The Fairness of Hearing the Gospel

Answering a question on Quora:

If only [by] believing in Jesus can someone go to heaven, what about people who died before Jesus's birth, who have not heard about Jesus at their time? If they can all go to heaven, is that not fair for us as we have to choose which god is the right one[?]

This question requires some untangling because it makes several assumptions and implies several questions. 

The question assumes that people have been accountable for fulfilling the same requirements at all times. That is, people living before Jesus’s birth could only go to heaven if they believed in Jesus.

Actually, accountability has always been proportional. That means that a child who has no ability to grasp the requirements has no accountability. It also means that people living in ancient times were not required to know something that had not happened yet.

The question asks, If [Since] only [by] believing in Jesus can someone go to heaven…. That is terribly over-simplified. “Believing in Jesus” is a mere title or summary. When you add the details, you find that five out of six (83%) of the requirements now and in ancient times overlap.

In ancient times, the required knowledge and belief were:

• God exists; and He is just and holy.
• My thoughts and actions have made me unholy, so I cannot defile the presence of a holy God.
• My actions require a just God to punish my unholy thoughts and actions.
• God is also merciful, gracious, and loving, so He will provide a way for me to enter His presence.
• I, therefore, trust God rather than myself.

In 33 AD, God added one more detail:

• The way is Jesus’s death and resurrection. (This is enough detail for this context, although another layer of details appears when you ask questions such as, Whom and What was Jesus? and What do you mean by resurrection?)

People living before 33 AD could not know how God would create the way to enter God’s presence, so they were not accountable for knowing the how. They knew — or at least they could know — through the Old Testament commands, that they were guilty before God. Then knew through the prescribed Old Testament sacrifices that it would require lifeblood and a substitution, and that it would be a price they could not pay without themselves being destroyed. So, instead of trusting themselves, they had to trust God.

Jesus lived, died, and rose again to create the way to enter God’s presence. The exact how was not something ancient people could know, but it is something we know. Since we know the how, we are accountable for following it.

Imagine being on a sinking ship in the middle of the ocean. Someone tells you that a helicopter is hovering overhead, rescuing passengers.

• If you do not believe the ship is sinking, you will drown.
• If you decide to swim 2,000 miles to the nearest shore, you will drown.
• If you look at the helicopter and then return to your room, you will drown.
• If you believe them intellectually but do not let them hoist you up into the helicopter, you will drown.
• If you believe in the helicopter but insist on getting to it your own way, you will drown.

The question focuses on the way of escape, which is trusting that God paid our penalty. In a sense, failing to use that way of escape can be blamed for going to hell. But that is simplistic. The sinking ship represents our unholy thoughts and actions. Drowning represents going to hell. Failing to put faith in Christ’s actions is just one more unholy failure. A sinner does not go to hell for any single moral crime (although one is enough), but for a lifetime of moral crimes.

God sends people to hell for their sins. People send themselves to hell by failing to follow the way of escape that God created.

As for having to choose the right God, all men, always,  have "had to choose the right God." Only one God deals honestly with the problem of sin and justice. For example, when Islam's god forgives, he does so at the expense of satisfying justice. Only the Judeo-Christian God satisfies both justice and love.

The question ends by asking about fairness. Fairness is a relative concept. It is a question that children ask when they don’t get what they greedily desire. “Johnny got a gift he didn’t earn, so it’s unfair if I don’t get a gift.” If there is unfairness, it is created by us. We are the ones making the choice to repent and trust Christ or to reject God’s way.

From God’s perspective, “fairness” would have been making Jesus the political ruler over all earth 2,000 years ago instead of letting the Innocent One take the wrath the guilty deserve. Fairness would be letting all humans go to hell.

Since Jesus created a way to be saved from hell, fairness is allowing us to choose our own fates. Fairness to ourselves would be responding according to our knowledge of the way, living accordingly, and passing that knowledge along.

Copyright 2020, Richard Wheeler. Assuming credit is given where credit is due, permission granted for non-remunerated use.

Could God Be a Monad?

Can God the Father be God without Jesus or the Holy Spirit?

(From a question on Quora)

The question is asked in present tense, and it is a bit ambiguous. I take it to mean, Is God the Father able to remain God if God the Son and God the Holy Spirit were split off, eliminated, or retracted from the universe?

Your question could also be taken to mean, Could God the Father have chosen to be a unitary God without having also existed as Jesus or the Holy Spirit?

Based on the relationship between God and the universe, I would say yes with respect to His substance but no with respect to His character. The same answer applies to either interpretation of the question.

One of the arguments for the existence of God is known as the Kalam Cosmological Argument. It states:

• Everything that begins to exist has a cause.
  
• The universe began to exist (around 13.8 billion years ago)
  
• Therefore, the universe has a Cause. 

From the nature of the universe and related arguments, one can derive (without turning to revealed information such as the Bible) that the Cause is timeless, spaceless, non-contingent, unimaginably powerful, volitional, and unfathomably intelligent. In other words, God.

