Is forgiveness without a price a virtue?

[Justin108]

Is it a good thing to be able to forgive without any price?

If so, is God imperfect for being unable to forgive sin without Jesus' sacrifice?

[Justin108]

What do you mean 'absolutely' sure? What things are we absolutely sure about in our lives?

At the very least I need to be as sure of God as I am of my parents. When he speaks to me, I need to be as sure it is him as if my mother was speaking to me. So a book won't cut it

Ok tell me exactly what needs to be achieved and I'll storm up a few ideas about how God would be able to achieve it

We need to not only know how to surrender

God, with his omnipotence, can upload that knowledge into our mind

Robo-Jesus would not have done exactly everything Jesus did.

Why not?

Jesus perfectly surrendered human nature in every respect to live in relationship with God through a free will. Robo-Jesus doesn't have a human nature, it's got a robot nature.

Isn't the point of Jesus simply to demonstrate how it needs to be done? If Robo-Jesus imitated every one of Jesus' actions, it would be a perfect demonstration of how to surrender. If a Robot showed a kid how to throw a ball and if a human showed a kid how to throw a ball, it would make no difference. The kid would see how it's done and learn from it

Teach (merriam-webster): to impart the knowledge of <teach algebra>.

How can you impart something you do not possess?

God possesses perfect knowledge of everything

[The Tanager]

At the very least I need to be as sure of God as I am of my parents. When he speaks to me, I need to be as sure it is him as if my mother was speaking to me. So a book won't cut it

You've learned things about your parents from other people, I'm sure. But Christianity doesn't limit it to a book. It teaches the indwelling of the Holy Spirit promised as a guide by Jesus.

Ok tell me exactly what needs to be achieved and I'll storm up a few ideas about how God would be able to achieve it

We need to not only know how to surrender

God, with his omnipotence, can upload that knowledge into our mind

That is only a response to part of what I said. Uploading that knowledge into our mind doesn't make it so we will surrender, at least not while keeping our free will in tact.

Isn't the point of Jesus simply to demonstrate how it needs to be done?

No. Just like I said the first time you made that point.

God possesses perfect knowledge of everything

So, you agree now that you can't teach what you don't possess? Because you were disputing that point.

[Justin108]

You've learned things about your parents from other people, I'm sure.

Some things, yes. But the vast majority of what I know about my parents are first hand accounts. I have never once doubted the existence of my parents. The same cannot be said for God. I've heard some things about my parents but most of it is first hand experience. With God, however, everything I know about him is from hearsay. I have zero experience with him. So how is it that he guides me when he's never there?

I'm sure. But Christianity doesn't limit it to a book. It teaches the indwelling of the Holy Spirit promised as a guide by Jesus.

But the book is the primary source of our guidance from God. The only reason the Holy Spirit is even a thing is because the book says it is. Without the Bible, I highly doubt anyone would believe in the Holy Spirit.

Do people have reason to doubt the existence of God? Yes or no?

Uploading that knowledge into our mind doesn't make it so we will surrender

It will teach us how to surrender. I though that was the main issue here?

at least not while keeping our free will in tact.

How does this break our free will?

God possesses perfect knowledge of everything

So, you agree now that you can't teach what you don't possess?

You can't teach what you don't possess knowledge of. You can teach something you cannot physically do yourself but as long as you have the knowledge, you can teach it. God cannot physically surrender, but he has perfect knowledge of surrender and so he can teach it

[The Tanager]

I'm not sure if I'll be able to respond until early next week due to travel/work plans. I might be able to get away here and there, but I'm not sure. I do appreciate your helping me to think through this more deeply.

With God, however, everything I know about him is from hearsay. I have zero experience with him. So how is it that he guides me when he's never there?

Christianity (as I've described it) would necessarily mean you aren't being guided by God, in the full sense at least. Except in something like a moral conscience that God puts into every one.

But the book is the primary source of our guidance from God. The only reason the Holy Spirit is even a thing is because the book says it is. Without the Bible, I highly doubt anyone would believe in the Holy Spirit.

That's not the reason why the Holy Spirit is a thing. The books we have didn't exist prior to Jesus' teachings about the Holy Spirit and they didn't exist prior to events talked about in the books like Pentecost in Acts, assuming they happened, of course.

Do people have reason to doubt the existence of God? Yes or no?

Yes. And reason to believe God does exist.

It will teach us how to surrender. I though that was the main issue here?

No, I said we even need help surrendering, actually doing it. I said God has told us how to surrender at one point (that's what Torah tells us), but the Jesus story goes beyond that and surrenders in a way we humans can't and then imparts that, actual surrendering, into us re-forming our human nature from within it. Re-forming it from the outside negates our free will.

