Clete said:
Seekinganswers said:
These categories are the attempt of a framework to conform me to that framework. If you look at the registration page for this site there is no option for neither left nor right, and if I am to register I must choose a category. I had to choose one side or the other. In fact, my stance is much more radical. The Enlightenment altogether has no say in my book. The Enlightenment is my focus for attack.
And yet you chose "More left than right" over all of the other options which is perfectly in keeping with your nutty idea that we are not individuals. And while I don't know this for certain I suspect that the reason there is not "neither left nor right" category is because the guy who made the options realizes that there is no one who would really fit in that category.
I chose "More left than right" because unless I chose I could not register to post on this site. The choice was arbitrary. It would have been just as easy for me to choose more right than left. There are ways in which I am "left," as you label it, and there are ways in which I am "right." Yet none is more overwhelming than another. The reality is that I am not shaped by such categories in my thinking. I am not shaped by the extremes. I am shaped in the reading of scripture, which does not fit into those categories. The scriptures that declare Isaiah's unworthiness to come before the presence of the Almighty God through his "unclean lips" also declares that Tamar, a woman who prostitutes herself to Judah, is righteous in her prostitution. The same Lord who tells the woman caught in adultery to "go and sin no more," declares her justified beforehand, even in her sins. The Lord who "conquers" the promised land through war, is revealed in flesh to be brought to a cross. Your categories are foolish because they claim something in themselves that is not of God. I am not a liberal or conservate making my descsions or being shaped in thought by these agendas of the Enlightenment. I am finding myself outside of the Enlightenment altogether. My opinion on this is that Medeval times are much more true than the Enlightenment's "categories," and I wish to learn from the Medeval Church, if I can.
Clete said:
Seekinganswers said:
And what of the culture that sees no connection between events?
There is no such culture and is irrelevant anyway because there in fact is a connection between events whether you or anyone else wants to acknowledge it or not.
There is such a culture. A few of the aboriginal tribes located in New Zealand and the north-eastern coast of Australia do not have a concept of cause and effect. In essense, they do not see connections between things, connections often taken for granted in the Western World. For instance, if milk were to go bad in this culture, it becomes something totally different. There is no connection between "good milk" and "bad milk;" they are simply two different substances altogether, and there is no casuality between the two. That is a different way of thinking, and so your connections cannot be taken for granted. If you think that you are superior in knowledge to these, then who gives you that authority, for the way of thought in grounded in something else altogether.
Clete said:
Seekinganswers said:
Or that there is no such thing as time?
I do not believe time exists. I do believe clocks exist though.
And yet you will claim that there is a connection between events. How can such a claim be made outside of time and space? Events take place in time and space
Clete said:
Seekinganswers said:
What I was trying to point out is that the system only appears to give us a choice. We think that if we decide to go to bed at 10:00pm or not, that we have been given a decision to make. But it is absurd. It is an appearance of control. The reality is that you will go to bed regardless of your choice or decision.
Fine. Then the conclusion that logically follows is that love and every other moral consideration is also an illusion. Are you willing to concede that? I'm not!
That is exactly what I am saying. Humans are not loving. They do not know how to love. To love is to be grounded in God the Father, and to live for the neighbor. Our understanding of love does not exceed anything more than an emotional response, oozing with sentimentality, all of which is temporal, fading, and as far from love as anything. Morality is a claim to judgment not found in God. We judge according to a universal standard, and yet our Lord calls us not to judge at all. Morality is a sense of goodness found within one's self that will never accomplish good, for to be moral is to be in opposition to God. Try to find "morality" within the scriptures; you will find that it is quite impossible to encounter such a concept in any positive sense. Goodness in the scriptures is entirely wrapped up in what is pleasing to the Lord. Goodness is in God, and God alone is good.
Clete said:
What is morality? Clete asked...
Seekinganswers said:
Morality is the deception that somehow we can distinguish what is right and acceptable in this world. It is taking of the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil. It is to say that knit within the very universe is a system of right and wrong and that a human being can discern that system. It is the desire of the Pharisee to be clean before God. The Pharisee did not simply want to judge others, he thought that he could discern wrong and right, and that the law's purpose was in fact this. The law for the Pharisee was this universal principle. You are trying to separate yourself from the Pharisee by separating yourself from the law. But an ethical principle can be used in the same way. "Good" and "Evil" are things that only God can judge and discern. As far as we are concerned Christ tells us that good and evil come together, that is the Creation and distortion are reconciled in him.
