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Thread: Did God Predestine Judas to Betray Christ?

  1. #101
    Super Moderator Quest's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by victoryword View Post
    Were you in eternal life before or after you came to Christ?
    No....but I was an eternal being who was destined to Hell without redemption...I believe I BEGAN at conception as an offspring of two eternal beings.
    However....again, eternal is the only word we have to describe No beginning and no end..do you have another word that fits better?

    Again, I am not so sure that our limited perspective of the term defines that term..that's why I don't believe God is in any kind of TIME that we can grasp in our human understanding...we can ONLY grasp what we have seen, heard, experienced either in the natural or revealed by the Spirit..

    Maybe if He took us to Heaven for a visit we might grasp the concept to some degree..but time as we know it does not apply to God, IMHO

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  3. #102
    Senior Member Colonel's Avatar
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    Eternal life is contained in Jesus whose life (before and after his incarnation) is without beginning and without end. As such "eternal life" qualifies as eternal even if we demand that eternal means unlimited at both ends. Then we partttake in this eternal life when taking up the faith and possibly stop doing so upon rejecting the faith. A person may have eternal life for only a few years or even days by believing then turning to unbelief. But the life he had for that short period of time was still eternal, by nature.

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  5. #103
    Senior Member Colonel's Avatar
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    Saying that God must only exist and operate within time is basically the same as saying that he must only exist and operate within our physical Universe. Both statements tie him to aspects of our physical Universe, the creation that we find ourselves within. If God must only exist within our time then he must only exist by way of a physical body within our physical Universe. If he can exist outside any of those boundaries then he could as well exist outside all of those boundaries.

    Some people refuse to believe in God because in their opinion he has to exist physically within our Universe or else he doesn't exist, and if he does exist physically within our Universe then he is per definition not God, just an other physical being like us. They have reduced the mystery to nothing and thereby they have also blotted out God's very existence.

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  7. #104
    Super Moderator Quest's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Colonel View Post
    Eternal life is contained in Jesus whose life (before and after his incarnation) is without beginning and without end. As such "eternal life" qualifies as eternal even if we demand that eternal means unlimited at both ends. Then we partttake in this eternal life when taking up the faith and possibly stop doing so upon rejecting the faith. A person may have eternal life for only a few years or even days by believing then turning to unbelief. But the life he had for that short period of time was still eternal, by nature.
    True...that was a segment within that never ending line... _____________________>__________________

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  9. #105
    Senior Member FresnoJoe's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Colonel View Post
    Isaiah 41:21-23
    "Present your case," says the Lord.
    "Set forth your arguments," says Jacob's King.
    "Tell us, you idols,
    what is going to happen.
    Tell us what the former things were,
    so that we may consider them
    and know their final outcome.
    Or declare to us the things to come,
    tell us what the future holds,
    so we may know that you are gods.


    Here God sets up foreknowledge of the future as a requirement for qualifiying as divine. What does that tell us about God himself ?

    I agree that God did not predestine Judas to betray Jesus, he did that of his own accord. God's foreknowledge depends upon Judas actual choice, not the other way around.

    The theological idea you mentioned about God being outside time relies on something deeper than that. The idea that God is ontologically prior to everything else, meaning that everything depends upon God and God depends on nothing else. Including time. It is difficult to visualize that God created time since the verb employs time in its definition (now it is not created, now it is created) but the notion that God is ontologically prior to time is more fundamental and doesn't rely on one's being able to visualize or grasp the mechanism involved with one's mind.

    If God is ontologically prior to time then he is per definition originally outside it. There is nothing to stop him from entering into time however, to interact with his creatures.
    ~

    But But But Beloved, Without Philosophy

    Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. Colossians 2:8

    How Am I To Understand God....

    Seek ye the LORD while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near:
    Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the LORD, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.

    For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD.
    For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.
    Isaiah 55:6-9

  10. #106
    Senior Member Colonel's Avatar
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    I have no idea what you are trying to say, FresnoJoe.

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  12. #107
    Senior Member FresnoJoe's Avatar
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    Beloved, The Book Says It All

  13. #108
    Senior Member Colonel's Avatar
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    To qualify as divine one has to know the future. That's what the book says. Then I may employ the faculty of my mind to try to figure out what that implies. It has to imply that God isn't contained within the flow of time from the past through the present to the future. If he were then the only way he could know the future would be by forcefully predestining every last bit of it. This isn't philosophy, this is Bible-based reasoning.

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