You’re assuming that I’m talking about some sort of overt evangelizing during the the practice of medicine. I am not. In fact, I would consider it highly unethical and unprofessional for a health care provider to start evangelizing during a patient assessment.
What I’m referring to is the experience of intuition – quiet guidance from God – that takes place within one’s own inner thinking processes. It’s an internal process, not an externally revealed process.
You don’t hear your doctor rattling on out loud about every train of thought he or she has about your differential diagnosis and treatment plan. Intuition – God’s guidance – is part of what you don’t hear out loud from your doctor. So you’ll probably never know for sure which doctors trust their guidance and which doctors don’t. But just because you don’t hear about it doesn’t mean it isn’t happening.
Completely agree. It is like seasoning soup. Using reason we read the recipes, measure out and add what is called for. But in the end we taste the soup to experience the actual result. But an experienced cook will probably add a little less to start and adjust to taste.
Reason tells us theoretically what we can expect will result but feeling will either confirm or contradict that. Intuition is like feeling as you go and being open to advantageous detours.
1 Like
Klax
(The only thing that matters is faith expressed in love.)
63
If I can’t tell the difference, then it isn’t in any meaningful way.
Perhaps you meant to say it isn’t a meaningful difference to you. Surely you didn’t mean to say that you personally are the final arbiter for all human beings about which decisions are made with God’s help and which decisions aren’t?
Many human beings think they can always tell the difference. Me, I think it’s often only hindsight that lets us see God’s wisdom at work in our lives.
Klax
(The only thing that matters is faith expressed in love.)
65
No, as no one else can tell the difference either, any meaning made up is just that.
Reggie, one shouldn’t throw out one alternative as if it is the only possible answer to the ‘I am’ question: David Rohl has an interesting alternative.
“As we have learnt, Enki (“Lord of the Earth”) was called Ea in Akkadian (East Semitic)-that is to say the Babylonian tradition. Scholars have determined that Ea was vocalized as “Eya”. So, when Moses stood before the burning bush and asked the name of the god of the mountain, did he really reply “I am who I am” (Heb. Eyah asher eyah)? This puzzling phrase has long perplexed theologians but now there is a simple explanation. The voice of God simply replied “Eyah asher Eyah”-“I am (the one who is called Eyah”-the name of Ea in its West Semitic (I.e. Hebrew) form. Scholars have simply failed to recognise that this is another of those characteristic puns in which the Old Testament abounds. I am (Eyah) he who is called (asher) Ea (Eyah)” is a classic biblical play on words. It also explains God’s apparently nonsensical instruction: "This is what you are to say to the Israelites, "I am has sent me to you. God’s words should really be translated as “Eyah has sent me to you.”
“Eyah” or simply “Ya” is the hypocoristic form of the name Yahweh found as an element of so many Old Testament names. David Rohl, Legend: The Genesis of Civilization, (London: Arrow Books, 1998), p. 196-197
As I said above, I can understand that if a person hasn’t felt the nudge of intuition, that person might be suspicious about such a thing. But there are many human experiences which not everyone has. It doesn’t mean the experiences aren’t real. It just means that some people aren’t in a position to explain what the experience is like – what it feels like, how it affects their other choices and behaviours, what it teaches them, and how they are changed by it. It’s a mistake to assume that because you haven’t personally felt something then it must not be possible for anyone else.
I very much doubt that you’ve experienced what it’s like to be pregnant and deliver a baby. But the fact that you can’t have this experience doesn’t invalidate it for other people. This is one only example, but human life is filled with the narratives of individuals who went through something that can’t easily be explained by Materialist science, but which happened nonetheless. Perhaps this is because most of the universe is governed by non-Materialist quantum physics?
It’s not factually true that no one can tell the difference between decisions made with God’s help and decisions made solely by the human mind. I understand that you don’t believe it’s possible. But you’re not in a position to know the private, inner details of the relationship between other human beings and God.
Speaking for myself, some the best fun I’ve had as a human being has been prompted by the uplifting, quirky, creative whispers that come through my brain’s intuitive circuitry. God certainly seems to have a sense of humour and isn’t afraid to share it when the timing is right.
Klax
(The only thing that matters is faith expressed in love.)
68
Ms. Thomas. It’s OK. I’m OK with intuition. I’m OK with what happened in and around the incarnation. I’m OK with reaching out to God in raw, open, helpless, childlike honesty. I’ve known when I was being watched. And I was right. Spooky. From a 50 feet up in the dark. I hear bats. Still at 65. Even when they’re there! We have senses and abilities we’re not aware of. I have experienced some VERY strange things. And all but one I can rationalize. I have been blessed by strangers in extremis. I’ve had the laughter. It saved my life. We project our decent selves on God and… it’s us. It’s still OK. And God is with us in it all, Zenning back in the dark. I don’t WANT to believe more than that. That He intervenes beyond ineffably. I will not have it : ) It’s better that way. Stoical. Because otherwise is madness. For me. God be with you.
@Klax: So the manifestly human Son of God was coterminous with God the Son?
coterminous
[kōˈtərmənəs]
ADJECTIVE
having the same boundaries or extent in space, time, or meaning.
\When talking about the things of God things are usually not so simple, but here I would say the answer is Yes.
Jesus the Messiah was both human and the Third Person of the Trinity. He is both manifestly fully God and fully Human.
Klax
(The only thing that matters is faith expressed in love.)
70
Not the Second? And so once upon a time, after eternity, this infinite, changeless, inseparable Person of three, reduced to a human ovum once and for all future eternal and infinite creation of beings like us?
God is not God because God is Infinite and thus Absolute God is God because God is Good, Free, and Loving. God found a way in God’s Goodness, Freedom, and Love to allow humans to be Free, and Loving so we can be Good in communion with God.
Thank you, Jesus, that God is not Absolute.
Klax
(The only thing that matters is faith expressed in love.)
72