Friday, December 16, 2011


St Mathews In The City: Christmas Billboard 
What does it mean?

It seems St Matthews are continuing a new Christmas tradition started a year or two ago with very controversial billboards. This years is no different. It features a renaissance style painting of Mary holding a pregnancy test kit with a look of surprise. What's wrong with the picture? To this writer at least it says far more about the age we live in than what perhaps St Mathews intended. It speaks to me more of a problem that is really pervasive in our post modern world. And yet it also speaks to me of a problem encountered since the dawn of man. 
What do I mean?
Firstly, in the narrative that this picture represents, Mary has already been told by the angel what has happened to her. But, entirely consistent with the post modern view of reality she has to interpret this for herself, she will be the final authority as to what is real. The post modern view of language has meant that she cannot allow herself simply to take the word spoken to her for granted, she must learn what the meaning is based on her own terms.What was spoken to her is not the final and authoritative answer to her quandary, in fact she has shown with the use of the pregnancy test kit that she needs science to tell her what is really going on. The voice and opinion of autonomous man is where she will finally place her confidence. In listening to science she seeks her answer other than from God. 
But how has science helped? She should already have been assured of her pregnancy, what has the scientific test added? Will it tell her her child is divine? Will it tell her that her son will be the center-point for all of history? Will it tell her her child will be a King and his kingdom will never end? Science speaks of a certain portion of reality, but to say it speaks of the whole is to sell oneself woefully short.

As N T Wright writes-
Current accounts of knowing have placed the would-be objective scientific knowing (test-tube epistemology, if you like) in a position of privilege. Every step away from this is seen as a step into obscurity, fuzziness and subjectivism, reaching its peaks in aesthetics and metaphysics. "The Challenge of Jesus"

Secondly, we see the import of the message even though manifested in a thoroughly postmodern worldview  is merely the same problem of old dressed in a new set of clothes. Mary has done what her forbears have done. In the Garden of Eden there was another who doubted the word of God spoken to her. In fact Eve took to heart- not the word spoken to her by God- but the word of the serpent- "Yea has God said...?" To me this picture is a self indictment of St Mathews and all who go along with the revisionist view of Christianity. It says more about St Mathews than about Mary, it says more about the so-called liberal churches of today who are more content to invent their own ideas of reality than listen faithfully to the words of Him from whom all reality comes. 

Sunday, November 27, 2011

Implications of Free Will on the Doctrine of Chance


In recent discussions in other blogs on the teaching about "election", universalism and freewill the above comment was made as a response to statements I had made. Go here and here to view full discussions.

Christians in general trust God is as good as his word, what he promises gets done, as someone has said we are all Calvinists when we pray, meaning when we petition God we at least assume he is able to do what we ask even if he’s perhaps not willing. There is an inconsistency in the heading to this post that ought to be made manifest.The alternative to being a Calvinist in the context of this discussion is to be an Arminian. It matters not whether you have never heard of these labels, generally people fit broadly into one of these two ways of thinking. In contemporary Christian culture the latter is virtually endemic, it occurs naturally in our thinking.  The inconsistency lies in not seeing the consequence of trusting that a person who has been offered salvation in Christ may (because of what is believed about human nature) refuse that offer. The argument would look something like this:
1. God leaves nothing to chance.
2. God is omnipotent
3. God wills the salvation of all.
4. Therefore if he willed the salvation of all, then the salvation of all would occur.

There would be no "chance" of anything else. Therefore all talk of freewill in the libertarian sense would be "mere sound signifying nothing". Libertarian free will means that our choices are free from the determination or constraints of human nature and free from any predetermination by God.(Theopedia an Encyclopedia of Biblical Christianity, Emphasis mine.)

What is commonly believed about human nature is that we have "freewill" in the definition given above. Many are unaware and have never really thought about how to define that facet of human nature. Many may not be aware that theologians and philosophers have struggled to define the scope of this extraordinary condition of human nature for centuries.
And yet at the same time it is assumed at grassroots level almost universally. Augustine once said: "What then is time? If no one asks me, I know: if I wish to explain it to one that asks, I know not." Freewill is a bit like that, easy to assume its existence- not so easy to define its limits (if any) with reference to God.

Even a cursory glance at the Scriptures affirms the existence of "will" in both God and humankind. Significant (to me at least) is the almost universal absence of the combined phrase "freewill" in the Bible. Where this term is used in the Old Testament it is (judging by its context) used to signify a special type of offering to God. A "freewill" offering is not the customary and obligatory "tithing" sort of offering, but is spontaneous and entirely voluntary, in the sense of free from the constraint of a command from God, free from direct moral imperative. You might even say that this offering is, by virtue of its spontaneity and that it isn't obligatory, a gift or favour given to God by a loving subject. But is that really possible in an absolute sense? One may think of all other types of offering as necessary for sins, necessary for the maintenance of the temple and so on, but not this one. 

But is it really true to think that we can do God a favour or, in a real sense give him a gift?

Consider this scripture:  “Who has ever given to God, that God should repay him?”  For from him and through him and to him are all things.To him be the glory forever! Amen.(Romans 11:35-36)

Who has ever given to God that He should feel obligation... That's an all-encompassing statement isn't it? In fact that is as universal as the following one: For from him and through him...are all things...

It is evident that when everything good you have, and everything good you are or do, is given by God- it is impossible to give something which would make him obligated to you. Nevertheless God is pleased with us about certain things: 

If it is universally true that we can give nothing good that didn't originally come from God, we can say that it is a rule, a law. Let's call it the "Law of Dependence".

But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.(Hebrews 11:6) 

Since it's impossible to please God without faith it follows that "faith" is what pleases him, and that is evidently so from the preceding verse: By faith Enoch was translated ...for ...  he pleased God.(Hebrews 11:5 abridged)  

Now let's test this law with regard to faith. Let's test our "Law of Dependence" What does this law state?
No good we give or do, or any good state of existence is absolutely independent of God- The "Law of Dependence" 

Where then is the evidence for the truth of this "law" with regard to "faith"? Where are the scriptures which (provided they are understood correctly) cannot be broken? Where does it say or imply that our "faith" is dependent on God?

(John 6:29) Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent.

(1 Peter 1:21) Who by him do believe in God, that raised him up from the dead, and gave him glory; that your faith and hope might be in God.

(Ephesians 2:8) For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: (Ephesians 2:9) Not of works, lest any man should boast.

(Ephesians 1:6) To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved. Here the gift of faith is implied in the grace by which he has made us accepted in the beloved.

Now if our faith is dependent on God, and faith is expressed when we choose Christ by the exercise of our will, how can it be said our will is free in the sense of "libertarian freewill"?

Now if you can think of any good thing that you enjoy (either material or immaterial) can you not see that you depend on it coming from God's good hand? How then, in an ultimate sense, do offerings that we are under obligation to give differ at all from freewill offerings? The difference is in our perception, we owe God everything because we are dependent on him for everything. With this in mind, how then is it possible to think of ourselves as entirely or absolutely independent from God? How then can "freewill" (in the sense it is used commonly) exist at all? The definition of "libertarian freewill" as understood and taught by Christians like Doctor Randal Rauser is that our will is totally independent particularly where salvation is concerned. Such that God may offer salvation but he cannot cause us to irresistibly accept the offer.Yet humanity is dependent on God under the universal "law of dependence" how then is it totally free? It is understandable that an atheist would try to prove this independence because our "law" is only validated by scripture, but ought Christians to follow the world in their appraisal of human nature?

(For a more complete discussion on the difference between offering eternal life and giving eternal life go here

Certain consequences must necessarily follow from believing that human will is independent of God in the sense of libertarian freewill. God is no longer the totality in whom we live and move and have our being something else must exist if we do not abide totally dependent on him for everything. He is no longer the ground of everything that we are or do. What is this usurper that makes room for our freewill in the face of our total "dependence" on God?  For humanity to have this independence of choice we must have a will which makes choices possible that is obvious, that is the faculty of will, the potential to make decisions. But is this will entirely and absolutely independent of God?

