Tentmaker Forum

Public Lounge => Welcome Central - **FIRST POST MUST BE MADE HERE => Topic started by: Ataraxia on October 23, 2010, 12:15:38 AM

Title: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Ataraxia on October 23, 2010, 12:15:38 AM
Hey, everybody!  I used to be a member here a long time ago (back in '06/'07), but I drifted away to other things.  Tried to find myself, but I figure my account got purged from inactivity, LOL.  So I just signed up again with a different username this time.  I like variety.  Decided to comeback because I was getting into theological discussions on other boards.  Anyway, glad to be back!
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: jabcat on October 23, 2010, 12:27:23 AM
Hi Ataraxia.  Thanks for coming back by.  Much has changed here since that time, so plz make sure and read the info in  http://www.tentmaker.org/forum/rules_and_faq/., it will be helpful to you.  Let His Light shine in and grow.  James.
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Cardinal on October 23, 2010, 02:48:08 AM
 :cloud9: Hi and welcome back.....just consider us the Homecoming Committee...... :icon_jokercolor:
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Ataraxia on October 23, 2010, 06:48:59 AM
Thanks for the welcome, folks.  Man, a lot has changed.  To complete my hat tip, the best I can describe myself is as a "Universalist Christian Panentheist"  Ha!  That's a mouthful...
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: WhiteWings on October 23, 2010, 08:24:26 AM
Looking at the eyes in your avatar they radiate a lot of light  :laughing7:
So you could never have been in utter darkness...

:bgdance: 
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: firstborn888 on October 23, 2010, 10:30:21 AM
Quote from: Ataraxia on October 23, 2010, 06:48:59 AM
Thanks for the welcome, folks.  Man, a lot has changed.  To complete my hat tip, the best I can describe myself is as a "Universalist Christian Panentheist"  Ha!  That's a mouthful...
WOW! A fellow C.U.P.
A rare thing.  :sigh: but wonderful!  :cloud9:
- Byron
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Beloved Servant on October 23, 2010, 04:29:52 PM


OK, another label in the new religion.
What is a UCP or is it CUP as firstborn888 noted?
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Cardinal on October 23, 2010, 06:05:54 PM
 :cloud9: I had to Google it to know what the term means, and to my surprise, there is another label that someone COULD attach to me as well  :laughing7:, because I too believe His Spirit is in His creation, only because He proved it to me. Blessings.....
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Lefein on October 23, 2010, 06:18:01 PM
Wouldn't Panentheism be pretty much a foundational principle to even fundamentalist Christianity?  Considering...that God is omnipresent...?  :laughing7:

A friendish person of mine told me that she was a panentheist, and that was the first time I was introduced to the term, but hearing the definition of it I was like...

"Why is this even considered a separate term?" But perhaps I am just ignorant on some things.  Glad to meet you Ataraxia!
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Cardinal on October 23, 2010, 06:27:26 PM
 :cloud9: Yes, well  you would think, but you say what I just said to most Christians, and they accuse you of Pantheism, another "ism" I had to look up.  :mblush: That's why I just say I'm a Jewish Christian, because that's what HE called me in a dream, LOL.....
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Lefein on October 23, 2010, 06:34:12 PM
That's pretty cool actually.  "Chosen of the Called Out Chosen."  Comes to mind.
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Cardinal on October 23, 2010, 06:38:12 PM
 :cloud9: It was "cooler" than you or I knew, at the time. I found out over 10 years after the "dream", I really was descended from Sephardic Jews, a fact my family hid.  :mshock:
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Lefein on October 23, 2010, 06:43:58 PM
God knows the DNA, the yarn which he spun through the spindle of our ancestral family threads - the yarn with which he knits us in our mother's womb.  :thumbsup:

God knows our family history better than we do!  :laughing7:
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Beloved Servant on October 23, 2010, 06:45:23 PM
Perhaps all your generations have been hidden until you came to Bethlehem.
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Cardinal on October 23, 2010, 06:47:28 PM
 :cloud9: Amen to both of you  :thumbsup:
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Molly on October 23, 2010, 06:56:31 PM
What happened to those ten lost tribes of Israel, disappeared some 900 years before Jesus walked on the earth?  They never returned from captivity but became lost to history, scattering to every part of the world, hidden in Christ.


Matthew 15:24
But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.



Genesis 49:22

22 "Joseph is a fruitful vine,
       a fruitful vine near a spring,
       whose branches climb over a wall.


Genesis 32:12
And thou saidst, I will surely do thee good, and make thy seed as the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered for multitude.


Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Lefein on October 23, 2010, 07:02:31 PM
Christians are like Samaritans...Not fully Gentile, not fully Judaic...

