Re-Thinking God: Is God Immutable?

Immutable -- adj. -- not capable of or susceptible to change.

Seems to be straight-forward does it not? Everyone knows God does not change. God never changes in any way. Psalm 55:19 says exactly that, does it not?

Unfortunately, there is also many verses of the Bible itself that indicate some changeableness to God -- God does demonstrate some mutability. Some examples:

1. God's Emotions: In my reading through Scripture, back in my agnostic state of mind, I discovered something very quickly -- The God of the Bible has emotions. Now the implications of this are not apparent at first but they are staggering if we take them seriously. Let's take a typical case where God gets angry. There are many of these so we do not need a specific one. The question comes: what happens when God gets angry at someone? The implication is that he was not angry before but then gets angry. It means God goes from a state of no anger to one of having anger -- a change. Some of the other implications of God's emotions we will see in later posts in this series.

2. God's Relationships: There are several ways to illustrate this a) covenants "If you have faith, I will do this"; b) "If...then..." statements themselves outside of covenants and c) commandments. All of these indicating God establishing boundaries and conditions of relationship with others that require God to be one that both acts and reacts depending on the situation.

3. God Changes His Mind: I have written on this at length in many of my Open Theism blogs and simply put God changes his intended actions and does something else other than what He originally intended. It does not just happen once but at least five times. Jeremiah chimes in on this as well in Jeremiah 26:13 indicating a promise that if people would repent then God would change his mind. Action: People repent. Reaction: God changes his mind.

All of this, plus other things opened up the possibility in my mind that there may be certain things about God that do indeed change and because of verses like Psalm 55:19 (which is talking about God's justice and holiness) certain things that do not change. After I was done, I drew the conclusion that God's core character (love, holiness, justice,etc.) do not change but God in His experiences does indeed change both reacting and acting in the context of relationship with other free beings.

What this means is that God can be approached and appealed to and if a person approaches God with a genuine heart, God will react and change the situation and his emotions will change toward that person or group of people accordingly.

Is God immutable? No - He is capable of change and indeed He is susceptible to it. He has the power to both act and react. What does not change about Him is His character as He reacts and acts to what people do. As we look at some of the other attributes of God in this series, we will see how this plays out in how we have to re-think God.

Next: God's Imminence and Transcendence

Curve Addiction - It Just Got Harder to Be a Man.

In a recent scientific study at the Georgia Gwinnett College a team of scientists discovered that in the male brain, when men looked at women who are curvy, that it stimulated the same place in the brain as the place that was discovered to be stimulated by recreational drugs. In short, men get the same pleasure centers in brain stimulated if they are smoking a joint or looking at a curvy woman.

Maybe that explains the popularity of art like the Venus de Milo above or on the opposite side -- pornography. Although the study concluded that the stimulation occurred regardless of whether or not the woman was clothed. Men are addicted to curves. As addictions go though this one seems to so common and natural that a perfectly good man can have it. Perhaps all men have it to one degree or another.

I also note that this curve addiction may extend to other things with curves - cars for example. The male brain simply likes the aesthetic properties of curves so much it sets of the pleasure centers of the brain. In addition to the normal challenges of being a man now we will have to guard against this new addiction - but then again it is not really new. Just another way God hardwired the male of the species so attraction would take place.

So ladies, when you catch you husband or significant other looking at another woman's curves. Just remember he may not be able to help it - he might be a curve addict. I have made many observations that this was so in the past but now I have science to back me up.

Curves - If you are a man, you may be addicted.

Theology for Dummies?

OK. This one was a suggestion from my oldest that I do a kind of Theology for Dummies blog or column. I already have enough to do with this blog, so a new series it is. This will be an Always Running Series (ARS), the purpose of which will be to define theological terms, make theological concepts simple and try to make the complex more understandably so that even people who are severely theologically challenged can understand it.

Blessings -- that means I wish you to receive a special favor or favors from God. See how easy this is?