According to General Relativity, time, space, matter, and energy are so intertwined that if God created the universe, He created time and space, as well. Creative power over time and space allows their Creator to be omnipresent and omnitemporal — which explains omniscience with respect to both every location and every time.

Creative power over time and space also allows God to enter and experience time and space as one Person (or center of consciousness) or as a billion Persons, yet remain One God outside of the Universe. As it happens, He chose to exist in time and space as three Persons. Those three Persons, while remaining in every way equal, voluntarily took on different roles and titles: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Due to the feat of entering time and space, all three Persons have the same substance (spirit). If God were a creature of the universe, this would be counter intuitive. However, with God having His “home” or “natural” existence outside of time and space, all three Persons can consist of the same spiritual substance.

We would be bothered by the physical law that two things can simultaneously occupy the same space at the same time. However, God’s substance is Spirit, not physical; so He is not subject to the same limits as we are.

Since all three Persons consist of the same substance, eliminating one or two of the Persons would not affect the existence of the third Person. Neither would it affect the existence of God outside of time and space.

So, with respect to God’s substance, one Person of the Trinity could exist without the other two.
But is this consistent with God’s character? God is relational and loving, and He has no needs. To exist as a unitary Person (a “monad”) would leave a relational God without any source or object of love until He created intelligent life. If God has no needs, then this makes it probable that God existed as three Persons even “before” creation. As Genesis 1:1 says, In the beginning, Gods (Elohim, “gods”) created (singular) the heavens and the earth.….

If the Son and the Holy Spirit ceased to exist in the universe, God the Father would still be God. However, He would cease to be “the Father” because you can’t be a father without at least one person in the role of “the Child” (or “the Son”).

Also, the roles of the three Persons teach us about relationships and solve problems that I won’t go into now. (For example, how can God remain untouched by corruption and at the same time experience incarnation? Or how can God simultaneously express His wrath and be the subject of that wrath in our place?) God would have to either fulfill the functions of all three Persons or eliminate some of those functions.

If God is God, then He is maximally great. If God is maximally great, then any other form in which He existed in the universe would be less than maximally great. By definition, a less-than-maximally great god would not be God.

To Modalists such as Oneness Pentecostals and to sects such as the Watchtower (Jehovah’s Witnesses), Oneness is not a problem. Modalists believe God is a quick-change artist, switching between three hats in order to deceive people into thinking He is three Persons. But that makes God a deceiver. The Watchtower teaches that only the Father is God because the Son is just an exalted archangel and the Holy Spirit is just an impersonal force of God.

But we are approaching this from the view that all three Persons are God, so a lonely, God is an unsolvable problem for Modalists, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Jews, and Muslims.

So my final answer is that, if two Persons ceased to be, the third Person could continue to be God. However, as a monad, God would have had or might still have unfulfilled needs and would be less than maximally great, so without the Son and the Holy Spirit, He would not be God.

Copyright 2020, Richard Wheeler. Since I originally posted this answer on Quora, I probably lost the right to claim copyright. However, I ask that if you use this material, please give credit where credit is due.

From a question on Quora:

Is the separation of "the entirety", the one god, into multiple gods or aspects due to our inability to comprehend "the entirety" as the singular aspect of all of creation?

In Hinduism, a multiplicity of minor gods make up components of a unified cosmic stew. The answer for Hinduism could be yes. I won't speak for them. My answer comes from a Christian perspective.

From a Christian perspective, the answer is no. The question reveals a lack of understanding of Christian theology. It comprises major non sequiturs which the following statements answer:

1. In Christian theology, one God is not separated into multiple gods or aspects. I’ll explain this below.
2. The “members” of the Trinity did not evolve from human imagination, but rather, are discerned from divine revelation.
3. The definition of the Christian God is not a convenience for the sake of comprehension, but rather, is a hindrance to the comprehension of many people such as Jews, Jehovah Witnesses, Latter Day Saints (Mormons), Oneness Pentecostals, Unitarians, and Muslims. The majority of trinitarians still accept it by faith despite the difficulty of comprehending it, and you may find the following explanation to be unique even among top Christian apologists and philosophers.
4. God is separate from His creation and not an aspect of creation. The way the question is worded is like asking whether an egg is an aspect of a hen or a painting is an aspect of an artist.

According to current cosmology, the Inflationary period and the Big Bang mean that the universe had a beginning. Matter, energy, space, and time are so intertwined that if the universe had a beginning, then even time and space had a beginning.

According to the Cosmological argument, everything that begins to exist has a cause, so the universe had a cause that was immensely powerful, timeless, spaceless, and volitional. Skipping other arguments that fill in attributes… according to Christian theology, that cause was a singular God.

Some people, thinking themselves clever, ask, “Then what caused God? And what caused the cause? [This is actually compatible with Gnosticism.] You end up with an infinite regression of causes of causes, but an infinite regression is impossible because if you start at the other end, you can never get to this time.” The argument creates two logical absurdities.

• If God had a Cause, then that Cause had to be greater than God. But if the Cause was greater than God, then God is not God. (Reference the Ontological Argument and St. Anselm’s definition of God.)
• Multiple causes and effects requires sequence, and sequence is meaningless outside of time. Thus, it is nonsensical to assume that, outside of time, God began to exist due to a preceding Cause.