Yet...who is the woman at the well, who had several husbands, and was living with one who was not her husband?  "Give me a drink" said Jesus, and then it was He who offered her thirstlessness.

After having many gods, and chasing yet another one to live with him, at last the Samaritan woman has met her true Husband.
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Ataraxia on October 23, 2010, 07:05:18 PM
Couldn't quote everyone, which makes me grin.  To put it simply: yes, it's fundamental to any being which is said to be omnipresent, which means I consider it basic to Christianity.  But when you actually give it a name and explain it, things change, because we are creatures of symbol.

QuoteJer. 23.24
Can anyone hide himself in secret places,
      So I shall not see him?" says the LORD;

      " Do I not fill heaven and earth?" says the LORD.

QuoteEph. 4.6
There is one God who is father of all, over all, through all and within  you all.

That about says it.  He's everywhere, in everything and everyone.  But He is so much more (infinitely more) than just the world, and that puts the "en" in panentheism.  I've seen people change before my eyes when I say this to them.  It's like a weight is lifted from their souls somehow, like they've become happier folk.  And that's before I get to the "universalist" part! I guess that's why they call it Good News.

QuoteLuke 17:21
nor will people say, 'Here it is,' or 'There it is,' because the kingdom of God is within you."
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Cardinal on October 23, 2010, 09:16:45 PM
 :cloud9: Yes, I've had the same experience with people. It's really the message of Gabriel, ie. telling "Mary" the church that there is life inside of her.  :thumbsup:
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: firstborn888 on October 24, 2010, 08:19:35 AM
Quote from: Lefein on October 23, 2010, 06:18:01 PM
Wouldn't Panentheism be pretty much a foundational principle to even fundamentalist Christianity?  Considering...that God is omnipresent...?  :laughing7:

Well, actually, many fundies LOVE to separate God from creation. That way they can separate God and themselves (eternally) from the problem of Hell. If (as Paul says to PAGANS  :mshock:) "In Him we live and move and have our being" then that means - hell has it's existence in God. Which is a no-no to fundies who want to forget their "lost loved ones" who are (in their perception) outside of God.
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Lefein on October 24, 2010, 08:28:21 AM
Eternal Damnationalists have a silly concept of Omnipresence it seems.  Then again they are in the business of limiting God, starting with his grace, his power to align the wills of men to his own, and now even the very nature of his omni-essence itself...

No wonder their power is weak, their god is weak...or else their faith in God is weak.  For that matter, no wonder THEY are weak, for we become like the god we worship.
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Johann on November 07, 2010, 04:11:07 AM
Quote from: firstborn888 on October 24, 2010, 08:19:35 AM
Quote from: Lefein on October 23, 2010, 06:18:01 PM
Wouldn't Panentheism be pretty much a foundational principle to even fundamentalist Christianity?  Considering...that God is omnipresent...?  :laughing7:

Well, actually, many fundies LOVE to separate God from creation. That way they can separate God and themselves (eternally) from the problem of Hell. If (as Paul says to PAGANS  :mshock:) "In Him we live and move and have our being" then that means - hell has it's existence in God. Which is a no-no to fundies who want to forget their "lost loved ones" who are (in their perception) outside of God.

I've noticed this too. Evangelicals and fundamentalists try to evade the idea of the Logos, and that it is the Light which shines in the hearts of all men and has from the dawn of creation, as much as they can, as if the very thought were somehow supremely uncomfortable to them. 
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: Cardinal on November 07, 2010, 05:41:26 AM
 :cloud9: It's because it doesn't fit with the doctrine of "asking Him in, in a church", which justifies their existance as a separate body FROM the body. He is the light of all men that come into the world.

I know I was shocked when I was given this revelation via the Tabernacle pattern, which left me questioning then what exactly happened to ME, because I know the prayer "worked", even though I was not in a church at the time.

He told me He had honored the measure of faith I had exhibited.  :mshock: And, another one (doctrines of men) bites the dust...... :thumbsup:  :laughing7:
Title: Re: Back from the Outer Darkness
Post by: firstborn888 on October 17, 2011, 11:32:30 AM
Quote from: Beloved Servant on October 23, 2010, 04:29:52 PM


OK, another label in the new religion.
What is a UCP or is it CUP as firstborn888 noted?
Panentheism is nothing new.

First of all, as opposed to "Pantheism" (All is God) it is a belief that all is IN God (Pan-EN-theism). That is, although God transcends creation He is imminent in creation.

Christian Universalists who embrace this view are (logically) Universalist Christian Panentheists.

Not religious labeling as much as just words used to describe a belief.