Real evangelism powered by the Holy Spirit (page 3)

Shining One

J.T.
If you think that all that is real is within the feeble grasp of your mind and senses then you will be truly surprised when you cast off the flesh...
Rex

Shining One

Cackle and cavort all that you want, Dan. Your comments here will not be recalled to mind by anyone here in a few days. You will account for them in eternity to your Lord, like it or not.

Rex

JamesThomas

Rex:

J.T.

If you think that all that is real is within the feeble grasp of your mind and senses then you will be truly surprised when you cast off the flesh...

Either I am a total moron at conversing, or you're not listing -- I'm not at all sure which -- because I have attempted to point to a Reality which is infinitely beyond the mind and physical senses to grasp. That, from which all universes arise from and return to. That, which is so vast and unending as to be the actual and true quintessence of all things.

j

DanTheMan

So you believe that unless I change God is going to see to it that my soul is tortured forever in Hell?

If your response does not at least start with a simple yes or no, I will not bother reading past the first word. I've noticed that you like to dodge this issue by responding with vague and euphemistic language, just like the Watchtower with their use of phrases like "destruction of this old system", which translated means a violent death for all non-jw's.

trevor

Once again we have a thread where people seek to place God in heaven or hell or beneath a church bell. Those that limit God in this way usually have a mental picture of a male deity with whom they have established a bond or relationship which must be nurtured and protected by agreeing to certain conditions and holding specific beliefs. They always expect to be rewarded with eternal life. Those that will not accept their beliefs are warned that they will perish.

In other threads they argue about the name of this male deity and try to justify the Bibles allegations of his tantrums and rages. The question of whether Jesus is of God is redundant. All that is - is of God and is God and is sustained by God. That includes everything living and all that has lived.

For God to punish people for eternity would be to punish himself. Why would God sustain life eternally with the purpose of deliberately causing eternal suffering. What crazy neurotic minds dreamed up this concept of a God?

Clam

Spot on Trevor. Good post.

trevor

Thanks Clam.

.......................................

Shining one reminds us of how fear is used to subdue the dissenters.

Cackle and cavort all that you want, Dan. Your comments here will not be recalled to mind by anyone here in a few days. You will account for them in eternity to your Lord, like it or not.

TopHat

Shining One, I personally do NOT need an organization to have a personal relationship with God.

All religious orgs. are man-made

Terry

So God is unable to not be somewhere. God is limited to having to be everywhere.
Is that what you just said?

At first I just laughed at this. Then, I thought about it. Then I stepped back to find my context to frame the question better.

Let's start this way:

1.What we "know" about God comes from where? First hand? Second hand? Third?

2.We more or less have a list of so-called attributes that narrow God down to some definitions of what he IS NOT. i.e immortal (does NOT die), etc. Add to the list the contraindicatives such as God is Love/Fear the true God.

3.When we give God a specific name (such as Jehovah) we are limiting his identity and saying he is NOT Allah, not Abraham Lincoln, etc.

Consequently, it occurs to me that the basic way of talking about an actual person is to make that person shrink to an identity/time/place as though a Cartesian co-ordinate were being drawn. Here we get into immediate trouble with all those competing descriptions of God.

Why?

God is one god; yet he has all those identities!

Holy Spirit is a vague description that practically means nothing at all; especially if we ask the question :"Is the Holy Spirit ALL that God is or only PART of what God is? The quantification/measurement is intended for actual persons/things and won't work with a mythical entity at all.

So.......

Back to your query:

So God is unable to not be somewhere; God is limited to having to be everywhere.
Is that what you just said?

If, on the one hand, God is EVERYplace it follows there can be NO place he is not. But, if God is able to NOT be some place (even desiring to not be there) there is a limit to God (even a chosen one). This presents us with a quantity of God-ness. He is no longer INFINITE in some way. This is a good thing. Why? Being infinite means God is merely a potential being and not an actual one inasmuch as the extent of infinity is an ongoing state of being and can never be an actual. (To be ACTUALLY infinite is to spout gibberish) God can only be potentially infinite.

This becomes the sort of intellectual shell game which preoccupied those stalwart folks at the Nicean Council back in 325 A.D. The Catholic church ultimately split in two (Rome/Constantinople) over such definitions as "substance". Why? Why? Why?

Here is my final word on this (not, mind you, THE final word!) subject. Every time we talk about God as though he were ACTUALLY existing as a person we compel him to NOT BE an infinite being with infinite capacities and singularities. But, if we cease submitting God to scrutiny and allow him a POTENTIALITY, then, he and we escape this difficulty altogether.

God is a conceptual construct (in my view, mind you) consisting of broad, generalized superlatives seemingly attached to a personage. Contexts, in order to fit reality, must have definitions which (among other things) tell us everything which is NOT categorically appropriate for our file folder marked GOD (or whatever) and neatly pinpoint what IS categorically appropriate.

Example: CHAIR (Chair-ness would consist of :

a. A place to put your butt

b. Legs (usually four)

c. A backrest

d. Sometimes armrests

Further, the more specificity we attach to CHAIR (definitions) the more able we are to figure out when something is maybe a stool or a couch or just a convenient place to rest. The fewer the definitions we have; the more ambiguity is possible in these decisions.

The very idea that GOD NEEDS human beings to speak for him, do his work, believe him, love him, serve him, etc. demonstrates the LACK THEREOF of same in him.

Each and every thing such as this makes God (as a concept) smaller and smaller and smaller.

Terry

Shining One

What does the Bible teach, Dan? The issue is before you and my opinion does not count. Grace offered and refused results is a choice that is sealed upon physical death. Try reading John 3:18-20, for the 'flip side' of vs. 16 & 17.Any judging will be done by our creator and not any one or group of us. He has the right to set the rules: it is His universe.
Rex

Real evangelism powered by the Holy Spirit

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