Existing outside of time and space and having creative power over the universe, God can enter or “reach into” His creation, reveal Himself to us, and experience it as one, three, or any number of apparent (apparent to us, that is) entities.

The Scriptures pose problems that the Jewish faith never dealt with. The clues are scattered throughout the Old Testament and are made more clear in the New Testament. The Father is clearly God, Christ is clearly God, and the Holy Spirit is God, and each of these has a distinct consciousness in time. Yet the scriptures explicitly teach that there is exactly one God.

To the Jewish and others who believe in a monolithic God, the idea of one God entering time and space as three Persons — the Trinity — is a problem. The evidence does not fit their understanding of God. However, to those who build their understanding around the evidence, the Trinity is a solution. It fits the scriptural evidence, and now we know it fits with science, as well.

In Christian theology, the three Persons are fully God, share the same spiritual substance, and share all the same attributes. The apparent (from our perspective) differences stem from the three cooperating by voluntarily accepting differing roles. Differences such as hierarchy of authority derive from the roles, not from the natures of the participant.

Another difference results from Christ joining with a human body so that, as the Son, He became fully man while retaining the nature of being fully God. Through this incarnation, He could experience the temptations, trials, and pains of life as a human, becoming a fitting proxy for us when God poured out judgment. At the same time, as God, He could live a sinless life, thus not needing to be judged for His own sins; and He could bear and recover from a judgment that would have destroyed us.

Thus, God is both eternal and temporal, transcendent and condescending, just and loving, responsible for creating a universe in which evil would happen and responsible for providing a way to offer redemption at His own expense. This is the maximally great God, far greater than any of the monolithic, “entirety” gods.

So God is creator of the universe, not an aspect of it. This one God is not separated into multiple gods or aspects. Rather, He exists as a continuing Unity. If we could see God from a perspective outside of time, we would see one God, whereas seeing God from within time, we see three co-equal Persons voluntarily fulfilling separate roles. Rather than man developing the Trinity as a convenience for our comprehension, the concept was discerned from divine revelation in spite of its challenge to our comprehension.


Copyright 2020, Richard Wheeler. Feel free to use for personal, non-profit use, provided you give credit where credit is due.

Separation from God, and Reconciliation

How was Adam separated from God?

God is perfectly holy, and His presence is sacred. Think about what it means for something to be sacred. It means that a thing is dedicated to holy purposes and not to be used for an unholy purpose.
We’ve seen Muslim extremists in Iran riot and kill after somebody allegedly defaced a Quran or drew an image of Muhammad. While we can judge the reaction as unacceptable, we can recognize that they respect the concept of sacredness in a way that people in the West no longer recognize.

We can see respect for sacredness in Roman Catholic churches. During communion, the priest allegedly turns the communion wine and wafer into Jesus’s blood and flesh. That makes the wine and wafer sacred to Catholics. To prevent defiling Jesus’s body by letting it fall to the floor, an assistant holds a plate at mid-chest level in front of the person receiving the wafer to catch Jesus in case his alleged flesh falls. This prevents defiling the sacred.

Through Adam and Eve’s disobedience to God, they did, as God had warned, die. It was not a physical death, although it made physical death inevitable. It was a spiritual death. Whereas physical death is separation of a person’s spirit from their soul, spiritual death is separation of a person’s spirit from God.

We inherit that condition from our ancestors. Although we are all born physically alive with functioning spirit and body, we are all born spiritually dead with spirit separated from God.
Separation from God means that fellowship with God is broken and needs to be restored. Sacred, holy God cannot just ignore sin. The Bible describes the situation several ways.

• Sin incurs a debt that we cannot pay. We owe obedience and all good deeds to God, so we cannot pay for sins with what we already owe. That would be like paying the bill from last month with what we saved up to pay for this month’s bill. That is why our good deeds could never cancel or outweigh our sins.
  
• The penalty for sin holds us for a ransom that we cannot pay. (Contrary to myth, Satan does not hold us hostage; God’s justice does.) The penalty is proportional to the importance of the one you offend. If I lie to my wife, I might have to sleep in the doghouse. If I lie to the government, I might go to prison. If I lie to infinite God, the consequences are infinite or everlasting.
  
• Sin defiles me, so if I stood before God without having been redeemed, then I would defile God’s presence, which God will not tolerate.
  
• Sin’s defilement changes my nature such that if I were thrust into God’s presence without having been redeemed and reconciled, I would try to flee from His presence.

This is why Jesus’s time on the cross is so crucial to us. When God created the universe, that included creating time and space. Having created time and space, God chose to experience time and space as three centers of consciousness or “Persons.” Each Person voluntarily took on a distinct role: Father, Son, or Holy Spirit.

The titles Son of Man and The Word: God the Son is called the Word because His role was to be the expression of God to human beings. When the time was right, the Son donned a human body and lived as the man, Jesus of Nazareth. As the Son of Man, Jesus experienced all the temptations and torments of life and death as our representative.

