Does God need man?

[quietthinker]

Isaiah 45:6-7

6 That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the Lord, and there is none else.

7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things.

Do you really believe God creates evil BP ?

 

[BlessedPeace]

Thanks. I think that passage is relevant to the discussion. For that reason I quoted it two or three times in the thread and alluded to it a couple of more.

Let me know when you understand it.
Contrary to your claims,you continue to imply God is needy.

 

[Matthias]

You presume we haven't.

If you had then you wouldn’t have written what you did.

Why?
Why would God need a place to put something not created yet?

Because he was going to make man. See the order of creation.

 

[BlessedPeace]

Do you really believe God creates evil BP ?

Do you believe God is not Sovereign over his creation? That God is not Omnipotent? Nor Omni-Genesis?

Do you believe there can be anything that exists in God's creation that God did not create?

 

[BlessedPeace]

If you had then you wouldn’t have written what you did.

Presumption yet again. As well as avoidance.

Because he was going to make man. See the order of creation.

No,that doesn't actually sustain your claim.

Never mind.
I accept you are in over your head.

 

[quietthinker]

Do you believe God is not Sovereign over his creation? That God is not Omnipotent? Nor Omni-Genesis?

Do you believe there can be anything that exists in God's creation that God did not create?

God is not Sovereign over the free will he created Man with.
We choose evil and reap its consequences. God does not pre-program us to that end.

 

[Matthias]

Presumption yet again. As well as avoidance.

No,that doesn't actually sustain your claim.

Never mind.
I accept you are in over your head.

I dealt with you, corporately speaking, earlier today.

 

[BlessedPeace]

God is not Sovereign over the free will he created Man with.
We choose evil and reap its consequences. God does not pre-program us to that end.

What is free will?

 

[quietthinker]

What is free will?

God's graciousness in allowing his creatures to make him vulnerable.
Loving means being vulnerable. (the right he gave us to exploit)

 

[Aunty Jane]

I don't have any sort of special revelation. I just have the Bible, and a willingness to work at understanding it.

And there is no better place to start.....with an open heart and mind....but not so open as to have your brains fall out.

It doesn't really matter whether Matthew did it or later translators. The point was just that this is one of the allowable meanings of the word "heaven" within the Bible.

You still did not give me a reference.....I would like to view the scripture.

It's just defining words. Spirit means "breath." It doesn't mean "ghosts," although that word appears in a few old Bible, which is a bit of bad translation that most recent Bibles have fixed. For there to be breath, there needs to be a body to breathe.

Yes, I agree again, there are no such things as “ghosts” as in the spirits of the dead among the living.
God is not a “ghost” either.
“Souls” are breathers, and the breath they take in to keep them alive is given by God. All the things that keep living souls alive was provided well in advance of our creation. We mortal creatures are abundant in variety, but all need the same basics to stay alive....food, water and oxygen. When we stop breathing oxygen no longer keeps our cells alive and we go into organ failure and we die. Animals and humans experience the same death. (Eccl 3:19-20) Humans alone we’re promised “everlasting life”....but not “immortality”. They are two entirely different things.

Again the word “spirit” has several meanings too.

“Spirits” in the Bible are spoken of as conscious entities who can interact with mankind. They inhabit the realm where God resides because we see in Job and also in Revelation the fact that these could come and go between heaven and earth.
Revelation 12 sees the end of satan’s access to heaven, as he is thrown down to the earth with his vile henchmen, in a final attempt to derail mankind from true worship. God is thus separating the “sheep from the goats” at this time by how we respond to his influence.

As for invisibility, there are plenty of things that are part of reality that are not visible. Wind is the classic example, and that seems very close to breath.

None of those things are living entities though.
The “spirit” or “breath of life” is what animated the first human....when his last breath left his body, that soul died. (Ezekiel 18:4)

Most of this... isn't in the Bible. It's a combination of extra information from Hebrew tradition (the Talmuds and 1Enoch) with some modern embellishments that are more science fiction than anything.

You're not going to find anything about spirits "materializing" in actual Scripture. You might find them moving from one body to another, but again... a body is a requirement.

There is a lot in the Bible on which to base those assumptions.....have you investigated them?
Why did the angels appear as human beings like Gabriel did? Why were they sometimes portrayed with wings and not at other times?

I already told you Psalm 139, but I guess I can quote:

7 Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence? 8 If I ascend up into heaven, thou [art] there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou [art there]. 9 [If] I take the wings of the morning, [and] dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; 10 Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. 11 If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me. 12 Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light [are] both alike [to thee].

There are others. The whole little book of Jonah is there to tell us that it's impossible to run away from God. Even at the bottom of the ocean, even in the underworld, God is everywhere.

Not a fan of the old KJV....if you want to stick with that dinosaur, that is up to you, but I personally find it a very inaccurate translation with glaring bias in many verses, and ignoring Greek phraseology is particularly misleading. I like to use a range of translations and compare them with a concordance.

As the “all seeing, all knowing” Creator, God does not need to leave his abode in heaven to observe the goings on down here on this earth.

Hard disagree. When a spirit is separated from the body... that's death. The body is now a corpse, and the spirit ceases to exist as a separate thing, instead returning to God, waiting for the Resurrection, so that it can have a new body to live in.

How does “the spirit return to God”? It returns to him in the sense that only God can resurrect a human and return the breath to their lungs to bring them back to life again. The spirit is not a conscious entity that leaves the body at death....I am pleased to see that your beliefs are somewhat close to my own in some cases.

No, I didn't copy/paste my theology from some community as part of their liturgy or creed. But my theology also doesn't come from myself.

I read. I study. The Bible. Also history and other ancient books, usually in an attempt to understand the Bible.

As I said...it a great starting point and it appears as if you have done your homework...more than most I can tell you.....but you need a brotherhood who also believes as you do.....we cannot be Christians in isolation. (Heb 10:24-25) God’s people were never free to teach themselves....God always provided teachers for them. For Christians, it was Jesus then the apostles who continued his ministry.....never deviating from what he taught.

Once I understood how the people in New Testament times would have understood human anatomy - which includes the idea of spirit -
I took that understanding back to the Bible, and re-read it with greater comprehension than before.

That was a really insightful thing to do. Part of understanding scripture is to see it through the eyes of those who wrote it, and what they themselves understood about the subjects they wrote about. All the Bible writers were Jewish and spoke from a Jewish perspective....using Jewish scripture.

The idea in Colossians 1:15 is that God Himself has provided an icon - of Himself - for our benefit. And that icon is a Man - Jesus Christ - rather than some dumb chunk of rock or metal that men have fashioned artistically. We are meant to look on Jesus and direct our worship TO GOD.

Yes! ....Christ is “the image of the living God”...an image is not the real thing but a reflection of it....he so perfectly reflected his Father’s image that he could say ‘he who has seen me has seen the Father also’.
The Father could have no better representative.

The Bible doesn't go into the study of angels very far, so most of what people believe has been injected from some other source. Some sources are better than others, but there isn't really an authoritative one to establish theology in this area.

And it seems to get weird.

The Bible tells us quite a bit about angels if you would like to explore this subject as far as scripture goes....?

Things that are a foreign concept to the carnal mind are always a bit weird at first...

 

[BlessedPeace]

God's graciousness in allowing his creatures to make him vulnerable.
Loving means being vulnerable. (the right he gave us to exploit)

Is God sovereign if people are able to act in ways that are contrary to his will?

 

[quietthinker]

Is God sovereign if people are able to act in ways that are contrary to his will?

If you mean by 'sovereign' he controls everything (ie, the responses of his creation) then no
however, if you mean by 'sovereign' he has no beginning and no end, then yes

 

[BlessedPeace]

If you mean by 'sovereign' he controls everything (ie, the responses of his creation) then no
however, if you mean by 'sovereign' he has no beginning and no end, then yes

There's only one definition of Sovereign over his creation.

God is eternal and infinite.

 

[Wick Stick]

You still did not give me a reference.....I would like to view the scripture.

For what? I don't understand what you're asking for.

“Spirits” in the Bible are spoken of as conscious entities who can interact with mankind. They inhabit the realm where God resides because we see in Job and also in Revelation the fact that these could come and go between heaven and earth.

This argument doesn't work logically. It assumes the conclusion. If a different assumption were made - that the heavens are physical - then the conclusion would also be different. :shrug:

There is a lot in the Bible on which to base those assumptions.....have you investigated them?

Yes, but was there something you'd recommend? I do have an open mind... hopefully it doesn't fall out.

Why did the angels appear as human beings like Gabriel did? Why were they sometimes portrayed with wings and not at other times?

There're different kinds of angels. Fundamentally, the Hebrew word (mala'ak) is any ambassador of a higher power, so it can be a prophet, or priest, the Lord Himself, or a message understood by looking at the stars. All of those examples appear in Scripture.

Not a fan of the old KJV....if you want to stick with that dinosaur, that is up to you, but I personally find it a very inaccurate translation with glaring bias in many verses, and ignoring Greek phraseology is particularly misleading. I like to use a range of translations and compare them with a concordance.

I'm aware of the KJV's shortcomings. However, I also have half the book memorized in that translation. When I use a concordance, I'm usually looking up words in King-James-ese.

As the “all seeing, all knowing” Creator, God does not need to leave his abode in heaven to observe the goings on down here on this earth.

I believe in omnipresence. And the issue is way more theologically important than we've so far disussed.

The gospel message itself is "the kingdom of God is at hand." The idea that God is an absentee-landlord is one of satan's greatest lies.

How does “the spirit return to God”? It returns to him in the sense that only God can resurrect a human and return the breath to their lungs to bring them back to life again. The spirit is not a conscious entity that leaves the body at death....I am pleased to see that your beliefs are somewhat close to my own in some cases.

It appears we're working from the same base, at least. But in my mind, when the spirit returns to God, it loses individuality... it's re-absorbed into the... collective?... not sure what word to use here to describe it. The real miracle is returning that specific individual consciousness to a new body.

As I said...it a great starting point and it appears as if you have done your homework...more than most I can tell you.....but you need a brotherhood who also believes as you do.....we cannot be Christians in isolation. (Heb 10:24-25) God’s people were never free to teach themselves....God always provided teachers for them. For Christians, it was Jesus then the apostles who continued his ministry.....never deviating from what he taught.

I do struggle with that. I find it hard to sit on a pew and listen to... inaccurate sermons... and keep my mouth closed. I wish I could find a group that held more similar beliefs to me, but I haven't so the current group will have to do.

The Bible tells us quite a bit about angels if you would like to explore this subject as far as scripture goes....?

Things that are a foreign concept to the carnal mind are always a bit weird at first...

I'm not gonna make a topic. If you make one I might participate. XD

 

[Matthias]

“Does God need us? At first glance at this question, most of us will quickly reply adamant ‘no‘. …

So why would God need us? Jesus needs us to be His witnesses ...”

(Crystal McDowell, “Does God Need Us”)

Does God need Us - Daughters of the Creator

Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. 1 Corinthians 12:27 Does God need us? At first glance at this question, most of us will quickly reply an adamant “no”. God doesn’t need us to do His will. God created the whole world and universe without the existence of man. God...

daughtersofthecreator.com

 

[BlessedPeace]

For what? I don't understand what you're asking for.


This argument doesn't work logically. It assumes the conclusion. If a different assumption were made - that the heavens are physical - then the conclusion would also be different. :shrug:


Yes, but was there something you'd recommend? I do have an open mind... hopefully it doesn't fall out.


There're different kinds of angels. Fundamentally, the Hebrew word (mala'ak) is any ambassador of a higher power, so it can be a prophet, or priest, the Lord Himself, or a message understood by looking at the stars. All of those examples appear in Scripture.


I'm aware of the KJV's shortcomings. However, I also have half the book memorized in that translation. When I use a concordance, I'm usually looking up words in King-James-ese.


I believe in omnipresence. And the issue is way more theologically important than we've so far disussed.

The gospel message itself is "the kingdom of God is at hand." The idea that God is an absentee-landlord is one of satan's greatest lies.


It appears we're working from the same base, at least. But in my mind, when the spirit returns to God, it loses individuality... it's re-absorbed into the... collective?... not sure what word to use here to describe it. The real miracle is returning that specific individual consciousness to a new body.


I do struggle with that. I find it hard to sit on a pew and listen to... inaccurate sermons... and keep my mouth closed. I wish I could find a group that held more similar beliefs to me, but I haven't so the current group will have to do.


I'm not gonna make a topic. If you make one I might participate. XD

If you find yourself that critical of most churches you attend, why not pastor one yourself?

 

[quietthinker]

“Does God need us? At first glance at this question, most of us will quickly reply adamant ‘no‘. …

So why would God need us? Jesus needs us to be His witnesses ...”

(Crystal McDowell, “Does God Need Us”)

Does God need Us - Daughters of the Creator

Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. 1 Corinthians 12:27 Does God need us? At first glance at this question, most of us will quickly reply an adamant “no”. God doesn’t need us to do His will. God created the whole world and universe without the existence of man. God...

daughtersofthecreator.com

or are we privileged? God could use the angels?

 

[Matthias]

or are we privileged?

“Blessed,“ is the word I would use.

God could use the angels?

God does use the angels.

 

[Matthias]

Did God create the option of choice, or did someone else create it?

If not God, then who? And when? And where?

If God created the option of choice, did God create the option of choice before God created man?

if God created the option of choice, did God create the option of choice when God created man?

If God created the option of choice, did God create the option of choice after God created man?

 

[Matthias]

Whoever created the option of choice, whenever the option of choice was created, and wherever the option of choice was created, why was it created?

For what purpose is the option of choice?