James White to Debate Bob Enyart on Open Theism

[Ask Mr. Religion]

I don't believe God was lying when said, "You have not because you ask not. Whatsoever you ask in my Name.... You seem to think that we have a Father that sits on His throne with His fingers firmly in His ears and watches our mouths run. I don't believe it.

I do not think you are reading me carefully. I clearly stated God ordains the means to His ends. "You have not because you ask not..." is clearly an example of what I stated. God ordains that you would pray, you pray and you receive your answer. What is confusing here?

AMR

 

[Ask Mr. Religion]

I know CL is on a little ban vaction at the moment. But he can still read posts.

Here is the debate Bob spoke of:

Good gravy, is a link too much to ask instead of a huge quote with no spoiler tags:

http://www.theologyonline.com/forums/showthread.php?t=21711

Just sayin'.

AMR

 

[Stripe]

What is confusing here?

That we say God can change and you say God is immutable, but will not elaborate on how broadly your description applies. Clearly something changed during the incarnation, but you will not plainly describe how God's immutability is limited.

 

[PneumaPsucheSoma]

That we say God can change and you say God is immutable, but will not elaborate on how broadly your description applies. Clearly something changed during the incarnation, but you will not plainly describe how God's immutability is limited.

And you have no intention of determining the difference between God's essence and God's energies.

Who God "IS" and what God "DOES" are not the same thing. Any economy (action/movement) is not inherent essence.

God's Logos becoming flesh is action. There is no change indicated by action.

Doing is not being. God's immuatable being was not affected by His doing, including the Incarnation of the Logos.

This is an ancient pillar of the Orthodox Christian faith. Just because moderns want to conceptualize by their own reasoning and logic, it doesn't change the facts.

Just as you putting on a costume doesn't change your being by that doing, neither does the divine Logos becoming flesh change God's being by that doing.

(And no, I'm not advocating a heretical Christology. Humans cannot accomplish a Hypostatic Union, so donning a costume is as close an analogy as is applicable.)

God is utterly and absolutely immutable. Period. Modern stupid opinions without understanding phenonemon versus noumenon and essence versus energies are exponentially less than irrelevant.

Like several others who have gone too far in judging others' hearts, I'm at least concerned about the salvific faith of Open Theists but without accusation to that end.

 

[npatterson85]

I find it quite absurd that a Theology such as Calvinism (Which is only roughly 400 years old, outside of Augustine's Plato influenced views of scripture; it's undeniable) needs to reinvent NEW ways of simple language in order to make scripture say what THEY want it to say. The incarnation being an action? Really? That's a change! By simple definition in any language:

change
CHānj/Submit
verb
1.
make or become different.
"a proposal to change the law"
"filters change the ammonia into nitrate"
alter in terms of.
"the ferns began to change shape"
synonyms: alter, make/become different, adjust, adapt, amend, modify, revise, refine;

Joh 4:24 "God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth."

God taking upon flesh in the incarnation is a change; He took on flesh!

He loves everyone, not just believers: Ezekiel 18:23; 33:11; John 3:16; 1 Tim. 2:4; 4:10; 1 John 2:2; 4:8

He wants all saved and to come to the knowledge of truth: Isa. 55:1; Ezekiel 18:23; 33:11; John 1:12; 3:16, 36; 12:32; Rom. 3:23, 24, 25, 26; 10:9, 10, 13; Rev. 22:17

Plain reading of scripture does NOT require we take a verse like Revelation 5:9 in order to define the term "elect" in the Calvinist sense. Because God's elect are those who put their faith in Christ and remain in Him till the end by their OWN faith, and not an imputed faith. Because what true, genuine faith is that if it has to be shoved down your throat?

 

[Nang]

That we say God can change and you say God is immutable, but will not elaborate on how broadly your description applies. Clearly something changed during the incarnation, but you will not plainly describe how God's immutability is limited.

I will repeat:

The Incarnation of Christ was a manifestation. A revelation of the promised Savior. The Light that was shone in this dark world.

It was not God the Son changing Himself, but showing Himself.

As Mediator, Savior, High Priest, and King.

