Is there anything that God does not know?
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SpiritLedEd
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Since God's power is absolute and perfect, it is impossible that He not know everything, no matter which of the many senses of know you refer to.
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Jaareshiah
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God utilizes his selective exercise of foreknowledge. At Deuteronomy 32:4, it says of him: "The Rock, perfect is his activity, for all his ways are justice." We can all look back in time, in history, with God being able to certainly retain these time frames. However, the argument that God’s not foreknowing all future events and circumstances in full detail would evidence imperfection on his part is, in reality, an arbitrary view of perfection.
Perfection, correctly defined, does not demand such an absolute, all-embracing extension, inasmuch as the perfection of anything actually depends upon its measuring up completely to the standards of excellence set by one qualified to judge its merits. Ultimately, God’s own will and good pleasure, not human opinions or concepts, are the deciding factors as to whether anything is perfect.( 2Sa 22:31; Isa 46:10)
At Genesis 11:5-8 God is described as directing his attention earthward, surveying the situation at Babel, and, at that time, determining the action to be taken to break up the unrighteous project there. After wickedness developed at Sodom and Gomorrah, Jehovah God advised Abraham of his decision to investigate (by means of his angels) to “see whether they act altogether according to the outcry over it that has come to me, and, if not, I can get to know it.” (Ge 18:20-22; 19:1)
God spoke of ‘becoming acquainted with Abraham,’ and after Abraham went to the point of attempting to sacrifice Isaac, Jehovah said, “For now I do know that you are God-fearing in that you have not withheld your son, your only one, from me.”(Gen 18:19; 22:11, 12) Hence, God used a test to determine Abraham's loyalty, knowing only after he was about to sacrifice Isaac, for a certainty that he would unreservedly be faithful.
God thus uses selective foreknowledge, meaning that he could choose not to foreknow indiscriminately all the future acts of his creatures. Such as in the case of Adam and Eve, in which he put before them a test, using the "tree of knowledge of good and bad".(Gen 2:17) Had he foreknown that these would have rebelled, then what purpose did the "tree of knowledge of good and bad" serve ? Rather, by putting before them this trial, he was then able to determine their obedience or disobedience of his laws.
To offer something very desirable to another person on conditions known beforehand to be unreachable is recognized as both hypocritical and cruel. The prospect of everlasting life is presented in God’s Word as a goal for all persons, one possible to attain. After urging his listeners to ‘keep on asking and seeking’ good things from God, Jesus pointed out that a father does not give a stone or a serpent to his child that asks for bread or a fish.(Luke 11:11-13)
Thus, the invitations and opportunities to receive benefits and everlasting blessings set before all men by God are bona fide. (Matt 21:22; Jas 1:5, 6) He can in all sincerity urge men to ‘turn back from transgression and keep living,’ as he did with the people of Israel. (Eze 18:23, 30-32)
Logically, he could not do this if he foreknew that they were individually destined to die in wickedness. As Jehovah told Israel: “Nor said I to the seed of Jacob, ‘Seek me simply for nothing, you people.’ I am Jehovah, speaking what is righteous, telling what is upright. . . . Turn to me and be saved, all you at the ends of the earth.”(Isa 45:19-22)
Perfection, correctly defined, does not demand such an absolute, all-embracing extension, inasmuch as the perfection of anything actually depends upon its measuring up completely to the standards of excellence set by one qualified to judge its merits. Ultimately, God’s own will and good pleasure, not human opinions or concepts, are the deciding factors as to whether anything is perfect.( 2Sa 22:31; Isa 46:10)
At Genesis 11:5-8 God is described as directing his attention earthward, surveying the situation at Babel, and, at that time, determining the action to be taken to break up the unrighteous project there. After wickedness developed at Sodom and Gomorrah, Jehovah God advised Abraham of his decision to investigate (by means of his angels) to “see whether they act altogether according to the outcry over it that has come to me, and, if not, I can get to know it.” (Ge 18:20-22; 19:1)
God spoke of ‘becoming acquainted with Abraham,’ and after Abraham went to the point of attempting to sacrifice Isaac, Jehovah said, “For now I do know that you are God-fearing in that you have not withheld your son, your only one, from me.”(Gen 18:19; 22:11, 12) Hence, God used a test to determine Abraham's loyalty, knowing only after he was about to sacrifice Isaac, for a certainty that he would unreservedly be faithful.
