Aletheia

A little Theology Q and A. Click on the question to read the answer.

1. Why does God exist?
2. Why were we made?
3. Why did God create time?
4. Could God create God?
5. Why did God create us to glorify Him?
6. What is your best explanation of the trinity?
7. Could there be 2 Gods?
8. Must God exist?
9. Does God have a sense of humor?
10. Why did Jesus pray?
11. Why are there 3 in the trinity and not 2 or 4?
12. Is there good and evil from God's perspective? (Assumption of the presupposition of knowing goodness only by comparison to evil).
13. Does God have free will?
14. Why is God perfect?
15. Can God cease to exist?
16. How are Love/Grace and Justice knit together in God?
17. Does God forgive and forget or just forgive?
18. Were we necessary or chosen to be the vessel used to reveal God's grace? (Because He did not show grace to Satan, but rather taught angels about grace through us. Is it necessity or could God have shown grace to Satan?)
19. Why did God choose the elect?
20. Why does God exist instead of nothing?
21. Is heaven as an eternal place outside of time?
22. What is freedom?
23. Why does God create people He knows will deny Him or never know Him? Basically, why does God create people that He knows will go to Hell?
24. Atheists pin religion on the susceptibility of the human mind. What is your argument against that?
25. How is God both immanent and transcendent?
26. What does "sovereignty" mean?
27. Does God limit Himself?
28. Could God fully reveal Himself to us in a way we could fully understand?
29. What is being real?
30. Is Truth Relative?
31. What is time?
32. What is the difference, if there is one, between praising and glorifying?
33. Why does God want to get rid of evil?
34. Why do we want to feel that God is close to us and like us?
35. Do angels have "knowledge of good and evil?"
36. When we die, do our souls go straight to heaven or hell, or is there a resting period or another place?
37. Is hell eternal punishment or annihilation?
38. Is grace just?
39. Why was there a covenant of law?
40. Why did God desire to reveal Himself fully?
41. How, if possible, can one fall away from God's grace? Isn't sin falling away from God's law?
42. Why did God save us?
43. What are the eschatological ramifications of transubstantiation in reference to the grounds of our being?
44. What is money?
45. What is God?
46. What is happiness?
47. What is the sake of Heaven? ("for heaven's sake")
48. Can God have preferences?
49. Can Satan use emotional breakdowns to discourage us from doing what God wants us to do?
50. Why do 'good' people go to Hell?
51. Why do bad people go to Heaven?
52. What happened to those who died before Jesus was born.
53. "Why does God need validation?"
54. Why is Jesus God?
55. Can God have desires?
56. Are Angels outside of time?
57. Are choices simply manifestations of an eternal will?
58. Do animals go to heaven?
59. How do you Christianity is real?
60. Is the trinity thoroughly equal?
61. Did God approve of the Donner party's cannibalism?
62. Where did Cain and Abel's wives come from?
63. What is the purpose of a covenant?
64. Why are we saved?

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1. Why does God exist?
It's not a real question. The reason it is so is that it is not applicable to God. This is so because the question infers purpose, for if not purpose, then what does why mean? Purpose is not applicable because it insinuates a creator and designer. Or perhaps, God could give Himself a purpose for His own existence. What then would that be? On second thought, He could not, for that would require that He be in time. Perhaps it could be interpreted, "Why does God exist instead of nothing?" For this I have no answer as of yet.

