Faith

[bluebell]

9 minutes ago, Pyreaux said:

Is it not logical that everyone exalted on high must have once been low. Repentance means to turn around. 

(Don't think me too stubborn, I am hearing you.)

How does this apply to the Savior, who is exalted on high but did not need to have ever been low to receive that?

[Bernard Gui]

7 hours ago, Calm said:

 

Why is it a hard saying that someone who has more to be grateful for is more grateful?  
 

Nowhere in that verse is the suggestion that the person who was forgiven the greater amount has the greater reward though. They both are at the same place, have the same reward of being out of debt.  

If the intensity of love towards God is determined by the quantity of sins for which one is forgiven, then let's sin all we can so we can love that much more.

Edited February 17, 2023 by Bernard Gui

[Pyreaux]

20 minutes ago, bluebell said:

How does this apply to the Savior, who is exalted on high but did not need to have ever been low to receive that?

We are not Him. He and others were sufficiently tested and perfected in pre-Mortal Existence. Due to the veil, we have no idea what that entailed, only we certainly didn't make it in that club. To be redeemed we must fall.

[bluebell]

6 minutes ago, Pyreaux said:

We are not Him. He and others were sufficiently tested and perfected in pre-Mortal Existence. Due to the veil, we have no idea what that entailed, only we certainly didn't make it in that club. To be redeemed we must fall.

I get that we aren’t Him, but He shows that it’s possible. That falling is not necessary for exaltation.

[bluebell]

27 minutes ago, Bernard Gui said:

If the intensity of love towards God is determined by for the quantity of sins for which one is forgiven, then let's sin all we can so we can love that much more.

It’s an interesting paradox. Because some seem to believe that we cannot love Christ without sinning, and yet Christ taught that those who love Him show that love by obeying Him and not sinning.

[Teancum]

8 hours ago, MustardSeed said:

Are you sure?  Maybe Job was a real person who had insane trials and the story was embellished to make a point.  I don’t think it matters. 

Well general scholarship is of the opinion that the book of Job is mythical, or an allegory.  I guess the story illustrates a message whether Job was real or not.  But taking it literally?  God and the Lucifer wagering?  God letting Lucifer kill Job's family?  Sort of seems like the gods of Greek myth.

[Rain]

2 hours ago, Smiley McGee said:

Great questions; I'll attempt an answer. Though, perhaps frustratingly, this may come down to a matter of how we define words.

I take knowledge in this sense to mean what I believe Jesus was describing in John 17, "And this is life eternal, that they may know thee, the only true God..." I don't believe the knowledge spoken of in this verse is some conceptual knowledge of God, but an experiential, ineffable knowledge that comes by union with the Divine. Until we achieve that union, we exercise faith by adhering to beliefs and practices that we trust will lead us to union with God. To paraphrase one teacher, these beliefs and practices are not the end in and of themselves, they are only useful for a purpose. They are like bricks that we lay down to create a path that we trust will lead to our divine goal; we don't just carry them on shoulders for the sake of having them. 

Stealing the imagery from the wedding in Cana in John 2, we exercise faith as we strive to empty our inner vessel of any corrupt elements and fill it to the brim with pure water, trusting that in doing so Jesus will transform the contents of our vessel into something that will fuel our union with the Divine. 

In short, and in agreement with @pogi (hopefully not putting words in their mouth), faith is what we have to work with until we are exalted, or, I would add, one with God.

Thank you.  I like it.  

[Rain]

1 hour ago, Pyreaux said:

Is it not logical that everyone exalted on high must have once been low. Repentance means to turn around. 

(Don't think me too stubborn, I am hearing you.)

So does that mean you feel one must hit rock bottom to have exaltation?

[Pyreaux]

34 minutes ago, bluebell said:

I get that we aren’t Him, but He shows that it’s possible. That falling is not necessary for exaltation.

All have fallen, because God "give unto men weakness that they may be humble” (Ether 12:27). So, sometimes even an adulterer with a humble attitude will be better off than one who seems to have lived their best life, never having known the other side of life, never needing to change his attitude, rather being proud of his personal righteousness.

