down on that little church on top of that mountain and very few people on earth even know that it exist. Oh, God I pray that the things of this world will continue to grow dim and that God’s people will be caught up in his glorious presence.
Because of the truth: Pastor: J. Randall Easter II Timothy 2:19 "Our God is in heaven and does whatever He pleases."(Ps. 115:3) "He predestined us according to the good pleasure of His will."(Eph. 1:5) Those who have been saved have been saved for His glory and they are being made holy for this is the will of God. Are you being made holy? Spurgeon says, "If your religion does not make you holy it will damn you to hell."
“...mono-bishophoric system....”
What’s that? You lost me, wf.
There you go assuming again what I know or don't know...
Perception is a function of "observation," whether it is "inner" or "outer." Thus, primitive man felt earth shake and created a superstitious belief that "God" was shaking the earth. The sick were "possessed" by "demons," and thunder and lightening were "God's" wrath.
Unfortunately, philosophy didn't offer a better perspective. Aristotle, for instance, "explained" gravity by concluding that all things fall because everything falls towards the center.
The Church concluded that this mist be true because "obviously" (based on the Bible) man is God's central creation, so there was your "corroboration" to claim that we are not only His central creation but actually in the center of His creation!
Luckily, some people, like Copernicus and Galileo and Kepler, and others were able to approach the issue in a matter that does not depend on one's opinion or belief as much as on whether a model works or not.
You didn't misquote scripture; you misquoted me by making it look like I was suggesting God was lying. If you didn't, you would have had no opportunity to open up with "God doesn't lie."
One should never confuse faith and reason
Well, that's epiphany! Faith has a purpose to "explain" that which is a mystery, like the lightening was to a primitive man. He believed it was God's wrath.
Man is not the measure of God
No one is comparing.
They were heretics from the beginning because they did not teach what the Church taught. The is the definition of heresy. Only Ecumenical Councils can call someone a heretic. But, then, only Ecumenical Councils can change the Creed too. It was also the first Ecumenical Council that decreed there would be no kneeling on Sundays. Obviously this never stopped the Church in the west, which acted on its own, often disregarding the binding nature of Ecumenical Councils.
As far as Donatists are concerned, they were no different than Cromwell's Puritans—they represented an extreme minority. Specifically, they rejected the absolute forgiveness for repentence professed in the Gospels. Doesn't get much more heretical than that!
Donatists were what you would call extremes, ultra-con-servatives. You have similar examples among Russia's Old-Believers and various other puritanical sects all over Christendom.
Once they denied the Sacraments of the Church, they exocmmunicated themselves from the Church.
True.. it is possible you might not know flesh is flesh and spirit is spirit.. Granting the benefit of the doubt can be arrogant, maybe..
Man is the measure of psuedo-Gods..
And there be many of them..
How's that different from Eastern Orthodoxy to this day? The Orthodox Church is organized exactly as you describe: the leader is one of the elders. All decisions are Synodal. Neither can the Synod act without the Patriarch, not the Patriarch without the Synod. His vote counts as any other bishops'.
You seem to be oblivious to the existence of the Eastern side of the Church which remains unchanged.
I didn't force you to say "Then his freedom is faux freedom. It's a charade. He is led to believe that he has freedom but God didn't tell him the whole truth—that his choices have been "preordained." He is under the impression that he is free to choose, and yet he is not. He is deceived."
You did that on your own at post 4603.
And the statement was a perfect "fall guy" for my "sermon" at 4633 as you call it, i.e. that God does not lie, Praise God!!!
Leave a door open and chances are pretty good someone will walk through it.
The very meaning of the word "church"(Eklesia) means those "called out of" sacrament. ceremony, tradition, and religious festival.. (John ch 10) and other places....
Even the word Sabbath is trumped by the Holy Spirit(paraclete)..
Jesus treated all seven days as the sabbath..
Example: Love the Lord your God, and treat your neighbor as yourself... 24/7..
On the Sabbath:
For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord's body.
For this cause many [are] weak and sickly among you, and many sleep. - I Cor 11:28-30
Since I'm into and enjoying the study of Blessed Aquinas these days... This should help(I hope) ...... "That in Created Subsistent Intelligences there is a Difference between Existence and Essence": .....(quote from Aquinas)
Hence in Exodus iii, 14, existence is assigned as the proper name of God, He who is: because it is proper to God alone that His substance is none other than His existence.
Excellent. Shame on me for not thinking of this. God IS: "I AM". That we even exist, or can know it, is fully dependent on God existing first.
