any thoughts, ideas, comments, opinios, etc..

[lookingglass]

Ed, you stated>Lets start with your last line.
John 1:14 To as many as believed to them gave He power to become sons of God
This is not carnal man this verse is addressing; this is believers. A "son of God" is not a man who is dead in trespasses and sin; he is a believer who has believed; who has overcome.
The text states that as many as believe. This cannot be limited to regenerated people..
This is a corrupt reading of the text. To say that a believer is believing in this verse is a redundancy that does not exist in the Greek.
How many times can a believer be a believer before you see that empowerment to believe does not need another jump start to keep us going? The initial step in the process from an unregenerate to a regenerated state is done by repenting . God takes the unbeliever to the next step in the process of salvation. This is according to you is irreversible!

.
But Hebrews 6:4-6 states the following:
4 It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, 5 who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age 6 and who have fallen[c] away, to be brought back to repentance. To their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace.

How does this square with your position on irresistible grace ?

 

[Ed Bana]

A son of God is not all believers. Some 30 60 and 100 fold.

Many of God's people are goats servants and are not sons. The son's of God are god's elect.

Not all will rule and reign with Christ; but they are still believers.

Ed, you stated>Lets start with your last line.
John 1:14 To as many as believed to them gave He power to become sons of God
This is not carnal man this verse is addressing; this is believers. A "son of God" is not a man who is dead in trespasses and sin; he is a believer who has believed; who has overcome.
The text states that as many as believe. This cannot be limited to regenerated people..
This is a corrupt reading of the text. To say that a believer is believing in this verse is a redundancy that does not exist in the Greek.
How many times can a believer be a believer before you see that empowerment to believe does not need another jump start to keep us going? The initial step in the process from an unregenerate to a regenerated state is done by repenting . God takes the unbeliever to the next step in the process of salvation. This is according to you is irreversible!

.
But Hebrews 6:4-6 states the following:
4 It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, 5 who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age 6 and who have fallen[c] away, to be brought back to repentance. To their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace.

How does this square with your position on irresistible grace ?

 

[Hisbygrace]

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[BarryK]

Originally Posted by BarryK

clickhere, its called "White Horse"

ReverbNation Player
​

Barry, could you share your thoughts about the song that you posted a link to in the OP? Maybe that would help to get us back to the topic that you started this thread to discuss?

Thank you skylark!!!

this song wad written produced preformed and released by a local church, and it hs recieved a wide variety of reviews everythig from "awsome" to "demonic" and everything in between.

in the OP i asked for any thoughts, ideas, copmments, opinion, etc, and I am still loking for them, just to see what people think about it, and to try to gain some insightas to why there has been such a varried local reaction to the song,
i had bumped the OP twice, and you are the first one to actually respond to post
with that being said, what are your thoughts, ideas, opinons, etc about the tune?

 

[BarryK]

once again, here is the topic for this thread:

any thoughts, ideas, comments, opinios, etc..


clickhere, its called "White Horse"

ReverbNation Player

please stay on topic

 

[Ryan Collins]

I couldn't even listen to the lyrics because it was tough to listen to.

 

[BarryK]

I couldn't even listen to the lyrics because it was tough to listen to.

was it "tough to listen to" because of the sound quality? production values? Genere? other reasons perhaps?

 

[Ryan Collins]

was it "tough to listen to" because of the sound quality? production values? Genere? other reasons perhaps?

Not really a fan of the music at all. It was surprisingly well-done production wise for a church worship track. Genre is not really my gig either, but overall, I cannot really say that I was a fan of the song. Lyrically, as I said before, I did not pay much attention, but there were a couple lines that made my head turn, as more of a "did they say that in a worship song?" reaction. Maybe for some it is too graphic of details? I did not catch much lyrically that I do not think someone can place their finger on in Scripture, but I was not entirely listening to it because I am busy working on a term paper regarding the Destiny of the Unevangelized and a philosophical reaction to HJ McCloskey's "On Being An Atheist." In other words, my head is in moving in seven different directions.

