ARCHIVE: Open Theism part 2

[Clete]

Is there anything in existence which is outside of God's domain, control, or providence?

I told you! Ask Jesus or Jeremiah (or any number of the other prophets, for that matter)!

Matthew 23:37 “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!" - Jesus

Jeremiah 19:5 "they have also built the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command or speak, nor did it come into My mind" - Jeremiah

Acts 7:51 “You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you." - Stephen​

Resting in Him,
Clete

P.S. For those of you who are thinking, "Why does Clete put himself through this torture with RobE?" GOOD Question! Don't worry! I have no intention of actually engaging him. This silly little argument of his is just so simple to refute, I couldn't resist the opportunity to make him look stupid again. Not that he need my help to do that, its just fun, thats all.

 

[lee_merrill]

Repeat after me: Group dynamics.

Group dynamics are not certain--and this is the Lord's sentence, not his observation--nor his estimate. And the Open View cannot explain how God knows this--What, they cannot all repent?

And if it is ever like the days of Noah, there must be a remnant, so Noah cannot refuse?

Then I wonder how Noah is a group!

Blessings,
Lee

 

[lee_merrill]

I told you! Ask Jesus or Jeremiah (or any number of the other prophets, for that matter)!

Matthew 23:37 “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!" - Jesus

Isaiah 45:17 But Israel will be saved by the Lord with an everlasting salvation; you will never be put to shame or disgraced, to ages everlasting.

Jeremiah 19:5 "they have also built the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command or speak, nor did it come into My mind" - Jeremiah

Ezekiel 20:25 I also gave them over to statutes that were not good and laws they could not live by; and I defiled them through their very gifts in their offering up all their firstborn, that I might devastate them. I did it that they might know that I am the Lord.

Acts 7:51 “You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you." - Stephen

1 Peter 2:7-8 But to those who do not believe, "The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone," and, "A stone that causes men to stumble and a rock that makes them fall." They stumble because they disobey the message-- which is also what they were destined for.

Because they resist the Holy Spirit, this does not then mean God's decision was for them to believe. The Open View is simple, it is alas, simplistic...

Clete: Don't forget Lk. 7:30...

Yet "God's will" can mean "God's counsel," we need not assume that God's will is frustrated here. Open View theology takes doubtful readings versus clear general statements.

Prov. 21:30 There is no wisdom, no insight, no plan that can succeed against the Lord.

Isa. 8:10 Devise your strategy, but it will be thwarted; propose your plan, but it will not stand, for God is with us.

Isa. 14:27 For the Lord Almighty has purposed, and who can thwart him? His hand is stretched out, and who can turn it back?

And to deny clear statements for doubtful readings is bad exegesis.

 

[godrulz]

OVTs: Can we say that God has exhaustive, contingent foreknowledge?

(Explanation: God knows all possible courses of the future.)

Muz

Are you talking Molinism and 'middle knowledge' or counterfactuals of freedom? The end result is still EDF, so I would reject it.

God knows possibilities, but He does not know all contingencies that will be actualized.

Clete: Don't forget Lk. 7:30...

 

[godrulz]

I can sit down at the piano and play a mess of notes or try to stumble through sight reading various songs. I see no possible mechanism for God to know what I will play and when (or not at all) from trillions of years ago. If He does know, I am a sock puppet and I am not playing, but God is playing through me like a dummy (stupid idea we should dismiss). To say that God simply sees or knows that I will do it is no more defensible. The playing is not an object of certain, actual knowledge until I actually do it. Before this, it is a mere possibility and I have full control over what I freely actualize. There is no possible mechanism, even for an omniscient God, to know what I will freely do. Compatibilism or Molinism are attempts, but fall short of credibility. Until choices are made, they do not exist, so knowing a nothing is an absurdity. Saying we cannot limit God misses the point. It does not limit God to not know where Yoda is. It does not limit an omniscient God to not know a nothing. His foreknowledge is voluntarily limited by His choice to allow us significant freedom, not a risk-free universe (so love, relationship, freedom will be possible).

I clearly see this, but understand that others don't see it yet (due to preconceived traditions that are uncritically accepted).

 

[RobE]

I told you! Ask Jesus or Jeremiah (or any number of the other prophets, for that matter)!

Matthew 23:37 “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!" - Jesus

Jeremiah 19:5 "they have also built the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command or speak, nor did it come into My mind" - Jeremiah

Acts 7:51 “You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you." - Stephen​

Resting in Him,
Clete

P.S. For those of you who are thinking, "Why does Clete put himself through this torture with RobE?" GOOD Question! Don't worry! I have no intention of actually engaging him. This silly little argument of his is just so simple to refute, I couldn't resist the opportunity to make him look stupid again. Not that he need my help to do that, its just fun, thats all.

I know many struggle with terms(such as know) here so I'll try to simplify they question.

Is Our Lord the Lord of all?

 

[lee_merrill]

I can sit down at the piano and play a mess of notes or try to stumble through sight reading various songs. I see no possible mechanism for God to know what I will play and when (or not at all) from trillions of years ago.