How does this break our free will?

It would if you meant (and I wasn't sure if you meant it or not) that this knowledge makes us necessarily act perfectly. But from the above, I don't think you are taking into consideration the difference between knowing how to do something and actually doing it. We need help actually surrendering. Uploading the knowledge into us doesn't help us to actually do it.

You can't teach what you don't possess knowledge of. You can teach something you cannot physically do yourself but as long as you have the knowledge, you can teach it. God cannot physically surrender, but he has perfect knowledge of surrender and so he can teach it

He can tell us how to do it (and did long before Jesus). But we don't do it. We are too far gone for that. We need someone to actually do it in us, do it for us, teaching us and giving us the power to do it on our own, like holding a kids hand to form letters at first and then later not needing to hold their hand. God can't do that without being able to surrender Himself. God can't do that without taking on a created human nature.

[Justin108]

Christianity (as I've described it) would necessarily mean you aren't being guided by God, in the full sense at least.

What's stopping him?

Except in something like a moral conscience that God puts into every one.

My moral conscience says homosexuality is ok while slavery is wrong. How is it my moral conscience disagrees with God when it's supposedly God's guidance?

Do people have reason to doubt the existence of God? Yes or no?

Yes. And reason to believe God does exist.

My point is people have good reason to doubt God's existence. The same cannot be said for one's parents. Most sane people do not sincerely doubt whether their parents exist. Therefore, God is far more doubtful than one's parents

No, I said we even need help surrendering, actually doing it

How does Jesus dying help us surrender?

but the Jesus story goes beyond that and surrenders in a way we humans can't and then imparts that, actual surrendering, into us re-forming our human nature from within it.

Wait so you're saying Jesus surrendered, and then somehow sent that surrendered-ness to us? Thereby surrendering on our behalf?

Re-forming it from the outside negates our free will.

How?

How does this break our free will?

It would if you meant (and I wasn't sure if you meant it or not) that this knowledge makes us necessarily act perfectly.

No all this knowledge does is teach us how to surrender

But from the above, I don't think you are taking into consideration the difference between knowing how to do something and actually doing it. We need help actually surrendering. Uploading the knowledge into us doesn't help us to actually do it.

And doing it for us doesn't help us surrender either. It's basically cheating. If God would allow someone to do this for us, then he might as well scrap the surrender requirement completely because we aren't the ones who surrendered. So what would be the point?

We need someone to actually do it in us, do it for us

What? Like a ventriloquist?

like holding a kids hand to form letters at first and then later not needing to hold their hand

How many times are we going to surrender? The point of holding a kid's hand to teach him how to write is to teach him an enduring skill that he will use over and over again in the future. Is this true for surrender?

And how is Jesus' death "holding our hand"? Jesus' body is not our body. It's not our "hand". All we get to do is read about what Jesus did 2000 years ago, so this is more like a kid reading a book about a guy who once taught someone how to write. I don't see how this is "holding our hand to form a letter"

[The Tanager]

What's stopping him?

You. But please remember I say this as something that logically follows from the doctrines, not in some holier-than-thou kind of way.

My moral conscience says homosexuality is ok while slavery is wrong. How is it my moral conscience disagrees with God when it's supposedly God's guidance?

Any actual disagreements would be because of the broken relationship. I don't think Christianity teaches the conscience is completely broken. I'm not saying non-Christians can't be good, in other words. But the break would lead to missapplying the moral principles.

My point is people have good reason to doubt God's existence. The same cannot be said for one's parents. Most sane people do not sincerely doubt whether their parents exist. Therefore, God is far more doubtful than one's parents

Oh, sure. Parents and God are two completely different kinds of being.

How does Jesus dying help us surrender?

Because Jesus' death was the finish to Jesus perfectly surrendering every aspect of the human nature to God. Jesus then puts that human nature into us.

Wait so you're saying Jesus surrendered, and then somehow sent that surrendered-ness to us? Thereby surrendering on our behalf?

Kind of. Jesus' transforms our human nature by 'sending' us his surrendered human nature so to speak, through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit for believers. God is 'side-by-side' with us, 'holding' our 'hands' like the letter analogy I said earlier, transforming/cleaning out our current human nature (not just making a new human from scratch).

How?

For someone to come from the outside and just give us a prescriptively perfect human nature in place of what we previously had, we become a completely different person. And this new nature is determined to only produce good moral results.

