What does God currently know?

**Xmansmommy** · September 23rd 2003, 06:45 AM

Ok guys, since I'm struggling with this theological issue, I come to you for help. I'd like biblical support for or against God's present knowledge. If you don't have scripture.....don't bring it.

Thanks!

**Bill the Cat** · September 23rd 2003, 08:13 AM

Linda, I apologize, I want to answer this but I'm busy at work today and have to "move back in" at home. We have power again!!!. I do have some good stuff on this, but I have no time right now...

:billsign:

**Xmansmommy** · September 23rd 2003, 09:33 AM

That's ok Bill, I have struggled with this for quite some time now. I'm sure I can wait until it's convenient for you. At your leisure bro. Thanks.

**EdJones** · September 23rd 2003, 09:52 AM

Hebrews 4:12
For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

Proverbs 15
3 The eyes of the LORD are in every place, beholding the evil and the good.

Matthew 9:4
And Jesus knowing their thoughts said, Wherefore think ye evil in your hearts?

Luke 11:17
But he, knowing their thoughts, said unto them, Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and a house divided against a house falleth.

Jeremiah 20:12
But, O LORD of hosts, that triest the righteous, and seest the reins and the heart, let me see thy vengeance on them: for unto thee have I opened my cause.

Jeremiah 17:10
I the LORD search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.

Revelation 2:23
And I will kill her children with death; and all the churches shall know that I am he which searcheth the reins and hearts: and I will give unto every one of you according to your works.

**geebob** · September 23rd 2003, 06:52 PM

I have to admit that I am not 100 percent certain on this issue. I tend to think that God knows absolutely everything about reality and there is absolutely nothing signfificant that he does not know. The verses that I think support this statement are of Jesus' claim that God knows when even one sparrow falls to the ground and he knows the number of the hairs on our heads. Given that there are currently 8 billioin heads of hair on the earth, that's a lot of minutia that God knows and for my finite mind, it is not a far leap conceptually to say that since God knows something as insignificant, he probably knows everything insignificant and significant.

But this isn't proof. Those verses just have to do with God's extreme concern for his creatures. They may not even have to be taken literally. Maybe God doesn't know the exact number of hairs on my head at exactly this very second. The point Jesus was making is that God's concern for us is unfathomable.

There are also no doubt other verses that speak of God knowing everything. So these are often taken to mean that God knows the vector of every dust particle and molecule in the universe and everything else that can be known insignificant or significant. But still, this may very well serve to smuggle the meaning of the text beyond it's intention. The author just may mean that God knows everything that is significant and nothing is beyond God's ability to scrutinize and fully comprehend.

I am not opposed to using such verses to argue for total and exhaustive knowledge of God, but I don't find them air tight.

So why do I believe that God knows all of reality exaustively? because it has at least mild biblical support, and that is what the church traditionally teaches and with tradition, I say if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Of course some who know that I am an open theist may ask how I balance this with the view that God does not know what we will choose in the future and to that I say that I simply have a different view about the future. Yes God knows the future exhaustively, but some of what he knows is uncertain because it is uncertain! So I believe that uncertainty not only describes ignorance, but it is also applicable to reality and when that is the case, it is not a matter of ignorance but of real undeniable substantial knowledge. God knows that tomorrow I may act in one way and I may refrain from that very action and that is all that is true, and God does not know which one I will do because there is no truthful statement as to what I will do (with regard to that specific act) until I resolve to choose one or the time comes and I do one of the things God knew that I might have done.

In short, God knows all of reality and the sum total of reality changes thus God's knowledge changes with it.

**Xmansmommy** · September 23rd 2003, 08:17 PM

Let me think on that geebob and figure out if I understand the reality of it. :stars:

Actually I did understand some of your post, but I hate to admit geebob (and I mean no offense) sometimes you talk over my head.

**geebob** · September 23rd 2003, 11:02 PM

I might be able to remedy that if I know what parts are confusing. But don't sweet it if you still don't get it after a few tries. I'm often not the best communicator.

BTW, I'll be here sporadically throughout the weeks

**Xmansmommy** · September 23rd 2003, 11:08 PM

Thank you Ed for the scripture references. Most of which bring more questions for me. Most of the passages you cited were ones dealing with God knowing the thoughts, intents, and purposes of the heart. I don't see however, that they deal with the outworking of those things. Some of them even pertain to God searching the hearts and discerning them. If God knows specifically what is in the thoughts of each person continually, why does He search our hearts?

