Covenant Hearts’ Blog

To quit the discussion at this juncture is to quit thinking and “prove” your own point that there can be no conclusions on absolutes.

I come from a very different school of thot…while most ppl are in their beds sleeping I am a slave driver—pushing my intellect past it’s biases into the plane of absolute truths….

I readily admit when I am wrong…I have had plenty of practice…at 25 yrs old I have admitted being wrong twice as often as most ppl do by 50—thus I am four times further along in my intellectual development than most ;) obviously a math joke…with a hint of truth.

I am reformed, but I did not start that way. I am a Christian but I did not start that way. I hold to libertarian ideology but I did not start that way. I hold to free market economic theories but I did not start that way. I am in a box but I did not start that way…or I started in the same box that most ppl are still in, you can phrase it anyway you like, but I am a “truth seeker” and can easily detect untruths…I have a knack for it and have trained myself to do this for many years…

And I listen…that is my strength…ppl may not think I listen but I do…that is how I know so much. Only becuz I listen. I have listened/read as much as I can/could and sifted the truth from the lies…I have a working body of knowledge/wisdom and the gift of understanding…to understand philosophers and their dark sayings…

I have mathematical as well as visual acumen…I do not allow my own thots to cloud my judgments. I know pride…I have it, I’ve been horribly humbled. Jesus was humble, but he did not budge on truth.

I am not Jesus, but where I detect self-contradiction…I too will not budge…but I now have just come to the startling realization that to further discuss this with you would result in a loss of friendship before truth could be culled from the mess…

Jeremiah 20:17 Because he did not kill me before birth, So that my mother would have been my grave, And her womb ever pregnant.

I really think this provides some grotesque imagery in consideration of one of America’s favorite past-time: abortion. Abortion is “killing before birth.” No denying that. Even if it isn’t murder, it is killing something that was alive…

But it is murder and that’s what makes it worse. You have turned an instrument of life into a chamber of death. God gave sexual intercourse, a wonderful thing, between a man and his wife. This act serves a two-fold purpose: bonding the couple and producing offspring. Lord knows that if sex wasn’t how children were made and they were made in some neutral fashion as to be a chore, then we as a human race would’ve died out long ago by disobeying His command to be fruitful and multiply.

The womb ought to be a haven not a hades, safe not sheol, help not hell, peaceful not purgatory, life not death…

LORD, let all of these things mentioned happen/cause them to happen so “That they may know that You alone, whose name is the LORD, Are the Most High over all the earth (Psalm 83:18).”

As Christians we take the Law-Word of God to be our ultimate presupposition, for it is God’s revelation to us. The Scriptures teach that God is the Most High. In theological/philosophical language we say that God is and that God is Sovereign.

If these thoughts are not the starting point of our thinking then we have already gone astray from our very intellectual “birth.” Yes, original sin has even influenced our intellect besides will and emotions; thus it is imperative that we rely on the Word alone to give us the foundations of thought and life.

Following this then, get rid of any ideas of autonomy. Just say no to: natural law theory and instead embrace some degree of theonomy (be pro-God’s law), rationalism and instead let God remain true and every man a liar (even if it doesn’t make sense to our human reason) and autonomy and instead embrace sovereignty (because the LORD He is the Most High).

What is it that drives a man to seek the truth? What causes him to hunger and yearn for that which he does not know?

At what point does this go away? Why does a man think he has found the ultimate truth? What makes him spew forth bile in defense of his [probably] erroneous views?

To be sure, we as Christians ought to be valiant for truth. We should know what we believe and why we believe it. If you are being questioned then you ought to be sure in what you believe. But when you debate, not being any less sure, you ought to present yourself in such a way as to have a winning spirit/attitude.

I guess this spirit of animosity between people who like to debate their beliefs is due in great part to lack of study of rhetoric. Rhetoric is the use of forms and methods in speech or writing that serve to convince the listener or reader of what you are saying. Obviously it should not be used for spreading lies, but has been and can be abused this way. If you believe that you hold to the truth, then win people to your belief.