The title Son of God: Being God, Jesus lived a perfect life, never sinning. Thus, He had no sins to pay for. This kept Him free to become our substitute. Like a big brother taking the whoopin’ for his little brother and sister, Jesus took our place and bore sin’s penalty.

The title Savior: Whereas the penalty for sinning against infinite God would have destroyed us, Jesus could not be held by death. He rose from the dead, proving that He was divine, that God was satisfied with the payment, that God would restore us to spiritual life, and that God can one day raise everybody from the dead. Thus, God offers this gift of redemption to all who will receive it as a gift. Those who receive the gift as a gift receive forgiveness and spiritual life, but those who refuse the gift will be sent into separation from God’s presence, forever stuck in their guilt and anger.

You might have been bothered by an apparent redundancy, receive the gift as a gift. The point is important because all the world’s religions depend on achieving or earning something to receive redemption. Within “Christianity,” many denominations swerve off into the world’s religions by teaching that one must do something to earn the gift — which is self-contradictory.

If someone suggests that you have to take part in a ceremony or do good deeds or persevere in the faith to earn or retain grace, their teaching lies outside of explicit biblical teachings. It even lies outside the definition of “grace?”

To receive the gift, you need to do exactly two things:

• Understand in your heart your need for the gift,
• Trust God to endow you with the gift.
• Any more than that turns the gift into something you could never earn in a million lifetimes. And God will not stand for having His generosity insulted.

One of the characteristics of separation from God is a lack of His immediate presence and influence in one’s life. When one is redeemed and restored to relationship with God, God sends the Holy Spirit. Before Jesus’s resurrection, the Holy Spirit came “upon” people to achieve a specific purpose such as prophesying, giving strength and skill in battle, or leading a nation. Since the resurrection, the Holy Spirit has indwelt believers to begin transforming them into holier people, give them insight when reading the scriptures, empower them to serve God and each other, and intercede for them when they don’t know how to pray.

To summarize what “separation from God” means, it means that a person who has not received the gift of redemption as a free gift has none of the blessings of forgiveness or intimate relationship with God. Unless he receives the gift as a gift, he remains forever outside of relationship with God.


I first posted this as an answer to a question on Quora. If quoting, please give credit where credit is due.

Can the Sin of ____ Be Forgiven?

The good news is that, it can be forgiven. Jesus said, “And so I tell you, every kind of sin and slander can be forgiven, but blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. (Matthew 12:31) This may not mean you are forgiven. It means you can be forgiven. Since you can be forgiven, you probably want to know more about that.

Let’s look closer. Why were you confused? There are three probable causes. First, you may be too new in faith to have much knowledge. That is understandable, as long as you determine to learn so you won’t be easily fooled again. Second, you may have had faith for a while but never bothered to do your homework. In this case, the sin of allowing yourself to remain ignorant can be forgiven, but you still bear the consequences. Third, you remain outside the faith. You may be close to conversion or far from it, but the result is the same.

If you are “in the faith,” then God, as Judge, has already forgiven you. (As loving Father, though, He may still need to correct you.) If not “in the faith,” then it is wise to “work out your salvation with fear and trembling” (Philippians 2:12) and “Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves.” (2 Corinthians 13:5) There are three topics in the test.

The first test is what you believe about yourself. The second is what you believe about God. The third is whether you put your trust in God.

You know you need forgiveness, so I will only expand on that point for the sake of other readers. Atheists (there is nobody to forgive and nothing needs forgiveness) and Universalists (everybody is already forgiven) think they need no forgiveness. For this answer, let’s ignore them.

The next group thinks they have a free pass to heaven just because Grandpa was a preacher or because they can trace their genealogy back to Judah, son of Israel, son of Isaac, son of Abraham. Be we do not inherit good deeds; we answer for our own thoughts and actions. Someone has said, “God has no grandchildren.”

A related group knows that right and wrong exists, but they don’t think they are bad. They think the good they do outweighs the bad they’ve done. But will that work in court? If you are on trial for shoplifting, do you think the judge will acquit you just because you volunteer at the food kitchen? It doesn’t work that way! We owe it to God to do right. If we fall behind and use the July rent payment to pay for June, we still owe for July. So we cannot “do good,” which we owe to our Creator, to pay for our sins.

Well, I keep the Ten Commandments, some say. But God gave the Commandments (there are actually over 600 — not that I counted) not to give us a standard by which to justify ourselves, but to show that we are on the “bad” side of the ledger. Everybody breaks the Commandments. Everybody. Because the closer you look, the more sub sections pop out.

For example, Jesus said, “You have heard that the ancients were told, ‘You shall not commit murder…’ But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever says to his brother, ‘You good-for-nothing,’ shall be guilty before the supreme court; and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell…. You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery’; but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart…. everyone who divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity, makes her commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery” *Matthew 5:21-32).

Paul, an apostle of Christ, wrote that nobody will be justified in God’s sight by keeping the Commandments (also called the Law); because the purpose of the Law was to make us aware of sin and shut the mouth of every person who would boast of their own righteousness. (Romans 3:19-20) The Law was a schoolmaster whose purpose was to make us aware of our need and bring us to reliance on God (Galatians 3:24).

