Adventist View of God Quiz

[skyblue888]

Philippians 2 tells us that prior to coming to this earth He was in the form of God. The Holy Spirit does not have a form or body like the Father or Jesus have. Otherwise He could not be everywhere present.

sky

[fccool]

Well, God them must be an enormous anthropomorphic body:

I Kings 8:27

But will God indeed dwell on the earth? behold, the heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain thee; how much less this house that I have builded?

[John317]

Well, God them must be an enormous anthropomorphic body:

I Kings 8:27

But will God indeed dwell on the earth? behold, the heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain thee; how much less this house that I have builded?

The text doesn't have anything to do with God's size. Jesus is God and He has a human body similar to the glorified, immortal bodies which the saved will have in the resurrection.

The verse is telling us that God can't be contained or confined in any house that humans build. It isn't a denial that God is in His heavenly sanctuary. But through the Holy Spirit, both the Father and the Son are Omnipresent. They live with and in each believer. Because of that, we shouldn't think that God is limited to one small part of His universe.

[fccool]

Quote:

But through the Holy Spirit, both the Father and the Son are Omnipresent. They live with and in each believer. Because of that, we shouldn't think that God is limited to one small part of His universe.

What I find hilarious, is that you do understand this one as a metaphor, when it's convenient for your beliefs

It's useless to debate the things that neither you nor I would know. Both of ours is a pure speculation, although, you portray God in rather Zeus-like manner, as anthropomorphic being.

[skyblue888]

John, you believe that God cannot be contained in the sense that by His Spirit He is everywhere present and yet in the same breath you seem to limit that presence to believers only!

Through the Spirit God and Christ are omnipresent working in and through all, moving in all things according to their will but more so in those who believe that God is and who hang their helpless souls upon the all-sufficient merits of the Saviour.

sky

[skyblue888]

I love this statement:

"The greatness of God is to us incomprehensible. The Lord's throne is in Heaven (Ps.11:4); yet by His Spirit He is everywhere present. He has an intimate knowledge of and a personal interest in all the works of His hands." E.G. White, Education,132.

[skyblue888]

In the book Education, 14 Mrs. White speaks of the "unseen, mighty Intelligence that is working in and through all."

In the same paragraph she says that it is "the mind of God."

The mind of God is the Spirit of God.

sky

[skyblue888]

Daniel chapter 7:9 clearly reveals that God the Father has a bodily form and He sits upon a throne and Revelation 1 describes the glorified bodily form of Jesus after His ascension.

But the Holy Spirit does not have such bodily form. He is everywhere present, invisible to us, and yet very real. That's why Jesus compared Him to the wind. We cannot see the wind but we know the sound thereof and we see its effects. It is the same with the Holy Spirit.

Before His incarnation Christ was in the form of God

Now He is in the form of man with the glories of

the form of God upon Him.

sky

[miz3]

This is not really a wright or wrong dogma discussion. Just would like to know what was taught in your local church on the subject (not what you currently believe), or the impression that you God when growing up, or learning these questions from your church. These are all true or false, for ease of comparing.

1) God has a literal throne in heaven that he occupies

2) The heaven is a physical location somewhere far away in our physical universe

3) There's a good chance that heaven is located somewhere in the region Orion's belt constellation.

4) God has literal body-parts, and "in the image of God" refers to not merely Character, but the physical aspects of God

I am coming to this quiz extremely late. I did not know it was here until my weekly update. Like the OP asks I will give what I was taught and have heard even up to this very day. Later I will have more comment.

1. True

2. True

3. True

4. True

[miz3]

Originally Posted By: fccool

This is not really a wright or wrong dogma discussion. Just would like to know what was taught in your local church on the subject (not what you currently believe), or the impression that you God when growing up, or learning these questions from your church. These are all true or false, for ease of comparing.

1) God has a literal throne in heaven that he occupies

2) The heaven is a physical location somewhere far away in our physical universe

3) There's a good chance that heaven is located somewhere in the region Orion's belt constellation.

4) God has literal body-parts, and "in the image of God" refers to not merely Character, but the physical aspects of God

I am coming to this quiz extremely late. I did not know it was here until my weekly update. Like the OP asks I will give what I was taught and have heard even up to this very day. Later I will have more comment.

1. True

2. True

3. True

4. True

Now for my comments and answers as to what I now believe.

1. False

God cannot be bounded in any way shape or form. However, God can make Himself appear in any form He wants in any and all environments. In addition God can do this in multiple environments that He created all at the same time. Like the Bible says, "Nothing is Impossible with God".

So when a Writer of Scripture says they saw God on the Throne that is what God wanted them to see. That does not mean that they are seeing God as He actually is. They are seeing what God wants them to see. Just like Abraham, God came as a human being. That does mean that God is a human being all the time and that being a human being was/is His original and permanent form.

God cannot be "boxed" in this way. Like I said God can be anything He wants to be anytime He wants. I also believe that Scripture says that no one has seen God except the Son. That would be Jesus Christ who by the way is also God and like the "Father" can and is anything He wants to be.

Thus, to say that God cannot be "Spirit" and everywhere at once is bogus trash. There is no where in Scripture where this concept is given. We humans do not know what the actual make-up of God is: whether it is three personalities who are one, or One who is three Personalities, or whether God is something else we can conceive of.

It is our own human arrogance and some other "sources" that have given us a false picture of God and such false pictures have been handed down not only in SDA circles but throughout Christianity. This why we do not know God as we are commanded to in John 17:3.