2. Why were we made?
There are many theories as to why we were made. The top few are 1. God wanted to love us. 2. God wanted a creature that would glorify Him. 3. God wanted a creature to love Him back as He loved it. All of these are mostly correct. Note, however that God does not need. That is an easily made mistake is that God created us because He needed us. Also each of these explanations, though mostly correct, contains within themselves their refutation, but this refutation is not a complete one but rather one that says it needs something more. 1. God may have wanted to love us, but why? He already is fully loved within the trinity. 2. God may have wanted us to glorify Him, but do not the angels already fulfill this purpose? The other comment with this is that yes, they glorify Him, but not completely. We were chosen (some even say needed) to be the stewards and vessels of God's grace and mercy rather than the angels who experience His justice and wrath. 3. God may have wanted a creature to love Him back as He loved it. Similarly to number 1, God already had fullness of love and therefore would not need another creature's love. It is because of this nearly complete in which each of the above answers are pieces that I have sought out more pieces to the puzzle that I might know both His Majesty and myself better. The first of these is based Biblically on the trinity and goes such:
1. God the Father created all things through God the Son and nothing without Him (John 1:3). 2. God the Father created all things through God the Son with both of them foreknowing the fall of Man (1 Jn. 3:20b). 3. God the Holy Spirit also knew of the fall of man (1 Cor. 2:10b). 4. God the Son and God the Father were glorified in the Son's death and resurrection (Ph. 2:11). 5. The death and resurrection of God the Son was an offering to God the Father through God the Holy Spirit as payment for the sin of all those who would believe (Heb.9:14). 6. God the Son therefore glorifies the Holy Spirit in use in the salvation process. 7. The whole Godhead is glorified in the creation, fall, and salvation of Man.
The point of this is to show that God wanted to glorify Himself, or to more fully reveal Himself. This second thought of revelation led me to two more theories to explain it.
A. Overflow of love:
God is love. He desires to share His love in its fullest extent. This is the source of creation, redemption and judgment.

B. Argument from Holiness:
Judgment, like love, is one of God's attributes. Judgment's source is God holiness. But if there were no creation, then there would be no judgment, for there could be nothing to judge. Judgment was a required action in creation, but not a motivation because created things were meant to walk with God. Because beings fell, judgment exists. The holiness of God is only expressed fully in judgment. Before judgment God was holy, but his holiness was not known. His motivation, therefore, was to reveal His holiness.
These two theories and reasoning led me to the ultimate conclusion that "creation exists because God desired to reveal Himself fully" for only in creation of all that has been created or will be created are God's attributes known. My analogy is one of a beautiful painting in a closet. It doesn't do anyone any good to keep it hidden. Bring it out so that we all may appreciate it.

3. Why did God create time?
This one remains to me a mystery so far. C.S. Lewis in The Problem of Pain goes into questions like these in depth. A fabulous answer I received when I asked this question to a group of people is that "He wants us to rely on Him." The explanation was that time keeps us on the edge of our seats always. We do not know what comes next and are more than often times afraid of our future, or change, or lack of knowledge about what will happen soon. This fear can drive us to Him. This is clearly one of the reasons. It also is the only way in which His revelation and glorification could be actuated. The fulfilled prophecies of old are one of the greatest proofs of the existence of God. Also there is much joy in development. Time is also a requirement of choice. Basically, God created time because it was the best and only way to fully reveal Himself and to fully glorify Himself.

4. Could God create God?
No and the reason is simple. God could not create God because it is one of God's immutable qualities to be uncreated.

5. Why did God create us to glorify Him?
While this one seems to run deeper than the question why we were made, its answer is simple stated. He wanted to. But then we go round robin with the question why did He want to? The answer to that is contained in the explanation of number 2.

6. What is your best explanation of the trinity?
The best explanation of the trinity so far is the Athanasian Creed. By analogy, the closest I've found is water because each of the three aspects of water (solid, liquid, and gas) are each very definable individual, they are each in and of themselves, wholly water. In the same way, God is definable in each of His aspects (Father, Son, Holy Spirit) as individuals yet each in and of themselves is wholly God. The only problem that might arise with this is when one has the ice melt. That becomes modalism: the belief that all the aspects of the trinity are simply one God changing forms or modes to meet His present need. One reason this does not work is because the Son in the garden of Gethsemane prayed to the Father.

7. Could there be 2 God's?
No. God knows everything and He states in the Bible that He knows of no other god(s).

8. Must God exist?
This is a difficult one. Many want to extend the question beyond its words to ask, "Must God exist for us to exist?" I must rephrase therefore to say, "Must God, in and of Himself, exist?" This we do not know nor can I yet reason, for we are not He, though we can be certain if He did not, there would be nothing nor no one to know it.

