All About GOD - Growing Relationships with Jesus and Others
FORTUITOUS
From My Perspective - - -
Everyone views life through his/her personal prism. We do not exist in a vacuum! We all have our values and biases. However, there are those who believe some “magic” has been at work in their behalf – maybe “karma”! There are numbers of people who believe that everything occurring in life is to be relegated and embraced as “good luck” – a matter of being in the right place at the right time. It is viewed as “chance” (things just happen). One can hear some commentary allude to “having to play the hand you’ve been dealt.” Much of this falls into the areas of relativism (no ideas or beliefs are universally true…their validity depends on the circumstances in which they are applied), and/or fatalism (all things are subject to fate, are predetermined, or that they take place by inevitable necessity). Determinism attaches itself to these views of life by allowing: “… that every state of affairs, including every human event, act, and decision is the inevitable consequence of antecedent states of affairs...” In other words, free will and intelligent choices are inconsequential – things are the way they are because of natural forces that predetermined that’s how they would be.
The above views and definitions have serious consequences. All of those views rule out Design and Order in the Universe. It becomes part of the Evolutionary School of thought and finds expression through various philosophies in the quest for Being and the search for Reality. If one’s presuppositions disallow for the supernatural, then the quest and search become endless and more and more circular. It becomes impossible to arrive at any foundational reality. In like manner, any attempt to define reality apart from the supernatural causes one to wander in the abyss of incredibility.
On the one hand, Paleontologists focus on “body fossils and trace fossils as the principal types of evidence about ancient life, and geochemical evidence has helped to decipher the evolution of life before there were organisms large enough to leave fossils. Estimating the dates of these remains is essential but difficult: sometimes adjacent rock layers allow radiometric dating, which provide absolute dates that are accurate to within 0.5%, but more often paleontologists have to rely on relative dating by solving the jigsaw puzzles of biostratigraphy (the study of the spatial and temporal distribution of fossil organisms, often interpolated with radiometric, geochemical, and paleoenvironmental information as a means of dating rock strata).” On the other hand, the Psalmist understands origins and life and reality much differently. In Psalm 139:13 through 18, “For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with you…”
Consider these things with me - - Atheism is a very empty, meaningless and directionless philosophy for life. It is a belief system with a negative viewpoint – no god, no eternity, and no foundational values. Many Atheists are very intelligent and well-spoken. It’s difficult to understand why they would embrace their views and argue them. Psalm 14:1 allows, “The fool says in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt, their deeds are vile; there is no one who does good.” It goes a step further when James allows that the unseen world has a viewpoint regarding Theism – stating that demons believe there is a God. In James 2:19 (NLT), “Do you still think it's enough just to believe that there is one God? Well, even the demons believe this, and they tremble in terror!” James is stating that speech and practice must intersect and demonstrate that what one believes is evidenced by what one is and does. Words of an old Gospel Song state: "What you are speaks so loud that the world can't hear what you say; they’re looking at your walk, not listening to your talk they’re judging from your actions every day. Don't believe you'll deceive by claiming what you've never known; they’ll accept what they see and know you to be, they’ll judge from your life alone."
Everyone views life through his/her personal prism. We do not exist in a vacuum! We all have our values and biases. However, there are those who believe some “magic” has been at work in their behalf – maybe “karma”! There are numbers of people who believe that everything occurring in life is to be relegated and embraced as “good luck” – a matter of being in the right place at the right time. It is viewed as “chance” (things just happen). One can hear some commentary allude to “having to play the hand you’ve been dealt.” Much of this falls into the areas of relativism (no ideas or beliefs are universally true…their validity depends on the circumstances in which they are applied), and/or fatalism (all things are subject to fate, are predetermined, or that they take place by inevitable necessity). Determinism attaches itself to these views of life by allowing: “… that every state of affairs, including every human event, act, and decision is the inevitable consequence of antecedent states of affairs...” In other words, free will and intelligent choices are inconsequential – things are the way they are because of natural forces that predetermined that’s how they would be.
The above views and definitions have serious consequences. All of those views rule out Design and Order in the Universe. It becomes part of the Evolutionary School of thought and finds expression through various philosophies in the quest for Being and the search for Reality. If one’s presuppositions disallow for the supernatural, then the quest and search become endless and more and more circular. It becomes impossible to arrive at any foundational reality. In like manner, any attempt to define reality apart from the supernatural causes one to wander in the abyss of incredibility.
On the one hand, Paleontologists focus on “body fossils and trace fossils as the principal types of evidence about ancient life, and geochemical evidence has helped to decipher the evolution of life before there were organisms large enough to leave fossils. Estimating the dates of these remains is essential but difficult: sometimes adjacent rock layers allow radiometric dating, which provide absolute dates that are accurate to within 0.5%, but more often paleontologists have to rely on relative dating by solving the jigsaw puzzles of biostratigraphy (the study of the spatial and temporal distribution of fossil organisms, often interpolated with radiometric, geochemical, and paleoenvironmental information as a means of dating rock strata).” On the other hand, the Psalmist understands origins and life and reality much differently. In Psalm 139:13 through 18, “For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with you…”
Consider these things with me - - Atheism is a very empty, meaningless and directionless philosophy for life. It is a belief system with a negative viewpoint – no god, no eternity, and no foundational values. Many Atheists are very intelligent and well-spoken. It’s difficult to understand why they would embrace their views and argue them. Psalm 14:1 allows, “The fool says in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt, their deeds are vile; there is no one who does good.” It goes a step further when James allows that the unseen world has a viewpoint regarding Theism – stating that demons believe there is a God. In James 2:19 (NLT), “Do you still think it's enough just to believe that there is one God? Well, even the demons believe this, and they tremble in terror!” James is stating that speech and practice must intersect and demonstrate that what one believes is evidenced by what one is and does. Words of an old Gospel Song state: "What you are speaks so loud that the world can't hear what you say; they’re looking at your walk, not listening to your talk they’re judging from your actions every day. Don't believe you'll deceive by claiming what you've never known; they’ll accept what they see and know you to be, they’ll judge from your life alone."
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