"Two men went up into the temple to pray; the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess. And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner. I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other." (Luke 18)

[MustardSeed]

6 minutes ago, Pyreaux said:

will be better off

How so? 

[Calm]

What keeps being ignored as far as I can tell by the God loves the repentant sensationally deep diving, wandering far afield sinner more than the repentant stay in the shallow end of the cesspool and stay close to home sinner debt redemption program paradigm is the unprofitable servant clause of the contract even though it’s not in the fine print, but right there in the middle of it all.

We aren’t just in debt to God for forgiveness of our sins, we are in debt for all the gifts he has given us.  Each and everyone of us will never be able to repay God because not only does he take on the debt we accrue from sinning, he also blesses us for every obedience.  He is not taking our obedience and applying it to our old debt to pay it off, no, he is too eager to reward us for doing good.  He has already forgiven us when we repent. When we then attempt to repay him through obedience, he showers us with other gifts (can’t always tell, of course).  Therefore we all are infinitely in debt to him and therefore it makes no sense to say one individual should love him more than another because each person’s limited sinning debt forgiveness gets added upon by the additional unlimited universe full of blessings that he covers us with for our obedience, together adding up to meaning we should each have a limitless love of God for his limitless covering of our debts…each and every one of us, no matter the amount of sin we have forgiven, also owe him everything and the only way we can repay him is by giving all of ourselves to him.  

[Calm]

8 minutes ago, Pyreaux said:

rather being proud of his personal righteousness.

But that pride is a sin, an unrepentant sin, so that person is irrelevant to our question. We are talking about those who haven’t sin that badly and who have repented and therefore are at the same stop on the journey, where prior to meeting there the one had traveled far afield and thus came a long way to get there where the other was a homebody and so had a short walk up the street.

The 99 sheep are in the coral are already listening to their Shepherd, they aren’t ignoring him.

Edited February 17, 2023 by Calm

[Pyreaux]

23 minutes ago, Rain said:

So does that mean you feel one must hit rock bottom to have exaltation?

 In so far, you've been sufficiently humbled and turned back is the bottom. Not the bottom of depravity, the sort of personal bottom you can still return from, then the experience as a whole can a boon. Those with the greater light receive the greater condemnation. Adultery might be bottom for some before they turn around, and a prophet impatient with his spouse or child might be his bottom.

[MustardSeed]

3 minutes ago, Pyreaux said:

 In so far, you've been sufficiently humbled and turned back is the bottom. Not the bottom of depravity, the sort of personal bottom you can still return from, then the experience as a whole can a boon. Those with the greater light receive the greater condemnation. Adultery might be bottom for some before they turn around, and a prophet impatient with his spouse or child might be his bottom.

I think your definition of rock bottom may be more loose than mine.  Since we all sin, we all hit our own bottom I guess? 
 

I do agree that if I live in a cave and never sin I’ll not learn as much as if I stumble and fall and go through a spiritual shift.  But I don’t have evidence that God prefers one over the other. 

[MustardSeed]

I actually had a boyfriend in college that believed there was more reward for attractive folks who kept the law of chasity than for unattractive folks because there is more opportunity therefore more temptation.  
One of many reasons I didn’t stick around. 
 

I think the reward / punishment religion is elementary.  Imo.  

[Calm]

10 minutes ago, Pyreaux said:

 In so far, you've been sufficiently humbled and turned back is the bottom. Not the bottom of depravity, the sort of personal bottom you can still return from, then the experience as a whole can a boon. Those with the greater light receive the greater condemnation. Adultery might be bottom for some before they turn around, and a prophet impatient with his spouse or child might be his bottom.

But the adulterer likely has to work harder to turn back and get back to where he started while the prophet has a small correction, so likely little speed bumps to get over than mountains.  So from the paradigm you described before, the former adulterer will get greater heavenly rewards 

[bluebell]

1 hour ago, Pyreaux said:

All have fallen, because God "give unto men weakness that they may be humble” (Ether 12:27). So, sometimes even an adulterer with a humble attitude will be better off than one who seems to have lived their best life, never having known the other side of life, never needing to change his attitude, rather being proud of his personal righteousness.

