What Is Impossible With Men Is Possible With God.

[fastfredy0]

Re: By that definition God is not limited in size, amount or extent.

Agreed.

I'm not sure God could create a universe that never ends... just like He could never count to the end of infinity ... I did pass grade 3 math so it's not as if I am completely ignorant .... hmmm

 

[fastfredy0]

God is also incapable (limited) from creating another God as the creation of an eternal being is not possible.

 

[makesends]

Re: By that definition God is not limited in size, amount or extent.

I'm not sure God could create a universe that never ends... just like He could never count to the end of infinity ... I did pass grade 3 math so it's not as if I am completely ignorant .... hmmm

God is also incapable (limited) from creating another God as the creation of an eternal being is not possible.

But you are capable, I hope, of seeing both of these scenarios as human constructions, humanly viewed as self-contradictory, or as I put it, built on human words. Just as, for example, the notion of 'God counting to the end of infinity' pretends to know what infinity really is (or is not) and pretends to see that as possibly a limitation to God. Instead, it should be, "Infinity, whatever it is, is by God's sayso. God is not subject to it, nor limited by it, but it is defined by God."

Whatever there is of the pinnacle of human math —modern physics, if they don't misuse the math— does not limit God, and only at best hints at further definition or understanding of God. It depends on him, and not the other way around. In that way, modern physics is no better than 3rd grade math. WE want to qualify infinity.

 

[makesends]

I was addressing the pantheism that could exist in the argument that God can not sin therefore He did not create sin.

God can create a thing and not be that thing. Therefore God could create sin. It is an act of His will (decree), not a quality of God, anymore than by creating trees, tree sap flows in His veins.
God could create and decree sin as a component of East of Eden.
There is providence and choice within a given space and time.
One man might choose to lie. Another man to steal.
Sin is a smorgasbord. All of it, the opportunity and the capacity to commit are within natural man in providence.
The same as a man in an icecream shop, he could choose vanilla (lust) chocolate (envy) OR he could choose none.
So within that very limited scope, when the man who chooses the double scoop dies from diabetes and heart problems, it is not God who chose the flavor of man's demise, even though God definitely created and decreed ice cream and metabolisms and gluttony in East of Eden.

But God created everything that led to that man's decisions, and caused all the world's decisions and all other causes related to that man's choice.

That what we consider the principle, "sin", to be is reality, is not proven. Its effects are proven, obviously, but not the reality of its existence. It is not itself properly 'a thing', but, rather, "exists" only as opposing good. As the reformers are careful to say, it is the "privation" of good.

 

[makesends]

God is also incapable (limited) from creating another God as the creation of an eternal being is not possible.

My point can be expressed this way: "How is that a limit on what God can do?"

That's just a silly result of human attempts at assembling words. It is a meaningless notion. It does not limit God.

 

[QVQ]

God is also incapable (limited) from creating another God as the creation of an eternal being is not possible.

God is separate from His will.
If another God is possible, then God could create it.
It is within the realm of possible. God does not actualize all possibilities.
Yes, It is possible for God to do that however, possible is not actual.
There is a difference between what is possible and what is or will become actual.
Not all possibilities are actualized. All possibility are within the realm of "what if" not within the more narrow scope of actual reality.

 

[QVQ]

That what we consider the principle, "sin", to be is reality, is not proven. Its effects are proven, obviously, but not the reality of its existence. It is not itself properly 'a thing', but, rather, "exists" only as opposing good. As the reformers are careful to say, it is the "privation" of good.

Yes, it is a concept, not a thing.
It cannot be applied to a cat, because a cat does cat, neither good nor evil
"Doing cat" may be sin if done by a man but the concept, sin, does not apply to cat.

 

[fastfredy0]

But you are capable, I hope, of seeing both of these scenarios as human constructions, humanly viewed as self-contradictory, or as I put it, built on human words. Just as, for example, the notion of 'God counting to the end of infinity' pretends to know what infinity really is (or is not) and pretends to see that as possibly a limitation to God. Instead, it should be, "Infinity, whatever it is, is by God's sayso. God is not subject to it, nor limited by it, but it is defined by God."

But we know what "infinity" is because we defined it. It's not God defining "infinity", it is us. Among other things, infinity is defined as having no end, so by man's definition God cannot do it.
God told us to name the animals. It man that assigned the name. I grant it is a second cause. A hippo is a hippo because man declared it so and man knows what a hippo is. Granted, God know more about a hippo and made us capable of knowing what a hippo is.