Which means therefore, he cannot do it--I suppose he also cannot know everything going on everywhere either, or create the universe out of nothing, for the same reason, we don't understand how this could be done.

The playing is not an object of certain, actual knowledge until I actually do it. Before this, it is a mere possibility and I have full control over what I freely actualize. There is no possible mechanism, even for an omniscient God, to know what I will freely do.

Verses and references? Yet there is no logical contradiction involved in God knowing what I will freely do. Then we look in Scripture to see if there are predictions involving free human choices, indeed there are many of them, for example, a sure prediction that that Peter will not deny Christ at the end of his life. Then the only obstacle is to believe that God can know this, though we don't understand how.

"Have you journeyed to the springs of the sea or walked in the recesses of the deep? Have the gates of death been shown to you? Have you seen the gates of the shadow of death? Have you comprehended the vast expanses of the earth? Tell me, if you know all this. What is the way to the abode of light? And where does darkness reside? Surely you know, for you were already born! You have lived so many years! Who cuts a channel for the torrents of rain, and a path for the thunderstorm? Do you know the laws of the heavens? Can you set up dominion over the earth?" (Job 38:16-33 excerpted)

Blessings,
Lee

 

[godrulz]

I know many struggle with terms(such as know) here so I'll try to simplify they question.

Is Our Lord the Lord of all?

Being Lord of all is consistent with a providential vs meticulous control model of sovereignty. A sovereign Lord can voluntarily limit Himself in some ways to enable genuine reciprocal, loving, free, responsible relationships.

It is not praiseworthy to be a micromanaging parent with kids. It is praiseworthy to be a responsive, creative, responsible macromanaging parent. The latter is the revelation of God and His ways with His people in Scripture (risk vs risk free model of sovereignty:God brings His project to culmination and perfection without always getting His way in every detail along the way. Men can rebel and not be part of His plan for them as individuals, but God's plan for His people will triumph in the end with evildoers being appropriately judged...in the end, but not always immediately..in the hopes that they will join the people of God before it is too late).

Lee: I have no problem defending creation ex nihilo based on omnipotence and revelation. I have no problem defending exhaustive foreknowledge of past and present free choices based on biblical omniscience, omnipresence, and revelation.

I cannot defend EDF and free will because it is logically incoherent (demonstrable). The future is fundamentally different than the past or present, even for God. You simply assume that He must be able to know the future, just like the past, without being able to explain it (we do not need to explain or understand all things for it to be true, I agree). The biblical revelation at times is that God knows the future as possible and partially unsettled, not as fixed and definite. It is not a limitation on our common agreement about omniscience for God to correctly know reality as it is. The debate is about the nature of creation (settled, unsettled, or two motifs), not whether He is omniscient (we all agree that God knows reality truthfully and exhaustively, but we disagree as to the contents of this reality or the certainty vs possibility of it).

 

[lee_merrill]

It is not praiseworthy to be a micromanaging parent with kids.

Fine, I don't believe God makes every decision.

Men can rebel and not be part of His plan for them as individuals, but God's plan for His people will triumph in the end with evildoers being appropriately judged...

So how is God the invincible chessmaster in this critical area? It seems he just has two choices, depending on whether people repent, but that is something I could do--how then is this a demonstration of God's power and wisdom in his purpose to save people?

I have no problem defending creation ex nihilo based on omnipotence and revelation. I have no problem defending exhaustive foreknowledge of past and present free choices based on biblical omniscience, omnipresence, and revelation.

So please let's stop saying God cannot know future free choices because we don't know a mechanism for such--when this point appears I shall take you back to this post!

The biblical revelation at times is that God knows the future as possible and partially unsettled, not as fixed and definite.

The difficulty is however, when God knows future free choices.

John 21:18-19 "Most assuredly, I say to you, when you were younger, you girded yourself and walked where you wished; but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will gird you and carry you where you do not wish." Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God. Then he said to him, "Follow me!"

 

[godrulz]

Knowing a few future free choices based on exceptional intervention or exhaustive past/present knowledge does not prove EDF of all future free will moral and mundane contingencies (unwarranted extrapolation). We can speculate on the issue of Judas and Peter's denial with an Openness response, but it does not get you off the hook for dealing with many more passages that show God changes His mind, knows some of the future as unsettled, does not know aspects of free will choices in many other cases, etc.

There is work to be done. I am confidant that OT is less problematic and more coherent than the alternatives, even if you are not convinced yet.

 

[lee_merrill]

Knowing a few future free choices based on exceptional intervention or exhaustive past/present knowledge does not prove EDF of all future free will moral and mundane contingencies (unwarranted extrapolation).

So free choices are not unknowable--but the Open View holds that indeed free choices are inherently unknowable, this is why the future is open.

I have even been told that knowing a future free choice made it fixed, and this was a contradiction. If EDF and free will are logically incoherent, how is knowing one free choice coherent with free will?