God thus uses selective foreknowledge, meaning that he could choose not to foreknow indiscriminately all the future acts of his creatures. Such as in the case of Adam and Eve, in which he put before them a test, using the "tree of knowledge of good and bad".(Gen 2:17) Had he foreknown that these would have rebelled, then what purpose did the "tree of knowledge of good and bad" serve ? Rather, by putting before them this trial, he was then able to determine their obedience or disobedience of his laws.
To offer something very desirable to another person on conditions known beforehand to be unreachable is recognized as both hypocritical and cruel. The prospect of everlasting life is presented in God’s Word as a goal for all persons, one possible to attain. After urging his listeners to ‘keep on asking and seeking’ good things from God, Jesus pointed out that a father does not give a stone or a serpent to his child that asks for bread or a fish.(Luke 11:11-13)
Thus, the invitations and opportunities to receive benefits and everlasting blessings set before all men by God are bona fide. (Matt 21:22; Jas 1:5, 6) He can in all sincerity urge men to ‘turn back from transgression and keep living,’ as he did with the people of Israel. (Eze 18:23, 30-32)
Logically, he could not do this if he foreknew that they were individually destined to die in wickedness. As Jehovah told Israel: “Nor said I to the seed of Jacob, ‘Seek me simply for nothing, you people.’ I am Jehovah, speaking what is righteous, telling what is upright. . . . Turn to me and be saved, all you at the ends of the earth.”(Isa 45:19-22)
RJ
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My dear friend, with all due love and respect to you, you speak from a false premise while using your logic. You also use variuous scriptures erroneously to support your theory.
To say that God uses selective foreknowledge and that He chooses not to foreknow indiscriminately is simply wrong.
God's tests of man that you illustrate was for God's knowledge but also for man's! Yes you can rightfully say that God tested them but you can't put YOUR logic to that and say that God elected not to know their answer before they did it.
In our world of time and space these tests were for Man's knowledge and for the rest of us to learn from.
God tells us that He is Spirit and in His realm there is no limits to time and space as we know it. He told us that He is the " Alpha and the Omega". He is not at the begining and then will be at the end, He is at both places at the same time. He is Omnipresent. You said: " To offer something very desirable to another person on conditions known beforehand to be unreachable is recognized as both hypocritical and cruel." "Is Recognized", is recognized by who? By Man, certainly not God! To say this of man, in our world, could be very accurate! But, if you hold to your above premise, then I say you have just called God hypocritical and cruel!
God is also Omniscient. His knowledge is PERFECT and, with Him being Omnipresent there is no "not knowing" in Him. With regards to man, With two of your examples in Adam and Abraham, of course God knew, He knew what they would do before the foundations of the Universe, before Jesus Christ created Adam and Abraham!
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Jaareshiah
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Had God foreknew that Adam and Eve would rebel, then for what purpose did he provide a test by means of the "tree of knowledge of good and bad" ? The view that God’s exercise of his foreknowledge is infinite and that he does foreordain the course and destiny of all individuals is known as predestinarianism. Its advocates reason that God’s divinity and perfection require that he be omniscient (all-knowing), not only respecting the past and present but also regarding the future.
According to this concept, for him not to foreknow all matters in their minutest detail would evidence imperfection. Examples such as the case of Isaac’s twin sons, Esau and Jacob, are presented as evidence of God’s foreordaining creatures before their birth (Rom 9:10-13); and texts such as Ephesians 1:4, 5 are cited as evidence that God foreknew and foreordained the future of all his creatures even before the start of creation.
