Why is God hidden, invisible, unprovable?

[SkyWriting]

We cannot obviously sense God.

Here you go:

Who Wants to finally Sense Gods Direct Answers to Prayers?

Happy to help!

 

[coffee4u]

I skimmed through another closed thread that was supposed to address why God chooses to be invisible but it was mostly off topic with predictable subjects. I'm starting this new thread on the subject as I'll be addressing it differently. My science oriented perspective does not subscribe to Bible inerrancy and infallibility, multi-universes, god is on another plain of existence, time travel, precognition, omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, omnibenevolence, miracles like magic. Note, will resist posts going off topic.
-----------------------

That no one in modern times has been able to provide certain physical proof of god or even spiritual existences looking back through human history, is the strongest scientific evidence for atheistic resistance to belief in any god.

God wants us to believe by faith.
John 20:29
Jesus said to him, “Thomas, because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”

 

[SkyWriting]

I skimmed through another closed thread that was supposed to address why God chooses to be invisible but it was mostly off topic with predictable subjects.

The better question is why did God become man and come to Earth as Jesus for everyone to see?

Because God did not connect well enough as pure Spirit, which He is,
after Adam separated from the Spirit.
SO in order for us to believe that God understood our sin, the Father
sent His Son to earth to show that he could understand the people
that He is forgiving. He did this by sacrificing Jesus life for us.

 

[SkyWriting]

I skimmed through another closed thread that was supposed to address why God chooses to be invisible but it was mostly off topic with predictable subjects. I'm starting this new thread on the subject as I'll be addressing it differently. My science oriented perspective does not subscribe to Bible inerrancy and infallibility, multi-universes, god is on another plain of existence, time travel, precognition, omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, omnibenevolence, miracles like magic. Note, will resist posts going off topic.
-----------------------

That no one in modern times has been able to provide certain physical proof of god or even spiritual existences looking back through human history, is the strongest scientific evidence for atheistic resistance to belief in any god. We cannot obviously sense God. The Bible itself states God is invisible and that no one (on Earth) has seen his true essence except the Son. God does not with certainty sensually communicate with us although many believers will claim they can tell in some vague way that God is there guiding their thoughts. But if he exists, God could and may at least on extraordinary occasions do so under conditions that he has carefully evaluated as to be un-provable. Such might be described as un-manifested. It may also be that God as spirit is not visible by our organic visual system. The following Bible verses are examples showing God’s attitude in being secretive, hidden, invisible, un-manifested and how that was even understood at Jesus’s time. As to why, I'll speculate about that later:

Matthew 11:25-27 (NIV)
At that time Jesus said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this is what you were pleased to do.“
Colossians 1:15 (NASB)
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
Mathew 12:38>39 (NASB)
Then some of the scribes and Pharisees said to Him, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from You.”
But He answered and said to them, “An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet;
Jhn 5:37 (NASB)
“And the Father who sent Me, He has testified of Me. You have neither heard His voice at any time nor seen His form

Yes. Rather than have us a sex slaves (rape) God chose to let us believe by choice. Which is always faith. I have my wife as "mine" completely on invisible faith.

 

[martymonster]

John 6:44 indicates that you cannot seek God yourself though.

"No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day."

And that is why we have so many false prophets.

Yep, it's both.

 

[SkyWriting]

People have good reason to be suspicious of supernatural claims as they live their own lives without ever experiencing such while throughout human history there have been endless such claims that are never verifiable and the source of regular derision.

I have provided the verification process here:

God Answers Prayers?

 

[DennisTate]

One important part of the answer to your question is here:

Genesis 3:8 "And they heard the voice of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God amongst the trees of the garden."

Adam and Eve sat on the Throne of Moses in a sense.... and had the authority to set a precedent for their children and grandchildren down to our generation.

Our ancestors hid from G-d...... not the other way around.

Before modern times God did not have to worry if he or his angel’s appearances or miracles were seen by one or even a few people because credibility even with the most important people like say kings or religious leaders was certain to be very low by just a following generation. In other words, if a king said God had appeared to him and then later he told those royalty and servants around him, those he directly told the story to might believe he really did see God but beyond his days, decades into following generations people would increasingly take the story with a grain of salt and suspicion, especially given the considerable superstitious nature of pre-modern eras. In the Old Testament that is exactly what happened in just a few short generations after the era of Moses, Joshua, and Samuel even among people closest to those events. People have good reason to be suspicious of supernatural claims as they live their own lives without ever experiencing such while throughout human history there have been endless such claims that are never verifiable and the source of regular derision.