 

[PneumaPsucheSoma]

I find it quite absurd that a Theology such as Calvinism (Which is only roughly 400 years old, outside of Augustine's Plato influenced views of scripture; it's undeniable) needs to reinvent NEW ways of simple language in order to make scripture say what THEY want it to say. The incarnation being an action? Really? That's a change! By simple definition in any language:

change
CHānj/Submit
verb
1.
make or become different.
"a proposal to change the law"
"filters change the ammonia into nitrate"
alter in terms of.
"the ferns began to change shape"
synonyms: alter, make/become different, adjust, adapt, amend, modify, revise, refine;

Joh 4:24 "God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth."

God taking upon flesh in the incarnation is a change; He took on flesh!

He loves everyone, not just believers: Ezekiel 18:23; 33:11; John 3:16; 1 Tim. 2:4; 4:10; 1 John 2:2; 4:8

He wants all saved and to come to the knowledge of truth: Isa. 55:1; Ezekiel 18:23; 33:11; John 1:12; 3:16, 36; 12:32; Rom. 3:23, 24, 25, 26; 10:9, 10, 13; Rev. 22:17

Plain reading of scripture does NOT require we take a verse like Revelation 5:9 in order to define the term "elect" in the Calvinist sense. Because God's elect are those who put their faith in Christ and remain in Him till the end by their OWN faith, and not an imputed faith. Because what true, genuine faith is that if it has to be shoved down your throat?

I'm not a Calvinist. And God's energies are NOT His essence, and that's a truth from the earliest centuries of the Church; not circa 400 years ago.

And a modern derivative pan-European high-context language (English) isn't the final arbiter of truth.

Your false logos is NOT God's Rhema on the matter. And you're just another who has no idea about God's essence and energies, or about phenomenon versus noumenon relative to God and creation.

All your own nebulous reasoning is void and vain. God is inherently and intrinsically immutable beyond the expression of men.

You can't even actually believe in the Incarnation if it's a change for God.

 

[PneumaPsucheSoma]

I will repeat:

The Incarnation of Christ was a manifestation. A revelation of the promised Savior. The Light that was shone in this dark world.

It was not God the Son changing Himself, but showing Himself.

As Mediator, Savior, High Priest, and King.

Yes, exactly.

There was phenomenological reality of existence before creation, so there was no change when the Logos shown as phainos within creation.

It's the height of pride and vanity and fallacy for Open Theists to be making assertions about God's essence in reference to His energies.

All anyone can do any more is attempt to conceptually reason according to their own flawed logic with no foundation of God's own Rhema. Because so few even know what God's Rhema IS.

 

[Tambora]

And you have no intention of determining the difference between God's essence and God's energies.

Who God "IS" and what God "DOES" are not the same thing. Any economy (action/movement) is not inherent essence.

God's Logos becoming flesh is action. There is no change indicated by action.

Doing is not being. God's immuatable being was not affected by His doing, including the Incarnation of the Logos.

This is an ancient pillar of the Orthodox Christian faith. Just because moderns want to conceptualize by their own reasoning and logic, it doesn't change the facts.

Just as you putting on a costume doesn't change your being by that doing, neither does the divine Logos becoming flesh change God's being by that doing.

(And no, I'm not advocating a heretical Christology. Humans cannot accomplish a Hypostatic Union, so donning a costume is as close an analogy as is applicable.)

God is utterly and absolutely immutable. Period. Modern stupid opinions without understanding phenonemon versus noumenon and essence versus energies are exponentially less than irrelevant.

Like several others who have gone too far in judging others' hearts, I'm at least concerned about the salvific faith of Open Theists but without accusation to that end.

Are you advocating that you can strip all of the "energies" from the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,; and He would still be the same God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob?

It seems as if your are limiting God's "essence" to a "what" instead of a "who".
At least, that is the perception I get from your speech.

 

[Tambora]

I find it quite absurd that a Theology such as Calvinism (Which is only roughly 400 years old, outside of Augustine's Plato influenced views of scripture; it's undeniable) needs to reinvent NEW ways of simple language in order to make scripture say what THEY want it to say. The incarnation being an action? Really? That's a change! By simple definition in any language:

change
CHānj/Submit
verb
1.
make or become different.
"a proposal to change the law"
"filters change the ammonia into nitrate"
alter in terms of.
"the ferns began to change shape"
synonyms: alter, make/become different, adjust, adapt, amend, modify, revise, refine;

This is actually a good point.

