I suppose you mean "thief", where He comes, takes, and leaves. But if He wasn't there, then was, then wasn't. The absence alone is not enough to cause the melting/atomic explosion, since He wasn't there before He was, even if He won't be there after He was. These may be two different states, but all we have there is two similar states, separated by a different state. "Not there" then "there" (comes) then "not there" again. And if He's in the first "not there" state, and we still aren't melting with fervent heat, then the latter "not there" state is not sufficient reason for everything to melt.
Yes, but constant?
As I said, perhaps a bit of AC and DC by analogy. John 15:5 is talking about being 'plugged in.' The Vine/branches analogy always means life is plugged in. Paul uses it often as in 'grafted in.'
A distinction: *Unbelievers are not 'plugged in' but in every sense that we are Christians, we negate our will against God and are subsumed by Christ, His love, His desires according to the Spirit with'in' us. "In" us is a reality, not figurative but it doesn't have to necessitate physically. We have to understand that our new life is spiritual and 'plugged in' grafted into Christ in God. Scripture often uses 'in.'
Here's the one that I gravitated toward:
Barnes' Notes on the Bible
For in him we live - The expression "in him" evidently means by him; by his originally forming us, and continually sustaining us.
But Barnes resorted to "evidentiary" meaning. So he needed some figurative leaning as well. "In" doesn't normally mean literally "forming and sustaining". It just doesn't.
Glad the link was helpful for information. "In" is literal, real, face-value but we usually are talking about physical things and envisioning physical things when we talk about being 'in.' If we are 'in' God's love, we catch that it is real, in the literal sense. We aren't meaning 'figuratively' unless what you are saying here is not 'physically' in. I'd agree if I'm catching what you are meaning. "In" means something literal but not physical. God isn't physical.
But not solely by His sustaining power. I suppose if we are dead/blown to bits, there's no decision we can make, but while we're not in that condition, we can make decisions by the power He granted us, including to do wrong. So if He's not manipulating us to do wrong (please tell me you reject that idea), then His "sustaining power" isn't causing any decisions.
Yes. This is how I'd reckon it as well and how I've understood. If we leave 'in' against any physical notion behind for a moment, these theologians can yet mean we are 'physically sustained' and that is the vast majority of the estimates you read there. Bringing back 'in' for a moment, they think AC/plugged in because so much of scripture is a command to 'abide in me.' John 15
We believers give Him sovereignty over our decisions if we're "plugged in" (abiding in Him). If not, then our decisions are going against His will until He decides to finally conform us to His will...by completely restricting our access to all that is good if we don't willingly conform.
Agree. With our without a 'cord' we are responsible for our choices and have been given the kind of 'self autonomy' you are talking about.
AMR, if you remember him, said we had a 'culpable' will. Clete is correct that such Calvinists are compatiblist/a combination of ideas different than a double-pred Calvinist. He said double-pred was heresy. I've ever been 'close' to a 5 point without going the whole way specifically because my 'limited atonement' has never been like they believe. I simply say "of course it is limited when one rejects it." They believe like Clete, because of perfect definite foreknowlge, God cannot offer to those He already knows are going to be saved, but I rather say: He causes the rain to fall on the just and unjust. The same miracles that caused Israel to trust God during plagues, caused Pharoah's heart to harden.
Well, if we are not in the condition of having been bought with a price, then there was a time when we weren't in that condition. Either way, the condition is not merely always accurate in description. Are we talking about everybody in the body of Christ? Which would exclude those not a part of his body. So then it can't be talking about the same thing as "in Him we live and move ed to and have our being", since that was to be universally applied to all men, believers or not.
*see the asterisk above. I think it echoes your thoughts.
So if there is a "not plugged in" condition, it isn't the same subject as "in Him we live and move and have our being."
Not exactly, but as you've read, the idea is 'sustains everything' as Colossians intimates both by 'in' and 'upholds' (sustains-but JR doesn't like that definition).
So I think we're in agreement. It isn't literal.
If you mean 'not physical' I'm open to a challenge. I'm not sure if God has us on AC or DC but if you mean 'in' I think you are also meaning not literal.
I think it better to separate the two ideas:
1) We are powered to exist either by being plugged in and charged and let go, or with power somehow still connected. It boggles my mind because we are talking about the physical not being the reality, but a result of Someone 'not physical.'
2) "In" means something literal, but doesn't
have to mean physical.
Is one of these what you are saying? Something else?
Ok. i get the two confused some.
Oops, I said that wrong! That idea was panentheism. Pantheism is "God is everywhere and in everything' and confines God generally to the physical universe.
We aren't just physical beings. Often, even as believers we mistake our 'tents' (as the Apostle Paul calls our bodies) as 'us.' We are spiritual.
Romans 8:10