The actions by authorities during Jesus’s public years confirms the majority of them were also highly suspicious of supernatural claims much like today. In fact, it is likely numbers in the Jewish Levite religious tribe really did not believe there was a god and instead just played the game superficially benefiting from their special societal position. And that also shows in how corrupt immoral ruling classes that were close to them obviously shared such non-believing views as they freely sinned expecting no after life punishment.

(more coming)

 

[Woke]

I skimmed through another closed thread that was supposed to address why God chooses to be invisible but it was mostly off topic with predictable subjects. I'm starting this new thread on the subject as I'll be addressing it differently. My science oriented perspective does not subscribe to Bible inerrancy and infallibility, multi-universes, god is on another plain of existence, time travel, precognition, omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, omnibenevolence, miracles like magic. Note, will resist posts going off topic.
-----------------------

That no one in modern times has been able to provide certain physical proof of god or even spiritual existences looking back through human history, is the strongest scientific evidence for atheistic resistance to belief in any god. We cannot obviously sense God. The Bible itself states God is invisible and that no one (on Earth) has seen his true essence except the Son. God does not with certainty sensually communicate with us although many believers will claim they can tell in some vague way that God is there guiding their thoughts. But if he exists, God could and may at least on extraordinary occasions do so under conditions that he has carefully evaluated as to be un-provable. Such might be described as un-manifested. It may also be that God as spirit is not visible by our organic visual system. The following Bible verses are examples showing God’s attitude in being secretive, hidden, invisible, un-manifested and how that was even understood at Jesus’s time. As to why, I'll speculate about that later:

Matthew 11:25-27 (NIV)
At that time Jesus said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this is what you were pleased to do.“
Colossians 1:15 (NASB)
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
Mathew 12:38>39 (NASB)
Then some of the scribes and Pharisees said to Him, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from You.”
But He answered and said to them, “An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet;
Jhn 5:37 (NASB)
“And the Father who sent Me, He has testified of Me. You have neither heard His voice at any time nor seen His form

Your statement that God has not communicated with people in the modern world, is untrue. You can only speak to what you know, and you know nothing about that or your statement would not have been made. God has communicated with people in our day, I am one he has through actual contact not some vague impression in my mind. The same is true of thousands of people throughout history. And our testimony is evidence God exists.


Atheist cannot through any means prove God does not exist. A statement they can is ridiculous because it is impossible to do. Atheists cannot even offer evidence God doesn't exist. It's also impossible to find any evidence of a nonexistent God.

What you claim does not exist. And that is a scientific reason to believe God does not exist. While first hand eyewitness testimony of God miraculously contacting people is evidence of God's existence. The fact you don't believe it is irrelevant to it being evidence. Your claim it is difficult to accept also does not deny its import. The evidence has gone into the world and accomplished its purpose. Fully accomplished it. And these testimonials occur throughout human history, changing history and the future as they have separated people. And it is for that purpose God provides proof of his existence.

So on one side, the believers' side, the world's given evidence. On the other side, the atheists' side the world is given rhetoric, not only lacking proof, also lacking any evidence at all. Because if they had any surely the world would have heard it. Instead atheists give us the evolutionary theory; common genes between species; the similar shapes of early embryos shared between some species and the like. It's similar to saying let me tell you about that engine in your Ford. They have no evidence, just diversionary rhetoric. Oh this is the strongest claim among some; it's the extreme pain in our world.

I find it interesting you claimed a scientific belief and yet deny the possibility of more than 4 dimensions. Many scientists believe there are between 10-21 dimensions. That means a being can be physically composed of something but outside our view.

Please don't refer to the evolutionary theory as you will no doubt desperately attempt to present evidence. The evolutionary theory is irrelevant when considering if God exists.

The two best types of evidence to God's existence are eyewitness testimonials and the prophecies a small portion of the group God contacted wrote down.

 

[Blade]

Our body.. some cute facts if our DNA was uncoiled it would stretch out about 10billion miles. Heart beats 100k aday pumping 5.5 litres per min. Our fingers can feel a ridge as small as 13 nanometers in size 7,500x smaller then then diameter of a human hair. We can distinguish between 2.3 and 7.5 million colors. There are a trillion nerves powering our memory and if after viewing 2,500 images for only 3 seconds participants could recall lf they had seen the images with 92 percent accuracy. Our body is made of about 7 octillions atoms. HAHA... man have not even started yet.

I like the raper NF.. song "oh lord".

It's easy to blame God but harder to fix things
We look in the sky like, "why ain't You listening?"
Watching the news in our living rooms on the big screens
And talking 'bout "if God's really real, then where is He?"
You see the same God that you saying might not even exist
Becomes real to us, but only when we dying in bed
When ya healthy it's like, we don't really care for Him then
Leave me alone God, I'll call you when I need you again
Which is funny, everyone will sleep in the pews
Then blame God for our problems like He sleeping on you
We turn our backs on Him, what do you expect Him to do?
It's hard to answer prayers when nobody's praying to you
I look around at this world we walk on
It's a smack in the face, don't ever tell me there's no God
And if there isn't then what are we here for?
And what are y'all doing down there? I don't know Lord

 

[Akita Suggagaki]

Maybe all our images, ideas, and expectations about God are all inaccurate.

 

[Davidz777]

Woke, please actually go and read ALL my posts just not the first few sentences of my opening post that are there to show the secular perspective and not necessarily what I believe.

Woke >>>"Your statement that God has not communicated with people in the modern world, is untrue. You can only speak to what you know, and you know nothing about that or your statement would not have been made. "

Davidz777 >>>"God does not with certainty sensually communicate with us although many believers will claim they can tell in some vague way that God is there guiding their thoughts."

You've twisted my statement that he is communicating to one of not communicating which my statement does not state.

As for scientific reasons for God's existence if such were obvious it would be admitted by the secular world of science. Of course they do not and that is the point of the thread, to provide reasons to those in the secular world of science why God would choose to be undetectable unprovable.

 

[ByTheSpirit]

I skimmed through another closed thread that was supposed to address why God chooses to be invisible but it was mostly off topic with predictable subjects. I'm starting this new thread on the subject as I'll be addressing it differently. My science oriented perspective does not subscribe to Bible inerrancy and infallibility, multi-universes, god is on another plain of existence, time travel, precognition, omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, omnibenevolence, miracles like magic. Note, will resist posts going off topic.
-----------------------

That no one in modern times has been able to provide certain physical proof of god or even spiritual existences looking back through human history, is the strongest scientific evidence for atheistic resistance to belief in any god. We cannot obviously sense God. The Bible itself states God is invisible and that no one (on Earth) has seen his true essence except the Son. God does not with certainty sensually communicate with us although many believers will claim they can tell in some vague way that God is there guiding their thoughts. But if he exists, God could and may at least on extraordinary occasions do so under conditions that he has carefully evaluated as to be un-provable. Such might be described as un-manifested. It may also be that God as spirit is not visible by our organic visual system. The following Bible verses are examples showing God’s attitude in being secretive, hidden, invisible, un-manifested and how that was even understood at Jesus’s time. As to why, I'll speculate about that later:

Matthew 11:25-27 (NIV)
At that time Jesus said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this is what you were pleased to do.“
Colossians 1:15 (NASB)
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
Mathew 12:38>39 (NASB)
Then some of the scribes and Pharisees said to Him, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from You.”
But He answered and said to them, “An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet;
Jhn 5:37 (NASB)
“And the Father who sent Me, He has testified of Me. You have neither heard His voice at any time nor seen His form

Why is there this need to constantly prove God exists? I just dont get it.

 

[Davidz777]

Why is there this need to constantly prove God exists? I just dont get it.

The thread is not about whether God exists but rather why has he chosen to be undetectable unprovable, as I've reiterated a few times in order to keep it from wandering so. As with many informal web forum thread topics, there are always some that will inject what they prefer or are able to discuss even if off topic. A common problem in web forums are those that jump into a thread after it is a few pages long and only read the last page or two without bothering to at least review the OP post on what a thread is about.