 If one who is declared "dead in trespasses and sins" is able to choose life over death independently of God then why do people bother to pray for her salvation? Every effort by Christians, should- by virtue of this "reality"- be directed straight to the person since that person is (on this basis) absolute in her determinate will. Prayer is a complete waste of time for the consistent Arminian, because on their view, God has already done all that is possible for the sinner. Every time a person, (who believes the human will is ultimate) prays for one to be saved they deny their own theology and affirm the truth of limitation in the human will.

The "environment" then which lies outside of both God and mankind is this thing, this entity called "chance"

 Chance is the necessary corollary of libertarian freewill. (Just as water is the necessary corollary of swimming fish) As I understand it “chance” (according to libertarian freewill) is an environment for want of a better word in which neither God nor man has control. Therefore for the libertarian "freewill" -chance is the entity outside of God where all possibilities exist. This is in contradistinction to what a Christian ought to believe who believes God is the ground of all existence both material and abstract. For the Christian she sees all possibilities only as they relate to God, not outside of God.When Christ said "O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt." He was looking to God and within God for the possibility. When the libertarian chooses Christ she imagines she chooses between the alternatives of atheism and faith irrespective of God and  her own nature because she is free in this absolute sense. She therefore looks to the realm of possibility and chance.

What that means is- in order for people to have freewill in the libertarian sense, (which entails that when a person makes a decision not to follow Christ for instance there is no guarantee that God or any one else can change that persons mind), in that sense her will is ultimate, sacrosanct, untouchable. It therefore means that the environment of “chance” is something outside of and beyond God’s control and hence in at least that sense greater than God.

Randal Rauser made mention (in the context of this discussion): “he”(God) “will bring the entire state of current affairs — everything in heaven and on earth — to reconcilation in Christ (Col. 1:20). And you think that means that we’re in the pole position?”

Right there is his reference to a promise from God but it seems to me in the interest of consistency our theology has to also regard and be consistent with how God works this out into concrete reality, So we have the end, what about the means to that end? According to Randall’s libertarian theology positing freewill within a universe of chance (to which God also is subject) leaves God’s promises no better than a person writing cheques knowing that there is not enough in the bank, and thereby putting libertarian mankind in “pole position” with regard to salvation.

This is in contradiction to what (I believe) the scripture teaches. The illustration below is the universe according to the consistent Christian worldview (1) in contrast to that which is influenced by the philosophy of the world in her Christianity (2). In effect he or she has simply tacked on Christian beliefs to an overarching worldview (libertarian ism) and is not consistent with a true Christian worldview. In one all possibility is encompassed within the nature of God. To the other because possibility is independent (outside) of God and man it encompasses both and heretically becomes greater than God.









Friday, November 25, 2011

Implications of Free Will on the Doctines of Grace:John Piper on Irresistible Grace

John piper addresses a misconception of resisting God's grace.

Basically what Piper is addressing here are two issues.


  1. Can God's grace be resisted?
  2. Can he be resisted such that his will in any particular circumstance be thwarted?
The importance of distinguishing these two separate questions are vital. Dealing with the first question: Of course God and his grace can be resisted. Every human will that ever existed (apart from Christ himself) has resisted, or will resist God in that he or she  contravenes the law of God. There is none that are righteous and each goes his own way, as such they resist the decree of God. One need only turn to the book of Acts of the Apostles where Stephen is being stoned to death as a record of God being resisted.
You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you.Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who announced beforehand the coming of the Righteous One, whom you have now betrayed and murdered, you who received the law as delivered by angels and did not keep it.” Acts 7:51-53
Earlier on we see that there is a sense in which those enemies of Christ could not resist  God:
And they were not able to resist the wisdom and the spirit by which he spoke. Acts 6:10
But resisting God's will is one thing, overcoming God's will is totally another.  Can an ant resist a bulldozer? Well yes he can, he may even appear to be successful- until the driver puts it in gear and moves forward!

One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who is able to resist his will?” Romans 9
Now here Paul is speaking of resistance in such a manner that points out that though God is resisted daily, hourly, and every second of the day, no one ever resisted in the sense that God could not do as he pleased in any day, at any hour or by any second he so chooses. And to emphasize the point it is as if Paul shrugs his shoulders and emphatically says: " Who is able...who is able to resist his will?

Isaiah 46:10 - Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times [the things] that are not [yet] done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure
Isaiah 55:11 - So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper [in the thing] whereto I sent it.
Daniel 4:35 - And all the inhabitants of the earth [are] reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and [among] the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?
In summary then, human freedom is such that we who are "sinners by nature" do resist God incessantly. It is in the nature of freedom that God has given, whereby we are able to resist God, and that even sometimes, or rather oftentimes- "successfully" if  God so wills. But that in no way detracts that to resist God in some sort of irrevocable or final and ultimate sense is not a liberty that comports with the word of God. Human freedom then is circumscribed always and everywhere by the ultimate omnipotence of God.
Behold, the LORD'S hand is not so short That it cannot save; Isaiah 59:1
For more on the subject of irresistable grace see here. 

Saturday, November 19, 2011

An Argument Against the Existence of God

I found this on atheist John Loftus' Blog (which is here) that hasn't apparently been commented on for some time so I thought I would post it here and my response.

Consider this deductive argument from Richard R. La Croix: “If God is the greatest possible good then if God had not created there would be nothing but the greatest possible good. And since God didn’t need to create at all, then the fact that he did create produced less than the greatest possible good.” “Perhaps God could not, for some perfectly plausible reason, create a world without evil, but then it would seem that he ought not to have created at all.” “Prior to creation God knew that if he created there would be evil, so being wholly good he ought not to have created.” [The Impossibility of God, pp.119-124]. After analyzing La Croix’s argument, A.M. Weisberger argued that “contrary to popular theistic opinion, the logical form of the argument is still alive and beating.” [Suffering Belief, 1999, p. 39].


"God is the greatest possible good." There is a problem with the way that is being interpreted. What that should say is that God is the greatest possible good being. That is like saying a circle is of the greatest possible roundness. Of course nothing can be more round than a circle, nonetheless a circle, even the greatest possible circle, can be joined by a lesser circle thereby increasing the amount of circularity in existence. But if the lesser circle was derived from the pattern of the greater, then its roundness was merely an extension of the roundness of the original.

What if: God is the greatest possible good only while nothing else existed. Having created the world, (not out of necessity) it too is good (with qualifications). God is still the greatest possible good in terms of essentiality and nature, the good of creation created more good in terms of quantity but not essence- thereby God created more good because it is derivative of his own goodness. Or it may be more correct to say- in that God created the universe, all the good therein comes from him anyway therefore he is still the greatest possible good.

"there are no limits to what an omnipotent being can do." There are limits to what God can do, like making square circles, and sense out of non-sence.

Implications from Free Will on the Doctrine of Omnipotence:Why Arminians should agree with Calvin


I have taken the liberty of copying an excerpt of a discussion between Randal and myself (Kerry) From his Blog (found here) on the issue of Limited Atonement. This discussion has generated some interest (as it should) by others. In the interest of simplicity (maybe some selfishness) I have included here only what Randall has proposed and the discussion arising between him and I. I mean no disrespect to the contributions of other readers and ask that any readers here pay their respects to other contributions by going directly to his Blog, it just gets very convoluted with all the other comments. As far as I can see the discussion is still live and therefore I may add other comments and contributions as they occur. I hope in the copy and pasting I have not inadvertently left out any of the points between us, if that is the case please point that out and I will address it. The discussion is opened by Randal: 





Over the years as I have engaged in extended discussions with Calvinists over election and the divine nature I have often found the same two red herrings being pulled out just as things start to heat up.


And so it is in my recent discussion with a Calvinist named Kerry over my critique of another Calvinist (Andrew). Given that I think the discussion is illuminating I have reproduced it below with some commentary. Then I conclude by returning to the first red herring (justice). The drift of my argument shall be this: demonstrate why Calvinists should either be universalists or Arminians.


Red Herring One: Appeal to God’s Justice


The first red herring is God’s justice. Kerry, would you please speak clearly into the microphone:


Kerry: “It seems to me you are measuring God’s love on the basis of his actions towards people without any other consideration. What I mean is God does not just love people in isolation. He loves justice as well. Your maximally loving God must also consider justice.”