... it does not get you off the hook for dealing with many more passages that show God changes His mind, knows some of the future as unsettled, does not know aspects of free will choices in many other cases, etc.

I address such here, you may know that I have been in such discussions!

And how is God the invincible chessmaster in the critical area of salvation? It seems he just has two choices, depending on whether people repent, but that is something I could do--how then is this a demonstration of God's power and wisdom in his purpose to save people?

Blessings,
Lee

 

[RobE]

Being Lord of all is consistent with a providential vs meticulous control model of sovereignty. A sovereign Lord can voluntarily limit Himself in some ways to enable genuine reciprocal, loving, free, responsible relationships.

Well 'voluntarily' means willingly. This would mean these events are within God's domain, control, and providence. Clete seems to miss this point.

Is there anything in existence which is outside of God's domain, control, or providence?

I told you! Ask Jesus or Jeremiah (or any number of the other prophets, for that matter)!

Matthew 23:37 “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!" - Jesus

Jeremiah 19:5 "they have also built the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command or speak, nor did it come into My mind" - Jeremiah

Acts 7:51 “You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you." - Stephen
Resting in Him,
Clete

P.S. For those of you who are thinking, "Why does Clete put himself through this torture with RobE?" GOOD Question! Don't worry! I have no intention of actually engaging him. This silly little argument of his is just so simple to refute, I couldn't resist the opportunity to make him look stupid again. Not that he need my help to do that, its just fun, thats

 

[godrulz]

I am working shift work tonight. I know I will be going to bed in the morning. This does not mean I know what I will be doing 10 years from now, if I am even alive.

 

[SaulToPaul 2]

I am working shift work tonight. I know I will be going to bed in the morning. This does not mean I know what I will be doing 10 years from now, if I am even alive.

God knows if you will still be alive and making anti OSAS/MAD posts on TOL
in 10 years.

 

[Philetus]

God knows if you will still be alive and making anti OSAS/MAD posts on TOL
in 10 years.

I think it safe to say that God knows that somebody will be if either OSAS or MAD survive that long, regardless of their position otherwise ... that is unless of course God calls an end to the whole debate through the second coming or TOL should close (God forbid!) or a myriad of other contingent factors.

I hope GR is still here, but also that we have finally laid to rest the Calvinist's dogma for good and are able to fully explore the implications of Open Theism by then. It’s just a matter of time now. I hope we all live to see it. (Well, almost all.)



Philetus

 

[godrulz]

God knows if you will still be alive and making anti OSAS/MAD posts on TOL
in 10 years.

Me no thinks so. Unless I am already actually dead in a parallel universe, the next 10 years are not recorded to be known because they do not exist yet. If they exist, then I do not have free will and the universe is fatalistic.

My posts are pro-Bible more than anti this or that.

 

[lee_merrill]

Mr. Muz...

Group dynamics are not certain--and "a remnant will be saved" is the Lord's sentence, not his observation--nor his estimate. And the Open View cannot explain how God knows this--What, they cannot all repent?

And if it is ever like the days of Noah, there must be a remnant, so Noah cannot refuse?

Then I wonder how Noah is a group!

Blessings,
Lee

 

[lee_merrill]

Godrulz...

Knowing a few future free choices based on exceptional intervention or exhaustive past/present knowledge does not prove EDF of all future free will moral and mundane contingencies (unwarranted extrapolation).

So free choices are not inherently unknowable--but the Open View holds that they are, this is why the future is open.

I have even been told that knowing a future free choice made it fixed, and this was a contradiction. If EDF and free will are logically incoherent, how is knowing one free choice coherent with free will?

... it does not get you off the hook for dealing with many more passages that show God changes His mind, knows some of the future as unsettled, does not know aspects of free will choices in many other cases, etc.

I address such here, you may know that I have been in such discussions!

And how is God the invincible chessmaster in the critical area of salvation? It seems he just has two choices, depending on whether people repent, but that is something I could do--how then is this a demonstration of God's power and wisdom in his purpose to save people? Unless you want to tell me that God does not have a purpose to save all lost people.

Blessings,
Lee

 

[godrulz]

The invincible chessmaster does not always get His way. Many perish in hell despite His perfect redemption. His overall project will come to pass and many will be redeemed and His rule and justice will be established. A risk-free, meticulous-control, blueprint model is not biblical. God incurs some risk by creating other moral agents; He does not always get His way; individuals can thwart his will for them (Lk. 7:30; Matthew 23:37); Jesus shows that there is a warfare. God wins in the end, but not without battles lost along the way (Satan snatches many who perish; he pushes them to self-destruction, etc.).

A paradigm shift would help you speculate more accurately about these things.

 

[themuzicman]

Are you talking Molinism and 'middle knowledge' or counterfactuals of freedom? The end result is still EDF, so I would reject it.

God knows possibilities, but He does not know all contingencies that will be actualized.

No. Molinism requires middle knowledge,where God knows what each posssible agent would choose in any given circumstance. That's how Molinism gets from all possible worlds to actualizing one with EDF.

Muz