“Excellent. Shame on me for not thinking of this. God IS: “I AM”. That we even exist, or can know it, is fully dependent on God existing first.”
Almost. What Blessed Thomas is saying is just what The Fathers said. God “is” or God “defines” existence. He is not saying that God “exists”, thus, “...because it is proper to God alone that His substance is none other than His existence.”
I would say that justice is an "attribute" (some people use that word differently) of God, so it must exist just as the chair does. It just has different properties, such as not having atoms. Our evidence for its existence is inferential, but nonetheless real.
Or we could wonder how the statement,"It is true that Albany is the capital city of New York" differs from "The Pythagorean Theorem is true," and whether they both differ meaningfully from, "It is true that 'truth is beauty.'"
I would say the first is true by arbitrary definition. The second is true by theory and practice. The third is just an opinion and is only true subjectively to the individual.
What kind of existence or being does the truth of those statements have? Does Truth "exist"? Does "existence itself" exist? Or, even worse, "Is there "being itself" and if there is what does "is" mean in that sentence?
"Yes" to all (yes-no questions). We can ONLY know all of these things if we start with an infinite-personal God, and know that He created us in His image. Once we accept that God is personal, and that therefore we are personal, then the existence questions fall neatly into place. If we KNOW that God is there, the real God, and that He is personal, then there should be no metaphysical problems concerning existence. That simple statement is what has confounded philosophers for centuries, all the way until this day.
ONLY a personal-infinite God can answer the needs of unity and diversity simultaneously, i.e. in the Trinity.
How (if at all) does the the word "exists" vary in meaning in the statements "Forest Keeper exists" and "The chair he's sitting on exists" and "Justice exists" and "God exists"?
Perhaps human ideas "exist" in a different sense, but all of the things you listed exist because we know for sure that God is "there". That is the crucial presupposition.
And to get closer to why we say God does not exist, "What, if anything, does God share with Forest Keeper, his chair, and Justice?"
Justice we throw out because that is already "OF" God. In terms of God being infinite, Forest Keeper and the chair are the same. In terms of God being personal, Forest Keeper was created in God's image and separated from the chair (and everything else not human). They are all the same and lower than FK, and still lower than God.
It is the "stand out from" suggestion of the word "exist" that pushes some of us to say that God does not exists. There is nothing for Him to stand out from. He is that from which created things, by His act, stand out. He, as it were, provides the matrix of existence in which created things stand out from one another and from Him.
I suppose that definition seems a little artificial to me. It is relational and perhaps helpful in all cases, EXCEPT for God. Could we say that God's existence stands out from His lack of existence? :)
Why, when God gives his name, does He choose Hebrew to do it, of all languages? Maybe because, in His providence, Hebrew is a language in which it is impossible to say clearly, unequivocally, and unmysteriously "I am that I am," since the tenses in Hebrew seem to be able to mean whatever the speaker wants, (well, almost).
I would doubt that God created and then used a specific language for the purpose of being evasive. :)
As I've said before, First we say, "God is Father, and I have some clue about that because I am a father." Then, and I'm not sure this can happen in the individual without grace and prayer, we come to realize that God is THE Father and that my relationship with my daughter is a pale and smudged imitation of real fatherhood - and that I can learn more about being a father by having frequent recourse to The Father in prayer.
I'm with you here. :) God is personal and we are personal.
“”Almost. What Blessed Thomas is saying is just what The Fathers said. God “is” or God “defines” existence. He is not saying that God “exists”, thus, “...because it is proper to God alone that His substance is none other than His existence.”””
That in God Existence and Essence is the same*
IT has been shown above (Chap. XV, n. 4) that there is an Existence which of itself necessarily is; and that is God. If this existence, which necessarily is, is contained in some essence not identical with it, then either it is dissonant and at variance with that essence, as subsistent existence is at variance with the essence of whiteness; or it is consonant with and akin to that essence, as existence in something other than itself is consonant with whiteness. In the former case, the existence which of itself necessarily is will not attach to that essence, any more than subsistent existence will attach to whiteness. In the latter case, either such existence must depend on the essence, or both existence and essence depend on another cause, or the essence must depend on the existence. The former two suppositions are against the idea of a being which of itself necessarily is; because, if it depends on another thing, it no longer is necessarily. From the third supposition it follows that that essence is accidental and adventitious to the thing which of itself necessarily is; because all that follows upon the being of a thing is accidental to it; and thus the supposed essence will not be the essence at all. God therefore has no essence that is not His existence.
2. Everything is by its own existence. Whatever then is not its own existence does not of itself necessarily exist. But God does of Himself necessarily exist: therefore God is His own existence.