"Two men went up into the temple to pray; the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess. And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner. I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other." (Luke 18)

From what I'm getting from your examples though, the difference between the two men is not their sins but their attitudes.  Both are equally sinful except that one adds the sin of pride that the other doesn't.  But since the pharisee is more sinful doesn't that mean--per your interpretation of the gospel--that his potential to be closer to God is greater than the publican who doesn't have as many sins to repent of? 

Given all of that, I'm not sure how this post supports your point.

(Also, weakness is not in and of itself sinfulness.  We can have weaknesses (and do have weaknesses) that aren't sins.  A weakness in speech or writing can produce humbleness; there is no need for Mormon to sin first in order to learn how to be humble.)

 

Edited February 17, 2023 by bluebell

[manol]

5 hours ago, Bernard Gui said:

... The sinner is condemned by violation of eternal law...

I like MustardSeed's analysis:

1 hour ago, MustardSeed said:

I think the reward / punishment religion is elementary.

Bernard, I understand that the preponderance of scriptural pronouncements justify belief in a fear-inducing God who either imposes, or is himself subject to, fear-inducing eternal law.  Imo that's telestial-level stuff.  That's a rung on the ladder which at one point in our progression is the rung by which we pull ourselves up, but later in our progression it's a rung we may let go of in favor of a higher and a better one.

On another subject:

Imo if God's love is a scarce commodity such that more given to one means less available to another, then indeed it is a competition to see who can work the system to get the most of it.

On the other hand if God's love is limitless, then there is no competition.  And if on some level we are all one, then when you are loved so am I, and vice-versa. 

Edited February 17, 2023 by manol

[The Nehor]

3 hours ago, OGHoosier said:

A note about Job, since I love Job. 

I mean I really love Job. I have an almost unhealthy obsession with Job. Job is profound, not just as a work of poetry (it has been called the greatest poem of the ancient Near East) but as a work of theology. It explores two of the central questions governing how we think of God, good, evil, and our knowledge regarding God. 

1. Why do bad things happen to good people?

2. Is worship truly worship if it's based on the expectation of reward? 

Question 1 is not answered by God in the Whirlwind Speech...that's part of the point. The entire book is spent with Job's friends trying to reason their way to an explanation of why God utterly blasted Job. The only option seemingly available to them, given their Book-of-Proverbs "just deserts theology", is to conclude that Job must be a truly vile sinner behind closed doors. Job knows this isn't true - the text makes sure that we know it isn't true - and the entire book is consumed in the friends trying to get Job to "accept" his alleged sins and Job growing increasingly agitated as he maintains his innocence and pleads with the Lord. 

"Then YHWH answered Job out of the whirlwind, and said: Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without knowledge?"

Essentially, Job doesn't have a fragment of an idea of the scale of the Creation which God must govern. God has created Behemoth, He has created Leviathan, He binds the Pleiades and guides the sons of Arcturus. Job cannot figure out why God does what He does, it isn't possible, even if God were to tell him he couldn't truly understand it...and thus Job is freed from the obligation to try and reason it out. God might tell him, God might not, in any case an answer would be incomplete, and Job no longer has to try and explain it. Job's reaction to the Whirlwind Speech:

"Who is he that hideth counsel without knowledge? therefore have I uttered that I understood not; things too wonderful for me, which I knew not...I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee. Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes." 

God approves this and then lights into the "friends" for not doing what is right: acknowledging their own limitations and speaking circumspectly about that which they could not understand. Job gets double of everything he lost, and in that time there is no asking "why": Job has learned that God acts according to reasons which he couldn't understand even in principle; his role is to live his part well. Everything he knows of God, he knows by God's self-disclosure; Job now lives by revelation. 