Take the time to study rhetoric. Learn about logos, ethos, and pathos. Learn rhetorical forms such as alliteration, several variants of repetition, and so many others. This is assuming that you have also studied logic or will simultaneously study logic; it is also necessary.

It is shameful that we as Christians do not follow our Lord. He was gentle and winning to the lost…He was scathing and accusing to those who knew better…He was true and righteous altogether.

Posted by Me on an OAO Message Board:

joem said:…exhaustive foreknowledge…equals exhaustive predestination…

jesse said:…If God eternally foreknew all that will unavoidably occur, God could never decide what will occur…

I think these statements are mutually exclusive. And as such, one or both statements must be wrong. And if wrong, then the philosophical underpinnings of these statements must also be wrong. So which one is wrong?

I agree with foryou that in God’s perfection He could foreknow all events in time including His active role in it and not need to change anything. God is powerless to originate a current idea/action in the same way that He is powerless to sin, IE change from being perfect.

Malachi 3:6 For I am the LORD, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.

In addition, God is the creator…Including being the creator of time. If you say He sovereign; He is not limited by time. There can be no “moment” for Him in eternity. To discuss sequence or moments, presupposes that He is limited by time. Is God in time or eternity? Time begins and ends. God has given us this picture in creation/natural revelation. God has no beginning and no end. If you can comprehend this, you can comprehend the incomprehensible.

I being a creature in time and space cannot fathom anything that is beyond time or space. This is why God has to reveal Himself for someone to know Him. That is why He uses Parables, analogies (heck, all knowledge is analogical), poetry, allegories, prophetic imagery and such the like. He cannot say I am like “X”. Because there is only one “x” like Him and that is the “X,” IE Himself; thus all knowledge of God is derivative and is in universal terms: the three “universal” omni’s or universal negative (versus affirmative) definitions: eternal (without time) and pure/holy (without blemish). For we know not what “eternal” or “pure” really mean since we experience neither eternity nor consummate holiness.

I agree with foryou that we must always return to scripture. We cannot start with the scripture and finish with philosophy. We must start with scripture, and be always checking our philosophy each step of the way by scriptural principles; concluding with something that does not contradict scripture or else we have erred in our surmising.

Posted on OAO Message Board, Topic: The future as both CERTAIN and CONTINGENT

I believe that God created the world, because that’s what the Bible says. I believe that God has an elect and that He will lose none of them, because that’s what the Bible teaches. But I think that we are missing something, all of us. How do we determine these ideas to be philosophically equivalent? But that is what God is calling us to. The Bible is true, it is God’s word. We are required to understand His Word comparing scripture with scripture. I don’t really have a great answer for the scripture you quoted (scriptures which seem to imply that man is a free moral agent), I can give you the textbook response:

God’s eternal decreetal [perfect] will is what must happen because God has determined that it will be so. And yet nothing happens but by the will of God, thus it is by His permissive will that He foreordains that sin will enter the world and His plan of redemption executed (no pun intended).

God doesn’t want some poor soul to be raped, murdered, mutilated, castrated or incarcerated/tortured. Except for the restraining work of the Holy Spirit, we would see quite a bit more evil in this world. It is not that he chose this person to be decimated, but that He chose you or me not to be…THIS is the grace of God…God hates sinners, while I was a sinner Christ died for me, Christ died for someone He hated. Love is a decision that God made according to His own pleasure.

If the Bible teaches that God has predestined the elect and yet calls all men to repentance, then we must hold both as scriptural not rejecting the one we don’t like. One day we will fully understand how they are consistent with each other.

If the Bible teaches that God hath declared the end from the beginning and that He is not the author of sin, then we must hold both as scriptural not rejecting the one we don’t like. One day we will fully understand how they are consistent with each other.

If the Bible teaches that God changes His mind and says that He changeth not, then we must hold both as scriptural not rejecting the one we don’t like. One day we will fully understand how they are consistent with each other.

Posted by Michaelsei (that’s me!) on Helium.com

This is truly the wrong question to ask. As usual we approach thinking about God in a self centered way. “Why, God, do I deserve to be punished?” Instead we ought to raise our level of awareness to the depth of reality; which is: God is righteous. When we think in this way about God, the issues become clearer. That is not to say that we will like the conclusions, but that they do begin to make sense.

