This month we are looking at "Salvation". This first week, we are addressing certain foundational concepts that will help us understand Salvation in-depth. In yesterday's post, we discussed "Resolution". This is the ability to separate what looks to be one large concept into two or more specific concepts. Today, we are going to perform "Resolution" on a large concept: IMPOSSIBLE.
The word "impossible" only occurs in the New Testament. The word is Strong's #102 adunatos - "unable, could not do".
When it comes to modeling the Bible and God, we pay special attention to extreme words because they are the "ultimate cases"...they stretch the variables and clarify the cause to effect relationships. We can learn A LOT from these extreme words...
In this post, we are going to look at the difference between "impossible" and "possible, but not going to happen". Some people consider these two concepts to be the SAME. They are NOT.
In the Bible, there are very few things that are impossible. There are a lot of things that are possible, but aren't going to happen. If we take the things in the Bible that are "possible, but aren't going to happen" and make them "impossible", then we have created the man-made doctrine of predestination and we have made God unjust. Before I give an example, let's look at the make God-given principle that will bring us Resolution: Causality.
When we speak about things "happening", we are really discussing an effect. The "happening" is an effect. However, causality says that effects are the natural occurrence of causes...effects and causes are halves of an inseparable whole. So, discussing "happening" REQUIRES us to identify a cause.
Said another way, the ABILITY for an event to "happen" depends on the ABILITY for the cause to exist...which requires us to identify it.
Take some time to let this sink in...if the cause doesn't exist or is not possible, then the effect is impossible. Notice, in order to PROVE something is possible, you would have to know the causes that would result in the possible action. Likewise, if you wanted to PROVE something is impossible, you would have to know the causes that would result in the impossible action. It is NOT good enough to say something is impossible because you can't identify the causes.
If the cause does exist and is possible, but the odds of it happening are very, very slim, then the effect is NOT impossible.
So, when we read the word "impossible", it means the cause is identifiable and does NOT exist and/or is NOT possible to exist. Let's look at an example of "impossible"...
"6 And without faith it is impossible to be well-pleasing unto him; for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that seek after him." (Hebrews 11:6, ASV)
This statement is saying that "well-pleasing" to God is the effect and faith is AT LEAST one of the necessary causes. There may be more causes, but faith is a necessary cause.
Said another way, if faith DOESN'T exist, then pleasing God is impossible...it is NOT (even) possible.
Notice, if the Bible says something is impossible, it doesn't have to tell us the causes...only if a person wants to project this intent on the Bible where it is not stated. However, I chose this verse because it actually gives the reason (WHY) this statement is true! Everything after the "for" is the REASON...
REASON #1: he that cometh to God must believe that He is.
A cause to pleasing God is to believe that God exists. If you don't believe God exists, then it is NOT possible to please God. To complete this loop...how is believing God exists tied to faith?
Five verses earlier, Hebrews 11:1 says:
"1 Now faith is...a conviction of things not seen."
In order to believe God exists, you must believe in something that you can't see...which is the definition of faith!
REASON #2: he that cometh to God must believe...that He is a rewarder of them that seek after Him.
A cause to pleasing God is to believe that God will reward those that seek after Him. If you don't believe God will reward you for seeking after Him, then it is NOT possible to please God. To complete this loop...how is believing God will reward you AFTER seeking Him tied to faith?
Again, five verses earlier, Hebrews 11:1 says:
"1 Now faith is assurance of things hoped for..."
In order to believe that God will reward you AFTER seeking Him, you must believe in something that hasn't happened yet...in things hoped for...which is the definition of faith!
Notice, you CANNOT please God if you don't believe in God rewarding you...which we will address next week. For now, we can say that something that is "impossible" is ONLY something that has identifiable causes that don't exist.
Let's look at an example of something that was possible, but was never going to happen...
Was it possible for Adam and Eve to avoid eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil?
The answer depends on two things:
1) Was there an identifiable cause to not eating the fruit
2) Did a way to avoid the cause exist?
