Proof from the Bible that God is In Time

[rainee]

God did not manipulate time. He manipulated the sun.

No, Ghost,

When God destroyed with the flood He showed how everything works together.

If He manipulates the sun He will be fulfilling prophecy - and it will be a very bad thing for the world/earth. He will change the moon too, remember?

What God did was freeze time in that one place and we know He did because the sun and the moon froze and gave Joshua a full extra day from noon on.
He also made a shadow go backwards, right? This was not all over the world - it was in one spot - one pocket, one place - time went backwards.
Er making Trad and his Greek thinking look like he can't comprehend what the Bible says about God.

Ghost, God manipulated time twice in the OT, He did not turn the world upside down either time. When He goes for the actual time measures (the sun and moon) it will not be time He is messing with but our world, right?

 

[Ps82]

Hi Ghost, good morning
You were being so kind to me above trying to give me something off what I said - I hope you did not get angry or feel you had to live up to a reputation after I then wrote something about you to BE?
I only found this that you wrote this AM.

I don't want you to care about us getting things done as much as I wanted to point out the measurements of time were appearing to be stopped. If time froze and Joshua and the battle and indeed the whole area were in a pocket of this frozen time - what would it be a pocket of - timelessness or endless time? Or is that splitting hairs?

The point is God could manipulate time, isn't it? So He could do something outside the defined area of time that we exist in - maybe yes?

Now the other thing I was thinking was that time could be the result of a recipe. But I don't know where to go with that.

Excellent point!

 

[Ask Mr. Religion]

As I posted to Traditio over in the thread he's created on this topic...

Traditio,

It's about time that someone squarely confronted us Open Theists here at TOL with this dilemma of how God could cross an infinite time to get to the moment of creation. Thanks

It indeed needs a fresh airing, as it got no response here, a few years ago.

I hope no one misses the irony in Pastor Enyart's response above and in the OP. On the one hand he raises the "Greeks!" "Philosophy!" canard, yet on the other appeals to Aristotle's views about the truth values of future propositions. Since the future does not exist, well, a temporal God cannot know anything about the future. This is just one of the many "having your cake and eating it, too" tactics of open theism.

In order to somehow relieve God of the problem of evil, open theists deny God knows the future actions of his creatures. To the open theists, free human actions cannot be known by anyone, including an "omniscient" God--after all, this does not mean God is not "omniscient"--for He knows only what there is to know. In other words the free actions of creatures cannot be the object of knowledge for anyone, including God. God cannot know the future because there is nothing for him to know.

Where does the logical conclusion of such a view lead us? If propositions about the future are neither true nor false, it is logically impossible for God to predict (not guess, but state with absolute certainty) the future.

The belief that God does predict the future presumes that God knows what he is talking about. Yet, if, per open theism, God does not know what cannot be known, it follows that God cannot predict the future.

The best the open theist can hope for is that God might be able to do, on Aristotle’s view, is make a good guess--quite the epistemological liability when compared with the historic Christian view about God’s knowledge.

Well, some openists will try to skirt the issue by saying that God knows some things about the future with absolute certainty failing to grasp that, per their view of God's limits of knowledge, God cannot even know what He is going to do in the future when His own actions in response to the unknown free actions of His creatures are not even known to him.

The facts are simple: God can have no knowledge of future human contingents because any alleged proposition about the free choices of humans contains no truth value--it can be neither true nor false. Remember, openists claim God cannot know these things because there is nothing to know. So when the openist starts to make statements that the constraints on God's knowledge are not as severe as I have stated per their own claims, we need to hold them accountable to their own dogma. Either God knows future contingents or He does not. If God knows even as few as even one future contingent, then He can know all.

AMR

 

[Ps82]

God did not manipulate time. He manipulated the sun.

Regarding time measurement for the world ... God said that he established the moon and the sun for marking the days and the seasons ... etc.

If God manipulates the the revolution of the earth around the sun, then he manipulates monthly TIME here on earth. If He manipulates the rotation of the earth, then he manipulates daily TIME.

I agree with rainee that God can manipulate time where ever he has established a way to measure it. God lives in a state of infinite time ... eternity... and this puts him out side of our meager time frame/ time measurements.

I think that scripture expresses to us how much God is above and beyond our days, months, and years with this remark:

To God one day on earth can be like 1000 years to him... or a 1,000 years on earth can be like a mere day to him. The spiritual God is not bound by our TIME.