This concept would mean that, prior to creating angels or earthling man, God exercised his powers of foreknowledge and foresaw and foreknew all that would result from such creation, including the rebellion of one of his spirit sons, the subsequent rebellion of the first human pair in Eden (Gen 3:1-6; John 8:44), and all the bad consequences of such rebellion down to and beyond this present day.
This would necessarily mean that all the wickedness that history has recorded (the crime and immorality, oppression and resultant suffering, lying and hypocrisy, false worship and idolatry) once existed, before creation’s beginning, only in the mind of God, in the form of his foreknowledge of the future in all of its minutest details.
If the Creator of mankind had indeed exercised his power to foreknow all that history has seen since man’s creation, then the full weight of all the wickedness thereafter resulting was deliberately set in motion by God when he spoke the words: “Let us make man.” (Gen 1:26) These facts bring into question the reasonableness and consistency of the predestinarian concept; particularly so, since the disciple James shows that disorder and other vile things do not originate from God’s heavenly presence but are “earthly, animal, demonic” in source.(James 3:14-18)
Hence, God descretionarily uses his power to selectively foreknow the future of persons and events, as in the case of the world powers at Daniel 2and 7. Instead of utilizing his foreknowledge as to whether a person will be loyal, God's "eyes are roving about through all the earth to show his strength in behalf of those whose heart is complete toward him."(2 Chron 16:9)
There would be no need for God to ' rove about through all the earth to show his strength in behalf of those whose heart is complete toward him' if he already foreknew that these would either be obedient or rebellious. He would not have to search out these ones, if he knew in advance who were going to have a ' complete heart toward God.'
StopPolloition
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Anthropomorphism is attributing human traits to God or using human traits to attempt to conceptualize him. When the scripture speaks of the Lord repenting, it isn't that God was doubleminded or somehow regret his decisions; from the perspective of man alone, God seemed to do an about face.
Further, the purpose of a test isn't to show God anything. He knows all things, there is nothing hidden from his understanding. The purpose of every test is to show US what God knew in us from the beginning and in the case of rejection of God's intended principle, to speak in judgement against us; to show us that man is inept and utterly, hopelessly doomed without God.
God knew Adam and Eve would sin. So long as the potentiality for sin existed, even God's good creation could not have been said to be perfect. God is eternal and unchanging, yet there were elements of his character that men would have never known had they not sinned. That the name of God, Jesus, means salvation, is telling. Man would never know God as a savior had they not sinned. They would not have been able (like the angels) to conceive of the fulness and ultimate perfection of God's plan absent of their failing him. And how much more excellent the praise of a redeemed creature made perfect than one made perfect and unredeemed.
While you, as we all are, are entitled to your opinion, the notion that God's knowledge, by choice or by fiat could somehow be incomplete, that the sin of mankind was a failure of knowledge rather than divine orchestration, goes against a host of scripture.
The limits God places upon himself are in keeping with his nature and his character. God cannot lie because he is truth. He cannot see past his Son's blood because he deemed it sufficient from eternity past. A God that cannot see all that he has created past present and future is no God at all.
Further, the purpose of a test isn't to show God anything. He knows all things, there is nothing hidden from his understanding. The purpose of every test is to show US what God knew in us from the beginning and in the case of rejection of God's intended principle, to speak in judgement against us; to show us that man is inept and utterly, hopelessly doomed without God.
God knew Adam and Eve would sin. So long as the potentiality for sin existed, even God's good creation could not have been said to be perfect. God is eternal and unchanging, yet there were elements of his character that men would have never known had they not sinned. That the name of God, Jesus, means salvation, is telling. Man would never know God as a savior had they not sinned. They would not have been able (like the angels) to conceive of the fulness and ultimate perfection of God's plan absent of their failing him. And how much more excellent the praise of a redeemed creature made perfect than one made perfect and unredeemed.
While you, as we all are, are entitled to your opinion, the notion that God's knowledge, by choice or by fiat could somehow be incomplete, that the sin of mankind was a failure of knowledge rather than divine orchestration, goes against a host of scripture.