 

[BarryK]

Not really a fan of the music at all. It was surprisingly well-done production wise for a church worship track. Genre is not really my gig either, but overall, I cannot really say that I was a fan of the song. Lyrically, as I said before, I did not pay much attention, but there were a couple lines that made my head turn, as more of a "did they say that in a worship song?" reaction. Maybe for some it is too graphic of details? I did not catch much lyrically that I do not think someone can place their finger on in Scripture, but I was not entirely listening to it because I am busy working on a term paper regarding the Destiny of the Unevangelized and a philosophical reaction to HJ McCloskey's "On Being An Atheist." In other words, my head is in moving in seven different directions.

Here are the lyrics (boldfaced highlighted) Chrous in Red, vs1 in black, vs 2in green, vs 3 in blue and the bridge in orange:

Revelation 19:1- 21 (KJV)

1 And after these things I heard a great voice of much people in heaven, saying, Alleluia; Salvation, and glory, and honour, and power, unto the Lord our God: 2 For true and righteous are his judgments: for he hath judged the great harlot, which did corrupt the earth with her fornication, and hath avenged the blood of his servants at her hand. 3 And again they said, Alleluia. And her smoke rose up for ever and ever. 4 And the four and twenty elders and the four beasts fell down and worshipped God that sat on the throne, saying, Amen; Alleluia.
5 And a voice came out of the throne, saying, Praise our God, all ye his servants, and ye that fear him, both small and great. 6 And I heard as it were the voice of a great multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying, Alleluia: for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth. 7 Let us be glad and rejoice, and give honour to him: for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready. 8 And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white: for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints. 9 And he saith unto me, Write, Blessed are they which are called unto the marriage supper of the Lamb. And he saith unto me, These are the true sayings of God. 10 And I fell at his feet to worship him. And he said unto me, See thou do it not: I am thy fellowservant, and of thy brethren that have the testimony of Jesus: worship God: for the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. 11 And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and he that sat upon him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he doth judge and make war. 12 His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on his head were many crowns; and he had a name written, that no man knew, but he himself. 13 And he was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood: and his name is called The Word of God. 14 And the armies which were in heaven followed him upon white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean. 15 And out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God. And he hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written, KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS. 17 And I saw an angel standing in the sun; and he cried with a loud voice, saying to all the fowls that fly in the midst of heaven, Come and gather yourselves together unto the supper of the great God; 18 That ye may eat the flesh of kings, and the flesh of captains, and the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of horses, and of them that sit on them, and the flesh of all men, both free and bond, both small and great. 19 And I saw the beast, and the kings of the earth, and their armies, gathered together to make war against him that sat on the horse, and against his army. 20 And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone. 21 And the remnant were slain with the sword of him that sat upon the horse, which sword proceeded out of his mouth: and all the fowls were filled with their flesh.
​

 

[Ryan Collins]

Interesting. I knew, just based on the robe dipped in blood it was something with Revelation. What are your thoughts on the song, Barry?

 

[BarryK]

Interesting. I knew, just based on the robe dipped in blood it was something with Revelation. What are your thoughts on the song, Barry?

I LOVE IT!!
The Return of Christ is somthing than much of the church only vaugely acknowledges and dosent deal with very much at all.
(i doubt you will ever hear that guy with the basketball arena in houston preach on this)
The lyrics are straight from scripture, so there is no fault in them whatsoever.
concerning the Genere, ( and this calls for personal preference and opinion) i like it a lot, (there is nothing that quite sounds like a Gibson semi-hollow body guitar ( a 335 or a 330) pushed thru a Fender 'princeton" valve amp.