If you will accept the statement, “God is righteous,” as a premise, then I can show you by this thinking: (1) that God must send people to hell, (2) God is loving, and (3) hell is not what we should be worried about.

In order to really understand what it is at issue, we need to decipher this statement: God is righteous. First, when I say “God” I am personally talking about the triune God of the Bible. Second, when I use the word “righteous” I really mean that righteousness as we know it is simply a reflection of who God is and what He is all about. God holds the moral high ground and as such is righteous and without sin. Note: He is without sin. As a consequence He cannot sin. That is to say God cannot contradict Himself. Furthermore He cannot allow sin to enter His presence (or glory; truly God is everywhere and sin is too so that makes me a liar. No, for the sake of simplicity I will use the word “presence” what I really mean is “glory.”). We know this concept anecdotally as, “I’ll burst into flames if I go into church!” and/or as a phrase, “No man can see God and live.” Thus it is clear to see that God must send people to hell because God is righteous and cannot allow sin in his presence.

If God is righteous and is the standard of righteousness, then we who are mere mortals are bound to His Law-Word. Let me ask you a question; have you ever sinned? Let me be more specific; have you ever lied? cheated? stolen anything? Perhaps you have had anger without merit towards another (even if you think you were justified, your thinking was clouded by emotion so how can you be sure?). Maybe you have lusted after someone. If you have done any of these you have broken God’s Law-Word. God calls this sin. In light of the previous paragraph you can only conclude that all men must be headed for hell. Who can say that they have not sinned? If you can show me someone like that then you may have found a liar. So God destroys all of humanity in a vengeful spirit, end of story. No. He sends His Son to take the punishment for sin and makes a way to seek and find Him in this dark and fallen world. Not all are saved. Not all want to be saved. But for those who are saved, the love of God is not merely an intellectual idea but an experienced ideal. So what is the love of God? The love of God is that He is not allowing everyone to perish in their sins but He is saving some. That is real mercy and grace. “To err is human, forgive divine.” Why do we say this? Because it is so hard to forgive. God does forgive, this is love. Seek and find Him and you too will experience that love.

What can be worse than hell? Well, what God says is worse than hell for starters. What place has God prepared for the devil and his demons from before time began? Where will He send all of the unrepentant sinners on that Final Day of Judgment where time will end and [for us] eternity begin? The answer: what the book of Revelation refers to as the Lake of Fire. The lake of fire is not hell. It is not synonymous with hell and should not be confused with hell. Hell is bad, yet it is only temporary. The lake of fire is worse, but it is everlasting. If this does not unnerve you then do not ever say, “I wasn’t warned.”

Yes it is true that if you end up in hell you cannot change your religion, start serving God and go to heaven after all is said and done. Your chance to go to heaven really does exist. God is love and has made a way for you to avoid the lake of fire. Seek after Him and find Him. Acknowledge His existence, then follow Him. Read His Law-Word and obey it. If you believe Jesus (i.e. believe what He taught) and that God raised Him from the dead, then you will be saved. If you persevere in this faith you will be saved. Obey Him by getting baptized. But if any of these elements are missing then you have reason to doubt your salvation (if you “used to be” a Christian but are not persevering then it is probable that you never were saved). If there are any doubts as to the truth of my statements then seek the truth and you will find it. Or contact me.

How could a loving and righteous God NOT punish unrepentant sinners? If He did not punish them, how could He reward the repentant sinners (now called saints)? Reward and punishment are two sides to the same coin (two “faces” of the one God). That is, whatever face of God we are beholding when we die is the face of God we will experience for eternity. So in a way, bear with me, we could say that a loving God could not send people to hell. Let me leave you with this last thought: God’s wrath sends people to hell, but God’s love saves some from hell.

To introduce this topic let me give a bit of my background.

I was raised in a Christian home. So naturally I became a Christian because I believed everything I was told, right? NO! I believed what my parents taught me was true, but that did not make me a Christian; in fact I resisted it.