On the other hand ... God did also establish A WAY that he could enter into our times ... in a bodily form and work among men and even have personal relationships with individuals at specific earthly times.

God is able to be eternal and infinite and also participate within a specific and limited time frame.

 

[Traditio]

It indeed needs a fresh airing, as it got no response here, a few years ago.

I hope no one misses the irony in Pastor Enyart's response above and in the OP. On the one hand he raises the "Greeks!" "Philosophy!" canard, yet on the other appeals to Aristotle's views about the truth values of future propositions. Since the future does not exist, well, a temporal God cannot know anything about the future. This is just one of the many "having your cake and eating it, too" tactics of open theism.

In order to somehow relieve God of the problem of evil, open theists deny God knows the future actions of his creatures. To the open theists, free human actions cannot be known by anyone, including an "omniscient" God--after all, this does not mean God is not "omniscient"--for He knows only what there is to know. In other words the free actions of creatures cannot be the object of knowledge for anyone, including God. God cannot know the future because there is nothing for him to know.

Where does the logical conclusion of such a view lead us? If propositions about the future are neither true nor false, it is logically impossible for God to predict (not guess, but state with absolute certainty) the future.

The belief that God does predict the future presumes that God knows what he is talking about. Yet, if, per open theism, God does not know what cannot be known, it follows that God cannot predict the future.

The best the open theist can hope for is that God might be able to do, on Aristotle’s view, is make a good guess--quite the epistemological liability when compared with the historic Christian view about God’s knowledge.

Well, some openists will try to skirt the issue by saying that God knows some things about the future with absolute certainty failing to grasp that, per their view of God's limits of knowledge, God cannot even know what He is going to do in the future when His own actions in response to the unknown free actions of His creatures are not even known to him.

The facts are simple: God can have no knowledge of future human contingents because any alleged proposition about the free choices of humans contains no truth value--it can be neither true nor false. Remember, openists claim God cannot know these things because there is nothing to know. So when the openist starts to make statements that the constraints on God's knowledge are not as severe as I have stated per their own claims, we need to hold them accountable to their own dogma. Either God knows future contingents or He does not. If God knows even as few as even one future contingent, then He can know all.

AMR

For the record: the specific problem that AMR is bringing up here is from De Interpretatione. Aristotle asserts that future contingents don't exist yet in order to avoid logical determinism. If it is the case, Aristotle asserts, that if tomorrow there either will be a sea battle or there will not be, then necessarily, there will be a sea battle or not, which seems bizarre. Those of you who are interested can probably find this work ("On Interpretation" in English) online. It's not a very lengthy treatise. As I recall, it's less than 30 pages. Closer to 15-20.

In any case, I'll get to Mr. Enyart's objections in the other thread.

 

[Ps82]

No, Ghost,

When God destroyed with the flood He showed how everything works together.

If He manipulates the sun He will be fulfilling prophecy - and it will be a very bad thing for the world/earth. He will change the moon too, remember?

What God did was freeze time in that one place and we know He did because the sun and the moon froze and gave Joshua a full extra day from noon on.
He also made a shadow go backwards, right? This was not all over the world - it was in one spot - one pocket, one place - time went backwards.
Er making Trad and his Greek thinking look like he can't comprehend what the Bible says about God.

Ghost, God manipulated time twice in the OT, He did not turn the world upside down either time. When He goes for the actual time measures (the sun and moon) it will not be time He is messing with but our world, right?

Hi rainee,
Actually, God can manipulate our time frame in any way he wishes ... but if we think about it scientifically, then we need to consider how a day is measured. It is based upon the rotation of the earth; therefore, all God really needed to do was manipulate the earth's rotation and this would make the sun either seem to be moving backward or to be standing still upon a sundial or in the sky.

I think that logic leads us to assume that this pause in time on earth happened all over the world when God stopped or slowed the rotation of the earth.

 

[Traditio]

As I posted to Traditio over in the thread he's created on this topic...

Traditio,

It's about time that someone squarely confronted us Open Theists here at TOL with this dilemma of how God could cross an infinite time to get to the moment of creation. Thanks!

Well stated.

Since it seems logically irrefutable that infinity could never be crossed, the Settled View camp of Calvinists and Arminians use this argument against Open Theism. But they ignore the exact same argument against their belief that God has exhaustive knowledge of the infinite future including all of each of our thoughts throughout eternal life as we live in His Kingdom which has no end.

