Can God lie?

[way 2 go]

The asinine "debate" about whether the Earth is flat was where things really began to take a serious turn for the worse. When DFT Dave, of all people, took a nose dive into utter insanity, I knew then that something important had changed and it's gotten nothing but worse since then.



So long for now,
Clete

(II Timothy 4:3-4) [3] For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; [4] And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.

 

[Hoping]

Right. But if death is the wages of sin, and babies die, then it's because of Adam's sin in some way. Maybe this will tie back in somehow...

Death came by Adam.
Sinning or not, all men's vessels die.

Agreed
Perhaps, but what about those before the flood.

I bet they had a conscience too.
And were judged accordingly.

The purpose was for Abraham to save His own life at expense of Sarah's dignity, by claiming she was his sister and not his wife.

I wonder where Abe's great faith was on that day?
Oh well, his generation was still walking in the flesh.

Any of those. They seem about the same to me.

Yeah.

 

[Hoping]

(II Timothy 4:3-4) [3] For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; [4] And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.

How did that get in this thread?

 

[Derf]

How did that get in this thread?

It was a response to part of @Clete's farewell message.

 

[Idolater]

It was a response to part of @Clete's farewell message.

You mean his "farewell" message in air-quotes. I mean this one seemed a little more reserved than others he's posted, but I still think dollars to donuts he ain't done yet lol.

 

[Idolater]

There are still larger evils out there.

How do you know what they are? How do you identify them?

That one in particular is easy to understand.

I think that one is a very particular one too. Like a singularity. You need a singularity like that to annul and or amend Moses, which is what Christ and the New Covenant had to do.

The ten Booms struggled with what they were doing. They weren't really blessed for it, as far as I can see--they all died in the camps except Corrie. That doesn't mean it wasn't the right thing for them to do, of course, since we recognize that we are to lay up treasures in heaven rather than here on earth.

Was it the right thing? And if so why? What makes this as important as Christ's coming, such that the eternal law can be suspended, because there's a higher purpose? How do you determine what that higher purpose is?

Yet we who still sin, but cling to the mercies of God in Christ Jesus, are regularly blessed and not cursed by Him.

And, we reap what we sow. If we tend to avoid sinning, then we're going to profit just from the lack of losses alone. Our "net worth" is going to be higher than someone who may be blessed more frequently than we are, but who sin and so they occasionally experience terrific expenses that almost wipe them out too, and on balance, we're ahead of the game. (Something like that. I'm not exactly sure how to word it.)

 

[Idolater]

The only people I care anything about are actively reading this thread and so I'll just say this here....

I have to get away from this place. At least for a while.

There isn't anything happening here that's worth the time and effort that it requires and there hasn't been for a very long time. I've stuck around because I've done it for so long and for pretty much no other reason, but that just isn't enough anymore. Putting those who are intentional wastes of my time on ignore worked for quite a while but really there's less than half a dozen people here who know how to think and who give a damn about whether their doctrine makes sense or not. Most here wouldn't know a rational argument from a hole in the ground and its boring. Its boring and aggravating and no longer worth my time.

It's pretty much always been the case that most everyone on TOL has been unwilling to move an inch off their doctrine, no matter what anyone says, the difference now is that no one seems to even want to defend their beliefs with anything that resembles reason. It's just a big pack of lies and B.S. that any third grader could have seen through back when I started posting here some three decades ago. Back then, I was challenged. I had to actually know something in order to respond with substance to the positions people held back then. I had discussions that lasted for years where, even though neither party was convinced to change their minds, both parties where edified by the exchange because both sides where honest and things to say that weren't abject stupidity and that both parties could tell were substantive issues that deserved to be well thought through and aggressively hashed out. That hasn't been the case at TOL for so long that I can hardly remember the last time it happened. The asinine "debate" about whether the Earth is flat was where things really began to take a serious turn for the worse. When DFT Dave, of all people, took a nose dive into utter insanity, I knew then that something important had changed and it's gotten nothing but worse since then.

There isn't any particular reason why this thread is the thing that's made me finally say that enough is enough. Maybe it's just the straw that broke the camel's back and I doubt that I'll stay gone forever because, at the end of the day, I do have a real need to think through doctrinal issues and I enjoy the process of writing them out and getting some kind of feed back on my thoughts and maybe that last part is what's now missing here. All I ever seem to get is vapid stupidity from anyone and everyone who doesn't already agree with me. It just doesn't fill the bill with me any longer.

So long for now,
Clete

It's used to be Theology Online, meaning, you could be and argue any theology position you liked, but it is definitely partisan now; there is a favored theology here now (since change of legal ownership). The presumed but not published official theology here now is OV MAD. You can't "blaspheme" against OV MAD (like calling them names), and you can't argue against OV MAD begging the question, presuppositions, and bare assertions either. And you're either in or out of the club, and if you're in the club, it's an echo chamber. You're in the club Clete.

