God changes his mind often?

1. Open Theism has been around for a decade or so now, but more and more evangelicals are buying into it.

2. And our culture, with its know-it-all-mentality isn't making things better either. You see: open theism is packaging God the way we would if we could.

3. At the heart of open theism is what does it mean to have a real intimacy with God. For them, it means getting rid of the mysterious. So the less we conceive of God being mysterious, the better it is for a real lasting relationship.

 

Is that a new species waiting to happen? :laugh:

 

Grrrr.

Back to the topic.
I had to look up Open Theism and quite frankly, it sounds like a bunch of non scriptural garbage.

 

1. The major premise of open theists is God entering a loving relationship with his creatures and what it entails.

2. For God to enter this relationship, He cannot be conceived of as all-knowing, because that would mean God would have an unfair advantage to begin with.

3. So, having created man with libertarian free will, allowing man to make whatever choice he wants to, this allows for that loving relationship.

4. Man has libertarian free will means that can create his own future and not until man so acts, is this future known and before this time, it is unknown--even to God.

5. In this scheme, God and man can now build a lasting, loving relationship together.

6. So the open theists think the anthromorphisms in the OT points to God making mistakes and have to correct them along the way, because He's not all-knowing.

 

Are you talking about quoting Gen 6:6?

 

No matter which side or labeling you wish to do whether it is coming from (Classical/Closed Theism, Open Theism, or others) I would take issue to someone who puts God in a box and tries to limit God from being able to respond in love to His creature’s in prayers or otherwise made in the assertions you’ve been attempting to shed on OVT.

This "unfair advantage" you proclaim is nothing more than sarcastic rhetoric against a position other than your own! Ever consider the newness of the limited atonement as equally repulsive of a doctrine in denying a Universal invitation from an Omnibenevolent God??? Up until a couple hundred years ago the position (L) would be called nothing short of heresy and sorely rejected.

Contrary to what you’ve been throwing around, not only OVT holds to LFW and some positions would only partially hold to it, but I would suggest ANY free will/moral agency from your own position would be only an illusion within a Capabilitist’s dreams. Further, I find it odd that you would be comfortable attempting to limit a sovereign God from making decisions and choices within the truths of His nature within His creation of time.

Absolutely false, the liberty of volition does not necessarily preclude God’s influence coming first nor regularly “means” any such thing, and most often is NOT seen that way in the other positions that oppose yours.

The “scheme” you represent would find building a loving relationship repulsive, would it?

I don’t have time right now to get into the many OT points that show how desperate and foolish to always find excuse in pointing to “anthromorphisms” is and also how these accusations of another’s position believing God makes mistakes is unfounded, and rather dishonest to their position. So, more to the point explain if you will the paradox in your own superior systematic finite understanding of God’s knowledge and how it holds compared to the counterfactual evidence seen in the NT that Jesus/God is not always all-knowing all the “time” from this verse:

(Mar 13:32) But of that day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father.

 

Here, it's Anthropp-oh-morff-ism. But then, here, Dennis the Menace is a cartoon character from a children's comic called "The Beano". He made his first appearance in 1951, and looks like this: ....well, he was going to "look like this" but my attempts to add an attachment failed, so I'll just have to say that he has knobly knees, a jumper with horizontal black and red stripes, and spiky black hair. If you can't think of anything better to do, you can see him at: http://images.google.co.uk/imgres?i...num=10&hl=en&rlz=1T4GZEZ_en-GBGB225GB225&sa=N :laugh:

 

1. Open theists are the ones putting God in a box, so as to domesticate Him. My belief in a real intimacy with God and answered prayers is in line with the God of Scripture that all the saints called upon. I don't have to embrace the God of open theism to have a real relationship with Him.

2. We're not arguing to merit or demerit here of Limited Atonement.

3. LFW and moral agency are two different things as understood by open theists. One who reads Scripture cannot deny the sovereignty of God in all things and at the same time, 100% human responsibility (Luke 22:22).

4. We need to harmonize rather than minimize either one.

5. Here's a quote from Dr. Boyd:

"In the Christian view God knows all of reality—everything there is to know. But to assume He knows ahead of time how every person is going to freely act assumes that each person’s free activity is already there to know—even before he freely does it! But it’s not. If we have been given freedom, we create the reality of our decisions by making them. And until we make them, they don’t exist. Thus, in my view at least, there simply isn’t anything to know until we make it there to know. So God can’t foreknow the good or bad decisions of the people He creates until He creates these people and they, in turn, create their decisions" (Gregory A. Boyd and Edward K. Boyd, Letters from a Skeptic: A Son Wrestles with His Father’s Questions about Christianity [Colorado Springs, CO: Cook Communication Ministries, 1994], 30, emphasis mine).

6. I didn't make it up. Dr. Boyd is the one publishing the books on open theism.

7. If it was possible for Paul, then it is certainly possible for the rest of us.

8. When I'm done doing theology, I always come back to Rom 11:33-36; It is not whether my theological approach is superior to another or not. It is what best explains the biblical data.

9. And you have proven that God doesn't know the future! Is that it?

 

So, if the Bible says "God repented" then you say He didn't?

