Exhaustive Foreknowledge

[JesusFan]

Folks, scripture is clear, God can know whatever He chooses to know, but He also has the power to choose not to know or not remember what He did know. This claim, God MUST know everything imaginable is false doctrine, as scripture means what it says, such as Genesis 22:12, Matthew 24:36 and Mark 13:32. Since Jesus was said to know all things (John 21:17) yet did not know the time of His Return, "the phrase "to know all" refers not to everything imaginable but whatever is in view contextually.

Biblical Doctrine = Inherit Omniscience
False Doctrine = Infinite Omniscience

So all knowing and omniscience means to you has limited knowledge and at times cannot know the future until He actually sees the event happening? So you do accept the heresy of Open Theism?

 

[Van]

Folks, scripture is clear, God can know whatever He chooses to know, but He also has the power to choose not to know or not remember what He did know. This claim, God MUST know everything imaginable is false doctrine, as scripture means what it says, such as Genesis 22:12, Matthew 24:36 and Mark 13:32. Since Jesus was said to know all things (John 21:17) yet did not know the time of His Return, "the phrase "to know all" refers not to everything imaginable but whatever is in view contextually.

Biblical Doctrine = Inherit Omniscience
False Doctrine = Infinite Omniscience

 

[JesusFan]

Folks, scripture is clear, God can know whatever He chooses to know, but He also has the power to choose not to know or not remember what He did know. This claim, God MUST know everything imaginable is false doctrine, as scripture means what it says, such as Genesis 22:12, Matthew 24:36 and Mark 13:32. Since Jesus was said to know all things (John 21:17) yet did not know the time of His Return, "the phrase "to know all" refers not to everything imaginable but whatever is in view contextually.

Biblical Doctrine = Inherit Omniscience
False Doctrine = Infinite Omniscience

How can by definition a Being who has as one of his divine Attributes Omniscience be limited in any way if His exhaustive knowledge?

 

[Van]

Folks, scripture is clear, God can know whatever He chooses to know, but He also has the power to choose not to know or not remember what He did know. This claim, God MUST know everything imaginable is false doctrine, as scripture means what it says, such as Genesis 22:12, Matthew 24:36 and Mark 13:32. Since Jesus was said to know all things (John 21:17) yet did not know the time of His Return, "the phrase "to know all" refers not to everything imaginable but whatever is in view contextually.

Biblical Doctrine = Inherit Omniscience
False Doctrine = Infinite Omniscience

What is not crystal clear? Nothing. How can our Omnipotent God be limited in what He can choose not to know? Why call God a liar when He says "now I know" or when Jesus says He does not know the time of His return.

 

[DaveXR650]

What is not crystal clear? Nothing. How can our Omnipotent God be limited in what He can choose not to know? Why call God a liar when He says "now I know" or when Jesus says He does not know the time of His return.

You can't choose not to know a specific thing without knowing what it is that you are choosing not to know (which of course would mean that you know it). If you are a being like us who is limited and can only know something by finding out about it then we can limit ourselves by not bothering to do so. Some people believe God is like that and doesn't know everything and while most all Christians don't accept that at least it is logical. What you are saying is just plain ridiculous and makes no sense at all.

 

[JesusFan]

You can't choose not to know a specific thing without knowing what it is that you are choosing not to know (which of course would mean that you know it). If you are a being like us who is limited and can only know something by finding out about it then we can limit ourselves by not bothering to do so. Some people believe God is like that and doesn't know everything and while most all Christians don't accept that at least it is logical. What you are saying is just plain ridiculous and makes no sense at all.

many would see us a being existing in linear timeline, so indeed the future cannot be known by us until it happens in time, but God eternally exists outside of linear time, so everything is known to Him as all present to him no past present or future but right now

 

[37818]

. . . but God eternally exists . . . .

Everything that exists, exists in God's presence.
Acts of the Apostles 17:28, For in Him we live, and move, and have our being; . . .

 

[Saved421]

Those who support the doctrine of exhaustive foreknowledge will often cite the same hand full of proof-texts.