The problem that we face here is that you think there is such a thing as "evil;" that there actually exists an entity which can oppose God. Yet the scritures have made it abundantly clear that there exists nothing that can be found outside of the Creation other than God in God's self. Everything is God's Creation (even the crafty serpent of the garden and the tree of knowledge of "good and evil." "Evil" is an attempt at creating an enemy; an oppositional force against whom we can fight. Yet God reveals, in Christ Jesus, that there are none who can fight against the Lord. Thus, in Christ, God's defeating blow is dealt to his "enemies," and they are found to be "enemies in their own minds." Thus God reconciles all the "goods" and "evils" of the created order in judgement, at which point none are spared, for all yield to the Creator, who is the only Good One. If "evil" and "good" are not reconciled in Christ, then explain to me this verse: "Therefore God exalted [Christ], and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven, and on earth, and under the earth, and every tongue confess, that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father" (Phil. 2:9-11). Or how about: "God put this power to work in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in the age to come. And he has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all" (Eph. 1:20-23). Does Christ's being ruler of all things not include the "evil" in this world? And if this is true, that Christ reigns over all things, would this not mean that the so-called "evil" things are subject to God, under the created order and are, therefore, nothing more than a distorted creation, but a creation nonetheless? Evil has no reality in Christ, for even death is defeated (as if death were something to fight against) and is not the power of sin made full in death? And if death comes and we survive, does that not mean that even God has defeated death, the victory of sin? Thus "evil" is an interesting category, as it cannot be defined without first knowing the creation. And if we try to define what "evil" is, we ourselves become distorted in our own sense of "good" as we ignore the true distortion that lies in our own being.
Clete said:
Seekinganswers said:
Jesus declares to us that there does not exist an enemy. It is our creation, and therefore he calls us to love our "enemy." Your moral system is the creation of the Enlightenment, in which a general principle, or a universal definition of "man" is created to decide what is right. God is not the universal principle, the "rights of men" are. So now that we know what the "rights" are we can live according to them. We can be like the Pharisees once again who conform their fellow men and women to this standard. And we can be even more corrupt than the Pharisees as we distort other human beings horribly through these principles of "rights." Bush can label his enemies "terrorists" and torture them, treating them as less than human, in violation of the geneva treaty.
Are you not aware of recent discoveries within Guatanamo Bay, in which practices of torture have been used against the Iraqi prisoners of war, in direct violation of the peace treaties established after WWII? These pratices included lining up naked men and having them lay across one-another's naked bodies in order to take a photo. Others were forced, naked once again, to put on a leash held by one of the guards, and photos were also taken. The White House has simply blamed this on "radical individuals" or scape-goats, (lower ranking officials) yet the evidence points to something much more systemic. Did you not know that the United States' Military publishes a torture manuel, which is in violation of national law? Torture is a reality of our world, and it is becoming more apparent, and yet nothing is done to stop it.
Clete said:
Seeking answers said:
These men that we torture are not human beings; his label of terrorist makes it easy for him to use tactics that are not legal according to the standard of the geneva treaty, which works off of a standard of universal human rights.