Meanwhile, another drama is playing out in the Court of Heaven. God's conversation with ha-satan, "the adversary", asks the same question as the Akedah: if rewards are promised, is worship anything but mercenary? Satan hurls a challenge at God's feet -  "Doth Job fear God for nought? Hast not thou made an hedge about him, and about his house, and about all that he hath on every side? thou hast blessed the work of his hands, and his substance is increased in the land. But put forth thine hand now, and touch all that he hath, and he will curse thee to thy face." 

This is no bar bet. Satan is striking at the very core of celestial sociality itself - accusing God of merely buying the loyalties of men through His blessings. By choosing a singular specimen of virtue as an example, Satan is implying that no man actually follows God out of a righteous character, but rather out of expectation of reward. And what if he's right? Then heaven becomes transactional, an eternal and almighty Ayn Rand thinkpiece. The inquiry "Does Job fear God for nought?" conveys the venomous accusation - even the greatest of God's children follows God for the guarantee of a good life, and nothing more. God now has to demonstrate that this is not the case, and he chooses Job as His champion. In this, Job represents all of us and decisively rebuts Satan. In the depths of his agony, he reaches for God, and his life after his trial is characterized by his expansion of soul and outward orientation. He prays for his friends to save them from God's just anger; he welcomes his former acquaintances to his home and accepts their ministrations (Job 42:10-11).  Like Abraham, he is a knight of faith - having interacted with God, he follows God for its own sake. This is loving God and loving one's neighbor - the two great commandments, ever the core virtue of the gospel, and the only value on which the Kingdom of Heaven can be built.

Thus, bad things happen to good people a) for reasons God knows but we can't understand and b) because God cannot always repay good with good, or else good would cease to be good. Utilitarianism is a garbage moral system for those with ultimate power, as we ideally will have. Gosh, we have so far to go.

I love Job.

I also like Job. I think one of the great lessons of Job is that his critics/friends start talking about how Job must have failed or sinned or that God is beyond our comprehension and Job keeps applying the moral standards he has. There is a temptation to toss the moral standard but Job sticks to it hoping it somehow balances out somehow. That is, I think, why Job is justified and his critics are not. In the end God acknowledges that His decisions are beyond our comprehension but are built on that morality and not tossing it aside. The lesson I take is the key to any theodicy is not to pretend black is white or that we can't know good and evil.

I think the Book of Job would be much better if they tossed the heaven scene in the beginning. The reason I call it a bar bet is why does God care what Satan thinks? If Job gets to the next life and finds out his suffering was to prove a point to Satan who wouldn't internalize it or doing anything with it I think Job would feel cheated. It is just so petty. If the whole thing is anti-utilitarianism it is again undermined at the end where God gives Job double what he had before as an implied reward for enduring.

[The Nehor]

1 hour ago, MustardSeed said:

I actually had a boyfriend in college that believed there was more reward for attractive folks who kept the law of chasity than for unattractive folks because there is more opportunity therefore more temptation.  
One of many reasons I didn’t stick around. 
 

I think the reward / punishment religion is elementary.  Imo.  

Your boyfriend seemed to value the potential for sin. That is a worship of power, beauty, and intelligence. It also means putting yourself in the path of temptation with the intent to refuse it ups your reward......

Wow, I am set. I have had so many ideas for self-enrichment and self-gratification that hinged on using and exploiting people to get ahead that I have rejected as morally wrong that I am definitely exalted. And turning down that polycule? That alone has got to get me into super-heaven.

WOOHOO!

[Pyreaux]

2 hours ago, Calm said:

But the adulterer likely has to work harder to turn back and get back to where he started while the prophet has a small correction, so likely little speed bumps to get over than mountains.  So from the paradigm you described before, the former adulterer will get greater heavenly rewards 

Rewards are merited by trials and the more difficult the better the rewards (a bigger mansion? Extra pudding cups on fridays? I don't know). A part of the trial is dealing with our temptations, the more temptation the better, "My brothers, count it all joy when you fall into diverse temptations, knowing that the trying of your faith develops patience. But let patience perfect its work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing" (James 1:2-4). 

