Jerry Shugart
Well-known member
Same old nothing burger from you!
ECT Time & Anthropomorphism with GOD
- Thread starter Tambora
- Start date
Same old nothing burger from you!
Lon, you're reading the scripture, but you're (possibly intentionally) ignoring the definition of a word in the full phrase (which I even provided above).
The full phrase is "before time eternal."
"Eternal" is an adjective. It describes the word "time" in the prepositional phrase.
πρὸ......χρόνων...αἰωνίων
pro.......chronon..aionion
before..time........eternal
Prep.....N-GMP....Adj-GMP
"Eternal time" seems pretty clear to me that time has no beginning or end.
G166 does not mean either "lifetime" or "lifetimes." It means "perpetual", or even "eternal."
Eternal means lasting or existing forever; without beginning or end.
Which, in a sense, makes the phrase "before time eternal" a bit of an oxymoron, as you can't have something happening before somethng that's supposedly existed forever. It's a figure of speech that means, in this case, that the grace given to us in Christ Jesus has always been available, but, as verse 10 states, "has now been revealed."
glorydaz
Well-known member
I understand your point, and it's well stated.
I see the Jews were a chosen people set apart (separated unto - as you rightly said), and called the elect.
I see the members of the body of Christ in the same way....a people set apart as holy. The YOU there is plural...whosoever believeth. There is nothing special in ourselves...as individuals. The only thing that makes us BELOVED is our position IN HIM. God foreknew His Beloved would have a body of believers.
musterion
Well-known member
There's no dilemma, Lon. You're complicating things that are very, very simple.
Fact: salvation is by grace (God's part) through the instrumentality of faith (man's part). That He has required faith in different truths at different times is beside the point--God has always required and expected to be believed.
Fact: God expects and requires faith of all who would be saved upon realizing they have sinned.
Fact: Those who do exercise faith in whatever God says to believe, receive whatever blessing was thereby promised.
Fact: God considers lack of faith to be sin and condemns all who will not believe what He wants believed.
This chain of reasoning proves that faith is a capacity God has given to all, along with the power of choice to exercise it as He desires, or not to.
Jerry Shugart
Well-known member
Of course Paul would use the plural since his epistle is addressed to those in the church of the Thessalonians. But the LORD's choosing people for salvation is based on "individuals" believing:
"But we are bound to give thanks alway to God for you, brethren beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth" (2 Thess.2:13).
Also, only "individuals" are baptized into the Body of Christ and that is exactly what is being referred to here:
"According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love" (Eph.1:4).
Only "individuals" are chosen "in Christ" and the verse I just quoted makes it plain that choosing happened before the world was. That fact alone proves that the LORD exists outside of time.
Derf
Well-known member
Not about the way God interacts with time. You've only presented scriptures that are hard to understand, and claimed that they fit your view. That's backwards from taking the scripture and trying to understand it.
And as I said, Boettner and crew do the same thing.
There's nothing wrong with that, except when we then turn around and apply that understanding to the rest of scripture--if the understanding is incorrect, its application to the rest of scripture will lead us astray.
Jerry Shugart
Well-known member
Why don't you actually give us some verses which you think proves that the LORD is bound by time the way His creatures are? I have given many which I think proves otherwise, such as 1 Peter 1:1-2 and 2 Thessalonians 2:13.
Of course they are hard for you to understand because you have a closed mind on this subject and you reject any verse or verses which actually shed light on this subject.
Neither of those two verses indicate that God is "outside" time. If anything, they could even be used to say that God is "inside" time, but more specifically, they can be interpreted to support the open view.
Try these phrases, all from the Bible, which show God as "inside" time.
| is - and was - and is to come - Whose goings forth are from of old, from everlasting - Forever and ever - The Ancient of Days - From before the ages of the ages - From ancient times - the everlasting God - He continues forever - From of old - Remains forever - Eternal - Immortal - The Lord shall endure forever - Who lives forever - yesterday, today, and forever - God’s years - manifest in His own time - Everlasting Father - Alive forevermore - Always lives - Forever - Continually - the eternal God - God’s years never end - From everlasting to everlasting - From that time forward, even forever - And of His kingdom there will be no end. |
Not one of those means timelessness, but rather unending duration.
Not to mention that we never see, in the Bible, God going back in time to fix something. He always works with what is available at the present point in the Bible.
Derf
Well-known member
Great idea! Let's start with 1 Peter 1:1-2.
Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace unto you, and peace, be multiplied. [1Pe 1:2 KJV]
fore·knowl·edge [fôrˈnäləj] noun
Definition: awareness of something before it happens or exists.
If we apply that definition to 1 Pet 1:2, we see that God knew about something BEFORE it happened. Thus, Peter thought that God has a "before" and "after" in His relationship with the elect. Such an interpretation is impossible in your view. You admit this in the following quote about foreknowledge:
So essentially you said the scripture does NOT mean what it says, that "foreknowledge" is not really "foreknowledge", it's a "figure of speech".
Why, Jerry, do you think that "foreknowledge" is a figure of speech? Isn't it because you've already decided that God can't really employ real foreknowledge?
This is a rather funny statement for you to make about ME in light of YOUR previous quote!
Derf
Well-known member
Your point about our will getting us in trouble is very apropos. But it seems like the whole point of this episode in God's existence is to get a people that will freely submit their will to Him. That was the test man failed in the Garden. That was the test Jesus passed in the other garden. That is the test the church seems to be working on right now.