9. Does God have a sense of humor?
While the answer to this seems a simple yes because we are in his image and we have humor and He has created so many funny looking creatures (in this one forgets that here "strange looks" are extrinsically placed) there is much more to the question. We must go deeper to ask, "What is humor?" I have found but two types: the unexpected, and slapstick. The first we can know is impossible for God because He knows all things and nothing surprises Him. The second is quite probable because the Bible tells us that God laughs at His enemies' follies. Therefore, yes, but only at those who think they can overcome Him.

10. Why did Jesus pray?
This one is a deep mystery to me. Many say that is was to set an example for us. Why then did He do it alone and only once instruct on praying and only a few rare occasions do we have more than just a few words or a notion of His prayers. Others would say that it is to keep a close relationship with His Father in heaven. This makes much more sense if you believe that Jesus laid aside much of His deity to become a man, for He would be as limited as we are for which there is Biblical support, but there is also support the other way as well.

11. Why are there 3 in the trinity and not 2 or 4?
This is at first appearance a moot question because the why again implies purpose given by a creator. But one must also consider that we only know Him as being triune because that is how He has chosen to reveal Himself to us. However, it would not make sense for Him to lie to us.

12. Is there good and evil from God's perspective? Explain.
The reason I ask this question is because of an understanding of why we know good and evil. We know goodness because of evil. Without evil, we would exist wholly good, but would not know it because we would have nothing that was not our existence to compare our existence to. C.S. Lewis' analogy of this is to imagine a planet in complete darkness. Now, imagine the creatures on that planet. If you were to ask them what darkness was, they would only at best have a notion of it if anything at all. We know goodness (I use this first because that is where we started) because of evil. I therefore applied this reasoning to God, for scripture clearly tells us that God knows the difference (In Genesis, Satan tempted Adam and Eve with being like God in knowing good and evil). But God has no goodness to look to but himself and in and of Himself, no evil. Rather, reasonably, God knows evil and good because He knows Himself versus that which is not of Him and rebels against Him.

13. Does God have free will?
This is a thoroughly involved question. One theory that I have come to hold to be more and more true is that "all true possibility for God is reality for us." By this I mean that God's character is so restrictive (always does what is the utmost best) that if it is possible for Him to do, He does it. There is always only one best thing, otherwise one equivocates and detracts meaning from the word "best." According to this theory, it would follow that it is impossible because if it were possible, we would see it and know it and it would be reality. By "it" I mean God choosing evil, for that is His only choice should He have one at all. Then, just to double check, we must ask if we truly do see evidence of God choosing to be good. This, when you think about it, is a silly question, for Who is the standard of good? If God did make a choice it would infer a moral principle higher than Him and therefore a being Higher than He that created the principle or from whose character the principle was derived. Another thing to consider is God's attribute of immutability (His unchanging nature). "He will never cease to be the consummation of His attributes. He has no choice and is locked into being perfect." It would therefore stand to reason, considering His timelessness, that He does not make decisions, but rather His general will radiates from His being like light from the Sun. What about His specific will then? Well, His specific will is parallel to His general will and could be defined as the enacting, individually, of His general will. Though impossible, should God ever change, we would not know it for He is our standard of Good. We could not know Him as evil unless He designed us that way, but that would be purposeless, and God is never purposeless in His actions.

14. Why is God perfect?
This question, just as the other two similar ones questioning the purpose of God's character are moot in that God has no innate purpose because that would insinuate a creator. Or, a great answer I received when I asked this question to a bunch of people is, "Because He made the rules." And that is exactly right.

15. Can God cease to exist?
No. It is impossible for God to cease to exist for that would be an evil action for it would mean all removal of all good everywhere. Some would say if God didn't exist then neither would evil, but rather, evil would be all that exists considering the theory of evil as being absence of good rather than evil being a thing in and of itself.

16. How are Love/Grace and Justice knit together in God?
The meaning of this question has to do with the problem that atheists and agnostics bring up as a contradiction within God's character: "God cannot be fully loving/gracious and fully just at the same time." They say this because Justice means getting what one deserves and grace means getting what one doesn't deserve instead of what they do deserve. The two seem to contradict each other and truly would if it weren't for Christ. With an atonement sacrifice, a being to take the punishment for us, then both God's grace and justice are satisfied. Grace is satisfied in that all people who believe are freed from God's wrathful punishment for sin. Justice is satisfied in that payment for the debt of sin was made. Therefore, an acronym of GRACE can show the true meaning. God's Riches At Christ's Expense.

