Nice dodge."in" Him we live and move and have our being. I'm not going to rewrite scriptures. They will inform me rather.
You need to stop pretending that you're being intellectually honest in your "study" of the scripture. The fact is that you really don't give a damn what anyone might say, do you? You're going to ignore every argument anyone ever makes. You've chosen your doctrines and arguments to the contrary be damned.
That response makes no sense whatsoever!Understood. Guilty by association? While I don't mind early dismissal, I do want to get homework done.
I'm the one, it seems, who is doing your homework for you. And while the fact that what you believe is also believed by others who are obvious nutjobs doesn't prove your doctrine false, the fact that they are the only people around that anyone can find who share your doctrine aught to at least serve as a red flag that indicates a need to reevaluate things to make sure you aren't also one of the nut jobs!
Well, Lon, that just isn't the way reality works! You don't get to shave off this razor thin aspect of a major thought process and think you can stick that in your pocket and not bring a big bunch of the rest of that thought process with it. Ideas have consequences! That isn't just a slogan, that's real!Does panentheism entail divergence? Yes. As such I may eschew it in the future but one has to ask 'what do you mean by using it?' to get away from all those who don't mean the same thing. I'm not with the 'in' crowd. Panentheists generally (in agreement with others) differentiate between God and His creation inherently else they'd be pantheists. Rather, Panentheists understand points I've elucidated. What do I mean by 'in?' Nothing more and nothing less that scripture means 'in' God or 'in' Christ. Colossians 1 intimates without Him, nothing exist(s) present active indicative. It necessarily means creation is presently sustained. This, among similar scripture, is very nearly the extent of my panentheistic thought.
Notice, for example, how you twist the scripture so naturally that you almost certainly don't even notice that you've done it. Colossians 1 DOES NOT say that with Him, nothing exists! That isn't what it says and that isn't what it means! It simply means that God maintains the universe. You simply cannot take the phrase "in Him" and apply it the way you're trying to apply it. Besides all the other problems such an interpretation creates that I've already presented, the bible tells us that believers are identified "in Him". In fact, its quite an interesting study to go through and look in detail at all the time Paul uses the phrase "in Him" throughout his epistles. What would any of it mean if we are already "in Him" as your doctrine explicitly teaches? If the whole universe, including every unbeliever and rebellious demon and Even Satan himself is "in Him" then what the heck is Paul even talking about?