 

[Derf]

How do you know what they are? How do you identify them?

That's an excellent question. That's why I choose to distinguish battlefield deception from normal lies. And perhaps saving Jews during the holocaust could fit in that category. It didn't make the lie righteous, but the people who lie for that purpose would be considered righteous.

And that's why I brought up Peter. It's an equally narrative passage (verses a teaching passage) with the midwives' and Rahab's. Peter was blessed with the leadership of the apostles and the early church. He brought many to eternal salvation.

I think that one is a very particular one too. Like a singularity. You need a singularity like that to annul and or amend Moses, which is what Christ and the New Covenant had to do.

Was it the right thing? And if so why? What makes this as important as Christ's coming, such that the eternal law can be suspended, because there's a higher purpose? How do you determine what that higher purpose is?

I wasn't meaning that every evil had to be as large as preventing the Messiah to be "worthy" of a lie, in case that didn't come across. Aiding in the salvation (physical or eternal) of a large, maybe even small, people group ought to suffice.

And, we reap what we sow. If we tend to avoid sinning, then we're going to profit just from the lack of losses alone. Our "net worth" is going to be higher than someone who may be blessed more frequently than we are, but who sin and so they occasionally experience terrific expenses that almost wipe them out too, and on balance, we're ahead of the game. (Something like that. I'm not exactly sure how to word it.)

That's why I used the "blessings" vs "curses" language. I think we are blessed for righteous living, but we also can suffer persecution for it.

 

[Derf]

It's used to be Theology Online, meaning, you could be and argue any theology position you liked, but it is definitely partisan now; there is a favored theology here now (since change of legal ownership). The presumed but not published official theology here now is OV MAD. You can't "blaspheme" against OV MAD (like calling them names), and you can't argue against OV MAD begging the question, presuppositions, and bare assertions either. And you're either in or out of the club, and if you're in the club, it's an echo chamber. You're in the club Clete.

I'm glad you said this, even if it gets you banned. This thread about lying is not even integral to either OV, which I agree with, or MAD, which I agree partly with.

But it ("lying isn't inherently evil" theory) was propounded by Bob Enyart, and that seems to make it a sacred cow. Don't get me wrong...I owe a lot of my own ideas to Bob, and I love to listen to his podcasts still. He was a righteous and brilliant man. I just don't think of his works as holy writ, and neither should anyone else.

Hopefully that won't get me banned.

 

[Derf]

@JudgeRightly (and @Clete if you're willing to have an adult conversation)

Consider this scenario:
Your family is rounded up and with you looking on, the enemy is about to put out their eyes if you will just agree to throw a pinch of incense on the fire in acknowledgment of the deity of Caesar. You don't believe Caesar is a god, but you decide to lie and do the incense thing. You and your family are released, and you and your children become successful church planters, leading thousands of people to Christ (iow, you are blessed by God).

Was that lie sinful or not?

 

[Hoping]

You mean his "farewell" message in air-quotes. I mean this one seemed a little more reserved than others he's posted, but I still think dollars to donuts he ain't done yet lol.

Donuts...ummmm!
Yeah, sometimes stepping back does one more good than engaging.

 

[Hoping]

Was it the right thing? And if so why? What makes this as important as Christ's coming, such that the eternal law can be suspended, because there's a higher purpose? How do you determine what that higher purpose is?

Great questions.
Lying to protect others may seem like a good thing to do in the short run, but in the long run it is disastrous.
If sinning were ever the right thing to do, Christians would be shooting from their car windows at everyone who upsets them.
So much for homosexual parades...eh?
Would that be the righteous thing to do?
No.

And, we reap what we sow. If we tend to avoid sinning, then we're going to profit just from the lack of losses alone. Our "net worth" is going to be higher than someone who may be blessed more frequently than we are, but who sin and so they occasionally experience terrific expenses that almost wipe them out too, and on balance, we're ahead of the game. (Something like that. I'm not exactly sure how to word it.)

God isn't judging on a sliding scale.
Jesus died so we can be free from committing sin, so more sin nullifies His suffering and death.

 

[Hoping]

@JudgeRightly (and @Clete if you're willing to have an adult conversation)

Consider this scenario:
Your family is rounded up and with you looking on, the enemy is about to put out their eyes if you will just agree to throw a pinch of incense on the fire in acknowledgment of the deity of Caesar. You don't believe Caesar is a god, but you decide to lie and do the incense thing. You and your family are released, and you and your children become successful church planters, leading thousands of people to Christ (iow, you are blessed by God).

Was that lie sinful or not?