So if God is unable to cross infinity, then just as He could never get to the moment of creation, then also regardless of how many of His own future thoughts that He foreknew, and of the thoughts of the billions of creatures who will exist eternally (both those living with Him and apart from Him, for as the Bible says, He put "eternity into their hearts" to exist in a "Kingdom that will never end"), He would never be able to have complete and final knowledge of an infinite number of thoughts.

If I am thinking clearly here Traditio, this argument does not favor Exhaustive Foreknowledge over Open Theism. For the "God exists in time" doctrine to be correct, the one God would have had to cross infinity. For Arminians and Calvinists to be correct, God's mind's eye would have had to cross infinity for billions of creatures for Him to know the unending particulars of the eternal future of each created angelic and human being, as they relate with one another, with Him, and as the Persons of the Trinity relate to one another, eternally.

Thus while I am not aware of an answer to your argument, I think I have established that it does not favor those who reject Open Theism for a Settled Future. For God did not create finite beings, but eternal beings, not to enjoy Him for a while, but forever in a Kingdom without end.

In Christ,

-Pastor Bob Enyart
Denver Bible Church & KGOV.com

Mr. Enyart: Enjoy!

 

[sky.]

It indeed needs a fresh airing, as it got no response here, a few years ago.

I hope no one misses the irony in Pastor Enyart's response above and in the OP. On the one hand he raises the "Greeks!" "Philosophy!" canard, yet on the other appeals to Aristotle's views about the truth values of future propositions. Since the future does not exist, well, a temporal God cannot know anything about the future. This is just one of the many "having your cake and eating it, too" tactics of open theism.

In order to somehow relieve God of the problem of evil, open theists deny God knows the future actions of his creatures. To the open theists, free human actions cannot be known by anyone, including an "omniscient" God--after all, this does not mean God is not "omniscient"--for He knows only what there is to know. In other words the free actions of creatures cannot be the object of knowledge for anyone, including God. God cannot know the future because there is nothing for him to know.

Where does the logical conclusion of such a view lead us? If propositions about the future are neither true nor false, it is logically impossible for God to predict (not guess, but state with absolute certainty) the future.

The belief that God does predict the future presumes that God knows what he is talking about. Yet, if, per open theism, God does not know what cannot be known, it follows that God cannot predict the future.

The best the open theist can hope for is that God might be able to do, on Aristotle’s view, is make a good guess--quite the epistemological liability when compared with the historic Christian view about God’s knowledge.

Well, some openists will try to skirt the issue by saying that God knows some things about the future with absolute certainty failing to grasp that, per their view of God's limits of knowledge, God cannot even know what He is going to do in the future when His own actions in response to the unknown free actions of His creatures are not even known to him.

The facts are simple: God can have no knowledge of future human contingents because any alleged proposition about the free choices of humans contains no truth value--it can be neither true nor false. Remember, openists claim God cannot know these things because there is nothing to know. So when the openist starts to make statements that the constraints on God's knowledge are not as severe as I have stated per their own claims, we need to hold them accountable to their own dogma. Either God knows future contingents or He does not. If God knows even as few as even one future contingent, then He can know all.

AMR

:BRAVO:

 

[godrulz]

It is not true that if God knows one future contingent that He must then be able to know all future contingencies. God can have high probability foreknowledge of a proximal event based on perfect present/past knowledge, but not have exhaustive definite FK of all future free will contingencies (even weathermen and insurance actuaries can predict aspects of the future, but this is far different than knowing things trillions of years before the agent making the contingent choice even exists). Calvinism/determinism could explain EDF, but at a high cost and contrary to reality (non-deterministic universe). Arminian simple FK could be assumed, but it is not demonstrable (rely on wrong view of eternal now). Molinism/middle knowledge is philosophical, but illogical and essentially deterministic.

 

[DFT_Dave]

This is why I say that the correct answer is neither thesis nor antithesis, but synthesis. God is both transcendent to and immanent within His material creation.

But that would be saying God is both in the world and not in the world at same time, which is impossible.

--Dave

 

[Ask Mr. Religion]

It is not true that if God knows one future contingent that He must then be able to know all future contingencies. God can have high probability foreknowledge

Thus, we have my often noted Survivor<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <wunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <wontGrowAutofit/> <w:UseFELayout/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} </style> <![endif]-->® God--outwitting, outlasting, and outplaying--his creatures. A probabilistic God. In fact, we have here the openist's view of God that is one of God becoming, for the God Moses was speaking to knew less in Moses' day than He now knows today. Tomorrow God will be more knowledgeable than He is today. Does this observation alone not give one pause?