Randal enter from stage right. Turn the spotlight. And go:


Randal: “Kerry, I’m not sure what you’re claiming here. Are you saying that God was unablejustly to elect all people to salvation from eternity in Christ? If you do believe that, what is your reason for believing it? If you don’t believe it (and thus believe that God could have justly elected all to salvation), then why didn’t God elect all people to salvation from eternity in Christ?”


Kerry: “What I am asking- is your definition and measure of maximal love accurate? If God is love then whatever he does proceeds on the basis of love. God loves justice so some are justly condemned that is also a measure of his love, it is just that in this case his love is expressed in justice while sometimes it is expressed in mercy. God is no less loving either way and the integrity of his love for both justice and mercy are met perfectly on the cross.”


Randal: “Kerry, are you suggesting that God wouldn’t have been just if he had elected all to salvation by imputing the righteousness of Christ to all? After all, whether God reprobate some or saves all, his wrath and justice are still satisfied on penal substitutionary theology by the death of Christ. So the only remaining question is how many people would God will to save by the infinitely effective death of his beloved Son. If God is omnibenevolent (meaning that he desires all creatures to achieve shalom) then it follows necessarily that he would desire that all achieve shalom and thus he would elect all in Christ such that none would be reprobate. Insofar as you deny that this is the case and continue to affirm that some are reprobate you thereby reject the divine omnibenevolence. The question is why?”


So the defense of the decree of reprobation by appealing to justice is shown to be the red herring that it is. Time to introduce the next red herring.


Red Herring Two: Eschew “Speculation”


This brings us to the second red herring a heady brew of ”Who are you, O man, to talk back to God?” (Romans 9:20) spiced with a dash of “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” (Isaiah 55:9) Kerry once again:


Kerry: “Ultimately I don’t have to suggest anything about a hypothetical world. This is the one I live in- and I seek to understand it in terms of experience and in the light of scripture. It is apparent that people reject the Gospel, some accept it. Choices have consequences. I seek to understand this world through the lens of scripture, if I were to be more convinced that libertarian free will reflected scripture better I would follow that. I think that what is damaging is the extremism of both sides. We have a will, it is meaningful- but not absolute.”


Okay, turn up the house lights. Now for some additional commentary on this second red herring in the exchange. This one is centered on Kerry’s reply to the dilemma I presented for his invocation of justice. As we saw, he replies: “I don’t have to suggest anything about a hypothetical world.”


This is an attempt to marginalize my critique of his position as being unduly speculative (perhaps irreverent) and altogether irrelevant.


But it isn’t irrelevant. If Kerry wants to defend his Calvinism he does have to respond to this problem that his position entails that God cannot elect all to salvation. Why can’t God do this? I already showed that appealing to justice is a canard. So what is Kerry’s reasoning for thinking God cannot redeem all?


Consider for a moment that Kerry staked his claim on the position of christological peccability meaning that while Jesus didn’t sin he nonetheless could have. I would respond as follows: “Are you saying that God can sin?” It would hardly do for Kerry to respond “I don’t have to suggest anything about a hypothetical world.” Of course you do. If your view entails that God can sin then you have to defend that implication. Similarly, if your position entails that God cannot elect all to salvation then you have to defend that implication as well.


Back to justice


Ultimately the defense of Kerry’s assumption that God cannot elect all will bring us back to justice, but not in the way Kerry initially thought. At this point I’m going to offer clarification on how a Calvinist might appeal to justice to explain reprobation and why I am not persuaded by that appeal.


First off, I already explained why explaining the divine decree of reprobation by appealing to justicesimpliciter does not work. The reason, as I said, is that Christ’s death satisfies the divine justice (according to the penal substitutionary theory of atonement typically assumed by the good Calvinist). Consequently, to appeal to justice as the explanation of reprobation makes no sense. It is akin to a police officer attempting to explain his use of a lethal gun to detain a suspect when he could have used a non-lethal taser to the same effect.


The only way the Calvinist can appeal to justice is if there is something overall better or more fitting about the damnation of some. But what does that mean and what would it look like? What I suggest is that the Calvinist switch the focus from justice simpliciter to the demonstration of justice. To make the difference clear we can distinguish two different principles:


Justice reprobation (JR) principle: God’s justice precludes him from electing all to salvation.


Demonstration of justice reprobation (DJR) principle: God’s need to demonstratehis justice precludes him from electing all to salvation.


Keryr initially appealed to the JR Principle. I’m arguing that the Calvinist cannot appeal to the JR principle to explain reprobation since Christ’s death satisfies divine justice. However, they could appeal to the DJR principle. That is, they could argue that God’s need to demonstrate his justice in a maximal sense requires that some people be reprobated. One could argue that the DJR Principle is assumed in Romans 9:22-23:


What if God, although choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction? What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory


Thus the claim goes like this: Paul is arguing that the reprobation of some manifests more fully God’s glorious justice than it would have been manifested if none had been reprobated. Thus, God reprobates some not because justice requires it but rather because his need to demonstrate his justice as fully as possible requires it.


Now why am I not persuaded by the DJR Principle? Here’s why:


Fuller Justice (FJ) Assumption: The DJR Principle assumes that the death of Christ plus the reprobation of some more fully manifests God’s justice than the death of Christ alone.


But why think that? As best I can surmise, the assumption that drives the FJ Assumption is a Diversity of Justice Principle. We can state this as follows:


Diversity of Justice (DJ) Principle: Divine justice is more fully appreciable by finite agents if that justice is manifested in the election of some in Christ and the reprobation of others to their sin.


Finally, I’m going to complete this depth analysis by suggesting that the DJ Principle is driven by a contrasting justice principle:


Contrasting Justice (CJ) Principle: Divine justice is more fully appreciable by finite agents if that justice is manifested in contrasting outcomes which are all consistent with divine justice.


I know what you’re thinking: this is getting a bit ridiculous. Perhaps. But I’m in the mood for over-analysis and the positing of principles today. Anyway, it seems there is some accuracy in this analysis. So to summarize, the CJ Principle grounds the DJ Principle which in turn grounds the FJ Assumption that drives the DJR Principle.


All this leads me to ask the following three questions.


Question 1: Assuming the CJ Principle and DJ Principle are true, is the additional understanding of divine justice through the reprobation of some sufficient to override the divine love that would otherwise redeem all?


In other words, while God may desire to manifest his justice to finite creatures, he also desires to redeem creatures. Why think the desire to manifest his justice to some would outweigh his desire to save all?


Question 2: Assuming the CJ Principle and DJ Principle are true, is the additional understanding of divine justice through the reprobation of some sufficient to override the additional understanding of divine love that would come through the redemption of all?


It seems to me that if there is an argument that human beings have a heightened sense of divine justice through the reprobation of some, they would have at least a commensurately heightened grasp of divine love through the election of all. So if God has two possible conflicting outcomes (greater sense of divine justice; greater sense of divine love) why think the grasp of justice trumps love?


As important as these two questions are, I’m going to focus on Question 3:


Question 3: Why think that the CJ Principle and DJ Principle are true?


I see no reason to accept these, unless of course you believe that they are somehow entailed by your reading of Romans 9. But that is, to say the least, a leap. And if we have good reasons to reconsider a particular exegesis of a text then we ought to take those reasons seriously. So in conclusion I’m going to offer just such a reason.


Let’s imagine that only 1000 people have ever existed. (That’s okay. The numbers are irrelevant to the point being made. Sticking to a thousand just makes things simpler.) This means that only 1000 people are possible objects of election or reprobation. The Calvinist believes that things work out approximately like this:


Calvinist Scenario: God elects 500 (more or less) and reprobates 500 (more or less) because this more fully manifests his justice than does saving all 1000.


But hold on. There is a serious problem with this analysis and it is that the manifestation of justice that comes through election and reprobation is radically disproportionate. Here’s why:


An elect individual has the full righteousness of Christ imputed to him or her. Christ has fully satisfied the wrath and justice of God on the cross and since that elect individual is counted in Christ that individual is a complete token of that infinite justice.


By contrast,


A reprobate individual must suffer eternally to satisfy the demands of justice apart from the imputed righteousness of Christ. Since it is impossible to traverse an actual infinite series of temporal moments it is impossible for this reprobate individual ever to satisfy fully the demands of divine justice and thereby become a complete token of that infinite justice.


