How would you answer this?

What's with all the long articles all of a sudden. This one is a first post, without so much as a hello.

 

So is the point of this to...

-cast doubt on God's sovereignty?
-slam Rick Warren/PDL?
-Ask honest questions?
-promote agnostic/atheist agenda?
-have a fruitful discussion?

I'll withhold judgement and my answer until I feel better about above. If you are legit, my apologies.

 

Generally, the custom is to start off with a short "I'm so and so from such and such a place and interested in thus and so. Howdy." type of a post and maybe a relatively innocuous question or two, and then jump in! That is pretty standard in dealing with people, actually, even in person. Also, in presenting a controversial subject, one usually prefaces it with a bit of an explanation and demurrer.

But I never pay enough attention to those rules either, so welcome! Glad you are here! And I think your question is an interesting one.

I actually went through a bit of a period of seriously questioning whether God might have ordained absolutely everything that happens. It wasn't too long ago, either. The Bible does say God created evil. Evil in that context, though, can mean a lot of things that aren't truly evil in the sense of being satanic, but just unpleasant, i.e., the bad times, cancer, death, etc. Yes, of course it is God's will that we all die. Some of us get cancer, some of us are murdered, all of us die. On the other hand, I do not believe that means that God wills people to commit murder, etc. The Bible plainly says "don't do it." How can God will that one person be murdered and not simultaneously will that another person commit murder? Great is the mystery of godliness. But the Bible does say very specifically that it was foreordained that Christ be crucified, and yet seems to impute a certain amount of so-called "free will" to Judas Iscariot, for example. So does this make God the author of sin?

At any rate, the provisional answer I have come up with is that it does not. We are responsible for our own actions, even though any decision we make is circumscribed by events beyond our control, the full control being God's. I suppose this is because in every situation, no matter how dire, it is always possible to do the "right thing" whatever that might be in a given situation. There is always a right way and a wrong way to go. Nonetheless, the fact that the holocaust happened is sufficient to prove that it was within God's will that it happen. If it were contrary to His will, IOW if He had willed that it not happen, then it would not have happened. Is this saying that God caused the holocaust to happen? Not to me. He allowed it to happen, though, at the very least. So I don't believe that every last single thing that happens is predestined. But much is. We of course are wrong to expect that God is only going to allow good things to happen to us. God is not our lucky charm. God allowed, and perhaps even foreordained, that Stephen be stoned, that Paul be beheaded, that Peter be crucified upside down. It was not for their good, but for ours.

I am sure I have expressed this rather poorly and will pay for it when someone else takes it to pieces. But it is very late, and this is the last official action of a long busy day. Can't do better right now.

 

One thing I am sure of, is, that, given all the things said pro and con Rick Warren, he is not an absolute predestinarian.

I do not think Rick Warren even holds to the Doctrine of Grace, a.k.a. Calvinism, a.k.a. Election, a.k.a. a lot of negative names to some. In fact, I think he is a modern day Arminian who probably doesn't know it.

And then, if there is such a thing as God's plan as espoused by Rick Warren and company, in fairness to them all, I believe it means, to them, something that is intended for "Christians" or those who have made an open profession of faith in Christ and have joined a church and know without a doubt that they are saved ostensibly because the Bible says so but deep down because they said so when they surrendered their life to Christ or said a silly little prayer after tearfully coming down the aisle to receive Christ.

I think if you confront Rick Warren and his apologists with the possibility that Hitler was part of God's plan and the hurt he brought to Jew and Gentile through the war he started were all part of God's plan, they all would vehemently deny that and will probably be nonplussed to explain why that is not so.

The same reaction will be elicited if you confront them with the possibility that 9/11 is part of God's plan for one and all, IED's and their makers are part of God's plan, and Bush bashing is part of God's plan for Bush, his defenders, and his detractors, including those on this board.

And then if Rick Warren and his company are backed into a corner and eventually zip their mouths and unzip it only after careful examination of what they are about to spew out, then that is part of God's plan for them as well.

