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NASB | Acts 13:38 "Therefore let it be known to you, brethren, that through Him forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you, |
AMPLIFIED 2015 | Acts 13:38 "So let it be clearly known by you, brothers, that through Him forgiveness of sins is being proclaimed to you; |
Subject: What is the Bible's take on sacriments? |
Bible Note: "I agree but who but God can judge those absolutes?" Anyone who has access to the Bible. God did not leave everything about himself to some sort of guessing game. He revealed Himself to us for a reason: He WANTS us to know Him and what He is like, at least as far as He has in his grace revealed Himself in the Scriptures. "See God can not lie because He is truth, so whatever He says is true. He is just because He is justice so whatever He does is just." This is a very subtle but very crucial error here. God does not act arbitrarily, and thus whatever he does suddenly becomes "justice" or "truth." God cannot say that Jesus is not his beloved Son, for example, and then it suddenly becomes the truth. He cannot let the sins of a rebellious humanity go unpunished and be just at the same time. He does what He does not on a whim, but acts in accordance with the immutable qualities that are eternal aspects of his immutable character. His truth and His justice and His holiness are as eternal and unchangeable as he Himself is. "He is loving because He is love so whatever He does is loving." Is pouring out his eternal wrath on sinners in hell an act of love toward them? "Since God establishes the parameters anything He does, by the nature that he establishes those parameters, has to fall within the boundaries of those parameters." But God's unchanging nature is uncreated. He always acts according to his nature, so while he established the parameters for His universe and how He will interact with it, He did not create His own nature, according to which He always acts. In other words, God does not define what He is like; He simply IS. "The problems begin when Man tries to define what God should, would, could or will do. God does what he pleases because He is God." Again, I am not talking about a God made in man's image, but God as He has faithfully revealed Himself. Am I overstepping my bounds when I say that God WILL bring all Christians to heaven? No, because I am not the one who has "defined" what God will do. "In any case if God did seem (to man) to violate one of your human established absolutes who would you complain to? Who would be your mediator? Who would be your judge your jury? :-)" I don't see why you keep asking this flawed question, Ed. I have already explained how the absolutes mentioned are not "human established," but rather eternally existent in God and divinely revealed to us. If God seems to violate His immutable character traits, then the problem is with the perception of the human being to whom it seems to be violated. We see such "disorientation" in many of the psalms, for example. Psalm 79 is a very good example of seeming injustice, but it ends with a firm grasp of the fact that God's promises are sure and that He is not a liar with regard to His covenant people. In other words, the psalmist embraces what he knows to be absolutely true about God in spite of present appearances. Did the psalmist "establish" this absolute? Absolutely not. He merely received it from God Himself, and doesn't question it for a second. --Joe! |