These guys are from a local church that meets on satyurday nights in the facilites of one of the larger churchs in town, they are a small congeration, ( about 15-20 adults) and are big on outreach, especially to the youths ( jr high skool to collledge age)

for some reason this has been assailed as "being straight from the devil" by quite a few religious people in this region, and i believe that thier vehelmance goes beyond genre preference

 

[Ryan Collins]

I LOVE IT!!
The Return of Christ is somthing than much of the church only vaugely acknowledges and dosent deal with very much at all.
(i doubt you will ever hear that guy with the basketball arena in houston preach on this)
The lyrics are straight from scripture, so there is no fault in them whatsoever.
concerning the Genere, ( and this calls for personal preference and opinion) i like it a lot, (there is nothing that quite sounds like a Gibson semi-hollow body guitar ( a 335 or a 330) pushed thru a Fender 'princeton" valve amp.

These guys are from a local church that meets on satyurday nights in the facilites of one of the larger churchs in town, they are a small congeration, ( about 15-20 adults) and are big on outreach, especially to the youths ( jr high skool to collledge age)

for some reason this has been assailed as "being straight from the devil" by quite a few religious people in this region, and i believe that thier vehelmance goes beyond genre preference

I completely understand where you're coming from, and I suspect you won't hear much of any "substance" coming from the dude in Houston. As far as the music, I kind of got a Keith Green vibe from the guy. I'm only 24, and my musical tastes are much different than most, so that is probably why I was turned off by the music. It is nice for a change to see a worship song stay as strictly Scripture, though.

 

[lookingglass]

Ryan, I see you have been reading many of the same authors on Open Theism that I have been reading. Until about 6 months ago I was completely in line with this theism and considered it the next big kid on the block. Then at the end of a very interesting read on foreknowledge I came to a blinding halt. I realized an apparent flaw. An apparent problem with this new theism.
Let me fill you in on my approach to this new theism and how I after struggling with others and myself on issues of free will and grace I came across a book Entitled "The Grace of God & The Will of Man". You may be familiar with it. Its general editor is Clark Pinnock. In the book are essays by both Armenian and Open theists. It was my introduction to the openness of God. One author in particular in this book ,to my surprise, was familiar. His name is McDonald. He was a professor of mine when I was in undergraduate work. Anyway, I was thrilled to find that this book was answering questions that I had be struggling with concerning the mode of salvation as it was originally taught by the early church. Defining grace ,election, selection and the scriptural references that speak to this kind of process was making more sense to me when viewed through this new theism.
In order for me to conceptualize this new theism I was finding it more and more necessary to familiarize myself with concepts in logic that these theists were speaking about. In particular “modal Logic” The more I immersed myself in open theism the more I encountered problems reconciling this new theism with modalities in logic. Open theist are openly accused of making a fallacious mistake in the process of drawing necessary conclusions from premises that although are logically true do not warrant the necessary conclusions that they were drawing.
For example, the idea that if god knows future free will actions then he would in fact have had to determine those actions. According to many theologians this is a fallacious argument.
It was when I began expanding my reading into other authors that I began to wonder about some real problems with open theism concerning God's omniscience. One author that enlightened me about this is William Lane Craig. I consider Craig a tremendous help in ironing out some of these apparent problems that I have been encountering. I have read some other authors who also have spelled out this same argument. Two books that have brought me to a higher plateau in understanding these issues are "Divine Foreknowledge" Four Views edited by Beilby & Eddy and "Time and Eternity" By WL. Craig. To be sure that I understood what was being said I have done some research on the definitions of modal logic and have viewed some personal videos from eminent theologians who discuss this mode of logic. See W.L. Craig’s website ,”Reasonable Faith”> View Audio/Video on Truth, interviews with theologians. It appears true that when one draws a necessary conclusion from premises like the following it is problematic.
1 – God is omniscient of all knowable truths
2- God can only know what is logically possible to know
3- It is not logically possible for God to know future free will actions (contingencies) without necessarily determining those actions
4. God does not determine future free will actions of his creatures
Conclusion- Therefore God cannot know future free will actions of his creatures without necessarily determining those actions.
This conclusion is fallacious. In modal logic it does not follow
that if God knows these future free will actions he NECESSARILY determines those actions.
The problem is in the mode of logic. See the following:
Modal logic is a type of formal logic that extends the standards of formal logic to include the elements of modality (for example, possibility and necessity)..
Epistemic modalities (from the Greek episteme, knowledge), deal with the certainty of sentences.
It would be too time consuming for me to expand on these ideas in this post as I realize I am making this post longer than I had originally intended. So if you are interested in following these arguments further I would recommend reading WL. Craig’s book on Time and Eternity. There are others who have written on this apparent problem and I would be happy to give you these other sources if you like.