17. Does God forgive and forget or just forgive?
The problem in this question is not whether or not God forgives, but rather does He forgive and literally remember our sins no more or does His omniscience remain in tact even when our sins are forgiven. Because it is firmer in scripture that God is omniscient and more interpretive that God forgets our sins when He forgives them, it would follow that He does not forget them, but rather chooses to overlook them. He chooses to not take them into account when He Judges us because He forgave us for them. God cannot forget, only choose not to take certain things into account in certain situations. Also, many of the references for God forgetting our sins are from the Old Testament where the people knew less of God's character and did not have the Holy Spirit dwelling within them to guide their thoughts.

18. Were we necessary or chose to be the vessel used to reveal God's grace? (Because He did not show grace to Satan, but rather taught angels about grace through us. Is it a necessity or could God have shown grace to Satan?)
For the answer to this I will use a quote from someone who received my questions.
"We were created for different purposes. The grace Lucifer got was to see God face to face and KNOW His character. In rebelling against what he knew face to face, Satan became the picture of evil. What grace is possible for the being who has seen the truth face to face and refuses it?"

19. Why did God choose the elect?
This is a very large question with much explanation required. I'll begin by citing scriptures on predestination. Italics and underlines added for emphasis.

"For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified." Romans 8:29-30

"In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ in accordance with his pleasure and will - to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves." Eph. 1:5,6.

"In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will, in order that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory." Eph. 1:11-12

The first verse, Rom. 8:29-30 will be my focus because it clearly displays the action of election while the other two provide the reason as well as the criteria. First, lets deal with the why because it is clearer. Why did God elect at all? "The praise of His glorious grace"; "for the praise of His glory." It is as simple as that. God chose those who would best glorify Him. But how does God choose them. God created all men so why are not all men chosen? Did He create some in such a way that they would glorify Him and others in another way that would not glorify Him? This would however be unjust and therefore impossible. Therefore it stands to reason that God created all men with equal ability of choice even if it seems otherwise.
Looking at the Romans verse, we can conclude a cyclic action required of God's timelessness interacting with our temporality. He predestined us because He foreknew and He foreknew because He made us and He made us because He predestined us. It is a very difficult cycle to understand yet is quite clear in scripture. It is also the only system in which neither grace nor foreknowledge are denied.

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20. Is heaven as an eternal place therefore outside of time?
While heaven may be defined as an eternal place, it is not necessarily outside of time. The Bible refers to both Heaven and the heavenly realms. Heaven is where we go when we die and are judged. The heavenly realm is the dimension of spirits and angels and the like. Because of quantum physics, we presently know that there are 10 dimensions. We only live in 4 of the 10: height, width, breadth, and time. It is possible and even probable that angels and heaven and our own souls operate under at least some of these other dimensions that we do not occupy. The question is, do we share the fourth dimension: time? Those who say no, that it is outside of time, reason that a dimension or place or anything that lasts forever must be outside of time. So their reasoning is "eternity equals timelessness." However, without denying Heaven or the heavenly realm's eternity, one could say that they are within time, though perceive it differently. C.S. Lewis theorizes that in heaven time will not flow as we know it, but that the effect might come "chronologically" before the cause, or so it would seem to an observer from our four dimensions. While this seems a little far-fetched and not much more than theory, there is reasonable evidence that Heaven and the heavenly realms are operating under at least some form of a time system. This evidence is that events have happened in the heavenly realms and events are yet to happen in Heaven. These are Satan falling, the two judgments, the releasing of demons from the pit in the end of times, etc. There are certain events that do happen and a common and simple definition of time is the perception of events. In this theorizing, an answer is nearly impossible because we do not know yet and the Bible does not directly talk about it. We must also be careful that we do not pull the mystery and majesty and awe of deep heaven down to our level nullifying its appeal as paradise and reward.

21. What is freedom?

22. Why does God create people he knows will turn from Him or will totally deny Him?

23. Why does God create people He knows will deny Him or never know Him? Basically, why does God create people that He knows will go to Hell?