2. False.

Very simple the Bible does say where Heaven actually is. The best we can do is to say "out there somewhere". Whether it is in the "Universe" or outside our "Universe" no one really knows.

3. False.

Myth given to us by human opinion and has no basis whatsoever in the Bible.

4. False.

See comments on number one.

It is amazing just how unBiblical we can become. Even in the SDA Church pagan myths abound.

[miz3]

And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things. (Romans 1:23)

But who is able to build Him an house, seeing the heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain Him? (2 Chronicles 2:6)

Much of the "support" for these things are being pulled out of symbolic and poetic books, which described visions and dreams. To take these as literal reality is both ignorant and naive.

On top of that, the idea that Jesus and God sit on the throne somewhere for thousands of years, and that Christ in 1844 entered some compartment in literal temple located somewhere in the stars far far away, and he is performing some ritualistic cleansing ... is likewise ignorant of the types and metaphors, and naive, in terms of who God is, and the need of him to perform such meaningless tasks that only give symbolic meaning to humans.

[John317]

John, you believe that God cannot be contained in the sense that by His Spirit He is everywhere present and yet in the same breath you seem to limit that presence to believers only!

God's Spirit works upon the minds and hearts of all people, to convict them of sin and to lead them to Christ, but God does not dwell in every human being. God gives life and breath to all human beings, but that is different from God living in them. Jesus and the New Testament teach that the Holy Spirit comes to live with believers who love Jesus. God was not dwelling in Hitler or in Stalin, nor does God dwell in the trees, the shark, the alligator, or the snake, etc.

John 14:15-17

[15] "If you love me, you will keep my commandments. [16] And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, [17] even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.

John 14:23

Jesus answered him, "If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him."

[miz3]

Originally Posted By: Bravus

I'm not going to address the Ellen White 'evidence'. I simply do not believe it to be compelling, for a variety of reasons, and have said so in the past.

Originally Posted By: John3:17

I am not in the least bit surprised, Bravus. It's clear that you and fccool don't believe she was a prophet of God. It's always good to know where people stand on these issues.

Originally Posted By: Bravus

Right, and you've known for years. So perhaps now you could just accept it and stop with the snide, superior comments.

Actually, I never saw before where you admitted you reject Ellen White as a prophet of God. You've always made it appear that the reason you don't want to consider her writings is that you are standing by what she said about only accepting the Bible as the standard. A case in point is your reason above for not considering her-- that her writing on the topic "is not compelling for a variety of reasons."

You've made it appear that you felt you alone were doing what Ellen White said we should do in the matter of "the Bible alone." You did not say that the reason was that you reject her as a genuine prophet of God.

I was very serious in my posting, Bravus. I meant nothing either snide or "superior." I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings, though. That was not the intention. My only intention was to tell the truth, which is what I did do.

Funny how the cutting remarks is not an attack but only telling the truth. Yet when others...............

[miz3]

Originally Posted By: fccool

Well, God them must be an enormous anthropomorphic body:

I Kings 8:27

But will God indeed dwell on the earth? behold, the heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain thee; how much less this house that I have builded?

The text doesn't have anything to do with God's size. Jesus is God and He has a human body similar to the glorified, immortal bodies which the saved will have in the resurrection.

The verse is telling us that God can't be contained or confined in any house that humans build. It isn't a denial that God is in His heavenly sanctuary. But through the Holy Spirit, both the Father and the Son are Omnipresent. They live with and in each believer. Because of that, we shouldn't think that God is limited to one small part of His universe.

Not Biblical. This is nothing but tortured logic.

[Tom Wetmore]

Now for my comments and answers as to what I now believe.

1. False

God cannot be bounded in any way shape or form. However, God can make Himself appear in any form He wants in any and all environments. In addition God can do this in multiple environments that He created all at the same time. Like the Bible says, "Nothing is Impossible with God".

So when a Writer of Scripture says they saw God on the Throne that is what God wanted them to see. That does not mean that they are seeing God as He actually is. They are seeing what God wants them to see. Just like Abraham, God came as a human being. That does mean that God is a human being all the time and that being a human being was/is His original and permanent form.

God cannot be "boxed" in this way. Like I said God can be anything He wants to be anytime He wants. I also believe that Scripture says that no one has seen God except the Son. That would be Jesus Christ who by the way is also God and like the "Father" can and is anything He wants to be.

Thus, to say that God cannot be "Spirit" and everywhere at once is bogus trash. There is no where in Scripture where this concept is given. We humans do not know what the actual make-up of God is: whether it is three personalities who are one, or One who is three Personalities, or whether God is something else we can conceive of.

It is our own human arrogance and some other "sources" that have given us a false picture of God and such false pictures have been handed down not only in SDA circles but throughout Christianity. This why we do not know God as we are commanded to in John 17:3.

2. False.

Very simple the Bible does say where Heaven actually is. The best we can do is to say "out there somewhere". Whether it is in the "Universe" or outside our "Universe" no one really knows.

3. False.

Myth given to us by human opinion and has no basis whatsoever in the Bible.

4. False.

See comments on number one.

It is amazing just how unBiblical we can become. Even in the SDA Church pagan myths abound.

[SivartM]

This is what I was taught:

1. Yes

2. Yes

3. Yes, I always thought that you got there through a hole in the middle star of Orion's belt. I'm not sure how much of that I was told or how much I just imagined being told.

4. Kind of yes? I think God was supposed to have a body but also be a spirit, so every mention of the topic was pretty ambiguous.