Churches founded on lies?
Where have I heard that before?
Your hypothetical situation could just as well go this way...Your wife and children abandon you because of your lack of faith and they proceed to become the worst mass-murderers who ever existed.
Was the lie still righteous?

 

[Hoping]

Churches founded on lies?
Where have I heard that before?
Your hypothetical situation could just as well go this way...Your wife and children abandon you because of your lack of faith and they proceed to become the worst mass-murderers who ever existed.
Was the lie still righteous?

I wish you had answered.
I see that good intentions may seem righteous, but they all depend on an unknown outcome.
Better to remain righteous than to cross your fingers hoping that unrighteousness is the right thing to do.

 

[glorydaz]

It's used to be Theology Online, meaning, you could be and argue any theology position you liked, but it is definitely partisan now; there is a favored theology here now (since change of legal ownership). The presumed but not published official theology here now is OV MAD. You can't "blaspheme" against OV MAD (like calling them names), and you can't argue against OV MAD begging the question, presuppositions, and bare assertions either. And you're either in or out of the club, and if you're in the club, it's an echo chamber. You're in the club Clete.

That's it in a nut shell.

I learned a lot of valuable information about Mid Acts here on this site, and I'm not afraid to admit it.

But what is this OV you're referring to?

 

[glorydaz]

Churches founded on lies?
Where have I heard that before?
Your hypothetical situation could just as well go this way...Your wife and children abandon you because of your lack of faith and they proceed to become the worst mass-murderers who ever existed.
Was the lie still righteous?

Oh my goodness. If we spent half as much time thanking the Lord for His goodness, as we do on these silly hypotheticals, we might actually speak to someone's heart.

I can remember back when I spent all day long worrying about what might happen, and wondering if God would allow it to happen. I'm thinking you folks have more to offer than what I've been seeing here.

 

[Idolater]

That's it in a nut shell.

I learned a lot of valuable information about Mid Acts here on this site, and I'm not afraid to admit it.

But what is this OV you're referring to?

I learned a lot of valuable information about MAD here too.

OV means Open View. It was really the first distinctive thing I noticed about TOL back in the day was that a lot of users preferred the Open View or Open Theism to what they always called Classical Theism which meant God foresees with exhaustive definitive foreknowledge.

The Open View says God can't see the future actions of free agents like us. This in spite of Jesus's foreknowledge of what both Peter and Judas were going to do. And in spite of things like every single one of us itt knowing with 100.000...% accuracy that @Hoping here will never repent of his false gospel. At least in the next say week or so. Anything can happen given enough time or a miracle, but in the next week, we are all certain, and we are also all correct, that Hoping will not recant his false gospel in the next week. That's impossible, and we all know that.

But the OV says God doesn't know that. When asked if it's a voluntary Self-limitation for God the OV says No, God doesn't know whether Hoping will recant his wrong testimony in the next week, because that's not knowable.

So you've got all of us on one side and we all know Hoping enough to know exactly what he's not going to do in the next week, and then there's God Who doesn't know what we all know. That's the OV.

 

[Derf]

Churches founded on lies?

And founded on a denial of Christ as the true God.

Where have I heard that before?
Your hypothetical situation could just as well go this way...Your wife and children abandon you because of your lack of faith and they proceed to become the worst mass-murderers who ever existed.

To me your change in scenario is much easier for him to answer, because the result is not a blessed result.

Was the lie still righteous?

And I think you caught the point of my question...That we aren't responsible for the result, nor do we measure the righteousness of an act by future blessings. Bob Enyart used to say, "Do right and risk the consequences." labelling wrong as right is the opposite.

I wish you had answered.
I see that good intentions may seem righteous, but they all depend on an unknown outcome.
Better to remain righteous than to cross your fingers hoping that unrighteousness is the right thing to do.

I'm not sure who you were hoping would answer. I'd still like to hear @JudgeRightly's answer to my question.

 

[way 2 go]

And I think you caught the point of my question...That we aren't responsible for the result, nor do we measure the righteousness of an act by future blessings. Bob Enyart used to say, "Do right and risk the consequences." labelling wrong as right is the opposite.

In a war is right or wrong to kill the enemy?

was David right or wrong when he killed Goliath ?

 

[Derf]

In a war is right or wrong to kill the enemy?

was David right or wrong when he killed Goliath ?

You're jumping in in the middle of the conversation. I've already said that war strategies allow for deceiving the enemy, and certainly for killing the enemy.

But Jesus also said to love your enemy. So killing men is forbidden, except when the alternative is worse in some way. Deceiving men might be treated the same way. But neither should be thought of as righteous acts without the added circumstances. Surely David shouldn't have had Uriah killed, even though he was the enemy (a Hittite), and they were supposed to drive the Hittites from the land. They were even allowed to take the women for wives from the enemy when they conquered a people.