I've come to a few realizations lately. Almost all "why" questions cannot be fully answered, and almost all our assertions about God are wrong. How are they wrong? There are no questions one can ask about God that can be fully answered, therefore almost no assertions about God can be valid, other than God is mystery.
"God is Love" for example. To me saying God is love is like saying rain is love. While you can say rain is love and thats not wrong per-say. It helps plants to grow etc, but its also not very helpful in understanding the nature, sorry for the pun, of rain. Is a storm love? is it anger? It is neither love nor anger, it just is.
"I am" is one of the best descriptions of God. Altho that too is not very helpful. What is something that was before time, during time, and will be after time? That cannot be comprehended.
A common parable is two men, blind from birth, arguing about what the color green is like. "I've felt green, and its soft" one says. "I too have felt green and it was hard" says the other. "Well I've smelt green and it smells like the forest". "No I've smelt green and it don't smell at all! How do you even know what you had was green?" "I was told by someone who's seen!" This is where we are, none of the arguments are is any way helpful in understanding the color green.
Does that mean we should not try to understand the nature of God? Of course not. We should try, but know that everything one thinks one learns is both wrong and right in probably equal proportion. "But we have the Bible!" I hear you say. We do have the Bible, written in words man can understand. If I gave you numbers and told you to write a story without having a number reference or refer to any language or letter, maybe you could do it. How many people who read your numbers will understand the meaning?
Why would you only give that book, when most will only get a sliver of understanding and it will be used for both good and evil? Well that come to why "why" questions cannot be answered very well.
Why is a leaf green? Is that an easy question? depends on what answer is expected. A leaf is made up of cells that contain chlorophyll, the combination of cells and this chemical seems to absorb all wavelengths of light spectrum except waves in the green range and reflect those colors into our eyes. Our eyes have lenses that focus the light, that acts as particles and waves and is not fully understood, onto rods and cones in the back of our eyes. Some of those receive light intensity others receive the color, that information is somehow translated into our brain and we "see" color. There is so much of even that we don't understand. We're so far away from understanding the brain and how translate information... How, if we can't even understand why a leaf is green, can we even hope to understand something before time, created time and all existence, and will be after time and existence. Every assertion, and every question about that "being" will be wrong.
To wrap up I'd like to touch on the trinity. I don't believe in the trinity as cleanly as 3 in 1. I feel like its like asking, "How many air is there?" or "How many water is there?" you can answer that question but the answer will not really help the person asking it in their understand of the nature of either air or water.
God is mystery.
Tuesday, November 19, 2013
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