To the openist God is always changing, becoming something he wasn't. Such is the process theology of Whitehead and open theism.

AMR

 

[One In Christ]

But that would be saying God is both in the world and not in the world at same time, which is impossible.

--Dave

This statement seems kind of limiting... You saying God cant be infinite in both "spaces"?

 

[godrulz]

Thus, we have my often noted Survivor<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <wunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <wontGrowAutofit/> <w:UseFELayout/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} </style> <![endif]-->® God--outwitting, outlasting, and outplaying--his creatures. A probabilistic God. In fact, we have here the openist's view of God that is one of God becoming, for the God Moses was speaking to knew less in Moses' day than He now knows today. Tomorrow God will be more knowledgeable than He is today. Does this observation alone not give one pause?

To the openist God is always changing, becoming something he wasn't. Such is the process theology of Whitehead and open theism.

AMR

Argg...Arminianism is not Pelagianism and Open Theism is not Process Thought.

If it is any consolation, I am going through 'Beyond the Bounds' every night before bed. It gives me nightmares, such as the story of the guy who had the diving accident and his move from a free will defense to the errors of Calvinism. I am trying hard to glean what I can, but its arguments against Open Theism are not persuasive and it is more of a rah rah Calvinism bias book.

I find your post to be more straw man than substance...but what do I know?

 

[Lon]

Hello rocketman! Open Theism helps restore the belief in a relational God. A god of Plato's imagination who is utterly immutable cannot change in any way, and true personal relationship requires interaction. God changes in relationship to His creatures, both in grieving over their sin, and rejoicing over their humility. Extrapolating from what I've seen, millions of people stumble over the false teaching of an exhaustively settled future. People pay a price for false teachings, and the utterly unchangeable god and future is one of the biggest false teachings. Men can still come to Christ in spite of this, but their conversion is in spite of, and not because of, this error.

Thanks for reminding us about the context of all this!

-Bob

Bob, on this I agree with you, but most of us do, rather than not. So one point in agreement on the immutability of God and one against it being the traditional stance. I spoke earlier about two kinds of change, intrinsic and extrinsic. I do agree there is extrinsic motion and qualified relationship (change). God meets our need. In fact, when He tells Moses "I AM" He is telling Moses He will be whatever Moses 'needs Him to be." The way I understand this: God doesn't intrinsically change, that is, He already retains every resource to meet our every need because literally everything comes from Him. When we see Him meeting our needs of love, catered to a specific situation, it isn't an intrinsic change (God can't be any more loving than completely), but those perfections of God meeting us where we live and move.
I'm certainly perplexed that having a future that is completely settle or not does damage to God's relationship with us. It has never made sense to me that anything is lost. It is, to me, about the same as the difference of having everything already available in my cupboard for any given meal as opposed to being caught unaware and needing to go to the store. I don't see anything lost if an excursion to a store is unnecessary and in fact, would prefer it that way. God having laid out ahead of time what I will do seems completely loving and caring to me, like if my wife laid out my clothes for the next day. "Loss of freewill" doesn't even enter my mind when people make up my mind for me about things they care about.

Even though I tend to feel ignored on some of these important issue, I do thank you for taking time in the thread as a whole. I agree with you, Trad, AMR, and others that this is an important discussion to be addressed.
Thanks.
In Him,

-Lon

 

[Nang]

God did not have to essentially change, in order to manifest and display His grace and promises of redemption, in the Son of Man, Jesus Christ.

Nang

 

[godrulz]

God did not have to essentially change, in order to manifest and display His grace and promises of redemption, in the Son of Man, Jesus Christ.

Nang

God did not change in character and attributes. To deny that the incarnation is still absolute immutability in every sense makes no sense. Biblical immutability is that God changes in some ways (not from perfection), but not in other ways. Platonic immutability is absolute changelessness, a false view.

 

[DFT_Dave]

As I posted to Traditio over in the thread he's created on this topic...

Traditio,

It's about time that someone squarely confronted us Open Theists here at TOL with this dilemma of how God could cross an infinite time to get to the moment of creation. Thanks!

Originally Posted by Traditio
The Open Theists assert that God always exists, but that He exists "in time." ...

They assert that the universe was created in time. Therefore... An infinity extends prior to the creation of the world. And God must pass through each point of the infinity prior to the creation of the world in order to reach that point. Therefore God is still waiting to create the world.

Well stated.