Re-Thinking God: Introduction

"Re-Thinking God" - I use this term a lot and I also talk extensively about finding the God of the Bible not the one that is commonly taught. Part of this comes from the simply fact that I had to discard the faith I once had in favor of something else otherwise; quite frankly, I was going to become an agnostic.

The dirty little secret is that most of our views of God have very little to do with taking the Bible at face value for what it says and more to do with a Western Philosophical view of God based on the Greek philosophers and (no surprise) what WE WANT God to be.

The problem is when you start to take what the Bible says for face value and compare it to what is traditionally taught by this Western theological- philosophy, you have contradictions and problems that abound from logical and common sense understandings. In some cases, the logic simply does not work at all.

In 2007, I ran head-long into this because of a personal crisis. The year before, I had resigned my second church and after fighting hard to keep my kids in that town till semester break, we eventually had to retreat back to my hometown. In March of 2007, I got a job at the same place I had left in 2000 to take my first church. After seven years I basically was right back where I started from, in far more debt, had lost a house and quite frankly I was angry at God. OK -- I was pissed off at God. So much so I had decided to quit everything - ministry, family, marriage - and start over. I was of the opinion, that quite frankly I had just wasted a lot of time and energy serving a God that was false. In the end, I decided I would give God one more try but I was going to be hard on Him. I decided to read the whole Bible in chronological order and search to see if there was anything that would change my mind and I was determined not to change it. I had some issues with God I wanted to see if 'His Word' would resolve them:

1. If it is so awesome to serve God, why do good people with perfectly good faith get screwed.
2. Does God in anyway change as revelation unfolds -- does he become different or do things differently as time goes by.
3. What does the God of the Bible say about himself compared to what I commonly understand.
4. I was also really wrestling with the Problem of Evil and wanted some answers.
5. I was also looking for anything that would allow me to keep my faith.

At this moment I had became an agnostic and was asking the simply question -- why should I believe in Christianity anymore? Unlike some, I kept this a secret, because I have seen how understanding Christians are when they have a fellow brother or sister have a crisis of faith. Kept going to church, kept singing songs and kept being respectable simply so no one would fire bullets.

In the end, I pretty much changed everything I believe about God. My views on his nature, attributes, character and will. They had all completely changed in many respects.

This series is about how I 're-thunk God' by simply taking His Word at face value. I want to contrast what is traditionally taught about God and the Bible. In short, I want to tell you what most people believe and then show how it is contradicted by the Bible when it comes to God. Topic Covered will include:
1. Gods Nature: Immutability, Imminence and Transcendence
2. God's Attributes: Omnipotence, Omniscience and Omnipresence
3. God's Character: Loving, Holiness and Justice
4. How God's Will Relates to Man.
5. Does God Always Get What He Wants?

It should at least be a fun ride if nothing else.

"Whose Side Are You On?"

I had someone ask me this once. My problem is that Christianity today makes it so easy to switch sides; which I why I have had to completely rethink it to keep my own faith intact. It wasn't simply to rethink the answers to the BIG questions, but to rethink the way Christianity needs to be practiced.

I suppose I should be worried out on a limb like this but I am in good company -- Jesus was very much a guy who was not afraid to take on the religious people of his day. You know those Pharisees that made their rules more important than the Bible. In the end, I had to create some questions to test myself:
1. Am I seeking to enslave people with my religious rules or am I liberating people through the Gospel?
2. Am I following my Master's command to do good to those who hate me and praying for those who are my enemies or am I engaged in political action to get them to see things my way and conform?
3. When dealing with unbelievers am I practicing wisdom or contempt?
4. Is it easier to pass judgment and think the worst or exercise grace and believe the best?

I follow these rules and now I find myself in a position more and more to talk to unbelievers because by doing this I have found myself listening more and talking less. One thing of note is that no dialogue takes place when we treat people with contempt or engage in name calling -- save that for the self-righteous.

In the end the issue is one of living the commands of Christ, not just acknowledging the truth of them and still doing what you want.

That is why at times I seem to be on the side of agnostics and atheists because they are bringing up valid points, but Christians as a general rule seem to be more interested in creating their own safe Christian world than ministering to the world outside.

