An omni thread

[micah7:9]

In the last year or so my study work it has been given to work from a point of absolute truth, the beginning. I see the field of religion... as a crop of denominations and those produce many disunifing crops. When starting from point 'A' without all the interloping thoughts and reasoning of theologians and the, "what if"and no addition, multipying, dividing, or subtraction.
Joh 1:1  In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Joh 1:3  All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.
Gen 3:1  Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. (great dragon, old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan.)
Gen 2:9  And out of the ground made the LORD God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
Col. 1:16-17  for in Him is all created, that in the heavens and that on the earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones, or lordships, or sovereignties, or authorities, all is created through Him and for Him, 17 and He is before all, and all has its cohesion in Him."
Isa 45:7  I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.
Now what it has been given me to build on is that 1)   All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.
                                                                       2)   Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field           which the LORD God had made.
                                                                       
3)   And out of the ground made the LORD God to grow......the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
                                                                       
4)   He is before all, and all has its cohesion in Him
                                                                       
5)      I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.

That is where my learning is, to gain understanding with the hope to gain wisdom.
Why is the hardening of Pharaoh's heart and all the Lord caused to happen, continuing to harden his heart UNTIL..... why is it any different than the evil ( A  primitive root; properly to spoil (literally by breaking to pieces);  adversity, affliction, bad, calamity) that HE causes in any ones life?

I believe that understanding and accepting that the Lord's wisdom with His use of evil, has brought me comfort. The Lord does not "allow" evil, He "causes" evil, it is the tool He created to teach, chastise. Of course this is only my opinion, but it sure leaves out excuses, again only my opinion.
The "evil" that troubles humanity comes out of mans own heart. Men chose to do that evil because they have not yet come to repentence, their mind(heart) is yet in the hands of the adversary.
Jer 17:9  The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?
Mat 15:19  For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies:
:dsunny: :HeartThrob:

[ded2daworld]

A muscle that is constantly met with more resistance then rest then more resistance then rest will grow to handle way more resistance than originally. No resistance the muscle atrophies.
I see us as needing resistance to grow and we atrophy if everything is handed to us on a silver platter.
I won't name names but you all know childstars that led pathetic lives as they grew up.
The few that survived continued to challenge themselves and grow.
No resistance= no growth

Linus (from Peanuts comic strip and UR author Schulz) - the growing soul is watered best by tears of adversity.

[Deena]

I agree Micah, and it certainly puts evil in its proper context. If evil's purpose is to humble man it has done its job with me. The evil/sin I do, experience, has made me a gentler, more compassionate person, but I still curse at people in my car, loose it occasionally with my students, get annoyed with my kids. etc, so I guess the job is not complete. This I know--I am definitely better than I was, by the grace and training (experience of evil?) than I was. Richard Rohr quotes a well known mystic (sorry, don't have the book in front of me): first there is the fall (a personal fall), then the recovery from the fall--both are the grace of God.

[micah7:9]

I agree Micah, and it certainly puts evil in its proper context. If evil's purpose is to humble man it has done its job with me. The evil/sin I do, experience, has made me a gentler, more compassionate person, but I still curse at people in my car, loose it occasionally with my students, get annoyed with my kids. etc, so I guess the job is not complete. This I know--I am definitely better than I was, by the grace and training (experience of evil?) than I was. Richard Rohr quotes a well known mystic (sorry, don't have the book in front of me): first there is the fall (a personal fall), then the recovery from the fall--both are the grace of God.

Wonderful!  :dsunny: :HeartThrob: :HeartThrob:

[marie glen]

Amen, "out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornication, thefts, false witness, blasphemies" etc.. I really feel that God examined all possibilities before doing any creating.. then of course we know was "the firstborn of all creation" the "only begotten" and straight out from God, so very close in essence, character and substance.. And in Jesus all else was created, and all things will be gathered back into Jesus.. No babysitting for Creator God / Father. I've been a christian for 33 years, and seventeen years ago my son asked me two questions, which I was not satisfied with my answers to him, so I prayed earnestly for better understanding and answers came to me, boom, boom, boom.. :smile: and changed my life and understanding of God, His character and motives, and how thoroughly mankind misjudges Him!!

- The questions my son asked were "why was the tree of knowing good and evil in the garden?" and "isn't it great we get to be an ant farm?"
- The answers which came to me, God is both Life and Perfection (surely?) and He created evil, albeit, indirectly when He endowed thinking ability. It was a real Pandora's box, for with thinking ability comes the ability to choose.. Sooner or later, some rational creature was bound to think "say.. do we really have to do everything God's way?!" The 'trouble' is once someone chooses any thing, no matter how 'tiny' or large, that differs from what God chooses, they become the opposite of Perfection, which is also the opposite of life. Since God endowed thinking ability, everyone suffers, some even horribly. But God, being life itself, the life force, lives through, suffers and experiences all sufferings which ever occur! Why would He put Himself through all that? Because He's not creating an ant farm, or robots. But His own family, and an eternally un-breakable paradise. Un-breakable because the full knowing of all good from all evil, which is also life from death, true from untrue, will be very deeply etched and engraved upon every heart, mind and psyche. Life as we know it, is an unavoidable journey (and lesson) if there is to be thinking ability, that is. The long 'day' called judgment day will strongly reinforce what has been learned by going through life as we presently know it (imperfect). Learned first hand, then review. All will fully understand that you simply cannot walk away from God, it simply cannot be done, for it simply results in nonlife.

- Back to the evil within.. yes, the abyss / bottomless pit of rev chapter nine is within us! Or more precisely within the imperfect, not totally aligned with God heart (be it man or angel). Yes I think we can see, that there is no limit to the depth of darkness to which the human heart can go.. And any teeny, tiny thing which differs from God's will, is the path which begins that road. (And imperfection cannot reverse its course and make itself perfect, being imperfect. Jude 6)

- So you see, or so I believe, the world and life as we know it, is actually perfect. Because of this, which it teaches.
- Because God is perfect, the 'end' result of all this can only be the utterly best one possible. :smile: Yes, He could interfere with letting this ability to choose (called 'free will') run its course, but then it wouldn't be 'free will' and would teach nothing.

- At the end of the 'boom, boom, boom' insights (please excuse my silliness) it seemed to me God ended His dissertation with a question - "why did God wait so veRy long (such patience!) and only create the universe and man and woman, not only after, the first bound to occur rebel thought had occurred, but after it had matured into outright sedition, revolt and trickery?" (So we would all, man & angel) take this unavoidable journey and lesson together, once for all 'time'. Otherwise, one would wander astray now, another later, and another later.. til it would take virtually 'forever'. He has done all things in order to bring about the best of all possibilities.

- God being honest that tree of knowing good and evil was in that original garden of life.. This life, human history is God's great truth proving drama. It is immensely important, including the peak for the world called apocalypse.
- It's my prayer that my brothers and sisters who understand UR would understand the beautiful simplicity of God's glorious truth proving drama, and its so important purpose, so UR could grow by leaps and bounds. :Pray: