well miss n i might ask you to name a single objective absolute truth from Scripture, but since that is apparently heard...um with protestant ears usually lol, maybe i can ask what circumstances have changed when you flip your current belief in Trinity, for example? And the ones about the past or the future meh for now
You and I have been down this road before, and it has not ended well. Mostly because I struggle to
understand you. But, out of respect, I'll give it another go.
Okay, some objective truths....
John 14:6 - Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
John 17:17 - Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.
In point of fact, the gospel of John is so chocka-block full of 'truth' statements I could spend all day posting them. But let's, for the sake of the conversation, just consider those two.
Jesus is saying here that HE is THE only way to God. To salvation. There is no other path. That makes him and his message THE truth.
Again, in the next verse, he tells us that God's word...something that is often used to describe Christ, by the way, IS truth. Not
a truth, but truth itself. And that as Christ's followers, we are to be sanctified in and by this truth.
Now, I would say that regardless of how we come to those two passages; how we feel about them or the world, there is just no wiggling around them. Christ IS the ONLY way to salvation, and it is through God's word, which Paul tells us is all:
"breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness",that we may grow in our walk with Christ. That basically covers salvation and sanctification...which is everything this particular life holds for us.
could you provide an example?
Well...there are the verses above, obviously. But since you were also speaking of the Trinity, let's briefly look at some verses about that.
John 10:30 - I and the Father are one.”
John 17:11 - And I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, And I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one.
John 8:58 - Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am.”
Okay, so, we see Jesus claiming that he and the Father are one. Now...if we stop and consider the attributes of God and how therefore Christ is also claiming those attributes; but at the same time we see throughout scripture that he speaks to the Father as a very separate individual...his
Father! Then the conclusion is the Trinity. How else can Christ make a claim to hold omnipotence, omniscience, and omnipresence? Or to have been eternally present; the Great I AM?
man, i guess its maybe the asperger's, but i see about four diff directions i could take off on here; dont we form beliefs in anticipation of outcomes?
Hey! A fellow ASD! And yes, of course we form beliefs, and of course what we believe effects us. But the fallacy of today is that we get to choose what beliefs are true and therefore what effects us. Think of the cascade of fake news these days. People are not particularly interested in finding out what is truth or not; they are quite content with listening to those news agencies that report on things from the perspective they take already. It makes them feel righteous about their beliefs and causes and they feel justified in the behaviors it pushes them too. But none of it is, or may be, based on truth. Because the fact is; black is black, white it white. There IS a truth and a not truth. Truth is not based upon feeling or personal perception.
And so, as Christians, when we read Christ telling us that His word is truth. That he is the way, the truth and the life; we either believe his words, and therefore the rest of the bible's words, which are God's words; or we dimiss them in favour for our own internal tuning fork; which I submit is pretty much what Eve did in the garden. 'Don't worry God; I got this'.
If ones life is made more meaningful, isnt that an outcome?
Isn't it possible that something that is correct for you may not be correct for me?
Has anyone, ever, seen God?
I'm sorry, but no...no I don't think the sum of our lives it simply to have it made more meaningful. That is what every person strives for, but outside of God, they miss the mark. That's why they keep looking and keep missing. They keep trying to fill a God-sized hole with other stuff. The ONLY thing that will fill that hole is God...and not what
we decide God is, or what
we decide God is telling us; but what he truly is and what he truly is telling us. Otherwise its just another human fabrication, at base, isn't it?
And I'm sure there are many, many things in life that can be true and correct for you and not for me; and that can be...must be, embraced! But not about God; when we can look to his own word given to us, and find that truth about himself...that which he has revealed to us that we might know. What was the point of him sending such things if we were not to use it to know?
And as far as anyone 'seeing God'...well, the Father? No...except, I suppose we could say Moses saw the back of his cloak...and it made his face shine so much he had to cover it with sack...and he still scared the Israelite's to death. Cool story! But other than that....we can say that all the people beholding Christ saw 'God'. We are told that:
"Hebrews 1:3 - He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,"
Jesus came, so that we might know God, and know him personally! We don't need to speculate or have God different for each of us. The bible tells us he never changes; that means his love and faithfulness, displayed in Christ, is steady forever.
ok well first i'd hafta ask for a rephrase, bc thankfulness and awe strike me as a response to it that likely impacts our life, but reply two would be that i completely agree, thankfulness and awe would be awesome, whereas maybe expecting everyone else to accept the revelation as AT, even demanding that, maybe not so much. Whats wrong with you believing something different from me anyway? At least as far as most of our "beliefs" are concerned, them being about the past or the future?
Sorry about the phrasing. I think I was just trying to say that our response to scripture should not be based solely upon our feelings and how our understanding of it impacts our happiness.
But of course we experience responses to scripture, but our responses ought to be based only in reaction to our recognition of the truth God is revealing to us. Which is wonderful and amazing and should, and do, create incredible feelings.
Um...let me try and explain it like this: a wife might feel incredibly loved if her husband always showered her with flowers and gifts. But if the truth was that he only did that because he was cheating on her, then those flowers and gifts would be a horrible mockery of the truth. Truth matters and can and should have a bearing on how we view things. If we are intent on reading scripture just to make us feel good, rather than plumbing it for the truth God intended when he inspired it, then we are just like the wife accepting lies.
And if you have any "beliefs" about the present, isnt another name for those "theories?" If you...no, wait, if i believe that i can handle rattlesnakes and not get bitten/poisoned by them, but i do, what then does my belief amount to but a bad theory proven wrong? (Not saying that the v is wrong, understand, just obv misunderstood)
I see where you're going. And sure, in some cases things will be 'true' for you rather than for me. But...I think you're missing the fact that the concept of truth has to exist. Not everything can be subjective. For example; the sun will not rise at a different time for you and I, should we live at the same place, just because you prefer to start the day earlier. Water will always boil at 100 degrees. Death will come for us all and gravity most likely won't take a day off.
These things are a matter of science, or natural law. They are provable by observation. I know most people enjoy trying to pit science and religion against one another, but the simple fact is that the natural laws of the universe are created, and upheld, by God. God is a God of order and creation. This means that like his creation, he himself has certain attributes, which he has revealed to us, or we can observe through his creation, that are not subjective, but are truth. When he declares something this way, he does it for all...not just for me but not for you. When he tells us his character is (x), we take it as truth, just as we observe the sun rising each and every morning. Not subjective for each different person, depending on how we
want to understand it.
Hope all that makes sense. My brain is objecting to working this morning!