It is starting to sound ridiculous, right ?
Oh, well, gotta go to the gym, and if the treadmill breaks down and my feet get caught in it and I don't get to the weight I targeted and eventually the diabetes takes full control of my body and my blood sugar stays at a "normal" level of 160, or if I drop the dumbell on my foot and it swells and the doctor amputates I guess I'll have to ask Rick Warren if all those events were preplanned by the Almighty.:wavey:

 

The greater possibility (i.e., fact) is that someone has simply applied the logical processes of a depraved and darkened mind (Eph 4:17-19). The truth is that God has planned all the days of our lives. He declares it to be so, and therefore it is. He also answers prayer. Think about it. If he has declared all the days of your life, he has therefore declared the prayers and the answers to them.

This is not really that hard, except for those who have a predisposition against accepting what God has declared to be true in his word.

I would read Greg Bahnsen "Always Ready" on this topic. It is a good starting place.

"Normal human intelligence" is a notoriously slippery phrase. Here, the person who made this argumet does not have "normal human intelligence." His "intelligence" is distorted by his sinfulness, and therefore cannot rationally approach this issue.

 

Excellent point! The lost cannot possibly understand the ways of God, so their arguments and logic amount to nothing.

It also does no good to argue with a lost person about God. Get them saved, then they won't want to argue. Well, looking at the BB, I guess that statement is false... :laugh:

 

Some of the most disagreeable and argumentative people I've known have been professing Christians--including church leaders. In fact, I'm now in the process of looking for another church because of that very thing.

 

Good afternoon TBLADY,

Welcome to the board.

In response, you've got some work to do. Your interlocutor has decided to rehash the good ole problem of evil. This has been mentioned before in the tradition and will be mentioned again. This person seems locked into the Enlightenment version of the logical problem of evil along with its smug epistemology, so besides pointing out the limitations of his presuppositions you can also provide some of the other defenses given by others.

There are numerous answers to this depending on one's presuppositions. I recommend perusing wikipedia's entry on theodicy here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodicy Like all wiki entries it is flawed but free to access.

You'll see some defenses old and new on there, and thankfully there's even mention of Yoder on the page.

As to books, John Feinberg has his own response in "the Many Faces of Evil" as well as bringing up some ground rules and what not. He, though, argues that the problem of evil while packaged in the logical and evidential forms-really stems from experience. For this, philosophical answers will not suffice-that's why the old prescription to show people Christ is the only adequate solution (Dostoyevsky in his "Brothers Karmazov" is a wonderful example of this). James Crenshaw has also written a book called "Defending God on this." You can peruse Amazon and their reviews for what other people think of those works.

For a fun, quick read on theodicy "blogger" Kim Fabricius has posted his thoughts here that take on a different approach: http://faith-theology.blogspot.com/2007/02/ten-propositions-on-theodicy.html

BJ

 

Of course it is impossible for us to have the intellect to completely understand all of what God knows, we are just simple man, His creation. How does anyone really expect the creation to understand everything about the creator?

That said I do understand God has given us free will. So when man chooses to do evil, it is mans choice. If a baby is murdered in the womb mans sin did that, not God. I imagine God mourns for those babies. Now God all knowing knew before time, that would be the result of that child's short life, and it was written. That doesn't mean it was what God would have liked to have happened, but because he gave man free will he allowed it to happen. Nothing happens without God allowing it. Even Satan had to ask His permission to sift Simon like wheat. So just because Gods knew every hair on our heads and every moment of our lives beforehand, it doesn't means God is choosing for babies to be murdered.

One thing I want to add. None of this means God doesn't answer prayers. Again it is hard for our little minds to understand all of this in context with each point, but God's word tells us that He does answer prayers, and it is important to have a strong prayer life. But then of course God would have known before who were going to pray and for what, so even when he answers our prays he knew we were going to do that. Nothing surprises God.

I don't know if any of this has made any sense to you, but I hope it helped you a little. Just remember faith is the answer. Just have faith in God, that he is good, and just. Even if you cannot understand something, have faith read the bible, and pray about it.

I will pray for you and your friend.

 

Sorry to hear about the death. May God comfort your family.