The limits God places upon himself are in keeping with his nature and his character. God cannot lie because he is truth. He cannot see past his Son's blood because he deemed it sufficient from eternity past. A God that cannot see all that he has created past present and future is no God at all.
Jaareshiah
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Should a mechanic be called to account, if he puts a defective part on a car, knowing full well that it will soon fail ? Or should he be free of any charges, though knowing that the part that he installed was defective and would fail, perhaps costing the lives of individuals ? The mechanic, when found out, would be subject to legal ramifications. Is it any different if God foreknew that making mankind would soon result in rebellion, and thus setting in motion all the troubles and problems that are now upon us ?
This would make God guilty of knowingly setting in motion the "woes" upon all of mankind. If a doctor knowingly gave you a prescription that would be harmful, what would you do ? It can certain that you would seek damages. However, if the doctor gave a proper prescription, but the instructions were not followed, and a serious problem arose, then who is to blame ?
King Solomon wrote: "See! This only I have found, that the true God made mankind upright, but they themselves have sought out many plans.”(Ecc 7:29) God made man "upright" or perfect in the beginning, and hence he needed not to use his power of foreknowledge to see if they would be faithful. The test involving the "tree of knowledge of good and bad" would prove that, but would have been worthless had God already known that they would fail this test.
Why put the "tree of life" in the Garden of Eden, along with the "tree of knowledge of good and bad", if indeed God foreknew that they would sin ? This would be no different than if a construction engineer knowingly used inferior materials or techniques to build a bridge, fully aware that it was just a matter of time before it collapsed, and bringing death with it. A test is provided by a teacher to see if a student can pass it, not to watch him fail.
Solomon brought out clearly that man's problems are of his own doings, seeking "out many plans" contrary to God's loving direction, as Adam did. If a mechanic installs a quality part on a car, he has every right to believe that it will function as designed. However, if the owner of the car abuses the vehicle, then who is to blame if it fails ? Hence, God selectively uses his power of foreknowledge to fulfill his everlasting purpose, as he chooses and not as mankind feels he needs to.
Similarly, if, in certain respects, God chooses to exercise his infinite ability of foreknowledge in a selective way and to the degree that pleases him, then assuredly no human or angel can rightly say: “What are you doing?” (Job 9:12; Isa 45:9; Dan 4:35) It is therefore not a question of ability, what God can foresee, foreknow, and foreordain, for “with God all things are possible.” (Matt 19:26) The question is what God sees fit to foresee, foreknow, and foreordain, for “everything that he delighted to do he has done.”(Ps 115:3)
This would make God guilty of knowingly setting in motion the "woes" upon all of mankind. If a doctor knowingly gave you a prescription that would be harmful, what would you do ? It can certain that you would seek damages. However, if the doctor gave a proper prescription, but the instructions were not followed, and a serious problem arose, then who is to blame ?
King Solomon wrote: "See! This only I have found, that the true God made mankind upright, but they themselves have sought out many plans.”(Ecc 7:29) God made man "upright" or perfect in the beginning, and hence he needed not to use his power of foreknowledge to see if they would be faithful. The test involving the "tree of knowledge of good and bad" would prove that, but would have been worthless had God already known that they would fail this test.
Why put the "tree of life" in the Garden of Eden, along with the "tree of knowledge of good and bad", if indeed God foreknew that they would sin ? This would be no different than if a construction engineer knowingly used inferior materials or techniques to build a bridge, fully aware that it was just a matter of time before it collapsed, and bringing death with it. A test is provided by a teacher to see if a student can pass it, not to watch him fail.
Solomon brought out clearly that man's problems are of his own doings, seeking "out many plans" contrary to God's loving direction, as Adam did. If a mechanic installs a quality part on a car, he has every right to believe that it will function as designed. However, if the owner of the car abuses the vehicle, then who is to blame if it fails ? Hence, God selectively uses his power of foreknowledge to fulfill his everlasting purpose, as he chooses and not as mankind feels he needs to.