If God becoming flesh was just His "energy" and not His "essence", then one could strip away that "energy" and God would still be God.

The problem with this logic is that if one strips away that "energy", then He is no longer the God of scripture.

 

[PneumaPsucheSoma]

Are you advocating that you can strip all of the "energies" from the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,; and He would still be the same God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob?

It seems as if your are limiting God's "essence" to a "what" instead of a "who".
At least, that is the perception I get from your speech.

No, not in the least.

There's a difference between God's inherent "stasis" as eternal and uncreated as His inherent being, and anything related to creation which is merely Him doing.

God is transcendant. He isn't inherently in creation, because He created as action by His energies. Nothing relative to creation is about God's intrinsic essence.

God took action for the Logos (Word) and Pneuma (Spirit) to be in creation. Creation came into existence when God spoke and breathed, and His Word and Spirit entered creation when/as it was instantiated into existence.

All of this is movement or action, referred to as economy or energies. It wasn't God's inherent (hypo)static ontology of Self-existence, so there was no change to God's essence in regards to creation.

No economy of God's energies as movement or action can ever be considered as affecting His innate ontological essence as the only uncreated and divine God.

The Logos came. The Logos didn't change. The same phenomenological pre-existence shown forth as phainos via the Incarnation.

There is no stripping of energies from God's essence. But essence is (hypo)static, and energies is economy. God's essence has no economy that we can know of.

In fact, to assign anything to God's essence is fallacious, since we can't know Him in His essence. We can only know God in His energies, because that's what's related to creation and we're created.

To make any assertions about God's essence based on His energies is to exalt oneself above God. It's just another manifestation of the Edenic lie, along with all the other trappings of Open Theism that place man in charge of many/most things.

 

[PneumaPsucheSoma]

This is actually a good point.

If God becoming flesh was just His "energy" and not His "essence", then one could strip away that "energy" and God would still be God.

The problem with this logic is that if one strips away that "energy", then He is no longer the God of scripture.

No, it's the inverse. The hypostasis (substance) underlies the ousia (essence). The underlying "stasis" of the essence is the substance.

It wasn't the ousia (essence) of God that took on flesh. It was the hypostasis (substance).

The Incarnation wasn't an Ousiatic Union, it was a Hypostatic Union. God's inherent essence has never taken action of economy as energies. Only His substance did and does so.

It's convoluted human logic otherwise that defies the very Rhema and Logos of God. Man's logos, as you have employed it, does not and cannot equate to God's Logos. This requires hearing, not postulating.

There is NOTHING in all of creation (including time and its occasions and occurences) that wasn't noumenologically within the pre-existent Logos to be uttered forth as creation. ALL things are upheld by the Rhema of His power.

The problem is so many employing their own faculties instead of adhering to God's Rhema. But that begins with so few even knowing what God's Rhema IS.

Beyond that, I can't help you or anyone. You're at the mercy of your own human logoi.

Nobody gets to assign anything about God's essence, especially that it changed. It didn't, hasn't, isn't, and won't. Ecomony as energies of substance is NOT inherent stasis of essence.

The very term hypostasis determines the stasis of that which it underlies... the ousia... the essence. God's essence is immutable.

 

[Tambora]

God is self existing. Nothing else is.
There has been no argument against that.

But to argue that if one says "God changes" has to include His self existence is (as Stripe suggested) putting a gross limitation on the word "change".
A being can change without every aspect of the being changing.

 

[PneumaPsucheSoma]

God is self existing. Nothing else is.
There has been no argument against that.

But to argue that if one says "God changes" has to include His self existence is (as Stripe suggested) putting a gross limitation on the word "change".
A being can change without every aspect of the being changing.

Economy is not change. Energies is not change.

Just more nebulous human logic instead of God's Rhema, and all to attempt validation of a presupposed false doctrine to leave man in charge of creation.

You have no intention of understanding God's essense and energies nor phenomenon and noumenon nor hypostasis, ousia, and prosopon nor rhema and logos.

You and your Open Theist peers have insisted, in total ignorance, that God's energies relative to creation and/or Incarnation of the Logos are a change.