Maybe I just don't understand what you're saying.
Gee, if I am not correct that 1+1=2 then there is no chance I will understand what you are saying.

 

[Arial]

If another God is possible, then God could create it.

In which case it would not be another God but a created being and God is not a created being.

 

[QVQ]

In which case it would not be another God but a created being and God is not a created being.

Could God produce something that was not created? Could He split into 2 separate parts.
God could do that.
If it is conceivable, then it is a possibility and all things are possible with God.
Therefore, whether He chooses to divide Himself has not been done but He is not, by that prescription, incapable of doing.
The fact is, no matter what "what if's" we manufacture, God could, by virtue of being God, do anything we could conceive.
The fact that God does not actualize all possibilities is not proof He can't.

 

[makesends]

That is not a limitation. The limitation is if He could learn as learning is for fulfillment.
He is filled, not limited.

Not that I jumped to conclusions about you from this, but it did give me pause. Some of that has the ring of Open-Theism. They may answer our objection to their philosophy, (that God can learn, and actually risk, etc), as if instead of "learning" as such, that God is only "filling possibility", and so "filling himself."

 

[makesends]

Could God produce something that was not created? Could He split into 2 separate parts.
God could do that.
If it is conceivable, then it is a possibility and all things are possible with God.
Therefore, whether He chooses to divide Himself has not been done but He is not, by that prescription, incapable of doing.
The fact is, no matter what "what if's" we manufacture, God could, by virtue of being God, do anything we could conceive.
The fact that God does not actualize all possibilities is not proof He can't.

Yet, facts do not exist outside his purview.

The nature of God has been debated and studied extensively over millenia. Both Simplicity and Aseity would be denied if God could split into two separate parts. That is, therefore, a bogus notion. It neither limits nor qualifies what God can or cannot do, because if he was to do that, then he would not be God.

Also, I do not think the phrase valid: "If it is conceivable, then it is a possibility...". One must ask —conceivable according to whom? We conceive of bogus notions, and discard them, every day! God has no bogus notions, although he does have some pretty fantastic plays on words.

But again, we have no reason to call something impossible unless we are conjecturing. Looking back, has more than what was possible ever happened? That, and nothing else, ever happened. So why do we suppose anything else was possible? God did not cause it to happen—therefore it could not have happened.

Lol, this is the madness into which logic has taken me. And poor @fastfredy0 is digging his heels in, trying not to succumb. Here you go Freddy—put it in proposition form: Nothing comes to pass but by God ordaining it do so. If God does not ordain it, it does not come to pass. If it came to pass, God ordained it; how then, can something be possible, if God did not ordain it?

Can anyone here show me rationally, or even Biblically, that anything is possible that does not come to pass? And just to head off at the pass this one I have heard— Where God says, "If you had done x, I would have done y", or, "If you had not done w, I would not have done z", that still doesn't mention what 'could have happened', but what someone 'should have done', at most.

 

[makesends]

God is separate from His will.

How do you know this? Can you prove it, or even demonstrate it may be so?

God is not made of parts.

 

[makesends]

makesends said:
But you are capable, I hope, of seeing both of these scenarios as human constructions, humanly viewed as self-contradictory, or as I put it, built on human words. Just as, for example, the notion of 'God counting to the end of infinity' pretends to know what infinity really is (or is not) and pretends to see that as possibly a limitation to God. Instead, it should be, "Infinity, whatever it is, is by God's sayso. God is not subject to it, nor limited by it, but it is defined by God."

But we know what "infinity" is because we defined it. It's not God defining "infinity", it is us. Among other things, infinity is defined as having no end, so by man's definition God cannot do it.
God told us to name the animals. It man that assigned the name. I grant it is a second cause. A hippo is a hippo because man declared it so and man knows what a hippo is. Granted, God know more about a hippo and made us capable of knowing what a hippo is.

Maybe I just don't understand what you're saying.
Gee, if I am not correct that 1+1=2 then there is no chance I will understand what you are saying.

I didn't say that you were incorrect, that 1+1=2. Can you show me where I sounded that way? I had no such intention.

If 'infinity' is a human word to describe something beyond our ken, then it still may be valid as that thing beyond our ken. We use quite a few of our own words to designate this or that —such as, "God"— that are used for things we want to put handles on, but do not consider ourselves the master of the concepts.

The hippo is what it is, (a hippo), by God's sayso, not by Adam's. Adam only put the name, 'hippo', to it. I'm wondering if Noah called it a pig, though.