So is firing amunition at Ambulances and other emergency vehicles in Iraq justified? A soldier, who had served in Iraq, came to a forum that was held at my school, and he testified to being ordered to fire upon civilian vehicles, and ambulances included. Can we suddenly take such measures to "free" the Iraqi people, and yet destroy all those who get in the way (whether "guilty" or innocent)? What about the tactic of shooting before asking questions? If the military takes a target (and these targets have included hospitals, schools and Mosques) the order to the soldiers is to kill all left standing, before assessing the risk that they pose. These tactics are only created because we have defined an enemy that can be destroyed by any means, and so our neighbor becomes an "enemy" and is not the object of love but of malice. And we distort love, by tying it to the nation, thus justifying the distortion of love, i.e. malice. Though my use of Bush here could be misconstrued as a political agenda, one thing is certain and that is whether Democrat or Republican, leaders in the United States throughout the past century have moved toward this way of war, whether it be the numerous presidents following the Second World War, or the recent agenda set by Bush of the "war on terrorism." Presidents throughout the 50's, 60's, 70's, and 80's fought the enemy known as "Communism," and discovered in the late 80's and early 90's that the Soviet Union they had feared was nothing more than an empty shell, and had been so from its formation in the 50's. The scars of WWII remained within the iron curtain, revealing not an enemy, but a weak distorted humanity deserving compassion, not malice. And we have also been made aware of our own distortion as these so-called "terrorists" fight against us with our own weapons that we pumped into their countries over the decades to fight our "enemy" of "Communism." This is not my political agenda. The policy of the United States in the decades following WWII incorporated both parties, both liberals and conservatives. And Bush will attempt to do the same as he "unites" the nation in its "war on terror."
Clete said:
Seekinganswers said:
The problem is that humans are never able to adhere to a universal standard so they are never human by their context. "Terrorists" cannot be humans because they deny the universal principles and thus we are free to do anything to them. Morality is absurd because it cannot resist distortion.
Your hightlighting has not been faithful to what I wrote. I did not write "Morality is absurd," but rather the whole sentance that is underlined above. "Morality is absurd because it cannot resist distortion." It is absurd because it is human "goodness" found in humanity itself, and is made absurd through death, because it is not grounded in God (as I detailed a number of paragraphs before). Many say Bush is a "moral person," and yet that morality is entirely detatched from his decision to bomb civilian populations in Iraq. Cliton's morality has to do with his conduct in the White House, and never is connected to the same decisions by Clinton to bomb civilian targets in the Sudan and other areas. How can a person be moral and kill? The church has always dealt with killing harshly, whether just or not. And unjust killing is a mortal sin that requires repentance. The Jews did the same, in that any human life that was taken was atoned for in the temple, through sacrifice. "Morality" could not be relegated to public and private sectors. But that is exactly what morality does. It fits into the private sector, leaving the public open to the most hanus crimes of humanity. Morals are only sovreign in the realm of the individual conscience, and will never encroach on our participation in the public sector, where the "nation" calls us to disobey the commands of Christ.
Clete said:
Seekinganswers said:
Evil is not an ontological reality. The only reality is God, and God made flesh in Christ, thus establishing "evil" as a corruption and nothing more. "Evil" does not have reality in itself. "Evil" is simply a distortion of what is good, making it impossible to create anything but a straw-man to fight against if we are to have a fight against "evil", like the "war on terror."
Tell me, Clete, how do you have a "War on Terror" any more than you can have a "War on Poverty" or a "War on Crime?"
Clete said:
Seekinganswers said:
Jesus' words and commands are enough for the disciple. And he says that evil is not only within our brother, but is just as much if not more a part of us. There is no need for a "moral principle."
Jesus' words and commands are sufficient
Clete said:
The highlighted comments are sufficient to prove you a nut. No further response to this lunatic rant is warranted.
Despite what you may think is understood by your highlighting, it only proves that you are not listening to what I am saying. You are out to "get" me with such readings, and the only you will "prove" by your highlighting is that you are ignorant enough to think that everyone has the same mind as you. Yet we are called to have the same mind as Christ.
Clete said:
What is justice? Clete asked...
Clete said:
It is an illusion. "Justice" in our world equals vengance.
Would this change your highlighting at all?:
It is an illusion
; "justice" in our world equals vengance.
Clete said:
Seekinganswers said:
One who commits a crime must pay, in other words, and restitution must be visited on the one against whom the crime was commited. And what we are told about this system of "justice" in the scriptures is that vengance is no one's business but the Lord's. Justice before God is reconciliation. The Righteous one is not shaped by morality, as many have come to understand "righteousness" in a moral sense. Righteousness in the scriptures is the same word as justice. And to be just before God is to be reconciled not only to God but to others. Justice is held in God, the one who can judge and yet patiently witholds judgment in seeking reconciliation. The sentance for humanity in the garden of Eden was death. It is language used as a death penalty language, not just to make humanity mortal (they were already mortal when they were created). When God says, "You will surely die," it is not just that you will eventually die, but if you eat from this tree you will be put to death. And notice at the pronouncement of judgment the death penalty is witheld. It is not that God is weak and can't enforce the judgment pronounced. It is that God is the only one who can discern good and evil (as a free agent) and is thus able to withold judgment as well as pass judgment (and notice how it has nothing to do with sacrifice). God is the just judge and will do whatever God pleases to do.
