Should open theist be allowed as members of N.A.E.?

I see this statement a lot -- "we can't limit God in any way" - in other variations, such as "we can't define God." This statement is used a lot to defend ideas that are not in the Bible (I am not personally saying you are endorsing unbiblical ideas because you said you were not an OT and I believe you; I am addressing this statement). I do not think we are limiting God when we stick with what the Bible says about who God is. It is clear that God is a God who knows all, who sees what we call the future, a God who cannot be surprised.

And just because God's sovereignty and man's free will (or to what extent he has a free will, if any) are a mystery and a challenge to our minds does not mean that we can or should accept doctrines that make God less of what he is in the Bible. Not understanding something is not an excuse for a bad explanation that leads to bad doctrine.

The implications of a God who does not know the whole future or who can be surprised lead to all sorts of beliefs that deny God's nature as we see it in the Bible. How can God be sovereign if he does not all? He can't. That is just a rational conclusion.

The refutations of OT show its flaws. Books that do this include Bruce Ware's _A Lesser Glory_, Norman Geisler's _The Battle for God_, _What Does God Know and When Does He Know It_ by Millard Erickson, _No Other God_ by John Frame, and _Beyond the Bounds_ by John Piper. There are others but I can't think of them.

 

I declare Charles you sound just like those half baked moderates

So I guess a half-baked moderate is better than a liberal?



Do you think Jesus got called a liberal?

 

Should Christians be members of the NAE? Not if they want to please God. All Christians and New Testament churches need to be warned to come out of that apostate organization. Revelation chapters 17 and 18 tell us the future and end of the ecumenical monster religion.

 

Shannon,

Yep I've heard of that town. Had some friends in Morgantown.

I live in Milton, about 15 miles east of Huntington.

 

I read Boyd’s book a few years ago and do not agree with everything but I did find it interesting about what got him started on the problem he was faced with. His struggle was with 2 Kings 20:1-6, “20:1 In those days Hezekiah became mortally ill. And Isaiah the prophet the son of Amoz came to him and said to him, "Thus says the Lord, `Set your house in order, for you shall die and not live.' " 2 Then he turned his face to the wall and prayed to the Lord, saying, 3 "Remember now, O Lord, I beseech You, how I have walked before You in truth and with a whole heart and have done what is good in Your sight." And Hezekiah wept bitterly. 4 Before Isaiah had gone out of the middle court, the word of the Lord came to him, saying, 5 "Return and say to Hezekiah the leader of My people, `Thus says the Lord, the God of your father David, "I have heard your prayer, I have seen your tears; behold, I will heal you. On the third day you shall go up to the house of the Lord. 6 "I will add fifteen years to your life, and I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria; and I will defend this city for My own sake and for My servant David's sake."

Anyone have any answers on how to interpret the contrast between verse 1 and verse 6?

 

I don't want to be portrayed as defending Open Theism. But I do want to be someone who is able to listen to the ideas of Christians who see some problems in our faith and sincerely try to address those problems, even if I believe their conclusions are wrong.

I personally feel that the RCC refusal to do this during the time of the Reformation is one of the primarly lessons of the Reformation. I'm not trying to elevate Open Theists to the status of the reformers if anyone misinterprets this.

I'm trying to compare our attitude towards Open Theists (whether they are right or wrong) to the attitude of the RCC around the 1500s and how the Council of Trent declared all the potential abuses of Reformation positions (which the Reformers usually did not hold) as anathema while not recognizing that the Reformers were trying to address very real problems in the RCC. The reality is that there were Catholics who sympathized with the Reformers and recognized the problems in the RCC that the Reformers were concerned about. But not enough of them.

In a similar way, I believe Open Theists are right in that there are some problems with the traditional understanding of God that we have, primarily in the Greek western philosophical terms that we try to capture God in and what those words mean to us. While I disagree with their resolution to these problems, I think they present some good challenges to problems in our understanding of God that have apparent conflicts in biblical passages like the one gb93433 cited.

 

John Piper addresses Boyd on the Hezekiah issue at
http://www.ondoctrine.com/2pip1201.htm

 

Couldn't get it all in one post.

That's just an excerpt. There's more.

 

Piper's explanation makes sense within his theological framework. That is part of the issue here. Piper must explain these verses in this fashion in light of his overall theological understanding. What can be argued is whether the "plain" reading of the text supports Piper's view.

 

I heard Boyd on Faith Under Fire address that issue and I didn't get the impression that he would agree with what Piper said about him. I got the impression that Boyd would agree with the idea that God does know the future.

 

Does the plain reading of the text support Boyd's view? Or the Open Theist view? If so, then we must believe that God changes his mind and only knows the part of the future that can be known. According to OT, God does NOT know what I will decide to eat for breakfast tomorrow. Does that bother anyone besides me?

 

Yes, they say that, but what they mean is that God knows the only the knowable future. There are parts of the future unknown to God or that he chooses not to know. How can he choose not to know? Is God saying, "I am not going to interfere in Marcia's free will so I will deliberately not look at the part of the future where she decides what to eat for breakfast." Isn't that a little ridiculous?

This is said by Boyd in his God of the Possible

 

Check it out from the horse's mouth. This is an essay by Boyd on the Open View. He says that God is surprised and "frequently" changes his mind.

http://www.opentheism.info/pages/information/boyd/boyd_godf.php

There's more.

 

Marcia,

I have read much of Boyd and the other Open Theists. I understand their position. I disagree with it. That is not the question. I think the discussion is over whether they have biblical arguments for their position and if it omits them from the evangelical realm.

Bruce Ware was one of my supervisors during a period of time when he was addressing this issue extensively. I know the arguments on both sides. My only suggestion is that things are not as cut-and-dry as we sometimes make them to be. If we truly think we can completely comprehend God and His word, we are mistaken. There is a mystery element to God's relationship with time that we cannot fully grasp.

I adhere to the traditional view of God's sovereignty. But I am not ready to pretend that my position is exhaustive. If it were, I would understand more about an infinite being than is possible.

 

Thanks for your input.

I don't think things have to be cut and dried to take a position based on the Bible on this issue. As I said earlier, just because we don't have exhaustive knowledge of God or because there is a mystery element to God's relationship with time, it doesn't mean that OT have good arguments. To the extent that I have studied their views, I do not think they make good arguments. I admit I have not studied them in depth, but I have investigated this issue for awhile at different points.

I feel okay saying that even though I do not have an exhaustive knowledge of God, I do not think the OT have good arguments for their views.