yxboom
March 30th 2003, 12:53 PM
A waking and eloquent post to say the least in the manner of how we interact to brethren. geebob made an absolutely fantastic wakeup call to myself and hopefully others who read it. :thumb:
Today @ 08:14 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=48519#post48519)
geebob:
I really feel that it is necessary to mention why your comment hit a nerve as hitch observed.
Yx's comment about it's substantless nature is quite accurate. As you mentioned, it was how you felt. Well from your feelings alone, we can conclude nothing. Now unlike some folks, I believe that feelings are highly relevent in terms of what should convince rational minds, but not when alone without a context that most if not all people can sympathize with they really don't serve much purpose unless you want to hold your whims up as some authority on a par with scripture and reason.
So not only is your comment worthless for rational discussion, it has quite the opposite effect of having a chance to enlighten some and instead only enrages as it was insulting to our beliefs and it was divisive. It seems that you and hitch feel your role is to divide the body of christ along the lines of who believes in free will and who does not. In doing so, you are defying God who said that whosever should believe in the Son should have everlasting life and that the defining characteristic of the people of God is the love that they should display for one another. No where do we read that the people of God is defined by their belief in theological determinism. Maybe you didn't mean it that way, but language that you used refering to what we believe as our "god" sure gives that impression. When I make comments about the attributes that calvinism would seem to imply about God, I say that it is the picture that they are painting. I do not imply that the calvinists are worshipping a pagan god. That does not divide because we see through a glass dimly and it should not surprise us that people with a legitimate relationship with God should get some wrong impressions that does not necessarily invalidate their faith.
Finally, I'd like to point out that it is hypocritical for you to make comments that flatly insult our beliefs and then complain about yx's attack of your arguement which barring a lack of humility is much less of an offence. Your skin is too thin for you to be refering to other christians' beliefs about these less essential issues (less essential in terms of what makes a christian) a belief in a different spineless god.
Now I'd like to mention that none of what I say here is something that I say as regular member of a discussion forum and not in the capacity of a moderator. For one thing, If I want some moderation action taken against you, because I have involved myself in this thread to a high degree in a discussion opposing the views that you espouse, I'd want you to know that the disciplinary action taken against you was rational, unbiased and without regard to the fact that you don't agree with me concerning the topic. In such a case, I would ask Gray Pilgrim who is a calvinist or Dee Dee Warren who does not hold to the open view to take the necessary action and in this way, you will know that your behavior was the reason for the discipline and not your views on the topic.
The reason I am not doing that now is because we value moderation in moderation. We want to allow passion and distinguishing that and worthless comments such as the one you gave can get a little fuzzy. But there's a better reason for that which I believe Gavin mentioned and that is that in such a forum, people's true colors come through more clearly.
On the basis of the colors you display, I may not take official moderation action, but I may indeed ban you in a method that is open to all forum participants and that is to simply disregard your posts and not react to them accept to post a message to the effect that if anyone else find's your comments convincing, then perhaps they would like to defend it, but I will not react to you directly because an exchange with you is not worth the trouble and would threaten and offer me temptation to drag me down to a level that would only hurt my cause and is beneficial to no one least of all myself. That form of banishment is no fun and I have found it effective to put it to use by my lonesome, but if need be, I might even ask my fellow ov'ers to participate in this type of ban. I'll tell you that it is no fun to participate in a forum where you are considered irrelevent to the discussion.
I enjoy interacting with many of the calvinists here or I at least respect them for the fact that instead of flatly trying to alienate me, they try to meet me where I am at through an attempt to rationally appeal to scripture, reason, tradition, and/or experience. They provide an example to follow. And because they are here, there are far better uses of my time than to interact in any depth with anyone who is of a character to flatly announce that my God is spineless with little recourse for reasoned discussion.
Today @ 08:14 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=48519#post48519)
geebob:
I really feel that it is necessary to mention why your comment hit a nerve as hitch observed.
Yx's comment about it's substantless nature is quite accurate. As you mentioned, it was how you felt. Well from your feelings alone, we can conclude nothing. Now unlike some folks, I believe that feelings are highly relevent in terms of what should convince rational minds, but not when alone without a context that most if not all people can sympathize with they really don't serve much purpose unless you want to hold your whims up as some authority on a par with scripture and reason.
So not only is your comment worthless for rational discussion, it has quite the opposite effect of having a chance to enlighten some and instead only enrages as it was insulting to our beliefs and it was divisive. It seems that you and hitch feel your role is to divide the body of christ along the lines of who believes in free will and who does not. In doing so, you are defying God who said that whosever should believe in the Son should have everlasting life and that the defining characteristic of the people of God is the love that they should display for one another. No where do we read that the people of God is defined by their belief in theological determinism. Maybe you didn't mean it that way, but language that you used refering to what we believe as our "god" sure gives that impression. When I make comments about the attributes that calvinism would seem to imply about God, I say that it is the picture that they are painting. I do not imply that the calvinists are worshipping a pagan god. That does not divide because we see through a glass dimly and it should not surprise us that people with a legitimate relationship with God should get some wrong impressions that does not necessarily invalidate their faith.
Finally, I'd like to point out that it is hypocritical for you to make comments that flatly insult our beliefs and then complain about yx's attack of your arguement which barring a lack of humility is much less of an offence. Your skin is too thin for you to be refering to other christians' beliefs about these less essential issues (less essential in terms of what makes a christian) a belief in a different spineless god.
Now I'd like to mention that none of what I say here is something that I say as regular member of a discussion forum and not in the capacity of a moderator. For one thing, If I want some moderation action taken against you, because I have involved myself in this thread to a high degree in a discussion opposing the views that you espouse, I'd want you to know that the disciplinary action taken against you was rational, unbiased and without regard to the fact that you don't agree with me concerning the topic. In such a case, I would ask Gray Pilgrim who is a calvinist or Dee Dee Warren who does not hold to the open view to take the necessary action and in this way, you will know that your behavior was the reason for the discipline and not your views on the topic.
The reason I am not doing that now is because we value moderation in moderation. We want to allow passion and distinguishing that and worthless comments such as the one you gave can get a little fuzzy. But there's a better reason for that which I believe Gavin mentioned and that is that in such a forum, people's true colors come through more clearly.
On the basis of the colors you display, I may not take official moderation action, but I may indeed ban you in a method that is open to all forum participants and that is to simply disregard your posts and not react to them accept to post a message to the effect that if anyone else find's your comments convincing, then perhaps they would like to defend it, but I will not react to you directly because an exchange with you is not worth the trouble and would threaten and offer me temptation to drag me down to a level that would only hurt my cause and is beneficial to no one least of all myself. That form of banishment is no fun and I have found it effective to put it to use by my lonesome, but if need be, I might even ask my fellow ov'ers to participate in this type of ban. I'll tell you that it is no fun to participate in a forum where you are considered irrelevent to the discussion.
I enjoy interacting with many of the calvinists here or I at least respect them for the fact that instead of flatly trying to alienate me, they try to meet me where I am at through an attempt to rationally appeal to scripture, reason, tradition, and/or experience. They provide an example to follow. And because they are here, there are far better uses of my time than to interact in any depth with anyone who is of a character to flatly announce that my God is spineless with little recourse for reasoned discussion.