The last sentence is in direct conflict with the first. Does justice exist or not? I don't care about what men say or what anyone's opinion is. Why can't people just answer a simple question? What IS justice? Not, what does the world think about justice? And not, what do the Pharisees think about what right and wrong is? I didn't ask that, and I don't give a crap about that. I want to know, based on what you believe about God and about the way we make choices in this life and what the consequences of those actions are, WHAT IS JUSTICE?
They are not in conflict. For one to be just does not mean that "justice" exists. Just, in this case is an adjective, and not all adjectives have to be nouns. Justice does not exist, for there is nothing that is just outside of the Creator. Who exists is God, and God alone is just. There is no standard for justice outside of the Creator. That means one cannot know justice, unless one first knows God. And here is the problem. "No one has seen God except God, the One and Only, who is at the Father's side, has made him known" (John 1:18) [the sight in John is refering back to the light that comes into the world and yet that which is the light's own does not receive him]. Knowledge is held in one, the Son. We do not know God nor justice until we know Christ. And to know Christ is to keep his commandments. JUSTICE IS
NOT. GOD
IS. GOD IS NOT DEFINED BY JUSTICE; JUSTICE IS DEFINED ONLY IN GOD.
Clete said:
What is love? Clete asked...
Seekinganswers said:
Once again, God is love. We know not what love is.
We do not know love, God made love known to us. And we only know love as it is found in God. There is no universal standard of love. It is found in Christ and the Father: "This is love: not that we knew God, but God knew us and gave his Son an expiation for our sins."
Clete said:
Seekingsanswers said:
Even our closest relationships with one another do not compare to love. The triune God is love: Father, Son, and Spirit. We are as far from love as we can possibly be. Just look at Christ and look at ourselves and we will see a vast expanse between the two. We cannot nor do we know how to love.
For outside of God, love is non-existant. Love is of the Creator, and is the Creator himself. To know love is to know God, and we cannot know God. God must know and love us, and only in that do we know love. Love is not a universal principle, God is, and God the universal is only made known in Christ.
Clete said:
Seekinganswers said:
Love is distorted among us as we wrap it up in shame and seek pleasure over the other's need. Even supposed love between a man and a woman in marriage is a distortion
For only in God is there love. The union of the man and the woman is distorted by sin ("the man shall rule of you and your desire will be for him" (Gen. 3)). Marriage is a hopeless endeavor if the love of the spouses remains in themselves, for only their vows (which God's command) are an expression of their love, and their union testifies to a love that is made complete as it looks outside of itself, a love which is foreign to the couple.
Clete said:
Seekinganswers said:
as that love is confined within them, instead of making them one flesh and living as one flesh to love the other, the neighbor, and the stranger (the child that comes into their marriage as a gift from God), their love remains within them. But God revealed God's love in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us. That is love, and do not think that we can define love outside of that very particular enactment. Love is defined within the trinity, and only as we are sustained by God do we even begin to know what love is.
Clete said:
2 Corinthians 11:11
Why? Because I do not love you? God knows I do!
Quite literally, Paul's love to the Corinthians is known by God, not by Paul or the Corinthians themselves.
Clete said:
Ephesians 5:2
and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
Notice once again love cannot be apart from Christ in his "the laying down of his life."
Clete said:
1 Thessalonians 1:3
We continually remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.
Faith, hope, and love, all of which are grounded in the work of Christ Jesus.
Clete said:
1 Thessalonians 2:8
We loved you so much that we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God but our lives as well, because you had become so dear to us.
Sharing in the sufferings of Christ (as they suffer within the body of Christ)
Clete said:
1 Thessalonians 4:9
Now about brotherly love we do not need to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love each other.