So if we cannot be good enough, can we be saved from hell? Yes, if we let go of self-righteousness and let God, our Judge, pay the penalty that we cannot afford to pay. That is where the Cross comes in. “For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive in the Spirit” (1 Peter 3:18). Notice in this verse that Christ suffered once, not continuously or in every mass, as a certain megachurch tell us. He suffered once for all of our sins, not for just the ones we’ve repented from. There are so many that we don’t even realize we’re committing! He took our punishment that we deserved. And He did it to bring us to God. As a perfect, omnipotent Shepherd, He brings His flock, ALL His flock, home.

Human pride makes us want to contribute to our justification through good works, but our works and God’s gift are mutually exclusive. You cannot earn a gift. If you receive a gift and then work to complete it or to retain it, then it turns from a gift into wages. That insults the Giver. The hardest part of the test for many is letting God give the gift freely. Baptism is good, but that cannot be part of receiving the gift. Joining a church (a bible-teaching church) is good, but that is not part of receiving the gift.

The only thing you can do to receive the gift is, knowing that you need it, submit to receiving it.

Many people say the words, but not from their hearts. Years back, because so many people had shallow, false conversions, it became popular to add, “you must make Jesus the Lord of your life.” That is a good thing, and He is Lord regardless; but that is not what the Bible commands for conversion. It is popular now to add, “you must repent of your sins.” That is more complicated. A common error includes reforming yourself as part of repentance. But repentance simply means changing your mind and your heart. In fact, we must repent from the idea that we can reform ourselves. We need God’s help to do that. So we do not reform to receive the gift; we reform afterwards, because we have received the gift.

I will finish with one last element of the test. Who is God? Many ideas have sprung up in the last 2,000 years to distract us from God. I will not describe them all but will leave it to you to discover the evidence in the Bible for yourself. i will just describe God for you.

God created the heavens and the earth. (Whether He did so less than 10,000 years ago, did it in phases, or did it billions of years ago, I don’t know, and I am comfortable not knowing.) Physics tells us that creative power over matter and energy implies creative power over time and space, as well. When you consider that God knows the future, it makes sense that he exists before, outside of, or above time. As Creator of time, God entered His creation to reveal Himself and experience it as three Persons. One united God, three distinct (yet united) Persons, each fully God, all-powerful, omnipresent, all-knowing, holy, righteous, relational, and loving.

The three Persons have distinct roles. One identifies Himself as the Father. The second identifies Himself as the Son. And the third identifies Himself as the Holy Spirit. The three roles both share and divide the labor of creation, redemption, and restoration, and they teach us by example, so there is purpose to it.

I said God is love, and love is relational. A unitary god such as that of the Watchtower, Islam, and certain Pentecostal churches, had nobody to relate to before creation. So that god had an unmet need for fellowship. Islam says, “Allah is great,” but the triune God who had no such need is greater. Moreover, it is an inferior god who forgives without justice being fulfilled, whose holiness can tolerate unredeemed sin, and whose love cannot bring him to redeem.

The only sin that cannot be forgiven is what Jesus called “blasphemy against the Spirit.” Blasphemy against the Spirit had a specific meaning and a generalized principle. The Jews had accused Jesus of performing miracles using the devil’s power. Since the Holy Spirit supplied the power in Jesus’ miracles, they were saying the Holy Spirit was the devil. God takes blasphemy personally!

The principle is broader. The Holy Spirit makes us aware of our sins and draws us toward trusting Christ for redemption. If we resist that drawing, then we repeat the Jews’ rejection of the Holy Spirit. Since that means we will not repent and be converted, we will never receive forgiveness, not only for blaspheming the Holy Spirit, but for any sins.

If you have seen yourself as lost to sin, as God sees, then you can entrust yourself to His provision for your redemption and receive that gift and the many blessings that come with it; and He does not take back His gifts.

Can Integration of Muslims Prevent Their Radicalization?

Integration reduces radicalization, but nothing can prevent radicalization among any significant Muslim population. 

First, many recent terrorist incidents have involved men putatively "integrated" into mainstream society in the US and Europe.  If we cannot prevent radicalization of people already in a society -- for example, American-born citizens who convert to Islam and then go to fight for ISIS -- how can we prevent the reversal of immigrants' integration?  Moreover, how can we "integrate" the pre-radicalized jihadist "immigrant" who merely feigns integration so he can wage jihad by either converting or killing the "infidels?"

Second, any large population of a given persuasion will contain outliers. Among Democrats, you have Communists (fairly common). Among Democrats and Republicans, you have KKK members (rare, and blamed entirely on Republicans, but not extinct). Among nominal "Christians," you have violent pro-lifers (extremely rare). And among Muslims, you have violent jihadists (fairly common). 

Republicans and Christians can argue that the KKK and violent pro-lifers do not really subscribe to their ideologies. Democrats can claim the same concerning Communists, but an examination of their ideologies shows only a difference of shrinking degree. Violent jihadists, however, adhere strictly to the Koran; rather, it is the liberal Muslim who deviates from core Koranic teachings. 