Since it seems logically irrefutable that infinity could never be crossed, the Settled View camp of Calvinists and Arminians use this argument against Open Theism. But they ignore the exact same argument against their belief that God has exhaustive knowledge of the infinite future including all of each of our thoughts throughout eternal life as we live in His Kingdom which has no end.

So if God is unable to cross infinity, then just as He could never get to the moment of creation, then also regardless of how many of His own future thoughts that He foreknew, and of the thoughts of the billions of creatures who will exist eternally (both those living with Him and apart from Him, for as the Bible says, He put "eternity into their hearts" to exist in a "Kingdom that will never end"), He would never be able to have complete and final knowledge of an infinite number of thoughts.

If I am thinking clearly here Traditio, this argument does not favor Exhaustive Foreknowledge over Open Theism. For the "God exists in time" doctrine to be correct, the one God would have had to cross infinity. For Arminians and Calvinists to be correct, God's mind's eye would have had to cross infinity for billions of creatures for Him to know the unending particulars of the eternal future of each created angelic and human being, as they relate with one another, with Him, and as the Persons of the Trinity relate to one another, eternally.

Thus while I am not aware of an answer to your argument, I think I have established that it does not favor those who reject Open Theism for a Settled Future. For God did not create finite beings, but eternal beings, not to enjoy Him for a while, but forever in a Kingdom without end.

In Christ,

-Pastor Bob Enyart
Denver Bible Church & KGOV.com

Solving the problem of infinite regress

Moments of time don't exist as "something" that exists that we or God must pass through in order to get from there to here. Time does not exist "in" God, time exists as a aspect of God's freedom. God does more than one thing at a time but he does not do everything he can possibly do all at once, that would be absurd.

God is active, Biblical Revelation, or God is "not active", philosophical "Unmoved Mover/Perfect Being". It's absolutely impossible for God, in essence, to be both and is why he cannot be both timeless and in time and be incarnate--become flesh.

An infinite regress of activity for finite creatures is impossible but for God it is possible because he is infinite. God can never exhaust his infinite/unlimited creative potential, freely self--actualized. A God who is "pure actuality/unmoved mover" could not create the world because that would require "movement". An "eternal now" God is "timelessly" forever doing everything all at once. I can't think of anything more ridiculous than believing that a timeless God is still creating the world because he has no past and has always been creating the world because he has no future.

The only rational view of God is "free infinite potentiality", a God who has time is free to do what he wants, when he wants. Infinite regress only deals with events in a chain of causes and affects, it has nothing to do with a God who always has infinite potential at any point in time and does not require an infinite series of causes and affects to act.

Balder challenged some of us back in 2006 in a thread titled "What is Time" to resolve the problem of infinite regress. I entered the debate in post #550 on July 24th.

http://www.theologyonline.com/forums/showthread.php?t=29473&page=14

--Dave

 

[Ask Mr. Religion]

Argg...Arminianism is not Pelagianism and Open Theism is not Process Thought.

The process theology aspect cannot be ignored. For open theism God is gaining more knowledge every moment. The God of Moses' knew less than the God of Paul, and so on. This is not a straw man at all and waving it off won't erase the conclusion drawn upon open theism's own denial of God's future knowledge.

If it is any consolation, I am going through 'Beyond the Bounds' every night before bed...I am trying hard to glean what I can, but its arguments against Open Theism are not persuasive and it is more of a rah rah Calvinism bias book.

It is of little consolation given that you find yourself unable to be persuaded of anything from the read. As a minimum the book puts to rest the frequent charges of the openists that classical theism is wholly rooted in Greek thought,while at the same time pointing out the philosophical heritage of open theism.

I would never make such a statement as yours when reading views different from my own by decent authors. Methinks you protesteth too much. Makes for good headlines, a reassures other gatekeepers that you are towing to the party line, but little else.

AMR

 

[godrulz]

:rain::cheers:

 

[sky.]

The process theology aspect cannot be ignored. For open theism God is gaining more knowledge every moment. The God of Moses' knew less than the God of Paul, and so on. This is not a straw man at all and waving it off won't erase the conclusion drawn upon open theism's own denial of God's future knowledge.

It is of little consolation given that you find yourself unable to be persuaded of anything from the read. I would never make such a statement when reading views different from my own by decent authors. Methinks you protesteth too much. Makes for good headlines, a reassures other gatekeepers that you are towing to the party line, but little else.

AMR

It's obvious that they have nothing to add when the truth is exposed. Open theism amounts to nothing but the idea that God is following us around so He can decide what to do. LOL!