Bible Discussion Thread

Chris, It is true that God knows things. He is Omniscient. But God is not a reactionary God. That is, He does not sees or know that something is going to happen and then reacts to that event. He does not see man is going to sin, so He provides a Savior. The Bible gives us an image of a God that is active in His creation. He Plans, then acts. To limit God to merely responding to what He perceives is going to happen, limits His ability to act. He is not a passive observer of history. He is involved and He is engaged with us in daily and constant prayer.

When you say, "I see that God's Foreknowledge determined His Plan to accomplish His Purposes," are you saying, "He knows what is going to happen in the Future and He acts on that"? Or "Based on His knowledge and understanding, He determines what He is going to do and how to accomplish it"? Examples: 1. I know what an engine looks like, so I will build one. 2. Based on my knowledge of mechanics, I will design an engine. The first robs God of all creativity, since He is only copying what He sees. I believe the latter is more Biblical, because God is in control. But if we think of God's Foreknowledge as a reaction to what He knows will happen in the Future, based on His omniscience, we make Him a prisoner of the Future.

The perception that the Future exists as an observable or knowable entity is flawed. We can't travel into the Future, because it doesn't exist. And if it did, we wouldn't be able to change it. The same is true for the Past. If there were such a thing as the Future, it would be set. That is, what the Future is, it is. Not even God could change it. Think about it. The perception of some is that God, in a sense, is reading in a book everything that's going to happen and that's how He knows the future. He didn't Plan the coming of Christ, He simply knew that was what was going to happen. But that is not what the Bible says. The Bible tells us God is in Control of creation, History and the future.