Isaiah 46:21-2
Present your case,” says the Lord.
“Bring forth your strong reasons,” says the King of Jacob. “Let them bring forth and show us what will happen; Let them show the former things, what they were, that we may consider them, And know the latter end of them; Or declare to us things to come. Show the things that are to come hereafter, That we may know that you are gods.

Isaiah 46:10
Declaring the end from the beginning,
And from ancient times things that are not yet done, Saying, ‘My counsel shall stand, And I will do all My pleasure.

1 John 3:20
For if our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and knows all things.

I take them to mean just exactly what they say, and have no problem with them saying it. But there are also numerous examples of God not getting what He wants, not getting what He tried to get, not getting what He expected to get.

Jeremiah 19:5
They have also built the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command or speak, nor did it come into My mind.

Isaiah 5:1-7
Now let me sing to my Well-beloved
A song of my Beloved regarding His vineyard:
My Well-beloved has a vineyard
On a very fruitful hill.
He dug it up and cleared out its stones,
And planted it with the choicest vine.
He built a tower in its midst,
And also made a winepress in it;
So He expected it to bring forth goodgrapes,
But it brought forth wild grapes.
“And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah,
Judge, please, between Me and My vineyard.
What more could have been done to My vineyard
That I have not done in it?
Why then, when I expected it to bring forth good grapes,
Did it bring forth wild grapes?
And now, please let Me tell you what I will do to My vineyard:
I will take away its hedge, and it shall be burned;
And break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down.
I will lay it waste;
It shall not be pruned or dug,
But there shall come up briers and thorns.
I will also command the clouds
That they rain no rain on it.”
For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel,
And the men of Judah are His pleasant plant.
He looked for justice, but behold, oppression;
For righteousness, but behold, a cry for help.

And these are by no means the only passages in the bible that is incompatible with the idea that God knows everything that will ever happen. Indeed, there are passages that aren't even compatible with the idea that God knows everything that has already happened.

Genesis 18:20-21
And the Lord said, “Because the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because their sin is very grave, I will go down now and see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry against it that has come to Me; and if not, I will know.”

Note that the above is God Himself speaking about what He is going to do and why He's going to do it. If you want to convert that overt statement of God's into some sort of figure of speech, where it effectively means the opposite of what it says, then you need to ask yourself why is doing so valid. Then, whenever you get an answer to that question, ask yourself why the same reason wouldn't apply to any passage at all. If a passage doesn't mean what it says then why does any passage mean what it says?

In short, scripture means what it says and God using His wisdom and power to both predicting the future and to guide the unfolding of history is not at all in conflict.

Dear reader,

God knoweth everything, all our secrets, all our buried deep sins. The spirit of us is the candle that is used to search our reins and hearts.

Motivating words and no, those verses rightly divided will not say God didn't know.

Shawn

 

[DaveXR650]

many would see us a being existing in linear timeline, so indeed the future cannot be known by us until it happens in time, but God eternally exists outside of linear time, so everything is known to Him as all present to him no past present or future but right now

I have no problem with that. But even for one existing outside of time and looking at the whole line as all being present you have to admit in that case it is also all "set" so to speak. In other words, if one could look at all existence at once rather that as unfolding as we see it, you still have the reality being that what you are looking at is an exact set of events and as such it is fixed. If it is fixed it is set and Calvinistic predestination of all things is true. If it is not fixed then even if you are looking at the whole of existence outside of time it still is constantly changing and you are back where you started with no way of knowing the future with certainty even though you can transcend time.

 

[Van]

You can't choose not to know a specific thing without knowing what it is that you are choosing not to know (which of course would mean that you know it). If you are a being like us who is limited and can only know something by finding out about it then we can limit ourselves by not bothering to do so. Some people believe God is like that and doesn't know everything and while most all Christians don't accept that at least it is logical. What you are saying is just plain ridiculous and makes no sense at all.

I am sorry Sir, but God does as He pleases, and for you to claim He can't is nonsense.

Once a list of names were posted on a board. I could look at it, or choose not to look at it. That way I never knew who was on the list.