 

[GraceBro]

I skimmed through another closed thread that was supposed to address why God chooses to be invisible but it was mostly off topic with predictable subjects. I'm starting this new thread on the subject as I'll be addressing it differently. My science oriented perspective does not subscribe to Bible inerrancy and infallibility, multi-universes, god is on another plain of existence, time travel, precognition, omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, omnibenevolence, miracles like magic. Note, will resist posts going off topic.
-----------------------

That no one in modern times has been able to provide certain physical proof of god or even spiritual existences looking back through human history, is the strongest scientific evidence for atheistic resistance to belief in any god. We cannot obviously sense God. The Bible itself states God is invisible and that no one (on Earth) has seen his true essence except the Son. God does not with certainty sensually communicate with us although many believers will claim they can tell in some vague way that God is there guiding their thoughts. But if he exists, God could and may at least on extraordinary occasions do so under conditions that he has carefully evaluated as to be un-provable. Such might be described as un-manifested. It may also be that God as spirit is not visible by our organic visual system. The following Bible verses are examples showing God’s attitude in being secretive, hidden, invisible, un-manifested and how that was even understood at Jesus’s time. As to why, I'll speculate about that later:

Matthew 11:25-27 (NIV)
At that time Jesus said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this is what you were pleased to do.“
Colossians 1:15 (NASB)
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
Mathew 12:38>39 (NASB)
Then some of the scribes and Pharisees said to Him, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from You.”
But He answered and said to them, “An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet;
Jhn 5:37 (NASB)
“And the Father who sent Me, He has testified of Me. You have neither heard His voice at any time nor seen His form

God tried speaking to the Jews and they chose to speak to Moses instead.

"And they said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen. But don’t let God speak directly to us, or we will die (Exodus 20:19)!”

God came as Jesus Christ, performed miracles, and the people conspired to kill Him because they were afraid they would lose their possessions to the Romans.

"If we allow him to go on like this, soon everyone will believe in him. Then the Roman army will come and destroy both our Temple and our nation. (John 11:48).”

So, He's "invisible" because people don't want Him around. Yet, the main reason He left was to send the Holy Spirit; which now indwells believers. He may be "invisible," but He could not be any closer.

"But in fact, it is best for you that I go away, because if I don’t, the Advocate won’t come. If I do go away, then I will send him to you (John 16:7)."

Grace and Peace

 

[packermann]

I skimmed through another closed thread that was supposed to address why God chooses to be invisible but it was mostly off topic with predictable subjects. I'm starting this new thread on the subject as I'll be addressing it differently. My science oriented perspective does not subscribe to Bible inerrancy and infallibility, multi-universes, god is on another plain of existence, time travel, precognition, omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, omnibenevolence, miracles like magic. Note, will resist posts going off topic.

I am not sure where you are going with this. You describe yourself as a Catholic and not an atheist. And yet you seem to be writing as if you are an atheist. I am not sureI understand why you do not at least call yourself an agnostic.

And I am not sure what you mean by going off-topic. If you reject Bible inerrancy and infallibility, multi-universes, god is on another plain of existence, time travel, precognition, omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, omnibenevolence, and miracles like magic then I do not see how anything can be off off-topic. I am just a little suspicious that anything starts to threaten your disbelief you reject by saying that it is going off topic. I hope I am wrong.

God gives enough evidence of His existence to those who want to believe but not enough to force those who do not want to believe. It is a matter of a free will. If He gave us absolute proof of His existence then we would not have a free will. No one would be idiotic enough to not serve God if he is absolutely convinced that God exists. It would force each one of us to serve God even though we may not want to. And this is exactly what God does not want.

It is like a teacher writing the answers on the whiteboard as his students are taking the final exam. What is the point of taking the exam? All Christian denominations agree that we will be judged by our faith. Protestants say that we will be judged only by this. Catholics and
Orthodox would say that faith is not enough but they would still agree the importance of faith. So why would God give us absolute proof of His existence if all or part of our judgment will be determined by faith that God exists and Christ is His Son?