To sum up, the Calvinist is proposing that a possible world in which divine justice is perfectly satisfied in some and only potentially satisfied in others is more illustrative of divine justice than a world in which divine justice is perfectly satisfied in all. But this is clearly false. To provide an analogy, that is like claiming that 500 infinite deposits into a bank account coupled with 500 finite deposits is worth more than 1000 infinite deposits.


Consequently, the consistent Calvinist will either embrace universal salvation or reject Calvinist election.


Q.E.D.


1.


Kerry says:
Wednesday, November 16, 2011 at 10:00pm


Randal the red herring thing, is that what you really think? If so that would be the first time that I’m aware of that justice should be excluded as a consideration when talking of the measure of God’s love, salvation and election. I thought we needed saving because he is a God of justice. I thought it was a reasonable statement to say that our overall view of God’s love must include and be tempered by his love of justice. You no doubt have heard the saying “justice must not only be done, it must be seen to be done”. It looks like that with Pharoah doesn’t it?
But then I see further down you have already anticipated that.


“Kerry, I’m not sure what you’re claiming here.” Really Randal, in your focused rebuttal you just finished saying you have spoken with Calvinists over the years and they always bring up this red herring? You knew exactly what I was claiming. Perhaps the red herring was put there by you for bait?


“This is an attempt to marginalize my critique of his position as being unduly speculative (perhaps irreverent) and altogether irrelevant”.


This talk of red herrings makes it sound as if I was deliberately obfuscating the issue. You pour scorn on the idea of bringing justice into the question and then bring my motives into question. Was that really necessary; is your argument so weak?
But enough tattle.


You say you “already showed that appealing to justice is a canard.” *, no you have told us it is; I have yet to see it demonstrated either philosophically or scripturally.


Are you saying that God was unable justly to elect all people to salvation from eternity in Christ? If you do believe that, what is your reason for believing it?


I am not saying God was unable, what I am saying is that He chooses not to, and I cite Pharaoh as a case in point.


You have not answered my question: “What I am asking- is your definition and measure of maximal love accurate?” Does maximal love mandate that not a single one need answer for the evil they have committed? Please explain.


If the definition of “maximal love” need not consider justice then wouldn’t maximal love have created an amoral universe? But that is clearly impossible since love cannot be comprehended in an amoral universe; our consciousness is given us as a reflection of being made in God’s image- love is our privilege to know but with it comes the correlatives of evil, justice and mercy.
How God weighs up what is “maximal love” is a mystery to me. Evidently it necessitated evil coming into the world, justice is an empty meaningless term without evil, and so is mercy. We have a moral universe, evil exists, God had pre-empted the incursion of evil with the lamb that was slain from the foundation of the world.


You may make talk of electing all but that negates the idea of electing or choosing (like talk of making square circles): Every act of will is an act of self-limitation. To desire action is to desire limitation. In that sense every act is an act of self-sacrifice. When you choose anything, you reject everything else. G.K. Chesterton “Orthodoxy”. By that standard if you posit that God elects all then you destroy the idea of election. He would have then simply said- “all are saved”, there would then be no more talk of election. Inherent in the idea of “election” (choice) is selection, distinction, separation. They are necessary corollaries to the word. The reality is God speaks of “election” you have to do something with the word without destroying its meaning.


Jesus said: Woe unto the world because of offences! for it must needs be that offences come; but woe to that man by whom the offence cometh! (Matthew 18:7)


I take it that the mystery of evil (for all it’s abhorrence) is a necessary evil, and that a “maximally loving” God is just that, not despite the evil but through it. The reformed view acknowledges human responsibility and culpability.


So what is Kerry’s reasoning for thinking God cannot redeem all?
I have made no statement at all about whether God can or cannot redeem all. As far as I can see He chooses not to save all and God being the maximally perfect being has made the best world possible. This also includes the fact that he chooses to “knock some off their high horse” (St Paul) while he continues to let others ride on blissfully unaware through self delusion.


I am not saying that God is unable justly to elect all people to salvation from eternity in Christ; on the other hand are you saying that God (because of libertarian freewill) cannot save whom he chooses from all eternity? Is God free? Are we more free than God? If God is not the referent for freedom then must we look to ourselves?


I have no doubt that whatever moral obligations or duties God may have (obligations or duties which are rooted in the necessity of his own nature) he has met.


Well we can surely agree on that.


If you don’t believe it (and thus believe that God could have justly elected all to salvation), then why didn’t God elect all people to salvation from eternity in Christ?”


Randal you are attempting to put me on the horns of a dilemma but I suspect the dilemma is yours. I neither confirm nor deny the possibility of God justly electing all people to salvation from eternity in Christ. This reminds me somewhat of the cosmological argument. In days gone by it was thought the universe was infinite and eternal and thus neatly dispensed of a need for a creator. Then there was a big bang and suddenly a creator is looming on the horizon again. Now we have to think of multiverses (for which there is no evidence) in order to find yet another excuse for denying a creator. Why can’t we stick with the world we do have?


*Wow! Canard I confess I had to look that one up… I can ’ardly wait to see what comes next… canard: a false or baseless, usually derogatory story, report, or rumor. Dictionary .com


I didn’t know Calvinism had sunk this low.


o Reply


randal says:
Wednesday, November 16, 2011 at 11:38pm


“I thought it was a reasonable statement to say that our overall view of God’s love must include and be tempered by his love of justice.”


This is completely ignoring my point. His love of justice is already manifested in the penal substitionary death of Christ.


“You no doubt have heard the saying “justice must not only be done, it must be seen to be done”.”


It was seen to be done. Look to the cross Kerry!


“This talk of red herrings makes it sound as if I was deliberately obfuscating the issue.”


That’s not my intention. I think the points are a distraction from the main issues, but I don’t think you’re trying to direct us away from the main issues. I could have said “rabbit trail” perhaps but that lacks bite.


“I am not saying God was unable [to elect all people], what I am saying is that He chooses not to.”


As you know, there are several texts in scripture that are interpreted by universalists (Calvinists among them) to suggest otherwise. At least their view is coherent. Why is it, on your view, that God, the God who is supposed to be infinitely more loving and compassionate than any human being ever could be, chooses not to?


“Does maximal love mandate that not a single one need answer for the evil they have committed? Please explain.”


I already defined love: to love another is to desire that the other achieve shalom. To love maximally is, minimally to desire that all achieve shalom. How do you define maximal love?


“To desire action is to desire limitation. In that sense every act is an act of self-sacrifice. When you choose anything, you reject everything else.”


Sure. So by electing to save all God would have given up the option fo electing to save only some.


“The reality is God speaks of “election” you have to do something with the word without destroying its meaning.”


You’re playing a semantic card? Insofar as we understand “election” as chosen for salvation it is perfectly meaningful to ask how many (and possibly all) are elect to salvation.


“I have made no statement at all about whether God can or cannot redeem all. As far as I can see He chooses not to save all and God being the maximally perfect being has made the best world possible.”


If God chooses not to save all then God could have saved all. As for “best world possible”, I think that’s an incoherent concept like “highest number”. God could always create a world with a few more daffodils and gum drops.


“I neither confirm nor deny the possibility of God justly electing all people to salvation from eternity in Christ.”


Read over the comments you made that I quoted above. Twice you actually said (the first time explicitly) that Christ could have elected all to salvation but chose not to. So then if you believe God is omnibenevolent or perfectly good you need to explain why this is. If you have a child contemplate that child suffering forever the most unspeakable torments for the glory of God and his saints. Does that make any sense to you?


2. Reply


Kerry says:
Thursday, November 17, 2011 at 1:10am


“A reprobate individual must suffer eternally to satisfy the demands of justice apart from the imputed righteousness of Christ. Since it is impossible to traverse an actual infinite series of temporal moments it is impossible for this reprobate individual ever to satisfy fully the demands of divine justice and thereby become a complete token of that infinite justice.”


By this stroke of genius you have not only robbed God of exacting justice, you have robbed anyone of “eternal life”. Why stop there! God himself (whom I believed to be eternal) mustn’t exist either by your definition.