Petra's song 'Looking Through Rose Colored Stained Glass Windows' has become more true each year.
"Looking through rose-colored stained glass windows
Never allowing the world to come in
Seeing no evil and feeling no pain
making THE LIGHT as it comes from within so dim."
Petra off the album 'More Power To Ya" (emphasis mine)

Whose Side am I On? Christ's: but I am learning that following his teachings and fulfilling them are the real mark of whether that is true or not. I find the more I understand this, the less time I have call down judgment on the world because I know that He himself said: "For God did not send his Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through him" John 3:17. Jesus was more interested in bringing the sinner to repentance than condemning that sinner's lifestyle and trying to regulate it through legislation.

I now value openness between sides so they can talk. If Christianity truly is the truth, then there is no question that should throw it or that Christians should not be able to come up with a reasoned and rational response. If it is true, there should truly also be no evil done to us or around us that we cannot respond to with compassion and love. If these things are not true of Christianity then there is something wrong and it needs to be corrected. We can't expect respect until we give it.

Marriage and the Bible -- Part 19 -- Ruth - Romance at Last?

The story of Ruth is included in the Bible for a multitude of reasons, but chief among them is to show the lineage of David. Given that this lineage is at the end of the book of Ruth indicates the story may have been handed down by David's family but not put on paper till many years later.

Many look at this story as a Biblical romance that illustrates that true love can find you anywhere, but that is a modern spin on the story and honestly I do not think the original readers would have looked at it this way.

I think the real reason is that David, a Jewish King, is known to have a Moabitess (Ruth) in his lineage and how that came about needs to be explained. The issue is mixed marriage between a Jewish man and Moabite woman.

The story chronicles Naomi, a Jewish woman, who's husband if from Bethlehem as they head into Moab to stay a while. While there, Noami has two sons and those two sons marry Moabite women. All the men in the story die and leave Naomi without resource and the legacy of the father is ultimately up in the air. While the other daughter in law leaves - Ruth stays with Naomi. Ruth in effect swears off her former nation and decides to become a part of Naomi's.

In the course of events, Ruth, while gleaning in the fields, catches the attention of Boaz who makes his workers drop extra behind so Ruth can glean more. Ruth tells Naomi and Naomi begins to seek for a way to get the two together. I involves going into the threshing floor while Boaz is sleeping and uncovering his feet and laying at them till he wakes up. She then makes her request and Boaz acts to take Ruth to be his wife. This involves convincing a closer kinsman to Ruth to give up his claim and let Boaz have it. The end result is Ruth and Boaz married and a baby that becomes part of the lineage of David.

1. The mixed marriage issue seems to not matter here. It kind of illustrates what I am talking about with women of this era being trading cards. When Ruth marries an Israelite male, which she does in Ruth 1:4, she technically (because of her virginity in this first marriage) stops being a Moabitess and becomes an Israelite, even though she is called a Moabitess in the rest of the story. Through marriage she has changed nationality.

2. Indicates the contract angle of marriage as well. The fact is when Naomi's son's die, the closer kinsman would not only been able to marry Ruth but in some senses obligated to to raise up a son for the inheritance. Ruth and Naomi don't press this angle because they perhaps see more of an advantage to themselves in Boaz. Boaz basically has to buy Ruth's contract for himself.

3. The threshing floor incident is actually a calculated risk on the part of Naomi that puts Ruth in danger. Had Boaz decided to expose her, she would have been treated like a harlot from that point on. Instead, I think Naomi is playing on the fact that Boaz is a man with a reputation of his own and would handle the situation justly. She may be also hoping that the two have developed feelings for each other. The fact remains though this is a couple of women trying to better their situation in life through marriage.

4. Age is an issue, Ruth might have been between 25-28 years old but based on Boaz's own words to her, he must have been quite a bit older than her (40s-50s). How old we do not know. For us in the western world having such a discrepancy in ages would be somewhat odd, But Boaz seems pleased because it showed to him that Ruth was a wise woman. In this culture, women were almost always far younger than the men they married.