**Xmansmommy** · September 23rd 2003, 11:11 PM

Another question geared more for the OVT's present.....

Scripture Verse:

Ge:11:5: And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded.

How does this passage differ from say.... Gen 22:12 where God learned something at a particular moment when it became a reality?

**themuzicman** · September 24th 2003, 08:28 AM

I think the difference is that God knew the tower was being built both because of the clear intentions of men, God's knowledge of the laws of nature as they related to the success of the plan of the men, and seeing the tower being built.

Matters of the hearts of men are a bit different. Many times we don't even know what we are capable of, because it is not settled in our minds, and because of that, God doesn't always know, either. In Abraham's case, God put Abraham to the test to see where Abraham's loyalties would fall, to explore this unsettled issue in Abraham's mind, and settle it.

This verse only makes sense from an OVT POV.

Michael

**Xmansmommy** · September 24th 2003, 08:39 AM

Michael, thanks for giving me something to ponder. I had not particularly focused on the clear intentions of man. You mentioned "seeing the tower being built." I'm assuming you meant from His abode in heaven. If I'm wrong I apologize. If I'm right in that assumption, what indicates to you He seen the tower being built from heaven rather than when He "went down to see?"

**themuzicman** · September 24th 2003, 08:51 AM

In that case, I it appears to be something of an anthropomorphism, where God's actions are given human function, even though it isn't exactly what God had to do.

If I were interpreting this section, I would say that God turned his attention to what was going on in Babel. OT writers tended to give God some humanity in their description of Him.

It's like the OT saying something about "God's right hand." Did God literally have a right hand? Well, no, God is spirit, so that's not a literal phrase, but the idea refers to God's power in action.

Generally, orthodoxy accepts God's omnipresence, and scripture does support this assertion. I don't know of any mainline denomination that disagrees.

Michael

**Xmansmommy** · September 24th 2003, 09:00 AM

Michael, I do suppose that this passage also deals with the omnipresence of God as you have pointed out. But the thing I'm struggling with as an OVT, is knowing how to be consistant with such passages. As you've stated you believe this appears to be an anthropomorphism. I mean no disrespect at all here brother, so please know that. But to me that seems to be the very same explanation that CVT's give for the passages regarding God's knowledge that we OVT's take literally. So my point being, I see that as an inconsistancy and I'm struggling to be consistant with scripture. I honestly don't know what the criteria or magical formula, if you will, is for taking scripture literally or figuratively. There are other passages that give me trouble as well. But I suppose they too have an element of omnipresence intertwined. Oh this is so difficult to understand sometimes!

**themuzicman** · September 24th 2003, 09:14 AM

I don't think there is a respected theologian who doesn't acknowledge SOME anthromoporphism.

However, it is hard to throw this at Abraham's testing, because there is no symbollic interpretation that can be given to God's response that he NOW KNOWS Abraham's heart and loyalties.

So, in order for something to be anthropomorphic, there has to be a clear symbollic meaning that fits into the text. No clear symbollic meaning can be taken for Gen 22:12.

Michael

**Dee Dee Warren** · September 24th 2003, 09:17 AM

Well Linda you hit the nail on the head sister. I have made this argument in a limited fashion against the OVT in that it uses anthropomorphisms when convenient IMHO, and disregards them in others, when the writers and social context are the same, and underlying foundation is the same. Now God not knowing the present (unless someone is going to posit that God voluntarily does not know something - ie he CAN, but chooses NOT to) is coming dangerously close to positing an entirely different God than that of the Bible. I do not agree with OV, but I do not believe, unlike some of its detractors, that it cuts to the heart of the nature of God, but cuts more to the heart of the issue of the nature of the future. But when we get to the issue of the "present" there are some serious ontological issues going on here. If God CANNOT know the present (and I am not referring to things such as Michael brought up, ie unsettled issues in the heart, for God does in fact know them even in Michael's proposed view, He knows they are unsettled) but to say that there is some of present reality that God does not know or is not aware of, is to essentially deny his omnipotence and omnipresence in principle, and such is no longer the God of Scripture. Scripture was never, ever meant to be hyperliteralized in this fashion. You (and no, no, no disrepect sister is meant at all in this) have some personal experience with this in your experiences with Mormon doctrine. If we go so far to as to deny the ability of God to have present knowledge, why not say He has a literal body and lives on a literal planet somewhere? The hermeneutical principles are the same. We have to be oh so utterly cautious not to read the Bible with wooden modern glasses with a low context understanding. That is not the cultural mileau in which it was written.