Once again, love is of God alone, not a principle or standard set by him. It is God in God's self.
Clete said:
2 Thessalonians 1:3
We ought always to thank God for you, brothers, and rightly so, because your faith is growing more and more, and the love every one of you has for each other is increasing.
Once again out of the faith you have in Christ Jesus (Christ's own faith to the Father) (vs. 4)
Clete said:
1 Timothy 6:11
But you, man of God, flee from all this, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness.
Is this love the thing which
IS, or love that is God? And notice how it is first "man of God."
Clete said:
2 Timothy 1:7
For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.
Love is of God, once again, not our own understanding of what love is. We did not know love, we were made loving by the one who is love.
Clete said:
1 Peter 2:17
Show proper respect to everyone: Love the brotherhood of believers, fear God, honor the king.
Actually not the word love (agape)
Clete said:
2 Peter 1:5-8
For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love. 8For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Actually not the word love (agape)
Clete said:
1 John 3:10
This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is right is not a child of God; nor is anyone who does not love his brother.
This is to say that one only loves who is in God. Interesting!
Clete said:
1 John 4:7
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.
Once again, love is not our own, it is God's. God is love. There is no love outside of God. And God must be revealed to us, apart from any decision might make.
Clete said:
1 John 4:11
Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
In the same way it is made complete in Christ. We do not love of ourselves, but in obedience to Christ.
Clete said:
1 John 4:16
And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him.
Yet this is a love that God has for us. Once again, God is love; and only in God are we able to love and know love. We do not
know love (active voice, human is subject of verb), but love is made known to us in God (passive voice, God is subject of verb)
Clete said:
1 John 4:20
If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen.
Once again, love is found only in God, and only as God reveals that love.
Clete said:
1 John 4:21
And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.
Indicating that one who does not love his brother, does not know love. Hmmm. According to James (chapter 2) one who gives preference to another by their appearance sins against his brother. And Jesus himself pointed out to the crowd of Jews that not one of them was worthy to cast a stone, for all were guilty before God. Our sins have not been justified by God. Sin is not just. We are justified, and our sins are removed from us, as long as we remain repentant, and do not raise ourselves about another. Therefore all are sinners before God, and do not know love in their sin. And who does not sin?
Clete said:
3 John 1:6
They have told the church about your love. You will do well to send them on their way in a manner worthy of God.
A love grounded in the Body of Christ.
Clete said:
1 Cor. 13:3 If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.
4Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. 8Love never fails.
Where in all of this does it say that we know love? It says that life without love is meaningless. And so our life must be found in God, who is the one who bestows life on us, not something that we ask for, but something given, and at a cost that we must serve him.
Clete said:
Can we love God? Clete asked...
Seekinganwers said:
We cannot love God. But God can love us. "This is love, not that we loved God, but that God loved us and gave his Son to be the expiation for our sins" (I John 4:10). And this love is perfected within us so that we can then love: "This is love, that we follow his commandments" (II John 1:6). Love remains wrapped up in God. It is not a universal principle in which both God and men can participate. God is love.
Clete said:
Deuteronomy 6:5
Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.
And who has lived according to this command other than Christ? So our love of God must be found in our faith (loyalty) to Christ in keeping his commands, as this command shows that love is in a commandment.
Clete said:
Deuteronomy 7:9
Know therefore that the LORD your God is God; he is the faithful God, keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commands.
Love and keep commands, hmmm. Sound familiar?
Clete said:
Deuteronomy 10:12
And now, O Israel, what does the LORD your God ask of you but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul,
To love and serve him, hmmmm?
Clete said:
Deuteronomy 11:1
Love the LORD your God and keep his requirements, his decrees, his laws and his commands always.
Love and keep?
Clete said:
Deuteronomy 11:13
So if you faithfully obey the commands I am giving you today—to love the LORD your God and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul
Commands and love? Love and serve?
Clete said:
Deuteronomy 11:22
If you carefully observe all these commands I am giving you to follow—to love the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways and to hold fast to him
Commands, love, and walk in his ways?
Clete said:
Deuteronomy 13:3
you must not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer. The LORD your God is testing you to find out whether you love him with all your heart and with all your soul.
