Thread: If God is omnipresent does the term 'in His Presence' mean something other than just His presence?

Originally Posted by Colonel

VW's version of how God operates is a bit like Calvinist single predestination where God "passes by" the nonelect then the Calvinist pretends that God did nothing whatsoever to single them out. If God chooses to withdraw his presence and the sole result is that a curse comes about then that is consequently what God had in mind should happen. Not ideally as in what the world should have been like in the absence of sin but practically, in terms of the specific situation at hand.

I think you grossly misunderstand my teaching.

Basically, I have discovered (or, I should say that others first discovered it and I have found more evidence) that God's primary method of exercising His anger, cursing, wrath, vengeance, killing, tempting, hardening, etc. has been to "forsake" or to "withdraw" his presence. The evidence for this truth is abundant in Scripture. It is not my idea or something that I piggy-backed off from Calvinism. It is something that was first pointed out to me by other Bible teachers, and then I studied for myself and found much more concrete Biblical data for. I have laid out most of this info in my books. A meme on social media is not going to relate this truth as thoroughly as my books will.

BTW, to compare my beliefs to Calvinist theology is like accusing Hank Hanegraaff of being Word of Faith

Originally Posted by Quest

I think that was my I think VW is saying that by simply removing His protection manifest presence man is left alone to suffer his consequences and left to the hand of Satan.

There is some truth to that and passages such as Job 1:11-12 and 1 Cor. 5:5 makes a strong case for it. But I would not say any of that without qualification. My book and other writings give more detail about how all of this works in Scripture. One example is the fact that people actually start out forsaking God before He forsakes them (Deut. 31:16-18; 2 Chronicles 15:2; 24:20). We actually leave God's umbrella of protection.

Numerous Scriptures show God pleading with the Israelites to return to Him so that He would not have to remove His protection from them. But when they constantly reject Him then He is left with no other choice but to leave because He has been pushed away. However, when they repent and return to Him after suffering God jumps right back into action and rescues them from their oppressors.

Originally Posted by Colonel

That's not even a passive, that's an active measure and there is no guesswork involved as to what the result is. I remove the mosquito net somewhere in Tanzania, the mosquitos bite and someone gets malaria.

That is a good observation because many do think that I teach a passive judgment of God which is not completely true. God is actively involved but not in the way that you might be implying that I teach but especially others who traditionally teach about God launching fireballs to kill those who angered Him.

God is active, as I stated above, in continually pleading with His people to return to Him so that He would not have to remove His protection from them. When they choose their idolatry over Him then He finally says:

Deuteronomy 32:37-38
37 And he shall say, Where are their gods, their rock in whom they trusted,
38 Which did eat the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their drink offerings? let them rise up and help you, and be your protection.

In other words, you want to forsake God and worship false gods, then depend on them to protect you. It is unreasonable for God to keep protecting those who prefer to continue sinning. The fact that He even remains protecting them for some length of time when they fall into sin shows His great mercy.

That is how God is vindicated in all of this.