I love to read.  I don’t remember exactly how old I was when I first started reading books on my own, just because I wanted to, but I was about eleven or twelve, I think.  I remember back in the 70′s getting lost in the adventures of The Three Investigators.  While other kids who read were following the mysteries of The Hardy Boys, I found that I was more interested in this series because of the supernatural element.

I moved on to other mysteries and detective stories like Ellery Queen and Sherlock Holmes and then my Dad introduced me to Edgar Rice Burroughs.  He was the creator of Tarzan of the Apes and many other larger than life characters that operated in many fantastical, magical, fantasy filled worlds that I found more fascinating than my earlier times helping to solve mysteries.

As time went on I read many genres; westerns, fantasy, science fiction, adventure, action, suspense, horror and of course many of the classics.  From comic books to extensive collections of adventure series, I always had something to read.  I was a quiet, shy, introverted kid that found the most enjoyment while alone with a book.  I had a vivid imagination and could get lost in the worlds of many of the stories that I read.

This has carried over into my adulthood.  I still read a lot but my focus since I was born again almost seven years ago has been on all things theological.  I have focused mainly on anything that helps me to do my work for the Kingdom.  I still have many works of fiction that I intended to read before I got saved that have been placed on the back burner.

I used to read fiction, I believe, to escape this world; this world that I really did not find much joy in.  My atheism and my dislike of people in general didn’t help me in this.  The wonderful and mysterious worlds of fiction kept me engaged on a level that allowed me to find some joy at least.

The introduction to Jesus Christ and His Kingdom has changed me.  I find joy in this world and relationships now because of the changes He has made in me and because of the importance of the work I need to do for Him.  And the investigation into the mystery of God and who He is, is satisfying in and of itself.

Yesterday afternoon I read a work of fiction again.  I read The Shack.  I know that I am a little behind the times on this one and almost did not write about it but I believe I should.  I originally did not want to read this book.  The hype surrounding it actually turned me off to it.  All the highly touted books in the realm of Christianity since I got saved have let me down.

The Purpose Driven Life is more about us than Christ.  The Prayer of Jabez was a misplaced idea about incorporating something that someone else prayed for in a certain context for the enrichment of ourselves,  again.  And I don’t really believe I need to say anything about Your Best Life Now, the title says it all.

Most everyone was saying how life changing The Shack was while the fundamentalist crowd has critiqued every word for theological error.  I read a little about it and figured that I would probably just look for the error in it also.  But yesterday, while sitting alone feeling pretty lousy from this flu or cold or whatever I have, I decided to give it a try.

I read it in three hours.

It surprised me.  It was fascinating and wonderful.  I t was an amazing view of a God that loves us and wants nothing more really, than a dynamic relationship with us; and our trust.
It will probably upset some with the authors liberties in the portrayal of God but I found it rich and authentic.  The relationship of the Trinity went a long way in helping me to possibly understand a difficult concept better.

The idea of a God that reaches out to His hurting children did not quite fit the reformed concept of foreknowledge that was there but that did not bother me.  That, I believe, was the power of the story.  If you allow yourself to lose any critical attitude and immerse yourself in the story, you will get something wonderful from it.

The story and the concepts of God in it fit so well with my growing ideas about who God is.  The relational aspects of our walk with God are just now starting to come to the front of my own and others theological thought.  Emerging churches, missional movements, open theism; all of these have at their core the concept of a loving God who wants us in a rich relationship with Him and each other.  This was a major theme I saw in The Shack.

The portrayal of the trinity as truly one God is exactly what I believe also.  We tend to treat God as three separate gods in our attitudes and speech, but I have always made it a point to see the God of the Old Testament, Jesus Christ, and The Holy Spirit that is here with us now as the same being.  They all share in this relationship and in all the pain and suffering with us.

The last concept put out in the book, the necessity of forgiveness was, in my opinion not expanded as much as I would like, but it was a powerful part of the story.  Forgiveness is one of the major steps to finding peace in this world.