When I asked you some time back a question about gods foreknowledge concerning what he knows about future free will sins and how it would be possible to reconcile these sins on the cross I was hinting an apparent problem concerning this unknown contingency. Reinterpreting the text to fit the theism is, I believe, troublesome.
More troublesome to me is the fact that if I am following this mode of logic properly, and I believe I am , that what remains is that these texts are implying some things about God that cannot to be taken literally. This has put me in limbo on what I believe is actually being put across when it comes to reading the bible. Augustine and Aquinas have written extensively on this and so have digested and thought out these problems quite thoroughly. They were convinced that the historic redactors were using hyperbole and metaphor among other modes when there were writing these documents.
Anyway Let me know what you think.

 

[Ryan Collins]

First and foremost, let me acknowledge that I have great respect for William Lane Craig and what he has done philosophically and apologetically for the Christian faith. I am a definite fan of his and was excited to see him on an opposing panel of Richard Dawkins at a recent debate. In fact, William Lane Craig's "The Absurdity of Life Without God" is one of my favorite articles regarding the, in essence, worthlessness of humanity without the existence of God.

In that regard, I have done little research regarding the philosophical validity and soundness of open theism arguments from a differing viewpoint. However, I do know that William Lane Craig, obviously, comes from a Settled Future View opinion. Craig argues a priori that the future is exhaustively settled and does so by appealing to commonsense temporal logic and semantics. He primarily uses three arguments against the Open Future View (OFV):

1). The Contradiction Argument: This is pretty much stating that things WILL or WILL NOT happen, which seems to provide no other options. Will or will not, one or the other is true regarding future possible state of affairs because they are contradictories, both mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive. So, this argument goes as such: T1 will represent any moment in time. S will be state of affairs. T2 is any time subsequent to T1. So either S will obtain at T2 uttered at T1 or S will not obtain at T2 uttered at T1 is true. Don't worry, I'll cut to the chase about OFV real quick, bear with me. Either one or the other is true in the Contradiction argument, will or will not.

2). Truth Conditions Argument is another one that Craig uses. In essence, "it will rain tomorrow" said on Thursday cannot have a different truth value if someone said, "it rained yesterday" spoken on Saturday because they have the same truth conditions...rain on Friday. In the opposite way, itwill not rain tomorrow cannot have a different truth value from it did not rain yesterday spoken on Saturday because they also have the same exact truth conditions...no rain on Friday. Now if we apply the same reasoning to any possible state of affairs (S) and any future time (t), for at (t)...S will have either obtained or happened or not have happened or obtained. So it has to be true that for any S and any future t that either S will obtain or will not obtain.

3). Craig also uses the Temporal Invariance Argument which, honestly, is a bit over my head but it discusses how a truth value of a tenseless statement is temporally never changing; that if a tenseless statement is EVER true, then it is ALWAYS true. Craig is pretty close to a genius in Christian Philosophy so I really do not do a good job of explaining things.

Either way, the Settled Future View, as Craig backs, has some pretty big outcomes regarding the foreknowledge debate regarding God's omniscience. The logical flow of SFV against open theism goes as such:

1). God knows all and only true propositions. (which is a definition of omniscience).
2). For any state of affairs S and any future time (t), either S will obtain at (t) or S will not obtain at (t) is true, which is SFV.
3). Therefore, for any S and any future time (t), God knows either that S will obtain at t or not obtain at t. (a conclusion from 1,2).
4). If for all S and all future times t God knows either that S will obtain or not obtain at t, then the future is epistemically settled for God.
5). Therefore, the future is epistemically settled for God.