Third, how do you force the integration of Muslims into Western society without undermining their religion, without crossing a line into deprogramming or brainwashing? That idea is abhorrent to both "liberals" and Muslims. Education is no cure-all. Many of jihadists, and especially Muslim Brotherhood leaders, hold degrees, even from Western universities.  Education aims at the mind, but secular education cannot convert the heart.  In fact, the educational environment can be counterproductive.  The temptations and challenges of secular universities can stress any devout student who aspires to a high moral code.  (As a former Bible-thumper, I can attest to that.)  I have recently seen a trend hinted at in the press, one I had not seen before, that of the Muslim who "integrates" and then sacrifices himself to pay for his Westernized sins.  Therefore, education not only has limited effectiveness but can result in violent reaction.

Before you read the next paragraph I must warn that I believe, based on both historical and theological arguments, that Islam is easily demonstrated to be a false religion that, despite Muslim paranoia about having their prophet and god blasphemed, is itself built upon lies and blasphemies.  

Secular liberals and liberal Muslims fantasize that violent jihadists are not real Muslims.  But that is not the elephant in the room.  Violent jihad is inevitable among those who follow the Koran.  Encouragement of liberal Islam and of integration of Muslims may reduce radicalization in the West, but it cannot prevent it, and it cannot reduce the radicalization already dominating at the source in Islamist countries.  

The only way to prevent Islamic radicalization is by reducing adherence to Islam.  As long as Christians and secularists fail to adequately address the theological problem of Islam, the jihadist problem will continue to fester.  And in its growing hostility toward evangelical Christianity while remaining neutral toward Islam and even accommodating it, the West does itself no favors.

Copyright 2016, Rich Wheeler

Another Illustration of the Trinity

Tri-une God, a Scientific Possibility

According to physicists and cosmologist, when the Universe was created, not only were mass and energy created, but so were time and space.  In other words, God has creative power over time. To Him, our past, present, and future are all one.  If He wishes to enter into time and space from three different "directions" and experience our "reality" as three Persons, He can do so; and yet, in that place outside of time, He remains a united God of one Mind and united substance.

The new illustration

Remember, no illustration using the physical can adequately represent the spiritual.  Even I see gaps in this illustration; but perfection is not my aim.

Imagine a Carpenter building a dollhouse with three openings. Then he creates puppets to inhabit the dollhouse. This Carpenter inserts his head through the front opening, his right hand through a side opening, and his left hand through the other side opening. 

 

Moreover, on his right hand, he dons a puppet costume so that his hand looks just like the occupants. His right hand has not changed its form; rather, it has taken on additional form.

Inside the dollhouse, the Walter puppet says there are three Carpenters. He counts, "One, two, three Carpenters." No connection between them can be seen; the Right Hand has a visibly different nature than the other two; and they have a clear hierarchy.

 

The Achmed puppet says, "The Head is God, the left hand is his angel, and Right Hand is his prophet. Headahu Akbar! Alalalalalalalalalalalal!"

The Lamb Chop puppet says. "All three are the same Carpenter: Carpenter the Head, Carpenter the Right (who has taken on puppet form), and Carpenter the Left. The three act independently, yet in perfect coordination, all of the same mind."

Obviously, the Carpenter represents God; the dollhouse represents His creation of time, space, mass, and energy; and the puppets represent His human creations. The face, left hand, and right hand represent how we perceive God's entry into and interaction with his creation, and the right hand's donning of the hand puppet represents Christ's incarnation. 

Naturalism makes the mistake of saying that we are only flesh. Some forms of Eastern religions make the mistake of saying that we are only spirit, and flesh is an illusion.  One variation that combines those those says that Jesus changed forms. Jehovah's Witlesses say He was angel, then man, then a god. Mormons say He was spirit child, then a man, and then a god (or will become a god, and so will all the rest of the "good" Mormons). 

The Trinitarian view holds that Christ was God from the beginning, and that never changed. At the incarnation, He added human form, although he refrained from exercising His divine abilities, most of the time. Within the dimension of time, He ever has been God and ever shall remain both God and human; and outside time, he is eternally One with the Father and the Spirit.

(One fine point that I have not seen addressed is whether Jesus consists only of divine spirit and human flesh, or additionally consists of human spirit. TMI?)

My purpose is not to "prove."  Many minds greater than mine have already gone over the evidence in greater depth than I can comprehend.  "Proof" is another subject entirely, but the mind cannot accept the proof of something that seems impossible.  My purpose is merely to stretch the mind, open the minds of non-tri-unitarians, and make them more comfortable with what has been revealed.

 

Copyright  2015, Richard Wheeler -- Permission granted for personal use; Please give attribution in group settings.

Differences between the Persons of the Trinity

Differences between the Persons of the Trinity

Raymond, a Oneness Pentecostal, challenges the Trinity. If the Father, Son, and Spirit are One in nature and One in substance, how can we tell them apart? If there's no difference, the Trinity must be pointless and a Unitarian God makes more sense.