4. ‘Existence’ denotes a certain actuality: for a thing is not said to ‘be’ for what it is potentially, but for what it is actually. But everything to which there attaches an actuality, existing as something different from it, stands to the same as potentiality to actuality. If then the divine essence is something else than its own existence, it follows that essence and existence in God stand to one another as potentiality and actuality. But it has been shown that in God there is nothing of potentiality (Chap. XVI), but that He is pure actuality. Therefore God’s essence is not anything else but His existence.*
5. Everything that cannot be except by the concurrence of several things is compound. But nothing in which essence is one thing, and existence another, can be except by the concurrence of several things, to wit, essence and existence. Therefore everything in which essence is one thing, and existence another, is compound. But God is not compound, as has been shown (Chap. XVIII). Therefore the very existence of God is His essence. This sublime truth was taught by the Lord to Moses (Exod. iii, 13, 14) If they say to me, What is his name? what shall I say to them? Thus shalt thou say to the children of Israel: He who is hath sent me to you: showing this to be His proper name, He who is. But every name is given to show the nature or essence of some thing. Hence it remains that the very existence or being of God is His essence or nature.
A few More..
That God is His own Essence*
IN everything that is not its own essence, quiddity, or nature, there must be some composition. For since in everything its own essence is contained, — if in anything there were contained nothing but its essence, the whole of that thing would be its essence, and so itself would be its own essence. If then anything is not its own essence, there must be something in that thing besides its essence, and so there must be in it composition. Hence also the essence in compound things is spoken of as a part, as humanity in man. But it has been shown that in God there is no composition. God therefore is His own essence.
2. That alone is reckoned to be beyond the essence of a thing, which does not enter into its definition: for the definition declares what the thing essentially is. But the accidents of a thing are the only points about it which fall not within the definition: therefore the accidents are the only points about a thing besides its essence. But in God there are no accidents, as will be shown (Chap. XXIII): therefore there is nothing in Him besides His essence.
3. The forms that are not predicable of subsistent things, whether in the universal or in the singular, are forms that do not of themselves subsist singly, individualised in themselves. It is not said that Socrates or man or animal is whiteness; because whiteness is not anything subsisting singly in itself, but is individualised by the substance in which it exists. Also the essences or quiddities of genera or species are individualised according to the definite matter of this or that individual, although the generic or specific quiddity includes form and matter in general: hence it is not said that Socrates or man is humanity. But the Divine Essence is something existing singly by itself, and individualised in itself, as will be shown (Chap. XLII). The Divine Essence therefore is predicated of God in such a way that it can be said: ‘God is His own essence.’*
That in God there is no Composition
IN every compound there must be actuality and potentiality. For a plurality of things cannot become one thing, unless there be actuality and potentiality. For things that are not one absolutely, are not actually united except by being in a manner tied up together or driven together: in which case the parts thus got together are in potentiality in respect of union; for they combine actually, after having been potentially combinable. But in God there is no potentiality: therefore there is not in Him any composition.*
3. Every compound is potentially soluble in respect of its being compound, although in some cases there may be some other fact that stands in the way of dissolution. But what is soluble is in potentiality not to be, which cannot be said of God, seeing that He is of Himself a necessary Being.
"Then" was a giweaway of what? I was responding to your ridiculous statement that Peter had the freedom but didn't because it was "perfectly possible" for predestination and free will to co-exist.
If this were true, then Peter's freedom is faux freedom and he would be deceived into believing otherwise.
I followed that with "And Christian God doesn't lie" which you conveniently left out in order for you to declare "God doesn't lie" ad make it look like I suggested otherwise. That's pathetic, A-G.
Leave a door open and chances are pretty good someone will walk through it
The door was not open. You opened it. It's like a thief who says "the alarm wasn't set, so I walked in."
But, what's good for the goose is good for the gander. Those who live by the sword, die by the sword. What you sow if what you reap.
I sometimes wonder if you even know what day of the week it is.
But what of you have no conscience (i.e. psychopaths)? What if your conscience excludes the rest and has no regard for the world around you?
Our conscience is o guide. We will be wrong vis-a-vis what Christ taught if we follow our conscience because of pride.
If Christ is the light, the way and truth then it is not or conscience but Him that we need to follow always. But we don't.
I thought this was how your church functions.
You seem to be oblivious to the existence of the Eastern side of the Church which remains unchanged.
I have a rudimentary understanding of the EO. The discussion originated with a RC poster and I was referencing the church formation in the west.
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