Romance? Maybe a little, but the fact is everyone is acting on cultural forces and trying to better their own situation. The issue is to get the contract of marriage that is the best situation and then raise up an inheritance and legacy through that union. Both are accomplished and the fact that Ruth and Boaz may have fell for one another might have simply been looked on as a bonus.

Next: Elkenah and His Two Wives

Troubling Passages of Scripture - Part 3 - Herod's Slaughter of Infants.

I know you were expecting: "Are Parts of the Bible not the Word of God?", but as I was studying to preach this passage this week, I realized it fits this series so well. Therefore, the interruption is a good one.

Matthew 2:16-17 records one of the most disturbing events of Scripture, Herod the Great slaughters all boys two years old and under in the vicinity of Bethlehem. The goal is to destroy what he perceives is a threat to the throne. Now what makes this passage troubling is not that Herod the Great is a butcher; that is a well documented fact of history. What makes the passage troubling is that God seems to direct it happening:

1) He tells the Magi to not return to Herod - had they done so, the innocents in the story would have been spared probably at the cost of the Magi (Herod was a butcher), but the exact target would have been known and Mary and Joseph could have escaped anyway through God's warning. The only problem would have been Herod would have known exactly who he was looking for and assassins could have been sent -- even into Egypt. In the final analysis, to protect His Son, the warning of the Magi seems the best. The problem is the cost is tremendous.

2) This is the most disturbing problem -- Jeremiah prophesies about this event. This means for God's Word to be fulfilled, the innocents HAD to die. Or did they? My views of how prophecy works have greatly changed since becoming an open theist. Here is the point -- Jeremiah the prophet sees Rachel weeping for her children in Ramah. Is he seeing this event or getting a feeling that something is bad is going to happen in involving Rachel and her city -- Bethlehem.

One thing I have learned about the gospel writers is that they play far more fast and loose with OT Scriptures (particularly prophecy) when they say they are fulfilled. In short, is this a direct correlation or is it Matthew seeing a connection after the fact. The thing with prophecy, I now believe, is that God leaves His options open in HOW he can fulfill them or simply that the prophecy fulfills itself with no action on God's part at all, but an observer sees the connection. In this case, the slaughter occurs through Herod, but the connection is seen with Jeremiah and Matthew, who is using prophecy to prove Jesus is the Jewish Messiah, uses that connection to further his point.

The other point that could be made here is that the ultimate fate of the innocents is generally believed to be Paradise. Is there really any harm done from an eternal perspective? Baby killed; it goes to heaven. For critics this is unsatisfying because the concept of heaven, or that innocent children go directly to heaven if killed, is something that is not directly provable and suffering here is caused because God is involved regardless. May not be His direct hand, but He is involved. Could He not have prevented it?

One thing to consider, though it does not really help resolve it completely, is the fact that infant mortality was high in the ancient world. Meant people were 'used to' infants and children dying; but that does not really help the main question because just because a culture may get used to something, still does not remove the evil of it.

For reasons that still baffle me, God has a great deal of respect for the freewill of man. It may be because of this, that events play out the way they do. God directs those who listen to him, but does nothing to directly stop Herod because the slaughter is ultimately in Herod's court and thus his responsibility. Herod is not listening to God but following his own desires. God ultimately will pass judgment on Herod's evil, but for the time being lets the rogue king have his way. Perhaps God could have changed Herod's heart like he did Pharaoh's in Exodus, but have you ever noticed God only seems to reinforce what is already in a person's heart, not completely change it in reverse. For that to happen requires repentance and Herod never will do so.

We may never have a really good answer to this one and it still remains a troubling passage. Between my open theist beliefs and my understanding of God's respect for freewill, I have come to terms with the fact that the slaughter is ultimately Herod's action that God, respecting the freewill of everyone involved, guides those who can escape it to escape it. Matthew when writing his gospel sees the connection between the event and the passage in Jeremiah but the fulfillment of that passage could have happen other ways as well. Perhaps this is not the answer, but it is the best one I can see for this troubling passage.

Next: Are Parts of the Bible, Not the Word of God?
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