In my teen years, as many others do, I was searching for identity. But did I look to Christ first? No. I looked elsewhere. I was particularly interested in mythology. But any thinking person could not accept mythology as true. It cannot be true. There is no basis for morality in mythology (specifically the Greek/Roman types). So I continued searching.

I started looking into other more modern myths such as vampirism, but was quickly dissuaded. I came to the realization that Christianity seems to be the most reason-able religion, but really just based upon my limited experience and introspective reflections. So then I accepted what my parents believed then, right? Have you learned by now that I do not do that. I did not.

I wanted to know if maybe other “Christian” branches had the truth; I looked into Catholicism then the Eastern Orthodox. But I did not find truth there either. This took place when I was about fifteen. I had not found the truth for myself. I believed my parents’ faith to be true, so by default I accepted what they believed as true.

In the winter I was seventeen going on eighteen, I had what Christians call a conversion experience. The faith of my father became my own faith. I had finally found the truth. Something awakened inside of me and I yearned so much for the truth of God’s Law-Word that I read it every day, every chance that I got.

This is how I came to believe in God. But that is not to say that I have no rational basis for belief in His existence. I do. But as a caveat let me note that no one will become a Christian just because they read what I say and believe in the existence of God. God has to reveal Himself to the individual for them to truly put their faith in Him.

Transcendental Argument for God’s Existence*:

There is proof that God exists. But if you expect me to upload a picture of that proof you are severely mistaken as to the nature of the question: “Does God exist?” The proof is not materialistic and it is not empirical. It is philosophical. Now, I am not a trained philosopher, but I will do my best to open up for you the enigma that is the philosophical proof of God’s existence.

Normally we argue and debate about things we believe or do not believe, but this proof goes beyond that. In order to deal with the claim of God’s existence we call for proof. But in order to provide proof we must first deal with what qualifies as proof. Do you see how you have to keep going backwards until you find the starting point?

So what qualifies for proof? Some might say a miracle or an appearance of God. But is that the only thing that can qualify as proof? To an empiricist or a skeptic, yes. I believe that would be the only thing they would accept as proof. Wait a second, what is up with the “empiricist” or “skeptic” talk? What I am saying is that there are differing philosophical schools of thought; and differing schools have differing criteria on how they arrive at their conclusions. If a “monist” and a “dualist” get into a debate they will most likely “speak past” each other. Why? The reason why communication breaks down is because everything known by a person is interpreted by their understanding. That is to say, your world view affects everything you believe; and people who hold differing world views cannot rationally resolve their disagreements without first dealing with the problems between their world views. What is next?

You have to talk about presuppositions and the pre-conditions of intelligible experience. This is the only way to rationally resolve the differences between world views. The proof of the Christian God is that without Him no other world view makes any sense. Without Him no other world view can rationally sustain an argument as to the origins of laws of logic, scientific laws and laws of morality. No other world view besides the Christian theistic world view can account for these laws in a consistent and internally coherent manner.

As to the laws of logic, the atheist cannot “logically” prove why we must use the laws of logic. As to the laws of science, the atheist cannot prove the basis for scientific laws. As to the question of morality, without God who is the arbiter of right and wrong? They cannot give a reasoned response. Morals are either conventions, stipulated or arbitrary. How then can they be laws?

The Christian theist has answers to these questions. What is the basis of these laws? The laws of logic are a reflection of the thinking of God. Morality is a reflection of the character of God and scientific laws reflect the way in which Gods sustains the creation. How do we know this? God has revealed this to us by His Law-Word.

The Bible reveals to us who God is and what He is all about. Consequently the world reflects this (general revelation). We see this in our everyday experiences. We view the world through our understanding and it logically makes sense because we know God. The atheist views the same world. Surprisingly it makes sense to him too. But the problem is he has borrowed the Christian theistic world view in order to make use of the tools of logic.

The laws of logic do not arise organically from an atheistic perspective and as such they cannot hold to a non-contradictory view of the world. Thus at the root atheism is irrational.

The proof of the existence of God is that without Him you cannot prove anything.