All you've done is leverage a conceptual definition and perception of an English word upon God. You've superimposed your own human logos to supplant God's Rhema.

The real issue is the scope of noumenologicality of all creation, which gets grossly diminished. Open Theists insist God's Logos was insufficient to have created ALL, including every occasion and occurence of time; instead elevating their own logos (thought and expression) and boulema (will) above God's own Rhema (substance of thought and expression) and thelema (will).

I'll take the latter every time. Only God's Rhema.

 

[Tambora]

You have no intention of understanding God's essense and energies nor phenomenon and noumenon nor hypostasis, ousia, and prosopon nor rhema and logos.

Untrue.

 

[PneumaPsucheSoma]

Untrue.

Fair enough. Ammended to "It seems you have no intention...".

:salute:

 

[Stripe]

AMR, do you have any idea what PneumaticPsycho is on about? :idunno:

 

[Nang]

God is self existing. Nothing else is.
There has been no argument against that.

But to argue that if one says "God changes" has to include His self existence is (as Stripe suggested) putting a gross limitation on the word "change".
A being can change without every aspect of the being changing.

A created human being can change their minds and purposes, because creatures/creation are mutable in essence.

But God is Creator; not "creature."

Open Theists contend Immutable God changes His mind and even His intentions, essentially just like creatures.

Q. If God could/would change what He is . . . what would He then be?
A. Mutable like His creatures. No longer God.

No way :noway:

 

[Ask Mr. Religion]

That we say God can change and you say God is immutable, but will not elaborate on how broadly your description applies. Clearly something changed during the incarnation, but you will not plainly describe how God's immutability is limited.

Change is ultimately for the better or for the worse. How can that which is absolute perfection, God, change as improvement and deterioration are both equally impossible?

I think you are confusing movement of God with change. The divine immutability should not be understood as implying immobility (the Unmoved Mover), as if there were no movement in God. It is even customary in theology to speak of God as actus purus, a God who is always in action. See also Exodus 3:14; Psalm 102:26-28; Isaiah 41:4; 48:12; Malachi 3:6; Romans 1:23; Hebrews 1:11,12; James 1:17.

The Scripture teaches us that God enters into manifold relations with man and, as it were, lives their life with them. There is change round about God, change in the relations of men to Him, but there is no change in His Being, His attributes, His purpose, His motives of action, or His promises.

The purpose to create was eternal with Him, and there was no change in Him when this purpose was realized by a single eternal act of His will.

The incarnation brought no change in the Being or perfections of God, nor in His purpose, for it was His eternal good pleasure to send the Son of His love into the world.

And if Scripture speaks of His repenting, changing His intention, and altering His relation to sinners when they repent, we should remember that this is only an anthropopathic way of speaking In reality the change is not in God, but in man and in man's relations to God.

It is important to maintain the immutability of God over against the Pelagian and Arminian doctrine that God is subject to change, not indeed in His Being, but in His knowledge and will, so that His decisions are to a great extent dependent on the actions of man; over against the pantheistic notion that God is an eternal becoming rather than an absolute Being, and that the unconscious Absolute is gradually developing into conscious personality in man; and over against the present tendency of some to speak of a finite, struggling, and gradually growing God.

The unsettled theist has God accreting knowledge at every moment. Per the unsettled theist, God therefore is more knowledgeable today than yesterday, and will be more knowledgeable tomorrow. Who is to say, then, that God in the future will learn so much that He will completely change on vital matters? To those that will say, no, God will remain true, how do they reconcile this with God's learning every moment? Why then is He learning anything if "no" is the answer? Well, the objector will state, that these new facts being learned are simply confirming God's perfect understanding. To which I would reply, being 99.9999 percent certain is not the same as being 100 percent certain. Only in the latter case do we find God knowing. If less than that then God is becoming, never ultimately knowing. The alternative is God who is always revising His "decision tree of possibilities" to achieve His ends based upon new accreted knowledge gained as his autonomous moral agents act and He learns of these actions. Common sense dictates this is an unreasonable view of the God who is.

AMR

 

[Brother Vinny]

Change is ultimately for the better or for the worse.

Couldn't let this go unchallenged. Is ice in some way objectively better or worse than liquid water?