Love with heart and life? hmmm?
Clete said:
Deuteronomy 19:9
because you carefully follow all these laws I command you today—to love the LORD your God and to walk always in his ways—then you are to set aside three more cities.
Laws, command, love, walk in his ways?
Clete said:
Deuteronomy 30:6
The LORD your God will circumcise your hearts and the hearts of your descendants, so that you may love him with all your heart and with all your soul, and live.
Lord must circumcise hearts (Paul's little chat in Romans?) in order that we might love? Love without God is non-existant, and it is acted in us by God?
Clete said:
Deuteronomy 30:16
For I command you today to love the LORD your God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commands, decrees and laws; then you will live and increase, and the LORD your God will bless you in the land you are entering to possess.
Command, love, walk in ways, keep his commands, decrees and laws?
Clete said:
Deuteronomy 30:20
and that you may love the LORD your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. For the LORD is your life, and he will give you many years in the land he swore to give to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
Love, listen, hold fast (the Lord is life?)?
Clete said:
Joshua 22:5
But be very careful to keep the commandment and the law that Moses the servant of the LORD gave you: to love the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, to obey his commands, to hold fast to him and to serve him with all your heart and all your soul."
Commandment and law, love, walk in his ways, obey his commands, hold fast to him, serve him
Clete said:
Joshua 23:11
So be very careful to love the LORD your God.
Might I add that this follows 22?
Clete said:
Daniel 9:4
I prayed to the LORD my God and confessed: "O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps his covenant of love with all who love him and obey his commands,
Love and obey his commands?
Clete said:
Hosea 3:1
The LORD said to me, "Go, show your love to your wife again, though she is loved by another and is an adulteress. Love her as the LORD loves the Israelites, though they turn to other gods and love the sacred raisin cakes."
Sounds more like a covenant, and love here is entirely with God, for the "love" referred to here is a union in sex, not the love of God (unless God has sex with Israel!)
Clete said:
Hosea 12:6
But you must return to your God; maintain love and justice, and wait for your God always.
Love and justice?
Clete said:
Amos 5:15
Hate evil, love good; maintain justice in the courts. Perhaps the LORD God Almighty will have mercy on the remnant of Joseph.
Love good, maintain justice in the courts?
Clete said:
Micah 6:8
He [God] has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.
Act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God. Love here is not the love of God. It is about clinging to.
Clete said:
Matthew 22:37
Jesus replied: " Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.'
It is a command, is it not? Commandment and love?
Clete said:
Mark 12:30
Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.'
I don't know how much more of this I can continue with. Need I go on?
Clete said:
Luke 10:27
He answered: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind' ; and, 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' "
Command and love?
Clete said:
Luke 11:42
"Woe to you Pharisees, because you give God a tenth of your mint, rue and all other kinds of garden herbs, but you neglect justice and the love of God. You should have practiced the latter without leaving the former undone.
Justice and the love of God (which is God's love, not the Pharisees' love for God)
Clete said:
John 8:42
Jesus said to them, "If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God and now am here. I have not come on my own; but he sent me.
"In other words, God is not your Father, and you do not love me." Love came from God.
Clete said:
John 16:27
No, the Father himself loves you because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God.
And this love is to keep his commandments.
Clete said:
Romans 8:28
And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
I don't even want to start on this one (cause you ripped out of context as you did with virtually all of these "proof-texts" [a falacy of logic, might I add])
Clete said:
1 Corinthians 2:9
However, as it is written: "No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him"
LOL. (And this is supposed to mean that those who love him have seen and heard and conceived?)
Clete said:
1 Corinthians 8:3
But the man who loves God is known by God.
Notice how love is the action of God and not man, for God must know the man first.
Clete said:
James 1:12
Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.
Whose pperseverance is this? The man's or Christ's own? Love must be in obedience to commandments.
Clete said:
James 2:5
Listen, my dear brothers: Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him?
My oh my! "And yet you continue to give preference to some over others showing your lack of love!"
I'm just sick of your prooftexting. It shows your ignorance with regards to the scripture. You have to use a search engine to even find these verses. And you never had to read any more of them than the word "love," as you have understood it, not as it has been revealed in scripture.