 

[DaveXR650]

I am sorry Sir, but God does as He pleases, and for you to claim He can't is nonsense.

Once a list of names were posted on a board. I could look at it, or choose not to look at it. That way I never knew who was on the list.

God does as he pleases according to his attributes and nature, some of which he has revealed to us in scripture. There are even things we can do that God can't, like lie or behave in a depraved manner. We can also limit ourselves from knowing something which God can't do. Think about it. The reason we can do that is like the example you used - we start from a point of having to look at something or else we won't know what is there. So since we never knew, all we have to do is not exert ourselves to find out. God knows what is there so he can't do like us.

If you look at cases where God is saying he won't remember something it means that in the capacity of judging it he won't hold it against us. We use the same terminology even as humans when we might say "in light of the occasion I'm going to forget you said that". In cases like with Abraham being told to sacrifice Isaac there is a sense that for all of posterity and for the record, Abraham had to actually attempt to offer Isaac. But that does not mean that God did not infallibly know what was going to happen. It just means that even if God knows something, it still has not happened until it happens. That's where hyper-Calvinists get into trouble because they think that if there is an "elect" chosen before time, it must mean that they were eternally saved, which is not so.

I don't mean to pick at you because I can tell from your posts that you are trying to honor God and honor scripture. I would just point out that you have to honor the other scriptures too that seem to say God is all knowing. That's why we try to have theology, imperfect as it is.

 

[JesusFan]

I have no problem with that. But even for one existing outside of time and looking at the whole line as all being present you have to admit in that case it is also all "set" so to speak. In other words, if one could look at all existence at once rather that as unfolding as we see it, you still have the reality being that what you are looking at is an exact set of events and as such it is fixed. If it is fixed it is set and Calvinistic predestination of all things is true. If it is not fixed then even if you are looking at the whole of existence outside of time it still is constantly changing and you are back where you started with no way of knowing the future with certainty even though you can transcend time.

Because God already fully knows all that will ever happen does not mean also direct caused them all to happen though

 

[JesusFan]

I am sorry Sir, but God does as He pleases, and for you to claim He can't is nonsense.

Once a list of names were posted on a board. I could look at it, or choose not to look at it. That way I never knew who was on the list.

There are some things not even God can do though, as that would violate His divine attributes any very nature of being God

 

[JesusFan]

God does as he pleases according to his attributes and nature, some of which he has revealed to us in scripture. There are even things we can do that God can't, like lie or behave in a depraved manner. We can also limit ourselves from knowing something which God can't do. Think about it. The reason we can do that is like the example you used - we start from a point of having to look at something or else we won't know what is there. So since we never knew, all we have to do is not exert ourselves to find out. God knows what is there so he can't do like us.

If you look at cases where God is saying he won't remember something it means that in the capacity of judging it he won't hold it against us. We use the same terminology even as humans when we might say "in light of the occasion I'm going to forget you said that". In cases like with Abraham being told to sacrifice Isaac there is a sense that for all of posterity and for the record, Abraham had to actually attempt to offer Isaac. But that does not mean that God did not infallibly know what was going to happen. It just means that even if God knows something, it still has not happened until it happens. That's where hyper-Calvinists get into trouble because they think that if there is an "elect" chosen before time, it must mean that they were eternally saved, which is not so.

I don't mean to pick at you because I can tell from your posts that you are trying to honor God and honor scripture. I would just point out that you have to honor the other scriptures too that seem to say God is all knowing. That's why we try to have theology, imperfect as it is.

he seems to really hold to a form of heretical Open Theism, and to really misunderstand what predestination/elections means to Calvinists, as we NOT saying God exhautively created all thuings that happens period

 

[DaveXR650]

Because God already fully knows all that will ever happen does not mean also direct caused them all to happen though

Exactly.