The author made it a point in some interviews that this is a work of fiction.  He is not trying to put out a commentary or textbook about theology.  Take it as that and you will find it enjoyable.  Life changing, I don’t know, but a valuable work to place into your mind for the enrichment of your spirit, I believe it is that.

Read it, enjoy it, but have some tissues nearby.

Love you all.

Tags: Atheism, Christianity, Church, edgar rice burroughs, ellery queen, fantasy science fiction, foreknowledge, Holy Spirit, Jabez, Jesus Christ, Kingdom, Love, mission, Prayer, Relationships, Self, sherlock holmes, spirit, Supernatural, supernatural element, tarzan of the apes, Theology, worlds of fiction

That sounds like the beginning of a joke. And it usually is, but not this time. Not unless the joke is on me. Just how low am I willing to go to get you to read this stuff?

I did walk into a bar one night nineteen years ago with nothing more than the intention of having a few beers. I was not looking for anything else, especially company. Little did I know that this seemingly insignificant moment in my life would result in one of the determining factors of my eternal destination.

This was the night that I met my wife, Tammy. Before this I had never met a Pentecostal. And believe me, she was not Pentecostal then. But she had been raised attending the very church we are a part of today. There were various reasons she was where she was at that time but that is not the focus of this post.

It did not take her very long after we settled down into marriage to go into service to Christ and the Kingdom. And that is when the change for me started. I had been an avowed atheist since my mid teens and had already argued with many Christians about the non existence of God. I had did it for fun mostly and just because I liked to argue, if I could win.

Now I realize that all the arguments with Christians were with those Christians of the reformed persuasion. These are the ones that hold to a view of God’s sovereignty and foreknowledge that does not allow for anyone to do anything that is not at His whim or with His permission. When faced with the real questions of how a God could be both loving and good, yet allowed or instigated all the evil that surrounds us and has for all time, according to history, most Christians crumbled or fell back to the mysterious, but still wonderful, ways of a God that was not for us to understand, defense.

Needless to say, they did not convince me that I was wrong or that He was real.

But then I met Tammy, married her, and she got saved. What I did notice, even though I did not care at that time, was that she seemed to have a real relationship with something I did not even believe in. My grandmother did too. And if I had been willing to discuss these things with them, I might have had a change of mind a lot sooner. But I never wanted to argue with them. Or maybe the enemy deceived me into keeping my mouth shut so he would not lose me. It was probably both.

The relational and interpersonal method of worship, the interaction with God as a true Father figure, the open view of His attributes, power, and actions shown by the very ways Pentecostals live for the Kingdom, (even if they won’t admit it and their theological speech implies reformed thought), are the true power of being Pentecostal. God is not some distant, egotistical, tyrant like figure that causes all things to happen, whether good or bad, for His glory. Instead He is a loving Father that wants the best for His children and invites us to come to Him, giving ourselves to Him fully, so He can direct our lives in the best possible way.

This is what meeting Tammy caused me to start seeing. That is not the end of the story of my transformation but it was the beginning. Did God set us up to meet? Did He direct all of this? I seriously doubt it but do admit that I don’t know for sure. But as promised, He does work it all out for good, if we allow Him to. Even if we might be in a bar when we shouldn’t be.

So a guy walked into a bar, that guy being me, and looking back, I am so glad I did.

Back then.

Love you all

Tags: atheist, Christ, Christians, Church, Enemy, Evil, Father, foreknowledge, Kingdom, Knowledge, Lie, Love, Marriage, mission, Pentecostal, Personal, relationship, Service, Sovereignty

Some people will find everything I said in my last post repulsive and heretical.  The very idea that I would try to limit God is intolerable and immediately calls into question my trust in the Bible.  I want to assure all that the Bible is first and foremost where I go to find wisdom and understanding. 

What I do not find particularly trustworthy is the traditions of man.  We all seem almost incapable of leaving our preconceived beliefs out of our discussions and interpretations.  That includes me.  But some will say, who are you to question the conclusions of the great theologians of the past such as Augustine, Aquinas, Luther, Calvin, etc.  Even the most prestigious contemporary scholars such as Sproul, Piper, and McArthur hold to the view of absolute exhaustive foreknowledge.  Although that is not the terms they would use.  So who am I?