Quite Easily Done


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randal says:
Thursday, November 17, 2011 at 10:47pm


“By this stroke of genius you have not only robbed God of exacting justice, you have robbed anyone of “eternal life”. ”


Kerry, I don’t think you’re understanding the point. Let’s assume that eternal conscious torment is just. On the Arminian view God allows those who freely reject him to suffer eternally because they will not choose otherwise and he respects their choice. That is, on this view, a fully just response to hell.


But things are very different for the Calvinist. On his view God could have willed that an individual freely repent and become a token instance of the imputed righteousness of Christ. But instead, God chooses to make that individual reject Christ’s righteousness and become a token example of an individual suffering finitely and in perpetuity for sins committed. In other words, God has inexplicably chosen a less complete means to exemplify divine justice.


So Calvinism has a problem here not faced by Arminianism and certainly not by eternal conscious torment per se.


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Kerry says:
Friday, November 18, 2011 at 3:59am


“On the Arminian view God allows those who freely reject him to suffer eternally because they will not choose otherwise and he respects their choice.”


You may claim that as an exclusive Arminian view but isn’t that the Calvinist position also?


“On his view God could have willed that an individual freely repent and become a token instance of the imputed righteousness of Christ. But instead, God chooses to make that individual reject Christ’s righteousness and become a token example of an individual suffering finitely and in perpetuity for sins committed.”


No I disagree, on the point that- “God chooses to make that individual reject Christ” as before- that person freely rejects him and God chooses to allow that to happen. In the elect God chooses to make the Gospel real enough to one’s heart that she accepts it. Isn’t that what grace is all about? Where Randal is your idea of grace? We acknowledge not only the sacrifice of Christ but the work of grace in the heart.


You haven’t answered my incredulity:


I may be thick as a plank but where do you get the idea to equate eternal with it is impossible to traverse an actual infinite series of temporal moments it is impossible for this reprobate individual ever to satisfy fully the demands of divine justice A reference like that pertains to time- we are talking outside the time/space realm are we not?


I am not committed to any particular view of existence for the unregenerate after death.


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randal says:
Friday, November 18, 2011 at 5:21am


“You may claim that as an exclusive Arminian view but isn’t that the Calvinist position also?”


I think it is very misleading for a Calvinist to say that God respects the choice a person makes since that would naturally be read as implying libertarianism.


“No I disagree, on the point that- “God chooses to make that individual reject Christ” as before- that person freely rejects him and God chooses to allow that to happen. In the elect God chooses to make the Gospel real enough to one’s heart that she accepts it.”


Your statement, particularly the last bit, is sufficiently unclear that it would be consistent with Arminianism. I am not sure how you’re understanding Calvinism Kerry. Put very simply, on Calvinism God’s decree is the ontological ground of election while on Arminianism God’s foreknowledge of human choice is the ontological ground of election. So I provided a correct description of the Calvinist position.


“Where Randal is your idea of grace?”


Grace is unmerited favor and it is found in God’s creating and redeeming actions, above all in Christ.


“A reference like that pertains to time- we are talking outside the time/space realm are we not?”


No we are not. Where did you get the idea that eternity is atemporal? Boethius? Even if you think divine eternity is atemporal that doesn’t mean human resurrection eternity is atemporal. We are embodied beings who will live in a temporal, redeemed heaven and earth. That’s the biblical view. It sounds like you drank a little too much of Plato’s punch at the reception. You know that stuff is spiked with bad metaphysics and will give you a wicked hangover.


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Kerry says:
Friday, November 18, 2011 at 9:19am


on Arminianism God’s foreknowledge of human choice is the ontological ground of election.


Isn’t that really saying God saw in the future that we would choose Christ, so God chose us on the basis of that? Which means what you chose and what I chose is really ultimate. And God ratifies our choice- his election of us becomes in effect a contingent cause. Here again this view denies the omnipotence and sovereignty of God not to mention the initiation of our faith. In my book- God is the author and finisher of our faith.


Does God direct History from the perspective of eternity? That is to say does he bring to pass events, and more specifically, move people, heaven and earth to orchestrate those events according to a plan that he purposed before the foundation of the world? Or does God merely report back from the future to his prophets like a roving journalist sourcing newsworthy stories that will give him a greater circulation? I mean doesn’t it strike you as being just the teeniest egotistical to be in the pole position?


Human freedom is real enough to make us responsible for our decisions and yet not so ultimate that God needs our permission to move our wills. Human autonomy must also be real enough for it to be truly possible to “love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul.” A love that was not spontaneous is not love at all- but here it must be stressed- that the love with which we love God is a derived love, not- in the purest sense- a native of human origins.


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randal says:
Friday, November 18, 2011 at 5:21pm


“Isn’t that really saying God saw in the future that we would choose Christ, so God chose us on the basis of that?”


Exactly.


“Which means what you chose and what I chose is really ultimate.”


It depends what you mean by “ultimate”. We are only saved because prevenient grace has enlivened the fallen human sufficiently to be able to choose the salvation freely offered in Christ.


“I mean doesn’t it strike you as being just the teeniest egotistical to be in the pole position?”


God created everything from an infinite number of possibilities with full knowledge of every event that would occur. He upholds it all in existence every moment. And he will bring the entire state of current affairs — everything in heaven and on earth — to reconcilation in Christ (Col. 1:20). And you think that means that we’re in the pole position?


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Kerry says:
Friday, November 18, 2011 at 10:15pm


I said “Isn’t that really saying God saw in the future that we would choose Christ, so God chose us on the basis of that?”
You (Randal) said “Exactly.”
What do you do with Paul’s anticipation of that very issue with regard to election?
(For the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth;)(Romans 9:11)
You have said that our act of believing is the basis on which God elects us; whereas Paul affirms election stands not only prior to any acts on our part, but irrespective of any acts on our part. That must include any act foreseen by God. This follows by what he says shortly after: So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.(Romans 9:16) That is not to say “irrespective” means that we need not believe, but that election is the determining factor.


“We are only saved because prevenient grace has enlivened the fallen human sufficiently to be able to choose the salvation freely offered in Christ”.


Prevenient grace: prevenient grace allows persons to engage their God-given free will to choose the salvation offered by God in Jesus Christ or to reject that salvific offer. (Wikipedia)


On that view God’s election can only stand subordinate to human will- that is patently not what Paul intends. God did not merely offer salvation to an entire humanity that was fallen in trespasses in sins and effectively dead to the call of the Gospel. What God did was to mandate to Jesus the Christ the power to give eternal life not, just proffer eternal life. If eternal life was merely presented to the fallen and capricious nature of mankind then it destroys the basis on which we are to look forward to the promise you referred to: “And he will bring the entire state of current affairs — everything in heaven and on earth — to reconcilation in Christ (Col. 1:20).”
(John 17:2) As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him I have written a piece which you can find here:http://struth-his-or-yours.blogspot.com/2009/08/power-over-all-flesh.html And I would value your comment.


“It depends what you mean by “ultimate”.” Come, come now, you know that what I mean is that on the Arminian position the last and final say as to whether one is saved is dependent on human will not divine will.


“And you think that means that we’re in the pole position?” You know, or at least ought to, that I refer to this supposed superior position of Arminians with regard to the human will and salvation.


“And he will bring the entire state of current affairs — everything in heaven and on earth — to reconcilation in Christ (Col. 1:20).”


I think that really is the point of Calvinism. Arminians concede this promise with lip service but deny Gods ability to achieve it through their system of theology which leaves election to chance and the capriciousness and ultimacy of human will. We know a house divided against itself cannot stand, Arminianism presents a view of human nature which if it were true would deny the power of God to fulfill any of those promises in any absolute sense.


You have certainly shaken my tree as regards to some issues peripheral to this one but I remain at this point committed to the view I have tried to demonstrate.


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Kerry says:
November 18th, 2011 at 10:28pm


So it is misleading because a Calvinist might agree with an Arminian on some issue? The hard Arminian errs because he makes the human will ultimate on the issue of salvation. My view of Calvinism is that when God sovereignly chooses (as in the elect) the extent of his revelation to that individual is enough to make his grace irresistible. Just as in the case of the ordinary course of nature God may choose to bring a miracle which by definition is a suspension of the laws of nature.