 

Of course you do or should realize you don’t have to embrace Calvinism’s doctrines to have a relationship with God either. My point is that you are limiting God through your theological boxing as if you fully understand what His knowledge must consist of while stating that the premise of OVT is God entering a loving relationship with His creatures, and under that premise of their belief that God is not all-knowing, while concluding as you did to then further suggest it is because they believe that it would give God an “unfair advantage to begin with”- the first part is yourself limiting God’s knowledge and the second assertion of belief of unfair advantage is bunk!

Fine, the tread was about God changing his mind and you brought in opinion toward the OVT belief that God can not be conceived of as all-knowing in order to enter a relationship according to OVT; I simply suggested that Calvinism doesn’t believe some can even have hope in entering relationship at all by the position of (L) because in that boxed doctrine God must have all-knowingly predetermined (caused) all future events within the Cal brand which is presuming to fully understand how God’s knowledge must work. I was comparing "your" doctrine which would be more repulsive and negating to having a loving relationship with God? Fair enough?

Calvinism atempts to assign moral agency to man while insisting in causal determinism. Simply use this quote: “If you can not do otherwise when you do an act, you do not act freely.” Theological fatalism is the thesis that infallible foreknowledge of a human act makes the act necessary and hence unfree. To be consistent with maintaining that human beings have LFW is to believe that they act freely, this a type of free will that is incompatible with causal determinism.
LFW, assigns that man is responsible for evil insisting God could not be by “causally” determining such. Luke 22:22??? Did Jesus have a free volitional will being 100% human?

LFW basically means God’s will influences and the creature will respond or not respond in faith as shown in the common Arminian doctrine of Prevenient Grace that suggests divine grace precedes human decision (much like Calvinist Total Depravity) and exist without reference to anything humans have done, and does not depend on any power or merit of men, except while allowing God’s creatures to engage in their God-given free will to respond and choose salvation.

Personally, I don’t fully agree with how Boyd is making his point; while I do believe in the liberty of human volition within created time, I believe that God does this with a complex type of knowledge and as I understand it would not exclude the ability of foreknowledge, or IOW’s God possesses a knowledge beyond our capabilities to understand and I see it as a paradox but true in how He can have both as in the model of Trinity and as seen in Mark 13;32.

If God created His creatures without free and without allowing them to act freely within time and doing so foreknowing/causal determining then logically if a creature commits an immoral act then one who denies LFW must assume God created that creature to be evil and to commit that act by creating their decision.

I appreciate the coming back to same passage myself. I feel Biblical data clearly shows God interacts with His creatures within time and makes current decisions and choices which are prone to change for various reasons according to the truths of His divine creation which allows human volition.

I have simply shown in Mark 13:32 that God possesses more than one type of knowledge at the same time and one in which it does not always point to foreknowing, got a problem with what the scripture says? This type of revealed knowledge further refutes only causal determinate actions by always assuming God's knowledge as constant foreknowing and limited toward His creatures as stated above and points to at least partial LFW. And I will add that this type of complex divine knowledge can be similarly seen in multiple passages.

 

What I say doesn't mean anything. The Bible says God doesn't repent.

 

The Skeptics annotated bible has a good list of verses where God does not repent as well as verses where God does repent.

http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/repent.html

 

Remind me not to buy any of Dr. Boyd's materials.

God is omniscient and knows the end from the beginning--all your thoughts, decisions, the ones you are about to make--everything. If he didn't then He wouldn't be God. Omniscience is one of the primary attributes of God. If God is not omniscient then God is not God. It is that simple.

Numbers 23:19 God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?

God is not a man. He does not repent.
Another basic attribute of God is that he is immutable; he changes not. That means he doesn't change his mind; he cannot repent. He is immutable. If he wasn't He wouldn't be God. These are basic attributes about God. We do not conceive of God as one that changes his mind at will--every time someone does bad God gets angry and if he is in an especially bad mood he will severely punish the victim. No. He is just. Shall not the judge of all the earth do right. He is immutable. He changes not.

The word "repent" is like an anthropormophsm, showing us what God is like, helping us to understand Him. Yes God answers prayer. He uses such words as repent to show us that He does answer prayer, though he knew before the foundation of the world that He would answer that prayer. That in no way negated the free will that man had to pray, and that God answered it. He simply knew what would happen, what choices were going to be made.
Foreknowledge and omniscience go hand in hand. But they do not alter the free will that man has to choose. God does not force your hand to do anything. The choice is yours. He simply knows what choice you will make.

 

On another thread it is posited that God's character doesn't change but His dealings with men (who make their own decisions) do change. The simplest example is when a person or city (like Nineveh) repents.

Furthermore, I denounce you "mugging" Jack Hyles in your little "dark alley." I knew Jack. You have probably misunderstood either him or scripture, sir.

skypair

 

The scripture that you don't even cite speaks of God not repenting in a certain situation. The Bible also says God does repent and you are not authorized to deny it, sir. Ergo, your first assertion -- "What I say doesn't mean anything" -- is the correct one. :laugh:

skypair

 

Is this one of those "All doesn't mean all" questions?

Genesis 6:6
And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.

 

You tell me.

Numbers 3:19
God is not a man that he should lie; neither the son of a man that he should repent.

Harmonize them yourself.

 

Does "should" mean "doesn't"?

 

You tell me. You're the one who can turn "through" into "if".

 

I asked you.