Oneness refers to the Unitarian belief that God exists as only one Person. Some Unitarians believe that God is a quick-change artist who switches costumes to appear as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Others believe the Father is God, the Son was just a man, and the Spirit is an impersonal force.

Raymond says no Trinitarian has ever answered his question, How can we distinguish between the Persons or personalities of the Persons of the Trinity? With that claim he implies that the Trinity does not make sense.

Differences in Person

The question has two answers because it has two parts. By Person, we mean all that makes up the Father, Son, or Holy Spirit. There is no reason to expect any difference in nature (the characteristics) or substance (whatever spiritual stuff they are made of. If there are differences, no mortal mind could grasp them.

We except from that statement the body of Christ Jesus. God translated the body of Jesus from physical form into spiritual form when Jesus ascended to Heaven. So the Son may have that additional "substance."

I'm sorry, but I have to hedge even on the exception. Jesus said, "I am in the Father, and the Father is in me" (John 14:11). Also, after His baptism by John, Jesus "returned from the Jordan [river], full of the Holy Spirit" (Luke 4:1). Therefore, the Father and the Spirit may share the the body of Jesus in Heaven. That brings us back to the Three having identical substance, even during and after the Son inhabited a physical body!

More than one in one

How does one program in a computer differ from another? They share the same hardware. They share access to all the power, interfaces, and data within the computer. Since a computer's existence is limited to the physical universe, the programs have to take turns checking the keyboard buffer, executing instructions in the CPU, storing data to or retrieving data from RAM, displaying information on the monitor, and so forth.

They differ not in substance, but in information. Each contains instructions and data that correspond to their roles. You cannot look at a computer and see the programs. Even if you examined the magnetic states on the hard drive, the logic states in the CPU, or the electrostatic states in the RAM, you would need yet more information to know where to look and to decode it. 

One, but more than One

Since God is spirit in nature, omnipresent, and eternal, it would be unrealistic to think we could "look" with our mind's eye at God or at the three Persons of God, let alone have the ability to recognize differences in what we see. It's not like the Father would have flowing white hair and a bald spot, the Son would wear gold chains and would have his pants hanging down below His butt, or the Holy Spirit would wear a butler's uniform.

The difference until the incarnation would appear to have been strictly informational. The three Persons have self awareness and, although we could not tell them apart, they know each other. Even if there were no differences in nature between the three in their transcendent reality, each would still be able to distinguish the other two because, to the extent that they exercise such knowledge, they know each others' minds (for example, Romans 8:27, "He [the Father] who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit"). 

As a result of accepting different roles and executing the functions of those roles, the three Persons accumulate differentiation in "their" memories. Yet even in that I must again hedge because, since the Trinity shares a common substance, the three Persons can share in each other's experiences.

Differences in Personalities

I would define personality as the aggregate of inward and outward attributes. Inward attributes would stem from one's nature. Having the same nature and shared substance, the three Persons of the Trinity would have identical inward attributes.

Outward attributes would result from the combination of the inward attributes and the Person's role. Whereas inward attributes express the nature, outward attributes put the role into action consistent with the inward attributes.

Listing the personality differences between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit rockets past my pay grade (if I had one). Having just enough knowledge to be a danger to myself, though, I'll attempt to name at least one unique outward attribute for each Person.

Personality of God the Father

• Christ said that not even He knew the day or hour of the end of the age; only the Father knew, so the Father is the Planner.
• The Father deploys the Son and the Spirit to execute His plan, so the Father is the Coordinator.
• The Father receives Change Requests from the Son and Spirit and issues Change Orders, so He presides over the Change Control Board.

These tell me that the Father is the Manager among the Three. Although the Father delegates certain judgments, He takes responsibility for the divine plan and its execution. Would He be better than the other two at those roles? No, His leadership does not indicate a difference in nature; but we perceive a recognizable outward attribute that ensues from a difference in role.

Personality of God the Son

• Since the Father fulfills a role of Leader, the Son and the Spirit fulfill roles as Followers. 
• Following requires obedience. While the Spirit obeys, the Spirit does not need to obey sacrificially. For a time, the Son forsook the glory of Deity and the comfort of Heaven. He took on the weakness and vulnerability of a child and a man, took upon Himself the weight of the guilt of the world, and suffered torture and physical death. He "learned obedience," not just as a matter of being obedient by nature, as all three Persons are, but by experience.
• As a follower of the Father, the Son demonstrates humility by representing and obeying the Father.
• As one who experienced the discomforts, risks, temptations, and agonies of earthly life and death, the Son understands our experience, so He has empathy.

This tells me that, although the nature of any of the three persons would have led to identical behavior, the Son acts with humility and grace in ways that the other two members do not have opportunity to express. Moreover, all three Persons can sympathize, but only the Son can empathize with us because He shared the human experience. As we consider the Son's sacrifice and see His humanity and brotherhood, which presents God as accessible, relateable, and an object of affection.