If I might make a distillation of your argument against limited atonement. Do I understand correctly that you posit that a “maximally loving” God cannot but help saving all (if possible) since that is what He is by nature? He is not free to choose to elect only some (you say) otherwise it effectively makes the Calvinist God a lesser God with regard to love. I find that interesting because that is essentially my beef with the Arminian God. On that view the Arminian makes a lesser God (I say) with respect to his power. The Arminian God voluntarily, by an act of will withstands or negates to some degree what He is necessarily by nature (omnipotent); something you say that (in the case of love) he cannot or ought not to do.


3. Reply


Kerry says:
Thursday, November 17, 2011 at 8:33pm


“Why is it, on your view, that God, the God who is supposed to be infinitely more loving and compassionate than any human being ever could be, chooses not to?”


The answer to that is that he is not only infinitely more loving he is also infinitely more wise and therefore he chooses (as far as I am able to see) not to give the gift of eternal life to all.
There is a problem with your view of God and I have been wracking my little brain to see what it is. Under your scheme God is bound by love to save all, where then is there room for grace? You would turn “amazing” grace into something obligatory, grace then is no longer grace.
You make God subject to a law of love in order to bind him to saving all. You think that it is expedient for God to be reduced to a being with no free will in order that you may keep your perception of human free will. You actually believe that because God can do no wrong humanity is more free than God! You seek to use the love of God as a means by which to bind Him in order to preserve your own sense of freedom. When it comes to love- God must be a maximally loving God who cannot but be bound by that nature and therefore elect all justly. You maintain that freewill entails that we must be free to choose either good or evil and you see that as a higher good. Therefore the ridiculous consequence (from that thinking) follows that humans are more free than God! I cannot (for what it’s worth) agree with this. How can we be more free than God? But that is the necessary consequence of thinking that way. It is a contradiction in terms to think of freedom in the context of a nature bound to sin.


This whole warped idea of freedom arises by believing that “free will” (as assumed and defined by the libertarian) is the highest good. People think that the ability to do evil shows freedom, it is not, it is the result of bondage. He is most free who is bound by a good nature to do no evil. This must be so; he is most bound who is, by an evil nature, free to do no good.

Unfortunately by this point the juggernaut has moved on, Randall has stopped responding to me (at least at this time) Which is really a pity because I managed to get a bit more formal in my argument and believe it puts Randal on the horns of a dilemma. But you be the judge of that, here is my last comment:



 Randal said: “If God is omnibenevolent (meaning that he desires all creatures to achieve shalom) then it follows necessarily that he would desire that all achieve shalom and thus he would elect all in Christ such that none would be reprobate. Insofar as you deny that this is the case and continue to affirm that some are reprobate you thereby reject the divine omnibenevolence. The question is why?” 

The strength of Randal’s argument lies in the apparent obligation of God to save all based on God’s omnibenevolent nature. Randal says: “it follows necessarily that he would desire that all achieve shalom and thus he would elect all in Christ”. In other words because he is omnibenevolent by nature then he cannot but act according to that nature.

G.K Chesterton in his book Orthodoxy said: “Do not free a camel of the burden of his hump: you may be freeing him from being a camel. The moment you step into the world of facts, you step into a world of limits. You can free things from alien or accidental laws, but not from the laws of their own nature.”  .

I will try to be more formal with the proposition.

“A house divided against itself cannot stand” therefore in a perfect nature one facet of that nature cannot militate against another. His omnibenevolence is in harmony with his omnipotence.

This is how it is for the Arminian:

God is omnibenevolent by nature.

The laws of his own nature preclude God from choosing anything that would violate that nature.

Therefore “he would elect all in Christ such that none would be reprobate.”

Now let’s see how it is for the Calvinist:

God is omnipotent by nature.

The laws of his own nature preclude God from choosing anything that would violate that nature.

Therefore he would elect to create a being that could not violate his nature. Libertarian freewill does not exist.

If we concede a limitation in the nature of God with respect to power (so that men are able to refuse God) then it legitimately follows that:

we may concede a limitation in the nature of God with respect to love (so that God is able to refuse men)

If there are good grounds (like sin) to refuse men then God need not save all.

Mankind has a will – being made in the image of God we concede

God has a will.

Man’s nature is imperfect- he is a creature subject to space and time with finite knowledge and limited power, therefore his will is imperfect (not to mention the fall)

God’s nature is perfect- he is not subject to his own nature in the same way we are because he is the ground of those perfections therefore his will his power and love is perfect.


It hardly needs saying that if God is bound by omnibenevolence to save all, then he would be equally bound by omnipotence to create that which was unable to violate his power.
On the other hand if we see a concession of his power is made on behalf of mankind such that they could resist his will, then we must see that a concession would exist with respect to his benevolence thus he could refuse to save some. 





























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Monday, October 31, 2011

Does God Hide? Or is it we who hide?


"I often wonder if we won’t eventually come full circle as a species to realize that the proof of this Mind [God] was hiding in plain sight" 


From: Absolute Proof God Exists
  http://8411c.wordpress.com/2011/10/20/absolute-proof-god-exists/#comment-52

You know, in the past I have often pondered about the "hiddenness" of God. Now, I realize that if you "can't see the wood for the trees", then it's time to hide the trees! I believe this goes some way to explain things. The scriptures say-
"...the heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork." Psalm 19:1. 
The word "declare" in Hebrew comes from a root word meaning: to score with a mark as a tally or record. So you might say the heavens bear the stamp- the brand-name of God. The heavens are all around us.

The problem is not, as mathematician, philosopher, author and noted atheist Bertrand Russell put it (apparently on his deathbed)- "a lack of evidence for God",so much as a suppression of the evidence.
As some wit once said- "An atheist cannot find God for the same reason a thief cannot find a policeman". 
I could add to that: sometimes a thief does find a policeman, a bent policeman that a thief can use for his own ends. We would rather invent a god that we can domesticate, one that makes little or no moral demand of us.

'Peter Kreeft, a modern day Christian philosopher and apologist, says that Pascal is a man for our day. 
"Pascal," he says, "is three centuries ahead of his time. He addresses his apologetic to modern pagans, sophisticated skeptics, comfortable members of the new secular intelligentsia. He is the first to realize the new dechristianized, desacramentalized world and to address it. He belongs to us. . . . Pascal is our prophet. No one after this seventeenth-century man has so accurately described our twentieth-century mind." 

Peter Kreeft, Christianity for Modern Pagans: Pascal's Pensees Edited, Outlined and Explained (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1993), 13, 189.'-

  -from a blog post written by Rick Wade- Blaise Pascal: An Apologist for Our Times.


Blaise Pascal:
"If God had wished to overcome the obstinacy of the most hardened, he could have done so by revealing himself to them so plainly that they could not doubt the truth of his essence. It was therefore not right that he should appear in a manner manifestly divine and absolutely capable of convincing all men- but neither was it right that his coming should be so hidden- that he could not be recognized by those who sincerely sought him. Thus wishing to appear openly to those who seek him with all their heart, and hidden from those who shun him with all their heart, he has qualified our knowledge of him by giving signs. Which can be seen by those who seek him and not by those who do not. There is enough light for those who desire only to see, and enough darkness for those of a contrary disposition." 
Blaise Pascal in "Pensees" quoted by Dr. C Stephen Evans  during his Hayward 2012 Lecture at Acadia Divinity College.

This is very much in line with what Ravi Zacharias has said, (perhaps even with Pascal in mind): "God has put enough into the world to make faith in Him a most reasonable thing, and He has left enough out to make it impossible to live by sheer reason or observation alone"


The fact is, any admission of God will suddenly thrust us into the dilemma of dealing with too many questions of morality, like- why do you lie? What are you watching on the internet? Whose husband are you involved with? Why do you pay so little tax? How is it you drove/walked past that toddler injured on the street? Why do you look the other way at so much suffering, deprivation and violence?