These theologians have concluded that God is so far above us and different from us that the views I am bringing to the discussions here are seen as simply trying to bring Him down to my level.  But ask yourself this. 

When God said let us create man in our own image, did we or did we not inherit emotions or states of mind such as wonder, surprise, excitement, awe, hope, optimism, and other positive human qualities? These good qualities had to come from God; we did not develop them ourselves. Therefore, what is so illogical about a God who also gives himself the luxury of experiencing awe, wonder, surprise and hope? Or is our God a being that has always been devoid of surprise, wonder, and exploration?  As naturally He would if He already saw everything.

In a view that holds to God having to react to our choices we see a God that loves and enters into a relationship with us.  In a view that holds to God being outside of time and far away and already knowing everything before it happens we actually place limits on God that the Bible just does not show us.

Taking the idea of absolute exhaustive foreknowledge at face value, let’s go farther back in time, even before any being in any world, or even in heaven, existed. Only God exists. God sees everything happening.

Can God do anything different than what God foresees happening?

Foreseeing everything that will happen, how can God choose to not create the angels and especially Lucifer?

So what is in control, time or God?  Prescience or God?

Do you see how a known future seems to force even God under its determining flow?

At this strong, absolutely knowable future level, then even God doesn’t have a choice in creating what He has foreseen. Does it really make sense for God to create all the pain? When you really think about it, in this scenario, how can we not argue over foreknowledge while the rest of the world wonders why we bother?  It must have been foreseen. 

Here, some of you may say, “that is just the mystery of salvation,” but when one confronts the true horror of unnecessary human suffering repeated billions of times through earth history, a God who knew it all along, even before Lucifer, becomes either despotic or controlled by time itself.

Do you see how in the theodicy problem, responsibility has to be placed on God if He knew exactly what was to happen?

Do you see how making God know the future absolutely makes God a slave to the stream of time as well?

All of this comes from the Greek deification of time itself, as Chronos, and making the gods and themselves dependent on Fate.  This is fatalism.  It is very similar to Calvinism, although you will never hear one admit it.  Richard Rice said the following in a book called The Openness of God: A Biblical Challenge to the Traditional Understanding of God…

“If at creation God knew with absolute certainty that man would fall, He was not risking the moral harmony of the universe in making man: He was simply sacrificing it.” 

And that sacrifice is not the one shown to us in the Word of God.  Instead we see a different sacrifice because of the fall, the sacrifice of Himself. 

If God does truly, absolutely, foreknow all that is ever to happen, I simply cannot see that true free will is possible.  And the thought of having no free will would make me kiss Christianity good-bye.

In the classic science fiction series, Dune, the complete story is about a family who gain the power to predict the future, but discover that they are in fact creating the future.  Their prescience actually created and they are then trapped in their creations. The first in the line is Paul Atreides.  He seeks the power of prescience but, when he obtains it and has it long enough to realize the nature of it, he just wants to die.  But he can’t until it is the right time to die.  Which will be when he foresaw it. 

The last “god emperor” of Dune decides to breed people whose actions cannot be predicted so no one will ever gain this power again. The thing he ultimately craves is someone who will surprise him.

How else can God truly delight in us if not in our ability to “surprise” Him with our right choices?

Pro 12:22  …but those who act faithfully are his delight.

Jos 24:15  …choose this day whom you will serve, …

It seems Joshua believed, as I do, that we have a choice. 

Love you all

Tags: Aquinas, Augustine, Belief, Calvin, Calvinism, Creation, Discussion, Dune, Faith, foreknowledge, Free will, God, Interpretation, Knowledge, limits on god, Lucifer, McArthur, Paul Atreides, piper, Richard Rice, sproul, traditions

The modern Christian conception of God does not actually come from the Bible. Instead, its roots can be found in the writings of Plato and Aristotle. And the God of Greek philosophy is far more remote and inhuman than the one portrayed in both the Old and New Testaments. This has created a tension in the field of theology that does not really answer any of the questions that the atheist or the hurting lost souls of this world so desperately need.