What was the cause of Adam and Eve eating the fruit?
Genesis 3:
"1 Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which Jehovah God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of any tree of the garden?
2 And the woman said unto the serpent, Of the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat:
3 but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die."
(Eve knew that eating the fruit would lead to death. Notice that God gave this command BEFORE Eve was created. Don't believe me? Look at Genesis 2:15-17 for the command and Genesis 2:21-22 for Eve's creation.)
"4 And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die:
5 for God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as God, knowing good and evil."
(The serpent spoke facts in verse 5, but the objective was destruction and the lie in verse 4 makes the entire statement NOT TRUTH.)
"6 And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat; and she gave also unto her husband with her, and he did eat."
Eve ate of the fruit because she saw that the tree was good for food, a delight to the eyes, and desired to make one wise. On the one hand, Eve has a fact that said she would die (Long Term effect). On the other hand she had three facts that would benefit her in the short-term.
Eve looked comparatively...she intentionally looked at three facts that allowed her to do what she wanted and intentionally ignored one fact that prevented her from doing what she wanted.
What would have caused her not to eat the fruit? Answer: Contrastive Thinking...the most powerful God-given principle.
Did contrastive thinking exist? Yes!
It was possible for Adam and Eve to have avoided eating the fruit if they had thought contrastively.
Said another way, it was NOT impossible for Adam and Eve to have avoided eating the fruit because they could have done the cause that would have avoided eating the fruit.
Separately, what are the odds that they would have been able to do this? Very slim. They didn't have knowledge of good and evil...so their understanding was limited...so their wisdom was hampered. Their ability to make good decisions was handicapped. When you take into account that they were up against the subtlest of enemies, their ability to avoid eating the fruit was possible, but wasn't going to happen.
If it was impossible for them to have avoided eating the fruit, then this would make God unjust...God would have rigged the system and made it impossible for them to do anything different.
THAT is the key result from lumping "impossible" and "possible, but not going to happen"...it results in God being unjust. People try to give an abstract answer why God is NOT unjust in this case, but they eventually have to say they can't identify the cause but it does exist. You CANNOT claim something is IMPOSSIBLE if you CANNOT identify the cause.
Tomorrow we will look at another "impossible" verse...
...and it concerned God's "ability".
Next Post
6 comments:
Hi John
I find the first chapters in the book of Genisis hard to understand.
Your model of possibility in the adam and eve account is better than the impossible model, but does it really justify god?
What would we say about a earthly father who leaves a child who is mabye old enough to make some decisions, but that ability was "handicapped" and limited in understanding, by the side of a busy highway, after giving him the command not to cross the road and that he would die if he did. and he knew that there was another kid on the other side who would be tempting him with some candy.
He leaves and comes back later to find the kid disobeyed and was killed.
Yes, the kid could have made the right choice and lived, but the possibility was slim.
Would we say it was only the kids' fault, or would the father be guilty of criminal negligence?
MT
Hi MT,
I have notes for the book of Genesis. If you are interested, e-mail me.
The fact that Adam and Eve "die" vs. "not going to Heaven" are two different things. What exactly did Adam and Eve have and lose? What did the kid in your analogy have and lose?
This is dealt with in-depth in the second book in chapter two.
More to the point, a better analogy would be a parent who gives their son a sportscar and tells the kid to drive the speed limit or he will lose the car. It is possible for the son to always drive the speed limit, however he is susceptible to listening to a jealous friend goad him into driving over the speed limit...and loses the car.
I don't think I would call these parents negligent.
Adam and Eve lost paradise...it's not the same as an "average kid" who gets killed.
No, those would be good parents! but losing a car is not the same as bringing death upon all of humanity either. I will read the genesis notes and hopefully understand better. thanks
MT
On the issue of original sin, a lot depends on how you conceptualize the transmission of original sin. The posts here conceptualize it as a something rather than a nothing. Historically, there have been conceptualizations of it as a nothing. Aquinas is a good example.