24. Is the susceptibility of the human mind an excuse to not believe in God?

25. How is God both immanent and transcendent?

26. What does "sovereignty" mean?

27. Does God limit Himself? (Could God do evil, but just chooses not to, or is He truly limited by His character?)

28. Could God fully reveal Himself to us in a way we could fully understand?

29. What is being real and how can we do it?
Being real as a concept is allowing others to "pop our bubble;" to let them into our personal lives and into our minds and hearts. To be real is to not hold anything back, but to openly discuss things on your mind and events in your life and their effect on you. Some who are very outgoing can achieve this easily. Simply choose a few people at first, perhaps just one, and spill your guts. Things that you hide from everyone else, reveal to this person. If you don't think have much you hold in, you don't know yourself very well or are just denying the facts. In this case, seek someone who is good at drawing things out. As for introverts or shy people, this process takes much longer. Begin with the things that are easy to talk about, like life, but do so with a person who asks how it affects you and answer them accordingly. Delve deep into your heart of hearts with others and you will find little greater joy in life.

30. Relativism: one of the new arguments against relativism I've learned in Philosophy is that equivocation of the word truth results in truth not having any meaning anymore. A rebuttal I heard against this is that that only works with "my definition of truth." What is a rebuttal against that rebuttal?
Well, quite simply it proves the point even more. There can only be one true meaning for a word. The problem is that common English has become too common and people do not know how to use proper words to express very specific ideas. Greek and Latin are much better at the right word with the right meaning. In English we are forced to rely on context more than just about anything. An example of this is if I'm talking about a canine by calling it a dog, it is different than a king calling rebels against his throne dogs. But then, that is language and we must use it as best we can. There are in fact about 5 or 6 different uses of the word truth that can come to one's mind when the word is spoken. Subjective, objective, inter-subjective/moral, necessary/definition, and absolute truths are all different variations on the meaning of the word truth. It is the meaning that we are most concerned with. The meaning can be clarified by adding words, which people should do much more often to elucidate their thoughts. There can be many subjective and inter-subjective truths that contradict each other, but no two objective, necessary or absolute truths can contradict each other. I may like ice cream and you may hate it, but the world is still round. Therefore, the concept of objective truth as expressed by the words "objective truth" cannot be relative. While there are many meanings of the word truth, there is only one meaning for the words "objective truth" and that is truth as provable by evidentiary support. Man cannot claim absolute truths, only by one who knows all things and all possibilities. This is so because we just don't know. The problem comes when just because we cannot make absolute claims, we conclude that objective truth doesn't exist either and therefore everything becomes subjective. That is the mistake of the century, literally.

31. What is "Time?"

32. What is the difference, if there is one, between praising and glorifying?

33. Why does God want to get rid of evil?

34. Why do we want to feel that God is close to us and like us?

35. Do angels have "knowledge of good and evil?"

36. When we die, do our souls go straight to heaven or hell, or is there a resting period or another place?

37. Is hell eternal punishment or annihilation?

38. Is grace just?

39. Why was there a covenant of law?

40. Why did God desire to reveal Himself fully?

41. How, if possible, can one fall away from God's grace? Isn't sin falling away from God's law?

42. Why did God save us?

43. What are the eschatological ramifications of transubstantiation in reference to the grounds of our being?

44. What is money?

45. What is God?

46. What is happiness?

47. What is the sake of Heaven? ("for heaven's sake")

48. Can God have preferences?

49. Can Satan use emotional breakdowns to discourage us from doing what God wants us to do?

50. Why do 'good' people go to Hell?

51. Why do bad people go to Heaven?

52. What happened to those who died before Jesus was born.

53. "Why does God need validation?"

54. Why is Jesus God?

55. Can God have desires?

56. Are Angels outside of time?

57. Are choices simply manifestations of an eternal will?

58. Do animals go to heaven?

59. How do you Christianity is real?

60. Is the trinity thoroughly equal?

61. Did God approve of the Donner party's cannibalism?

62. Where did Cain and Abel's wives come from?

63. What is the purpose of a covenant?

64. Why are we saved?