And doing it for us doesn't help us surrender either. It's basically cheating. If God would allow someone to do this for us, then he might as well scrap the surrender requirement completely because we aren't the ones who surrendered. So what would be the point?

I agree. I think Christianity points to a distinction. The difference between me writing the A's for my daughter's handwriting lesson by myself and me holding her hand and helping her to form them. We do them together.

How many times are we going to surrender? The point of holding a kid's hand to teach him how to write is to teach him an enduring skill that he will use over and over again in the future. Is this true for surrender?

Surrender is a constant thing in one's relationship with God, in every aspect of life, if we are living how I think Christianity says God intended it to be.

And how is Jesus' death "holding our hand"? Jesus' body is not our body. It's not our "hand". All we get to do is read about what Jesus did 2000 years ago, so this is more like a kid reading a book about a guy who once taught someone how to write. I don't see how this is "holding our hand to form a letter"

The holding is from the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in us. The Spirit is with them in every aspect of life, which includes while reading the Bible.

Also remember that this is all an extended analogy that tries to understand, in human terms, what Jesus did on the cross and why. It's a theory, which is distinct from the act itself. All Christians (should) agree that the main importance is the act itself and they've all said that, somehow, Jesus' death puts us right with God. How all that works out probably needs multiple analogies. If this sounds wacky to you, drop it and look at other theories...all as theories.

[Justin108]

What's stopping him?

You. But please remember I say this as something that logically follows from the doctrines, not in some holier-than-thou kind of way.

1. How can a mortal man stop an omnipotent God from doing anything?
2. When you say I am stopping God from guiding me, are you saying I'm simply ignoring him? Or do my sins somehow block his communication?
3. Wasn't Paul a sinner before Jesus suddenly appeared to him uninvited?

My moral conscience says homosexuality is ok while slavery is wrong. How is it my moral conscience disagrees with God when it's supposedly God's guidance?

Any actual disagreements would be because of the broken relationship. I don't think Christianity teaches the conscience is completely broken. I'm not saying non-Christians can't be good, in other words. But the break would lead to missapplying the moral principles.

If my moral conscience is somehow broken regarding homosexuality, how can we be sure slavery is immoral? I mean clearly we cannot fully trust our own moral conscience, and without the Bible ever saying slavery is wrong, how can we be sure?

Because Jesus' death was the finish to Jesus perfectly surrendering every aspect of the human nature to God. Jesus then puts that human nature into us.

Jesus could have put that human nature into us without dying

And this new nature is determined to only produce good moral results.

Is this new nature literally incapable of sinning?

And doing it for us doesn't help us surrender either. It's basically cheating. If God would allow someone to do this for us, then he might as well scrap the surrender requirement completely because we aren't the ones who surrendered. So what would be the point?

I agree. I think Christianity points to a distinction. The difference between me writing the A's for my daughter's handwriting lesson by myself and me holding her hand and helping her to form them. We do them together.

But you said Jesus surrendered "for us", not "with us"

And how is Jesus' death "holding our hand"? Jesus' body is not our body. It's not our "hand". All we get to do is read about what Jesus did 2000 years ago, so this is more like a kid reading a book about a guy who once taught someone how to write. I don't see how this is "holding our hand to form a letter"

The holding is from the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in us.

The Holy Spirit could have done its thing without Jesus dying

[The Tanager]

1. How can a mortal man stop an omnipotent God from doing anything?

Because as an exercise of God's omnipotence, God decided to allow humans free will to do just that.

2. When you say I am stopping God from guiding me, are you saying I'm simply ignoring him? Or do my sins somehow block his communication?

Probably both.

3. Wasn't Paul a sinner before Jesus suddenly appeared to him uninvited?

Yes.

If my moral conscience is somehow broken regarding homosexuality, how can we be sure slavery is immoral? I mean clearly we cannot fully trust our own moral conscience, and without the Bible ever saying slavery is wrong, how can we be sure?

I agree you couldn't be absolutely sure, but I also said earlier that I'm not sure we can be absolutely sure about much in life. We try to take into consideration as much as possible and are continually open to being corrected.

Jesus could have put that human nature into us without dying

It would not have been a perfected, complete human nature. Why? Because death is a part of human life. Jesus had to die to surrender human nature in that last aspect of human life.

Is this new nature literally incapable of sinning?

Jesus' human nature was capable of sinning, but Jesus didn't sin. It was surrendered in every aspect. This perfect nature is what Jesus' disciples are having transform their own nature. Our sinning nature is being transformed to become like the perfected nature.