(1) Prior to the fall, Aquinas says man possessed three things:
(a) an ordinary human nature, consisting of the potentialities for body and soul, intellect and free-will;
(b) certain 'preternatural' gifts, consisting of the complete actualization of all human potentials and the freedom from disease, suffering and death. Man's reason perfectly ruled his passions. Each was properly ordered and proportioned to the other. The name for this relationship between reason and passion is 'original justice', because it describes the 'fitting' relationship of reason and passion. It is occasionally called 'moral integrity' because reason and passion are properly integrated when reason rules passion. Reason in this context is not understood narrowly as a sterile form of intellectuality, but broadly as a form of common sense that integrates all the spiritual, intellectual, and emotional aspects of a human being.
(c) certain 'supernatural' gifts, consisting of a knowledge of God's essence.
(2) If man had continued in obedience, these gifts would have been made part of his human nature. If he did not, they would not. After the fall, man lost two out of the three things. He lost his preternatural and supernatural gifts, but retained his ordinary human nature. The name for these two types of gifts was sanctifying grace. It was called 'sanctifying' because it made man ready for heaven. All that was needed was obedience. Original sin is the loss of these gifts. The essence of original sin is the loss of that original justice.
(3) The transmission of original sin is transmission of that loss. Adam's descendents lack these gifts. What is transmitted is not a habit of sinning, but the lack of a divinely infused habit of complete self-control that might prevent sinning. A child born in original ‘sin’ is merely born without the perfect self-control typical of a mature adult human being completely submissive to God. Self-control, the subordination of passion to reason, must be learned through trial and error.
(4) This lack of self-control, a lack of the passions being subordinate to reason, might be defined as a predisposition to sin, since it makes sinning more likely. But it is not properly defined as a habit of sinning. Habits of sinning are formed through actual sins not through original sin. This lack of lack of self-control at the moment of birth is not itself sinful. No blame, shame or guilty attaches to the fact that human beings are born that way. The word “sin” in the phrase ” the transmission of original sin” describes a metaphysical evil not a moral evil.
(5) This understanding of original sin makes sinlessness difficult for all human beings but not impossible. Jesus is said to be one such human being who, through a continuous reliance on God, led a sinless life. Job may be presented as another such human being. In any event, God provides all human beings with sufficient common grace to do all that he requires of them.
(6) A helpful analogy might be an offer God might make to our grandfather to give him a million dollars if he can stop smoking for one week. In this analogy, the offer of one million dollars parallels the offer to make the preternatural gift of perfect self-control permanent and an essential part of human nature. A million dollars like perfect self-control would be a real good that would assist a human being in obtaining all the other real goods that make for a good human life. However, our grandfather smokes on the sixth day and loses out on the proposed gift. He and all his descendants are deprived of that real good. It is that absence of a million dollar inheritance that is what is passed down through the generations. It was an actual sin on our grandfather’s part in that the loss occurred because of a moral failing. However, his descendants are not sinful merely because they lack the inheritance that they would have had had their grandfather acted appropriately.
Hi MT,
In points 4-6, Anonymous just said what I wanted to say, but in a SUPERIOR manner. (I want more time to think about points 1-3 because what I wrote on the expanded version of Chapter 2 for the Sequel doesn't sync up with it and I can't figure out if I think points 1-3 are wrong or better than what I explain.)
At first I felt this discussion was distracting to this month's series, but the explanation by Anonymous actually brought it back to this month's series! Once again, proof that we ought not judge...
So, MT thank you for the comments.
Anonymous, please consider coming up with a screen name if you don't want to take credit for your writings with your real name. There are A LOT of Anonymous's out there and I would like to know when I'm hearing from you. Thank you so much for taking the time to share GREAT information and teaching me.
I owe you!
So mabye sinlessness is one of those things that is possible, but not going to happen?
Anon, thanks for the reply. Is this the roman Catholic view?
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