But, regardless, if infinity is a human concept, and if infinity is not a human concept, God is not limited by it.

 

[makesends]

I was addressing the pantheism that could exist in the argument that God can not sin therefore He did not create sin.

God can create a thing and not be that thing. Therefore God could create sin. It is an act of His will (decree), not a quality of God, anymore than by creating trees, tree sap flows in His veins.
God could create and decree sin as a component of East of Eden.
There is providence and choice within a given space and time.
One man might choose to lie. Another man to steal.
Sin is a smorgasbord. All of it, the opportunity and the capacity to commit are within natural man in providence.
The same as a man in an icecream shop, he could choose vanilla (lust) chocolate (envy) OR he could choose none.
So within that very limited scope, when the man who chooses the double scoop dies from diabetes and heart problems, it is not God who chose the flavor of man's demise, even though God definitely created and decreed ice cream and metabolisms and gluttony in East of Eden.

Oh, ok.

Though I disagree that sin can be a creation, as such. To my mind, it can't even be quite a principle as such, but an anti-principle at the most.

 

[QVQ]

how do you know this? Can you prove it, or even demonstrate it may be so?

God is not made of parts.

I meant it in the sense that God is the potter, not the pot.

Also, I do not think the phrase valid: "If it is conceivable, then it is a possibility...". One must ask —conceivable according to whom? We conceive of bogus notions, and discard them, every day! God has no bogus notions, although he does have some pretty fantastic plays on words.

Who put that thought in your head?

that anything is possible that does not come to pass?

The original verse in the OP is exactly that...With men this is impossible; but with God all things are possible.
Man can concieve of that which God gives him power to imagine, invent or dream.
Mostly what man imagines is impossible but Christ said, "With God all things are possible."
However, thre isn't space enough and time for all that is possible.
Therefore, things that are possible to God do not necessarily come to pass.
IT isn't required in "all things are possible" for all possible things to come to pass.
It merely requires that it, the thing, is a possibility

 

[QVQ]

I suppose I would defend to the final straw the fact that God is limitless, without beginning or end and there is nothing, not one thing in the entire universe and beyond that God could not do, according to His good pleasure.
There is no possibillity of anything that is not within the realm of God's power to make come to pass. Whether He does or not, He could.

 

[makesends]

I meant it in the sense that God is the potter, not the pot.

ok

Who put that thought in your head?

What thought? You are the one who asserted, "If it is conceivable, then it is a possibility..."

The original verse in the OP is exactly that...With men this is impossible; but with God all things are possible.

Man can concieve of that which God gives him power to imagine, invent or dream.
Mostly what man imagines is impossible but Christ said, "With God all things are possible."

And so, one might wonder, if something is possible, what are the 'things' that are NOT possible? What is a "thing"?

It's not as silly a question as one might imagine!

But I will grant that the verse is talking about things (such as walking on water) that man considers impossible, are not impossible to God.

However, thre isn't space enough and time for all that is possible.
Therefore, things that are possible to God do not necessarily come to pass.

IT isn't required in "all things are possible" for all possible things to come to pass.
It merely requires that it, the thing, is a possibility

Not by strict definition of 'possible'. We already know that nothing can be possible except by God's establishing the fact of it. If he did not establish the fact of it, it was not possible. Not that he is or is not powerful enough, but that it simply is not, because he did not make it so.

We want to establish a separate entity from God we would like to call reality, and give it characteristics as though it being separate from God means he is obliged to deal with it as separate from himself. We would be mistaken. Not only is it not a willed fact, nor imbued with randomness and chance and principles of its own, but it does not even exist but by God's precision, control and immanence. And, no, that isn't Pantheism, nor even Panentheism. Nor New Age. Just good understanding of what God is.

 

[makesends]

I suppose I would defend to the final straw the fact that God is limitless, without beginning or end and there is nothing, not one thing in the entire universe and beyond that God could not do, according to His good pleasure.
There is no possibillity of anything that is not within the realm of God's power to make come to pass. Whether He does or not, He could.

And, until someone can show me different, there is no reason for me to think that God would do anything that is not according to his good pleasure —specifically those 'things' we might consider actual and possible, but that are, in fact, self-contradictory notions.

 

[Hazelelponi]

Gee, if I am not correct that 1+1=2 then there is no chance I will understand what you are saying.

1 ⊕ 1 ⊕ 1 = 1

My contribution . Tropical algebra.