Humpty Dumpty had it right all along: 'The question is,' said Humpty Dumpty, 'which is to be master — that's all.' (Lewis Carroll: Through the Looking Glass)
I don't think it flies in the face of freewill at all--God wants us to use our freewill to do one particular thing: give it up! And in doing so, we will gain our real freedom.
glorydaz
Well-known member
Whether the Lord is outside of time or not is above my pay grade, Jerry, but I can't see that these verses prove what you seem to be suggesting. That God foreknew us individually...who would come to Christ or not, can't be supported by what is written in Ephesians, and Thess. can't be at odds with what Paul teaches us in Ephesians. Romans speaks of individual salvation while in Ephesians, Paul is focused on the position of believers. We are individuals when we are outside Christ, but once we are accepted IN THE BELOVED, we are His church...His body.
Our Lord Jesus Christ is the ONE chosen from the foundation, and it's our position IN Him that was foreknown. I don't see that Paul is speaking of individual salvation. In fact, how can it possibly be that we have been chosen EXCEPT that we be IN HIM?
Eph. 1:1 Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, to the saints which are at Ephesus, and to the faithful in Christ Jesus:
2 Grace be to you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ. 3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: 4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love: 5 Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, 6 To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.
2 Grace be to you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ. 3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: 4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love: 5 Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, 6 To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.
Therefore, as I see it, we are not chosen "individually" ...to be placed into the body, but become "chosen" only as and because we are IN HIM. Once we are accepted IN the Beloved, and only then, can we be said to be a body that was foreknown.
Jerry Shugart
Well-known member
Do you not understand that if the LORD exists outside of time then there is no such thing as "foreknowledge" with Him? This figurative language is employed because we cannot even begin to understand things in eternal state so figurative language is used to help us understand things in regard to Him.
Jerry Shugart
Well-known member
I think that you are missing what these two different passages are teaching when compared with one another:
"Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ" (1 Pet.1:1-2).
"But we are bound to give thanks alway to God for you, brethren beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth" (2 Thess.2:13).
The words "from the beginning" in the second passage must refer to his foreknowledge because these two verses are spoeaking about the same thing--"sanctification of the Spirit."
So we can understand the second passage in the following way:
"But we are bound to give thanks alway to God for you, brethren beloved of the Lord, because God by His foreknowledge hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth" (2 Thess.2:13).
It is "individuals" who are saved by believing, not groups of people. So according to what is said in this verse the LORD knew who would believe before they actually believed. That can only mean that the LORD is not bound by time as we are and that is because He exists outside of time.
Jerry Shugart
Well-known member
See post #254.
Derf
Well-known member
If we cannot even begin to understand things in the eternal state, then you have little you can help me with in this conversation, because you "cannot even begin to understand" it, and you certainly cannot begin to explain it to me.
It is possible that God only talks in our timeframe, and thus talks (through Peter) of His "foreknowledge", saying that "before" the present, God knew something that was "going to happen". But all you know from the passage is that "knew" something. In God's time, God never "knew" something--He only "knows" something--there is no "never", there is no past tense, there is no passage of one state to another. In the everlasting now, there is no "fullness of time", nor the "times of the Gentiles", nor any other description of one thing that happened before another thing or after another thing.
Yet the Bible is, among other things, a history book and a book of prophecy--a book about which things happened before other things, and which things are going to happen after other things--none of which can have any meaning to the God you describe. The whole bible is really just a figure of speech in your conception, Jerry. THE WHOLE BIBLE!
So since we can't even begin to understand what the whole bible says, since it is a figure of speech, we can make it say anything we want it to say. ANYTHING. Thus, there is no truth, and no falsehood.
Jerry Shugart
Well-known member
I never said that the whole Bible is a figure of speech. If you really want an intelligent discussion on this subject please reply to what I said on post #254.
glorydaz
Well-known member
But He could certainly make a PLAN....plans for how He would send a Saviour who would have a body of believers....who were saved by Grace through faith. He would have known they would be indwelt by the Spirit and then conformed into the image of the Son. Then when those things came about, He would describe it as knowing beforehand exactly how those things would be so.
glorydaz
Well-known member
The PLAN from the beginning was that whosoever responded to the call of the Gospel would be placed in the body of Christ through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth. No need to know individuals, and I see nowhere that says that was the case.
The plan from the beginning, and the means by which that plan would be accomplished. That we do see.
Yep - in the beginning was the Word...already.
And in the beginning...of time...God, Who already was...did set off said beginning of time.
And as is often the case throughout the Scripture his "men in white" (angels) just appear and disappear at will.
Meaning, they are not constrained by time, space and matter, for their realm is also outside of it.
One would think that of all people, a Dispy, would be easily able to "see" this.
But as many of them on here often prove - theirs is more often the result of another man's labor: said men's mis-fires here and there not only taken as sound; but turned into the springboard from which only more of the same kinds of mis-fires in reasoning cannot but end up more of the same of.
There is...no reasoning with such, as to the "deeper things" of the Lord.
Hebrews 5:11 Of whom we have many things to say, and hard to be uttered, seeing ye are dull of hearing. 5:12 For when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again which be the first principles of the oracles of God; and are become such as have need of milk, and not of strong meat. 5:13 For every one that useth milk is unskilful in the word of righteousness: for he is a babe. 5:14 But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.
It is...what it is..with such.
Nevertheless, Rom. 14:5; in memory of Rom. 5: 6-8 - in each our stead.