If you look at the evidence that I am sure the others our presenting, the evidence is substantial, but is not compelling enough if you do not want to believe. I would encourage you do do some soul-searching. We have faith in many things. The next time you get into your car, remember that it is possible that you will die in a car accident. Statistics show that it is possible. It probably will not happen, but it is still possible it does. But I assume that you get into the car and drive off to your destination with very little thought that this may be your last drive. Why? Because you will probably will not be a statistic and you really want to drive to your destination. Now, I can give you evidence for Christ's resurrection, or evidence from design, or Catholic miracles, but these evidence are never going to be 100% certain. There is always a possibility that Christ did not rise from dead, and that designed world only looks as if it is designed, and that all miracles are fakes. If we needed 100% certainty before we do anything we would never leave our homes. You cannot say with 100% certainty that someone may kill you when you go on a nightly stroll. We hear about something like that almost every night on the 10 o'clock news. But we step out faith all the time - because we want to. We do not want to be prisoners in our homes. But you seem to want 100% certain of Christ before you step out towards Him. Unless you have 100% certainty then you won't step out. It seems to me that you are willing to enter a car even though there is a possibility you may die, but you are not willing to step out in faith where if true may live eternally and even if it turns out the possibility that there is no God, no Christ, and no Heaven you will still live in this present life better than having a nihilistic attitude that life is a b*@& and then you die.

 

[GingerBeer]

Yes, that must always be considered as a possibility because it then requires faith in God. Faith is important because it stretches us.

Faith can do some undesirable things too like encourage gullibility, dependence, uniformity, prejudice, even cruelty can grow out of misguided or misapplied faith. Think of the many religious (and some secular) cults of personality, high control groups, and book oriented conformity demanding philosophies and religions in the world. One must be on guard not to elevate opinions, books, and faith to such an extent that mistreatment of others is the result of adhering to "the faith".

 

[Bible Highlighter]

Woke, please actually go and read ALL my posts just not the first few sentences of my opening post that are there to show the secular perspective and not necessarily what I believe.

Woke >>>"Your statement that God has not communicated with people in the modern world, is untrue. You can only speak to what you know, and you know nothing about that or your statement would not have been made. "

Davidz777 >>>"God does not with certainty sensually communicate with us although many believers will claim they can tell in some vague way that God is there guiding their thoughts."

You've twisted my statement that he is communicating to one of not communicating which my statement does not state.

As for scientific reasons for God's existence if such were obvious it would be admitted by the secular world of science. Of course they do not and that is the point of the thread, to provide reasons to those in the secular world of science why God would choose to be undetectable unprovable.

Your statements are not quoted in a way that shows that another is really talking as a part of quote but it sounds like you are saying it. You said in the OP, "But if he exists,...." This could be the secular atheist mind, but you have to make it clear you are quoting the secular atheist by quotation marks by saying something like, "the atheist says, 'if God exists.'" In other words, this is what I would say in order for folks to not draw the wrong conclusion by what I said. But that is just my 2 cents worth. I thought were having some doubts about the faith by what you said in the OP. For you were talking about how miracles are like magic when miracles are actually real things done by GOD. But I am glad that you do not doubt GOD's existence and that He can work miracles.

 

[coffee4u]

The thread is not about whether God exists but rather why has he chosen to be undetectable unprovable.

And that is easily answered, because he wants us to believe by faith. That's it, all summed up in one short sentence. People try and make things complicated but it's not.

Matthew 18:3
“Assuredly, I say to you, unless you change and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.”

Hebrews 11:6
“And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.”

 

[ewq1938]

I skimmed through another closed thread that was supposed to address why God chooses to be invisible but it was mostly off topic with predictable subjects.

When the Father is close by, he can be seen and many scriptures attest to this fact. If he is far away in heaven...he is "invisible" meaning not able to be visually seen and the same can be said about anything or anyone in heaven. We cannot look up and see heaven, God's throne or the Father. Invisible here simply does not carry the same meaning as it does in modern English like an invisibility cloak or the invisible man who can sneak around without being seen.

Example. My car is invisible to everyone here...only because no one knows where it is and thus cannot see it but the car isn't literally invisible when standing near it.

 

[Davidz777]

I am not sure where you are going with this. You describe yourself as a Catholic and not an atheist. And yet you seem to be writing as if you are an atheist. I am not sureI understand ...
God gives enough evidence of His existence to those who want to believe but not enough to force those who do not want to believe. It is a matter of a free will. If He gave us absolute proof of His existence then we would not have a free will. No one would be idiotic enough to not serve God if he is absolutely convinced that God exists. It would force each one of us to serve God even though we may not want to. And this is exactly what God does not want...

Another person that seems to have only read the first lines of my OP. I essentially related what you do...but you need to read my other posts.