To develop your character a component of the trial is to allow us to experience all the hardships that we currently experience. Exposure to sin and guilt is necessary. Ecclesiastes tells us, "In the place of justice, there was wickedness; and in the place of righteousness, there was wickedness. ... Regarding the account of sons of men, God is making clear to them to show that they are but animals (Eccl. 3:16-18)." God wants to show us our sinful nature without Him. 

I wasn't saying great sin gives rewards, simply greater temptations in our trials earns greater rewards. Humbly facing and ultimately overcoming great sins can help one more than simply avoiding temptation and thinking you necessarily did the harder thing that will merit the greater reward. You were not tried. A sinning struggling, but humbled and earnest Publican will be heard over the Pharisee who abstained with ease and so had poorer character.

Edited February 17, 2023 by Pyreaux

[Pyreaux]

1 hour ago, bluebell said:

From what I'm getting from your examples though, the difference between the two men is not their sins but their attitudes.  Both are equally sinful except that one adds the sin of pride that the other doesn't.  But since the pharisee is more sinful doesn't that mean--per your interpretation of the gospel--that his potential to be closer to God is greater than the publican who doesn't have as many sins to repent of? 

Given all of that, I'm not sure how this post supports your point.

Well, the outwardly righteous Pharisee might not be rewarded at all, while the grievous sinners "extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican" maybe farther along the path to a reward than himself. I'm not certain about the point I was making other than that I think, rewards are different, the two men we are not "equal" sinners, per se..

Edited February 17, 2023 by Pyreaux

[OGHoosier]

43 minutes ago, The Nehor said:

I also like Job. I think one of the great lessons of Job is that his critics/friends start talking about how Job must have failed or sinned or that God is beyond our comprehension and Job keeps applying the moral standards he has. There is a temptation to toss the moral standard but Job sticks to it hoping it somehow balances out somehow. That is, I think, why Job is justified and his critics are not. In the end God acknowledges that His decisions are beyond our comprehension but are built on that morality and not tossing it aside. The lesson I take is the key to any theodicy is not to pretend black is white or that we can't know good and evil.

I agree. Theodicy that pretends we can't know good or evil is self-refuting. Another thing that I take away from Job is: there are some things I don't have the authority to theodicize for. I affirm that God had a reason for it, but I have no authority to declare that reason. Some things can only be answered by God Himself.

46 minutes ago, The Nehor said:

I think the Book of Job would be much better if they tossed the heaven scene in the beginning. The reason I call it a bar bet is why does God care what Satan thinks? If Job gets to the next life and finds out his suffering was to prove a point to Satan who wouldn't internalize it or doing anything with it I think Job would feel cheated. It is just so petty.

Perhaps. I think it does serve an important purpose though. The relation between "worship" and "expectation of blessing" needs to be explored - the prosperity gospel needs to get nuked. Satan certainly won't get the point, but I think we can, and we are God's audience as well in this respect. 

48 minutes ago, The Nehor said:

If the whole thing is anti-utilitarianism it is again undermined at the end where God gives Job double what he had before as an implied reward for enduring.

It does seem like a reward. That said, I think it might be more of a restitution, not a reward. Exodus 22:4 says that if a man steal an ox or a sheep, "and the theft be found in his hand alive...he shall restore double." Seeing as all things remain in God's hands, I think this is God's way of doing restitution, a representation of His pledge to make all things right. 

[rodheadlee]

5 hours ago, Calm said:

I agree. Do you believe though that everyone has to hit it in order to eventually be offered exaltation by God?  Do you think it is a waste of mortal life not to live in a way that you hit rock bottom?

I personally love that the Lord’s atonement means if I repent my sins will be remembered no more, but where I don’t sin I don’t harm others. And to me that is a very worthy goal. I don’t believe there is any harmless sin, even if it’s the pain we cause by our loved ones worrying about us. 

I don't believe we have to but I believe we will. Your rock bottom maybe way higher than my rock bottom. 

[Calm]

1 hour ago, Pyreaux said:

wasn't saying great sin gives rewards, simply greater temptations in our trials earns greater rewards.

Why did Jesus teach us to pray to God to keep us from temptation?