I consider it a weakness on my part for not having the ability to adequately articulate my point. I am new to TOL, and debating for that matter, so I thank you again for being patient through my bumblings.
I read your post of October 2 and need you to answer a couple of concerns I have. What I read in 1Samuel 23:11-13 is God saying “He will come down.” And “They will deliver you.” Where do you read “if he remains”?
You then say that it is “by God’s knowledge that these events are averted.” I have to disagree with this. It was not by God’s knowledge per se, but by His revelation of that knowledge directly to David. If David had not gotten this information from God, he may well have remained in Keilah and averted nothing.
And this is my point. If God can truly know the future exhaustively, it seems odd that He can’t reveal that knowledge without the possibility of man’s will changing that course.
Because He knows either way exactly how it will come about. I think your what-if is problematic though and I'll try to explain.
I believe God sovereign. David's throne was established and through his lineage Christ would come, thus establishing forever. You are asking a question about 'what-if' this or that, but I see His plan unfolding by His power. What happened happened and what-if's are but speculations and OV gets really hung up on these. Philosophically, what-if's concerning God are full of problematics because it tries to bounce back and forth through the time-line while denying God that ability. Many OV assertions are logically problematic because 1) they don't recognize that they are making a linear logistic about a 'what-if' that isn't linear. Hope that makes sense, it is important to see the faults in our respective logic. 2) We are incapable of really analizing 'what-if' scenarios with logic because we are trying to jump through alternate reality hoops and again, it is difficult to build supposition when God is denied the power to do so. I've said before that OV tends to elevate man's will and logic and I believe without meaning to most of the time, is de-elevating God. When we think our logic can make these leaps and come up with straight answers and God cannot, I believe we have a real problem. Your question is dealing with an alternate reality of what actually happened.
Let me ask a couple of questions in return:
1) do you believe God mistaken in what He said? It didn't happen, right?
2) do you believe God should have just cut to the chase and told David to get the heck outta Dodge?
The questions and your answers will be speculative about those what-if's so I understand where you are coming from, but it is very precarious to make solid theology based on 'what-ifs.' Even with LWF, the definition the OV embraces is 'ability to do otherwise' which is also a speculation into an alternate reality. I don't deem speculation a good place to build a systematic theology.
If God can truly know the future exhaustively, it seems odd that He can’t reveal that knowledge without the possibility of man’s will changing that course.
It is a bit of a 'what-if' kind of question that I'm not fully understanding from you. Do you mean that man's choices can change an outcome? I'm not quite following what you are asking.