Clete said:
Is God just? Clete asked...
Seekinganswers said:
This shows the absurdity of your system, for by your system you would judge God. Your standard of justice can even define the limits of the Creator. It is not my place to establish a justice by which to judge the Creator. Justice is held within God, and therefore only by God are we just. As I said before, God's command regarding justice is to be reconciled. But you go ahead and create that absurd situation where God will be judged by men.
Ok, and if I don't know what justice is, how am I supposed to say God is just? You asked me to tell you what "justice is," before, and I said that justice is God. Not that God participates in a universal understanding of what is right, but that God himself is justice God himself is right. So God is not only just, he is justice. God is reconciliation, which is justice. Justice and reconciliation cannot be defined by themselves. They are defined in God, and therefore it is absurd to ask if God is just. It is like asking if a tree is wooden. our definition of wooden would be obsolete without the tree. In the same way our definition of just is obsolete in the presence of God. You do not determine if God is just. God simply is, whether you like it or not.
Was the author of Hebrew absurd too?
Clete said:
Seekinganswers said:
Hebrews 6:10
God is not unjust; he will not forget your work and the love you have shown him as you have helped his people and continue to help them.
No the writer is quite right in that God is not less than justice.
Clete said:
Is God moral (Is God good)? Clete asked...
Seekinganswers said:
Once again, this is absurd. You have created a system of goodness that superceeds the Creator. God is not good in your system, God participates in goodness that is even outside of God. You once again take judgment into your own hands in order to create that absurd situation where man judges God.
Well this proves my point as well as anything could I suppose. How is it possible that a person who claims to be a Christian can have such a reaction to the notion that God is good? It's insane! It is literally insane.
God is good and is it not wrong for me or anyone else to say so. In fact, quite the contrary. If you cannot bring yourself to say that God is good then how can you love Him? But you can't love Him according to you so I suppose on that much you are consistent. Consistently lost in a world of insanity, that is.
It is the same reason why a great thinker will cringe at the sound of his conclusions being uttered by an ignorant fool of a student who thinks they understand the statement. It is the utterance of a conclusion as the initial data without regard to the lifetime that comes before. (Dietrich Bonhoeffer's assesment of the Lutherean use of "you are saved by faith, not by works.") To say: "God is good," is ignorant, for, once again, you define God by that which can only be God. Good is not the adjective, it is the reality defined in God, that is God defines goodness, not that goodness defines God.
Seekinganswers said:
Thisis is the most ridiculous statement anyone has tried to make of me. Do you think that I am a liberal Democrat?
No I never said that. But you are a liberal.
Yet you say what I teach is in line with Hillary Clinton and Hitler? You don't want to associate me with "political parties" because you think there is such a thing as liberal and conservative apart from political parties? Yet you associate me with two very radical political figures. What am I supposed to think? How would you like to be accused of having thoughts in line with Pinochet and other right winged dictators put into power by forces in the United States, who go on to "disapear" and slaughter tens of thousands of people in order to bring about a Capitalistic system and a radical Democratic one as well?
Seekinganswers said:
If you have read anything that I have written on this site you would know that your categories of "right" and "left" do not apply to what I am saying. I have never read Hillary Clinton's books any more than I have read Hitler's!! If you would like to understand what I am saying, read Bonhoeffer (The Cost of Discipleship and Ethics).
Clete said:
I responded to this already.
You still label me a liberal! You didn't hear what I said at the end of this parragraph. I read Dietriech Bonhoeffer and that is where the majority of these ideas are being drawn from, right out of his book. Maybe I should give him more credit, accept that I am summarizing, not quoting, because I don't think you would actually listen to Bonhoeffer if I quoted him directly. He doesn't agree with your reading of the scriptures, yet he is a man far more worthy of our attention than you or I, for his understanding of the scriptures brings him to Christ, as one who lays down his life in testimony to Christ. He saves Jews in direct opposition to the state because he fears God more than he fears retaliation from the state. He is not one who has freedom in his decisions. He knows he does not have freedom in his decisions. His freedom is found in being a slave to Christ, and that is the same freedom that we are given.
Grace and Peace,
Michael