Similarly, if, in certain respects, God chooses to exercise his infinite ability of foreknowledge in a selective way and to the degree that pleases him, then assuredly no human or angel can rightly say: “What are you doing?” (Job 9:12; Isa 45:9; Dan 4:35) It is therefore not a question of ability, what God can foresee, foreknow, and foreordain, for “with God all things are possible.” (Matt 19:26) The question is what God sees fit to foresee, foreknow, and foreordain, for “everything that he delighted to do he has done.”(Ps 115:3)
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God does indeed know the beginning and the end and all inbetween.
GOd makes us and gives us free will. if GOd decided no to make us just because he knew we would fall then there would be no real free choice.
God knows all things. Man had free choice becasue GOd loves us and he wants us to love him back. real love is not forced but given by choice.
did man fall? yes
did God know we would? Yes
who fell we did and we did not have to therfore it is on our head not Gods. ours.
GOd makes us and gives us free will. if GOd decided no to make us just because he knew we would fall then there would be no real free choice.
God knows all things. Man had free choice becasue GOd loves us and he wants us to love him back. real love is not forced but given by choice.
did man fall? yes
did God know we would? Yes
who fell we did and we did not have to therfore it is on our head not Gods. ours.
SpiritLedEd
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Is there anything God does not know?
I have to change my position on the issue raised by this thread. I originally stood opposed to the idea that God could repent. But, upon further reading of Scripture in my NIV Study Bible, I came upon the following study notes for Jer 18:7-10 NIV: "The Lord retains the right of limiting His own absolute soverignty on the basis of human response to His offers. God, who Himself does not change, nevertheless will change His response to people depending on what they do."
SLE
I have to change my position on the issue raised by this thread. I originally stood opposed to the idea that God could repent. But, upon further reading of Scripture in my NIV Study Bible, I came upon the following study notes for Jer 18:7-10 NIV: "The Lord retains the right of limiting His own absolute soverignty on the basis of human response to His offers. God, who Himself does not change, nevertheless will change His response to people depending on what they do."
SLE
StopPolloition
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Your ENTIRE post is ridiculous. You can go to another mechanic or use another engineer or hold to task the ones you've chosen. Who can do this with God? God is sovereign and answers to no one. Further, if a mechanic or an engineer were prescient, they'd be more than men. For your argument to make sense, the mechanic or the engineer would have to be God. Short of this it falls flat on its face.
RJ
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Your diatrabe is baseless,false, and terribly misleading to others that are here seeking truth!
RJ
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This should have NO reflection on God being Omniscient!
RJ
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Is there anything that God does not know? - <!-- status icon and date --><!-- status icon and date -->12-23-09, 05:25 AM <!-- / status icon and date -->
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<!-- message -->???Is there anything that God does not know???
The above was the original thread. Then this grew into a discussion of whether God chooses not to know. As an example He choose not to know what an outcome was like; Adam choosing the apple and Abraham deciding to sacrifice his son. Most, through the thread agree that God is Omniscient and therefore fully knew what Adam and Abraham would do before they did it! One particular thread disagrees and states that God choose not to know these outcomes.
shipwrecksoul
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Everything
God knows whats under the stone outside. He knows about little jimmy running. He knows of the man put in prison for life. He knows about the guy in the hospital breathing his last breath.
He knows you and he knows me inside out.
God knows everything!
The fact of the matter is are you known of God. Are you born again. This is the real issue for one to begin to understand who God is. Jesus knows everything!
God knows whats under the stone outside. He knows about little jimmy running. He knows of the man put in prison for life. He knows about the guy in the hospital breathing his last breath.
He knows you and he knows me inside out.
God knows everything!
The fact of the matter is are you known of God. Are you born again. This is the real issue for one to begin to understand who God is. Jesus knows everything!
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StopPolloition
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I think you hit the nail right on the head. I'm sure there will be further discussion, but I don't believe that any more need be said after this. Well said. :shade:
RJ
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Of course, being "Born Again" is of the most importantance and the center of our affection for God and his calling to use to witness to others!
NY Believer
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God doesn't know how to lie, be unjust, or hate his children.