And doing it for us doesn't help us surrender either. It's basically cheating. If God would allow someone to do this for us, then he might as well scrap the surrender requirement completely because we aren't the ones who surrendered. So what would be the point?

I already responded to that whole paragraph in my last post.

But you said Jesus surrendered "for us", not "with us"

Well, then, I thank you for giving me the opportunity to clarify what I meant.

The Holy Spirit could have done its thing without Jesus dying

It's thing, though, is transforming our nature with Jesus' perfected human nature. It couldn't do that withouth Jesus' perfected human nature, which to be made perfectly complete had to undergo death, since humanity undergoes death.

[Justin108]

1. How can a mortal man stop an omnipotent God from doing anything?

Because as an exercise of God's omnipotence, God decided to allow humans free will to do just that.

Are you saying I cannot hear God because I choose to not hear God?

2. When you say I am stopping God from guiding me, are you saying I'm simply ignoring him? Or do my sins somehow block his communication?

Probably both.

I am certainly not ignoring God and I fail to see how sin would prevent God from communicating with us.

3. Wasn't Paul a sinner before Jesus suddenly appeared to him uninvited?

Yes.

Then how did God manage to communicate with Paul when Paul's sin would block God's attempt to communicate?

Jesus could have put that human nature into us without dying

It would not have been a perfected, complete human nature. Why? Because death is a part of human life. Jesus had to die to surrender human nature in that last aspect of human life.

Jesus did not have to actually die in order to put a surrendered nature into us! He did not have to surrender himself in order to place a surrendered nature into us! Insisting that he had to is saying that God is not omnipotent. It's that simple

But you said Jesus surrendered "for us", not "with us"

Well, then, I thank you for giving me the opportunity to clarify what I meant.

If Jesus surrendered "for us" then you cannot use the form-a-letter analogy because doing something for us is not the same as teaching us how to do it. If I wrote your math exam for you, did you learn anything?

The Holy Spirit could have done its thing without Jesus dying

It's thing, though, is transforming our nature with Jesus' perfected human nature. It couldn't do that withouth Jesus' perfected human nature, which to be made perfectly complete had to undergo death, since humanity undergoes death.

Look up "omnipotence" then get back to me

[The Tanager]

Are you saying I cannot hear God because I choose to not hear God?

Yes, but probably in the sense that you don't hear because you don't believe (for a mix of intellectual and emotional reasons, just like everyone else, believer and non-believer) that this God is real. If something was coming to you from God you would have another explanation for it because of all the other things you believe about reality.

I am certainly not ignoring God and I fail to see how sin would prevent God from communicating with us.

Ignoring in the sense I said above, where what does come from God, you have a different explanation for it, since you don't believe this God even exists.

On the other, we were made to be in relationship with God and Sin is a description of our 'rebellion' against that, becoming self-reliant and all I've said on that earlier. I don't see how this wouldn't prevent us from hearing God's attempts at communication, by the nature of its very definition.

Then how did God manage to communicate with Paul when Paul's sin would block God's attempt to communicate?

I didn't say, or at least never meant it to seem I was saying, that our sin completely blocks all of God's attempts to communicate with us.

Jesus did not have to actually die in order to put a surrendered nature into us! He did not have to surrender himself in order to place a surrendered nature into us! Insisting that he had to is saying that God is not omnipotent. It's that simple

No, what I said was Jesus had to die to have a completely, perfectly surrendered human nature. And he had to surrender his human nature to have a perfected nature to "put into us."

This does not say God is not omnipotent. There are two ways God can "put" a surrendered nature into us. God could just do it (as you seem to be saying), replacing our previous nature, but then God is creating a completely different being. And that being either (a) is determined to not sin by that very nature, thereby negating free will or (b) has been given a nature that can go astray causing God to have to fix "us" (aka, make new people) all over again.

Or God can transform the nature we already have, by actually helping us surrender. Not doing it for us, which negates free will, but helping us to do it since we are such that just telling us what to do doesn't work. But God cannot logically do this in His divine nature, since surrender is no part of that nature. So, logically, God must take on the human nature. This isn't a lack of omnipotence, since omnipotence (you agreed) does not include doing logical impossibilities and a being that cannot surrender surrendering would be a logical impossibility.

If Jesus surrendered "for us" then you cannot use the form-a-letter analogy because doing something for us is not the same as teaching us how to do it. If I wrote your math exam for you, did you learn anything?

And I just said thank you for giving me the opportunity to clarify that I should not have said "for us," but rather "with us."

Look up "omnipotence" then get back to me

Okay, I did and now I'm back with you. Where do you think I'm getting it wrong and what is your source(s) for that conclusion?