I have been in a few discussions on this site and in my class on Wednesdays about these concepts.  Some might even call them arguments.  There are a couple of us that get a little passionate about our beliefs. 

There are different aspects to classical theism that I do not subscribe to and I have attempted to create a dialogue about such things as Gods omnipotence, His omniscience, and other attributes and how they relate to a proper understanding of the reality of spiritual warfare. 

In my group of brothers and sisters in Christ I have not found much resistance with the idea that we have free will or that God does not definitively control all things.  The area of most resistance, surprisingly, has to do with God’s foreknowledge of events and free will choices. 

I do not believe we can actually have free will or make true choices if God already knows the choice.  How can I not make the choice He has already seen?  But some seem to think my question should instead be, how can God’s or anyone’s prior knowledge interfere with (cause to happen or prevent from happening) my present choice or future decision to act?

A friend made this statement, “I know that I will not rob a bank today. That does not mean I don’t have a choice. I know what my choice will be, yet I can freely choose.”

My answer is that if God knows the future like you or me, then there is no free-will problem. In fact, this comparison of divine omniscience to human inferred knowledge is essentially what I hold to be true, instead of the sovereign view which would say that God knows, unlike you, that you would most definitely not rob that bank. You know you would not, based on your knowledge of who you are, and God knows you would not, based on the same thing.  Not on the basis that He has already seen your day come to its conclusion.   

I’d like to raise God to be higher than this view.  I believe God knows more than us, namely every possible choice we can make. I believe God just doesn’t know in the absolute sense, which choices we will make until we actually make them.

The fact is that we all “know” things that don’t actually happen the way we expected.  What if someone, at gunpoint, forced you to rob a bank?  That would force you to do something that you knew at the beginning of your day you would not do.

To really understand the classical view I am talking about, this concept of infinite divine foreknowledge as put out by classical theism, we must see it as having zero contingency.  If God absolutely knows what will happen before it happens, then there is neither meaning nor responsibility for human choice. This determinism is the foundation of most of the moral complacency of Greek fatalism. The common view of the sovereignty of God is really due to the scholastic merging of Aristotle’s thoughts, not from study of the very dynamic God of the Bible.

Let’s take a look at a logic problem.

1.    God’s having absolute foreknowledge implies that if I mow my lawn on Saturday afternoon, then God saw at an earlier time that I would mow my lawn on Saturday afternoon.

2.    Necessarily, all that God has seen is true and absolute.

3.    No one has the power to make a contradiction true.

4.    No one has the power to erase someone’s past knowledge, that is, to bring it about that something known in the past by someone was not known in the past by that person.

5.    No one has the power to erase someone’s existence in the past, that is, to bring it about that someone who did exist in the past did not exist in the past.

6.    So if God foreknew that I will mow my lawn on Saturday afternoon, I can refrain from mowing only if one of these conditions is true:
(i) I have the power to make what God has seen false.
(ii) I have the power to erase God’s past foreknowledge.
(iii) I have the power to erase God’s past existence.

7.    Alternative (i) is impossible. (This follows from steps 2 and 3).

8.    Alternative (ii) is impossible. (This follows from step 4).

9.    Alternative (iii) is impossible. (This follows from step 5).

10.  Therefore, if God foreknows that I will mow my lawn on Saturday afternoon, I do not have the power to refrain from mowing my lawn on Saturday afternoon.

Work on that one and I leave you with this thought based on years of actually believing it and still not seeing an answer in the classical view of absolute exhaustive foreknowledge.

One of atheism’s strongest condemnations of Christianity is, if God (if there is one!) absolutely knows what will happen, why does he allow the world to go on with all of its atrocities and horror?  Why doesn’t He change things? Why did He even bother?

I know from experience that none of your answers will satisfy.

Love you all

Tags: Atheism, Belief, Bible, Christianity, classical theism, Discussion, divine omniscience, foreknowledge, Free will, greek philosophy, Knowledge, Lie, Love, Sin, Spiritual Warfare, Theology