In short it is our unwillingness to face moral accountability to a higher power. Many intellectual questions about the evidence for God (or lack thereof) that appear so honestly to be a barrier to belief, are just so much smokescreen to the real barrier. I'm not saying these questions don't need answering- they do, and I'm not saying that most of the questions people have, (or the people that have them) aren't sincere, they are. What I am saying is what Pascal alluded to in the "Pensees"-
"The heart has its reasons, that reason knows nothing of" 
At a sub-conscious level we don't want to know God exists, even while a basic belief in Him is present but driven from our consciousness, because if one does become cognizant of God, the implications for us are too serious to contemplate. Like for instance, our claim and desire for complete and absolute autonomy.  At a conscious level we find all these questions and barriers to belief because, at another level we really don't want to know.
 The scriptures point to this:
"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?"(Jeremiah 17:9) 
That is precisely why being "born again" is a miracle. It is an intervention, an impregnation of the spirit of grace and truth in the heart of a person who, while on the exterior may appear morally good- is systemically evil.. Faith, as Pascal admits (in line with the Bible), is the gift of God to the heart, even while the mind may continue to have its objections, this injection of faith overcomes the disbelief in and enmity of the heart. Augustine alluded to this when he said:
"Therefore do not seek to understand in order to believe, but believe that thou mayest understand."

Sometimes it happens, in such a flash of real soul-searching honesty (that leaves no doubt in my mind as to its origin) that we catch ourselves being angry at something for no apparent reason, or we may get a glimpse of our selves as if from some distant, detached vantage point, as if we were someone else, and we may not like what we see. But this passes from us so quickly we are almost unaware of it, we regain our composure just as quickly as that window to our soul had appeared...and the mask is back up.

There is an objective reality, all things are not relative and when that glimpse into the "twilight zone" comes, take a good look. It's not there to scare you, so much as to inform you. If you will take the time to find out who Jesus is, you will also find out who you are!

No one in the history of philosophy or religion made such audacious claims as Jesus the Christ. Neither Gautama Buddha, nor Muhammad, Kant or Socrates made the claim to be divine. Many, many have come and pointed out a way to God, heralded a great truth to know or how to live a right life. But Jesus stands alone and unique claiming-
 "I am the way, the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father but by me"(John 14:6) 
As C.S. Lewis has said: I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: "I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God." That is the one thing we must not say. A man who said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic--on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg--or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.
We are faced, then, with a frightening alternative. This man we are talking about either was (and is) just what He said, or else a lunatic, or something worse. Now it seems to me obvious that He was neither a lunatic nor a fiend: and consequently, however strange or terrifying or unlikely it may seem, I have to accept the view that He was and is God. God has landed on this enemy-occupied world in human form.

The question "Why does Christ not continue to reveal himself physically as he did to his disciples in his advent?" requires a multi-faceted answer. First human nature in its depraved and fallen state has no real interest in knowing God, but rather in the secret recesses of the heart as sinners we have a vested interest in assuring that we remain ignorant of God, the moral accountability that follows is just too unsavoury to contemplate! Both in our search for God and/or our continued ignorance of God we are not neutral. I say this guardedly because of course multitudes of Christians recall adamantly their testimony of how they found God, in the face of Jesus Christ,  after much searching. But does human experience have the last say on spiritual realities or will the Word of God be our final authority? God says

 "There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God." Romans 3:11 
"Neither knoweth any man the Father save the Son, and he to whosoever the Son will reveal him." Matthew 11:27

So how do we explain this sense of individuals searching for God in the light of the above scriptures? How do we explain the coming to faith of people as a result of their search? Again scripture is clear:


"Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you."  15:16 John

The reality is then, our search for God is actually the Holy Spirit at work within us bringing us to God. It is not native to fallen human nature but a work of grace. It is rather God finding us through our own agency.

" Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent." John 6:29
Given the depravity of humankind then, and that left to himself no one seeks God we begin to appreciate the reality of that "Grace that taught our heart to fear, and that Grace our fears relieved". It also make much more sense of the scripture:
"And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us. For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."  Romans 5:6-8

Without strength and while we were yet sinners meaning that just as a dead person cannot give themselves life neither can someone dead in tresspasses and sins even contemplate seeking after God. Just as Jesus called Lazarus out of the tomb so Christ called us out of our deadness to God. This is not mere metaphor but  a real death in which we are oblivious to God and unable to initiate anything any movement towards God. He is truly then the author of our faith the alpha that is the beginning of it and the omega the end of faith.

 And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins; Ephesians 2:1

And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses; Colossians 2:13
I will continue to reiterate what C.S. Lewis said of his own conversion:

"The hardness of God is kinder than the softness of men, and His compulsion is our liberation"

Thursday, October 27, 2011

Dehumanization: The Irony of Modern Intellectual Progress




Richard Tarnas provides some helpful insight into the dehumanizing effects of modern scientism, briefly scientism is the view that science is the only source of knowledge:


The more modern man strove to control nature by understanding its principles, to free himself from nature’s power, to separate himself from nature’s necessity and rise above it, the more completely his science metaphysically submerged man into nature, and thus into its mechanistic and impersonal character as well. For if man lived in an impersonal universe, and if his existence was entirely grounded in and subsumed by that universe, then man too was essentially impersonal, his private experience of personhood a psychological fiction. In such a light, man was becoming little more than a genetic strategy for the continuance of his species, and as the twentieth century progressed that strategy’s success was becoming yearly more uncertain. Thus it was the irony of modern intellectual progress that man’s genius discovered successive principles of determinism — Cartesian, Newtonian, Darwinian, Marxist, Freudian, behaviorist, genetic, neurophysiological, sociobiological — that steadily attenuated belief in his own rational and volitional freedom, while eliminating his sense of being anything more than a peripheral and transient accident of material evolution.
  1. The above appears in: THE BIG PICTURE EXPLORING THE COSMIC AND COMPREHENSIVE SCOPE OF GOD’S REVELATION (http://metanarrative.wordpress.com/2010/01/07/the-irony-of-modern-intellectual-progress/#comment-104
Science, the dominant voice of authority for many in various cultures around the world, has- particularly in the West- in the last generation or two, declared that we are merely biological machines, according to some- even our complexity is not so much real, as apparent. It is interesting that this apparent complexity is closely allied, that is- this view- seems to be held in common with those, like Richard Dawkins, who think that the nature of humanity is more one of apparent design as opposed to actual design. What seems to get lost in the translation, is that hardly ever can we observe, if any, machines that are capable of self replication, and self modification without further information added to them by some information source. And we know also that information in the strict sense of the word is always observed to originate with some mind. And thus with some robots, it is expected that they will be able to build themselves, that is replicate themselves, and rebuild themselves according to the adaptations that are necessary to face different circumstances. Of course in this case, no-one doubts, that these machines are accounted for by looking to some intelligence for- not only their origin- but also their ability to self replicate, and change according to circumstance.
 In the field of neuro-biology in particular we have the over-stated claim by some, that our sense of freewill, is also more apparent than real, a delusion. A "useful fiction" we are told.  In the blurb fronting his book entitled " Free Will" by outspoken atheist Sam Harris we are told:
 "A belief in free will touches nearly everything that human beings value. It is difficult to think about law, politics, religion, public policy, intimate relationships, morality—as well as feelings of remorse or personal achievement—without first imagining that every person is the true source of his or her thoughts and actions. And yet the facts tell us that free will is an illusion." 
The reason I say it is overstated is relatively simple, yet perhaps not so easy to grasp. If someone writes: "I cannot write a word of English" we rightly would wonder about the sanity of the person, since (all things being equal) the statement is internally contradictory, as they have already done that, which in making the statement, they are claiming an inability to do. The very act of doing what they have just done- is in contradiction with what they have said. And this is the same for those who say such things as: "It is true that we can know no  truth". That foolish talk is easily anwered by simply asking the question: "How then, did you know that?" The problem is that people will camoflage an absurdity in a lot of language, which is dressed up, and padded out in such a manner that the self contradiction is lost in a welter of words. Hardly ever will people make such obviously erroneous contradictions in such few words.