I think you would probably agree that that argument is clearly valid. Now Craig affirms that by rejecting premise 1, a person needs a reason for distinguishing between truths that are or are not possible to know, and that it is not clear what reason there could possibly be for maintaining that difference for an omniscient being like God. OFV primarily disagrees with premise 2 and hold that the future cannot be exhaustively and entirely defined in the terms of will or will not happen or obtain.

Now open theists, such as myself, hold to the contignecy thesis that states there are future contingents, like the future being causally open. Now there is also a thing called semantic settledness which is usually agreed upon that semantic settledness presupposes causal settledness. So for example, it is striclt y true that something WILL happen if and only if it is causally determined THAT it happen, and this is often called the incompatibility thesis because it is an implication that semantic settledness is incompatible with causal openness. Together, they entail the Open Future view. The reason is this: if the future is causally open and causal openness entails semantic openness, then the future must be semantically open. As a result, the future cannot be exhaustively and properly defined as what will or what will not happen. If the event occurs in ALL causally possible futures, then it is causally determined and WILL happen; on the contrary, if it is not then it is causally impossible and WILL NOT happen. Say though, that it only occurs in SOME causally possible futures and not in others, then as a future contingent it neither WILL or WILL NOT happen, but rather MIGHT or MIGHT NOT happen.

Now as far as Scripture goes, if it is seen from Scripture that God KNOWS the future as partly open (and I think you can show that in Scripture), then it would naturally follow that it is partly open because piestemic openness entails semantic openness. Let me give you a flow chart for the Open View like I did with the Settled Future view.

1). God knows all and only true propositions (same definition as previously given for omniscience).
2). There are future contingents (contingency thesis).
3). If it is nw contingent whether state of affairs S happens at a future time t, then neither "S will happen at t" nor "S will not happen at (t)" are now true and both "s might happen at t" and "S might not happen at t" are now true (incompatiblity thesis).
4). Therefore, for some S and some t, neither "S will happen at t" nor "S will not happen at t" is now true and both "S MIGHT happen at t" and "S might not happen at t" are now true (2,3).
5). Now, for some S and some t, God does not know either that S will happen at t or that S will not happen at t and God does know that S might or might not happen at t. (1,4)
6). If for some S and some t God does not know either that S will happen at t or will not happen at t but God does know that S might and might not happen at t, then the future is epistemically open for God.
7. Therefore, the future is epistemically open for God.

Slightly different than what you're offering, but it is clearly a valid argument that affirms open theism built upon the contingency thesis and incompatibility thesis. If the open view is correct, then the claims of exhaustive definitive foreknowledge imputes to God beliefs that are simply not true. If we say that contingent events will or will not happen when it is not true now that either they will or will not happen, it in essence implies that God has false beliefs resulting in a compromise of omniscience. If the open view is correct then it is the ONLY way to avoid compromising divine omniscience.

Lots can be said about this subject, but open theism philosophically and logically makes sense. Sorry for the lecture, but I just wrapped up my Philosophy courses on Metaphysics and Epistemology today where William Hasker and Jay Wood texts were extensively used so I have had my fair dose of open view metaphysics and a great deal of epistemology.

Nonetheless, I know this is a lot and I'm sure there are probably some mistakes in there because I do not entirely know it all myself. I would suggest reading some William Hasker if you enjoy William Lane Craig (if you have not already). There are many knowledgeable open theist philosophers that if you want some recommendations, feel free to PM me and I will gladly sure them with you.

I will be going out of town tomorrow to spend "Christmas" with my side of the family (since we are moving to Portland this summer, we are trying to get all holidays in with both sides of the family). So feel free to respond in thread if you have any questions or PM me and I'll get back to it as soon as I'm available to give you some complete thoughts.

 

[BarryK]

anybody here care to stay on topic ?

in the OP, and I presented the topic, in posts #22, #31, #64, and #65 I have asked those posting to stay in topic.

for some reason this has been ( with one brief exeception, at the prompting of Skylark) ignored

Will a Mod please shut down this thread

 

[Dark_Lite]

Closed at OP request.