Personality of God the Holy Spirit

• The Spirit enlightens man that he might see and births believers into life.
• What the Son demonstrated, the Spirit enables. The Spirit imbues and empowers spiritual gifts in accordance with the Father's plan.
• The Spirit glorifies not Himself, but the Son and the Father by teaching, through the Sword of the Spirit, the written Word of God, all spiritual knowledge that we need.

This tells me that the Spirit enacts the quiet humility of a servant, teaching and equipping the saints for their own role in the spiritual economy that they might enjoy the benefits of God's love and glorify their Father and Brother.

The difference is also intuitive

It should be obvious to anyone that, although the Trinity is one in substance and its members are equal in nature, if we relate to the Father as our Father, to the Son as our Big Brother, and to the Holy Spirit as our Teacher, Quartermaster, and King's Messenger, we innately recognize differences of personality, even if we fail to consciously recognize them.

Is "moderate Islam" an oxymoron?

I received an email, with the above title, that makes the case that all Muslims are extremists. I have to disagree. The key to understanding my position lies in a look at Judaism and Christianity.

Judaism has what Christians call "apostates," those who have left the faith; and it has "heretics," those who were raised outside the faith and either through error or through hostility, undermine the faith. At the extreme, some of these people remain religious and follow cults such as Kabbala or (from their perspective) our Yeshua. In the middle, the vast majority follow some semi-agnostic variety of Judaism that is Jewish primarily by culture. The real Jews are the Orthodox Jews, whose males often wear some element of a uniform such as yarmulkes or beards to identify themselves.

Christians are the same way. There are plenty of heretical sects such as Mormons, The Watchtower (Jehovah's [false] Witnesses, and Unitarians. In the middle are the mainline denominations that use a Christian vocabulary but have lost the Christian faith. For example, in the United Methodist Church, a poll many years ago revealed that half the pastors denied the virgin birth and the resurrection. With so many holes cut in their Bibles, it's no surprise that most "mainstream" Christian churches cooperate in the ecumenical movement, whose aim is to join with all theologies, even including New Age religions, animist, aboriginal religions, and "moderate" Islam -- essentially, a precursor to the One World Religion of Antichrist. I would put  the apostate Westboro Baptist Church in that category. I think you might be willing to put the Liberation Theology branch of Catholicism in that category, too.

The main thing that ties together all those "heretical" and "apostate" varieties of Jewish and Christian beliefs is their treacherous lip service to The Bible. They either believe God isn't god, or God doesn't care enough to communicate truthfully with man and then preserve that communication. Functionally, they are agnostics who prefer to err on the faith side instead of erring on the side of atheism. They contrast with evangelical or fundamentalist believers, and they make up the majority of Christians. (The sense with which I mean "evangelical or fundamentalist" includes those who have a strict faith in Catholicism.)

Islam has a similar distribution of faith. I don't know whether the majority of Muslims are functional agnostics the way most Christians are, although I've met a lot who are. I've met a few who might compare to mainstream Christians that border the Evangelicals. They retain the culture and worship; but in practice, they don't treat the Koran as a reliable revelation of their god.

I've described a perspective that views a moderate in anything as falling short of "true believer." For example, if you disagree with the Constitution and the reasoning behind it, you are fooling yourself if you claim to believe in Americanism and be a patriot. Similarly, "moderate Islam" is an oxymoron, just like "mainstream Christian" or "non-Orthodox Jew" are oxymorons. If the words apply to one, they have to apply to the others.

The difference is that, in Islam's case, moderation is a very, very good thing.

The "Scientific" Laws of Islam

Reference: Iingam, Rama. Iddat, a Scientific Concept in the Islamic Law to Identify the Paternity. factoidz.com. Downloaded 18 December 2010.


Something surprised me while I looked at writing samples from a web site that pays writers for short articles. The article is Iddat, a Scientific Concept in the Islamic Law to Identify the Paternity. The web site identifies writer Rama Iingam as its #4 expert in Divorce and Family Law.

The writer wishes to convince readers that many of [Muslim Law's] concepts are logical, reasonable and above all... scientifically based and have withstood the test of time.

Before we proceed, we need to define Iddat:

Iddat is quite scientific and it is helpful to identify the paternity of a child. Iddat is nothing but a period of probation a Muslim woman has to undergo immediately after she was divorced by her husband or on his death.

By probation, he means isolation. The law prevents confusion over paternity by ensuring that no child is conceived immediately after divorce or after the death of a husband. Here's the interesting part:

When a Muslim wife below the age of 8 who is under the menopause stage, even if her marriage is consummated, she need not undergo Iddat, when she is divorced or when her husband died.

How many 8-year-olds have undergone menopause? Hopefully, the author meant 'puberty;' so we will let that slide.

I admire Rama Iingam's courage to expose Islam's allowance for consummation of pre-pubescent marriage. Or, I am thankful for his naive exposure of a law, Iddat, that should be spelled Idiot.

What kind of culture condones consummation of marriage to a little girl who is only seven years old, or even younger? Muslims get quite worked up over others' sacrilege toward their false god. Perhaps they should concern themselves more with the blasphemy that is Islam.