And thus it is that someone will write a whole scholarly work on the so called reality that life has no meaning. I would just love to be there when a reader, having just finished the book, puts it down and faces the author squarely with the question: "But what do you mean?" It hardly needs saying that someone who is obviously prepared to put such effort, time and expense in writing a whole book regarding life's lack of meaning- has actually got a lot meaning out of writing that book. In short, there is no doubt that in writing the book, she felt she was contributing real meaning, real knowledge and felt she was adding a sense of self worth to her own life and that of her peers in feeling that she needed to "correct" this "false" sense of meaning that those all around her are apparently assuming. A famous debater was heard to have said that in some debates, merely by turning up, they have lost the debate. And that is so in all of these instances of self contridictory propositions I have been mentioning.

We should really take our proverbial hats off for the inimitable wisdom of C. S. Lewis for pointing out many such instances. He said:
"The validity of rational thought... is the necessary presupposition of all other theorizing. There is simply no sense in beginning with a view of the universe and trying to fit the claim of thought in at a later stage. By thinking at all we have claimed that our thoughts are more than mere natural events. All other propositions must be fitted in as best as they can round that primary claim"
By "natural events" Lewis alludes to physically determined events, such as, if I hit a billiard ball at x position, with y amount of force towards position z on the pool table cushion, all things being equal it will always behave the same way. It is therefore deterministic.

We can see then that any theory that one might propose, that does away with the idea of truth, cannot be true. Because that is the foundation they were arguing from, any argument at all, even those that are justifiably proven  false arguments, all assume the validity of truth. They have therefore sawn off the branch on which they sit. The same goes for rational thought, if by proposing a system, (which is presumed to be rational), but which- by doing so- ultimately destroys the basis of rational thought, has in fact destroyed itself. It has in fact proven to be irrational.

And so it is with Harris's view, that free will is an illusion. In point of fact his physical determinism is the illusion. This I will say, that the libertarian idea of absolute free will, I don't concur with. It is quite obviously wrong. A perfect free will for example, needs no environment within which to live, our dependency on our natural environment is patently obvious. It reminds me of the recently dear departed Mohammed Ali, other wise known as the one who moves like a butterfly and stings like a bee. He was on an airliner about to take off, and as per usual, the flight attendant was going down the aisles, checking that all seatbelts were buckled up. Coming alonside Ali, she found his belt in the unbuckled position. Politely she asked him to do it up, to which he promply responded, "Superman don't need no seatbelt", without hesitating, she in turn responded: "Well Superman don't need no plane either, so do your belt up!"

The idea of truth then, seems to me at least, inarguable, and so too, the idea of rational thought. Harris is proposing that it is objectively true that free will is an illusion and that rational people should believe him. So he is assuming the reality of objective truth, and he also is ratifying the validity of rational thought, and by attempting to persuade us, is rubber stamping our ability to choose that which is rational.  But for rational thought to be inarguable, then so also, must free will be- at least in the realm of thought. Because if I am unable to choose freely (on the basis of the weight of evidence), that which I believe to be objectively true, knowing that its counter perspective false, then my thoughts must be determined, and if so why must they be a reflection of truth? So if free will, with regard to choosing truth is an illusion, then why must I choose to believe that which Harris is saying is true, when his proposal undermines the ability to choose that which is true? In proposing that free will is an illusion, he has not only "succeeded" in ridding us of that encumbrance, he has done away with the validity of rational thought, and the idea that humanity can know truth- all in one foul sweep.

J.B.S. Haldane (1892-1964)was a British-born Indian scientist known for his work in the study of physiology, genetics, evolutionary biology, and in mathematics. He famously said :

"It seems to me immensely unlikely that mind is a mere by-product of matter. For if my mental processes are determined wholly by the motions of atoms in my brain I have no reason to suppose that my beliefs are true. They may be sound chemically, but that does not make them sound logically. And hence I have no reason for supposing my brain to be composed of  atoms."
It should hardly be necessary to remind the reader that if "my mental processes are determined" this must include the mental process of deciding against or for propositions of truth.

And what has changed that might affect the truth of what he said perhaps 60 years ago? Obviously science has advanced remarkably since his time, and Lewis's,  but the truth of these statements seem to supercede what science is telling us, or rather, truth be told, what certain scientists with an ideological axe to grind, want to inform us under the rubric of science. Implicit in assuming that science tells us about real states of affairs, are presumptions of truth, the ability to know, and the ability to choose truth over falsehood by rational means. To do away with any is to undermine science itself. To future-proof rationality, the correspondence view of truth, and even free will (at least in a limited sense) will also be essential to future proof science itself, as it does indeed the persuit of truth in any sphere. Obviously anything that brings into question rational thought itself must be based on false premises, because you cannot have an argument that destroys all arguments.

Therefore Harris is wrong.

In a debate between Professor William Lane Craig and Dr Alex Rosenberg called "Is Faith In God Reasonable?"   the crunch question to Dr. Rosenberg was asked by a young man, apparently a student which completely unravelled all the credible answers and postulations that Rosenberg had given up to that point. (At 2:40:43 in the debate). This question which I have put in writing for the viewer to ponder was in fact the last question for Rosenberg and to my mind the most significant- and one which I feel Dr Craig himself should have asked and pushed.
"Dr. Rosenberg I wonder if you might help me to understand how your view is not incoherent, uh- do you really claim in your book that sentences have no meaning or truth value, even the sentences in your own book? How is that not incoherent, it's self refuting- um at least the sentences you've made tonight surely you think are true? Um but if even you don't think your position is true why should we?"
Rosenberg's discomfort and hostility is palpable and his reference to this "puerile" question (Childishly silly and trivial) makes it abundantly clear what he thinks of it. This whole question arises as a result of trying to fit  a naturalistic template over the mind/brain question. Rosenberg is a Philosophical or metaphysical naturalist. "Metaphysical naturalism holds that all properties related to consciousness and the mind are reducible to, or supervene upon, nature."(Wikipedia) You cannot claim something to be true and then deny the ability to know truth in the next breath, you cannot wax long and lyrically on the truth of atheism according to the findings of science and logic and then proceed to dismantle the foundation for believing logic.


Celebrated Christian philosopher Alvin Plantinga writes:
"If Dawkins is right that we are the product of mindless unguided natural processes, then he has given us strong reason to doubt the reliability of human cognitive faculties and therefore inevitably to doubt the validity of any belief that they produce- including Dawkins' own science and his atheism."
"If Dawkins is right... he has given us strong reason to doubt...the validity of any belief...including [his] own..." 

"His biology and his belief in naturalism would therefore appear to be at war with each other in a conflict that has nothing at all to do with God."



The following excerpt used by permission is from a music video put together by Matt McKegg with Loop Drop. Matt has an abiding interest in determinism. This was performed at First Assembly.





The source of the text in "Soulless Machines" comes from an interview with Jeffrey Hawkins who became famous when he invented the Palm Pilot—a device that in no small way ushered in a whole new era of mobile computing.  However his ambition now, is to build a machine that can think and reason on its own by mimicking the workings of the human brain. In this video Hawkins opines on both risks and rewards of artificial intelligence. But at about 29 minutes into the video, as a response to a question of human nature, Hawkins gives a confident response that human nature is reducible to a very complicated machine, in short that, humanity is exhaustively explicated simply in terms of matter and energy.


 The piece quoted at the top of this post, by Richard Tarnas is strongly reminiscent of C.S. Lewis in The Abolition of Man- 

“Mans conquest of Nature turns out, in the moment of consummation, to be Nature’s conquest of Man”
“…as soon as we take the final step of reducing our own species to the level of mere nature, the whole process is stultified, for this time the being who stood to gain and the being who has  been sacrificed are one and the same. This is one of the many instances where to carry a principle to what seems its logical conclusion produces absurdity. It is like the famous Irishman who found that a certain kind of stove reduced his fuel bill by half and thence concluded that two stoves of the same kind would enable him to warm his house with no fuel at all, it is the magician’s bargain: give up our soul, get power in return, But once our souls, that is, ourselves, have been given up, the power thus conferred will not belong to us. We shall in fact be the slaves and puppets of that to which we have given our souls.”
"A dogmatic belief in objective value is necessary to the very idea of a rule which is not tyranny or an obedience which is not slavery."

To see this irony played out in a debate on February 1st, 2013 between two philosophers who represent some of the brightest minds of both the atheist and theistic camps is a wonder to behold. Take particular note of the question posed by a student from the floor 2 hours and 40 mins, 43 secs into the debate at question time.