 

[DaveXR650]

he seems to really hold to a form of heretical Open Theism, and to really misunderstand what predestination/elections means to Calvinists, as we NOT saying God exhautively created all thuings that happens period

If someone on here who knows theology from a historic point of view would comment it would be of help. Wouldn't be surprised if through much of history and even Christian history it may well be that many or even most people did not believe that God had total foreknowledge of every single event and the movement of every single molecule. I get a kick out of modern theologians who announce that if there is a random molecule somewhere in the universe then God is not God and so on. God is God and we aren't, and we discover his attributes as best we can and mostly through scripture we have. We don't get to declare what he has to be and if he is still allowed to be God if he doesn't meet our standards.

But I do find Calvinist theology to be well thought out and very good although I don't worship it. I really like Edwards but a lot of his thoughts on things in this area are based partly on rationalism. He said so himself.

 

[JesusFan]

If someone on here who knows theology from a historic point of view would comment it would be of help. Wouldn't be surprised if through much of history and even Christian history it may well be that many or even most people did not believe that God had total foreknowledge of every single event and the movement of every single molecule. I get a kick out of modern theologians who announce that if there is a random molecule somewhere in the universe then God is not God and so on. God is God and we aren't, and we discover his attributes as best we can and mostly through scripture we have. We don't get to declare what he has to be and if he is still allowed to be God if he doesn't meet our standards.

But I do find Calvinist theology to be well thought out and very good although I don't worship it. I really like Edwards but a lot of his thoughts on things in this area are based partly on rationalism. He said so himself.

Open theism heresy, as are also Finney full free will gospel. and hyper calvinism

 

[Van]

God does as he pleases according to his attributes and nature, some of which he has revealed to us in scripture. There are even things we can do that God can't, like lie or behave in a depraved manner. We can also limit ourselves from knowing something which God can't do. Think about it. The reason we can do that is like the example you used - we start from a point of having to look at something or else we won't know what is there. So since we never knew, all we have to do is not exert ourselves to find out. God knows what is there so he can't do like us.

If you look at cases where God is saying he won't remember something it means that in the capacity of judging it he won't hold it against us. We use the same terminology even as humans when we might say "in light of the occasion I'm going to forget you said that". In cases like with Abraham being told to sacrifice Isaac there is a sense that for all of posterity and for the record, Abraham had to actually attempt to offer Isaac. But that does not mean that God did not infallibly know what was going to happen. It just means that even if God knows something, it still has not happened until it happens. That's where hyper-Calvinists get into trouble because they think that if there is an "elect" chosen before time, it must mean that they were eternally saved, which is not so.

I don't mean to pick at you because I can tell from your posts that you are trying to honor God and honor scripture. I would just point out that you have to honor the other scriptures too that seem to say God is all knowing. That's why we try to have theology, imperfect as it is.

One well worn method of scripture nullification, is to claim scripture does not mean what it says, because of some claimed attribute of God. The most used one is "God would not send people to Hades because God is love."

I say God is all knowing about whatever is contextually in view. The false doctrine of Infinite Omniscience rips "all knowing" out of context and claims it means everything imaginable. Using this pretext, next they say God cannot remember no more forever, because He MUST know everything imaginable. It is nonsense.

 

[JesusFan]

One well worn method of scripture nullification, is to claim scripture does not mean what it says, because of some claimed attribute of God. The most used one is "God would not send people to Hades because God is love."

I say God is all knowing about whatever is contextually in view. The false doctrine of Infinite Omniscience rips "all knowing" out of context and claims it means everything imaginable. Using this pretext, next they say God cannot remember no more forever, because He MUST know everything imaginable. It is nonsense.

You open Theism God is heretical and is as you stated"nonsense", for if God ever has to learn anything new, by very definition no longer qualifies to be God

 

[Van]

You open Theism God is heretical and is as you stated"nonsense", for if God ever has to learn anything new, by very definition no longer qualifies to be God

One well worn method of scripture nullification, is to claim scripture does not mean what it says, because of some claimed attribute of God. The most used one is "God would not send people to Hades because God is love."
I say God is all knowing about whatever is contextually in view. The false doctrine of Infinite Omniscience rips "all knowing" out of context and claims it means everything imaginable. Using this pretext, next they say God cannot remember no more forever, because He MUST know everything imaginable. It is nonsense.

Calvinism's God is an Open Theism God because He is not the author of sin. This is not rocket science.