The opposite of rational isn’t just irrational but a-rational, without rational reason. There is no rational requirement for God. Nature is sufficient. If we nonetheless posit God, the only justification for doing so being Jesus, we must be rational either side. Rationality is prevenient of God.
That’s pretty funny. If he wasn’t (as in nonexistent), you would be, too. There is nothing that is pre-God, anyway. He is omnitemporal.
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Then Job replied to the Lord:
2 “I know that you can do all things;
no purpose of yours can be thwarted.
3 You asked, ‘Who is this that obscures my plans without knowledge?’
Surely I spoke of things I did not understand,
things too wonderful for me to know.
4 “You said, ‘Listen now, and I will speak;
I will question you,
and you shall answer me.’
5 My ears had heard of you
but now my eyes have seen you.
6 Therefore I despise myself
and repent in dust and ashes.”
Grandma, who lost her young daughter, Crystal, before whom an angel appeared to transfer her from her bedroom to paradise, “lived” in Job as Crytsral became more and more consumed by the disease. She would raise her hand up to the sky with the most beautiful tear filled and joyous look on her face and begin to say, “He Was There! I know it was Him. He came for Crystal. He allowed her to see an angel just before she left. It was Him in that room. I tell you, this God of ours is the most wonderful, the most mysterious, the most loyal companion and friend. He was there and Crystal knew. Crystal knew and she tried to tell me, but I had no idea. But it was God Himself in that room. O Glory to God. Glory, Glory, Glory. He heals the broken hearted.” (She couldn’t stop. Louder and louder.) “O Glory to God. He was there for little Crystal just as He promised He would be and she saw his angel. I spent hours and days in Job. And God taught me lessons. Yes he did. He sustained me. I couldn’t do anything to stop her from failing. Job suffered terribly, too, but God came through, He came for Crystal and He will never forsake us or leave us. If we stay true. In the end God taught Job how great He is and He blessed him. O Glory. Glory to God.”
No one had a dry eye. She was softspoken, gracious, always working, folding laundry, washing/drying dishes, cooking and on occassion when we would talk about the Lord (I was a babe in Christ and had an endless supply of questions. I never had anyone to talk to like her. She would always listen. She took me into her heart as if I was her own.) She would get tickled–that’s what they called it–and she would end up shouting praises to Jesus. So sincere. So precious. So real. So true. Not an ounce of guile or showiness. We all cried. Grandma, I know you are in heaven. Do you remember our times together, Grandma? Can you see and hear us from heaven? I want to make it home Grandma. I’m trying my best. I want to see that other land.
Sorry about being so slow in responding but I was thinking about consciousness in a more general, less personal sense. I was trying to imagine how the consciousness that manifests in my life might exist after the death of my body, something that has always struck me as unimaginable. But you seem indeed to be going strong at 72, an age I’m a few years shy of but which my wife passed several years ago.
Hi Mark.
I think that there is consciousness in a more general sense. We ourselves are conscious being so this is personal consciousness and it surpasses death so we never really die. We only shed the physical garment. I guess that is probably why you find death unimaginable.
I believe that all of creation is animated and given life by God by upholding the relevant information, which creates each being and the Universe, in the Divine Consciousness. So this is, in a sense a general consciousness.
Dear friend,
It’s been a while since we have spoken. Jesus, His existence, His works, His ministry, His death, and His resurrection, are all a Christian needs to believe.
It’s well-established in academia that Jesus is a historical figure. Few question it–fringe positions like those of Richard Carrier are about the same in the world of historical academia as YEC in the scientific community. With this in mind, let us consider that the Jews of Jesus’ day had seen many Messianic figures. They died, and their movements died with them. This is known. And why should it be any other way? The Jews of Jesus’ day expected a Messiah who would bring them a political revolution, a political kingdom. They had no reason to expect Him to bring a spiritual revolution, a spiritual kingdom, nor did they expect Him to come back from the dead–because the Messiah wasn’t supposed to die.
Yet this Jesus came. And He did die. Yet…His movement did not. The Jews who followed Him changed. They changed what they believed about the Messiah, about the resurrection, and the Church was born. Why did they change? What good reason did they have to believe that Jesus was raised to life? They weren’t expecting that from the Messiah. Did the apostles make it all up? If Jesus’ body was in the tomb, why didn’t His movement die? It would surely have been easy to say, “No, His body is in there and He is dead. Sorry for you.” Maybe a spiritual resurrection, then?
Well, that doesn’t work either. We know that it wouldn’t have been a spiritual resurrection that they were claiming–the physical body is of great value, generally speaking, in Jewish thought, unlike in Gnostic or other thought. It’s not something to be discarded, nor is it a prison for the spirit. Did they steal His body? And if they did, how is it that they went to death for that lie? How is it that other believers witnessed the risen Jesus? Were they all just crazy from grief? It might be a big claim to say that Jesus came back from the dead, but it seems a pretty big claim to also say that everyone either lied or hallucinated about Jesus.
And what good reason did a persecutor of the Christians, Paul, have to claim that Jesus had appeared to him, that he became a Christian himself? Cognitive dissonance? Hallucinations because he was crazy? The writings that are taken to be Paul’s even by the most skeptical of people do not suggest a man out of his wits or crippled by mental disability. Paul had an experience. The other apostles had an experience. Many disciples had an experience. What are we to make of all this?
You once said in a post regarding all of this, “Something happened.” I agree. Something happened. Can we know for absolute certain? No, of course not. That’s kind of what faith is all about, and Jesus makes it clear when He tells Thomas, “You believe because you have seen, blessed are those who have not seen and yet believed.”
You have not yet seen. But believe nonetheless. And say to the Lord every day, “Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief.”
Go well and in peace, my friend. May we meet in person when we are both restored to life…
With love and care in my heart,
-Joshua W.
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From the POV of pan psychism that is true but since God and the cosmos are inseparable from that point of view the G word isn’t especially important.
I’ve long thought that if there was any continuation after death it wouldn’t be what sets us apart as individuals which went on. Makes me wonder if, for those who have looked into panpsychism more than I, concepts of what sets God apart from the cosmos are also seen as transient.
Panpsychism reminds me of the New Age woo that was big in the 1980s. No scientific foundation. But of course, anyone who has not experienced it for themselves could say the same thing about God’s providence, no matter how much personal meaning is infused into someone else’s life by multiple sequential and nested sets of ‘coincidences’ within brief periods of time.
My most frequent prayer Joshua.
Mine and many others I know. Many. We realise that it doesn’t matter and that we must be kind anyway, due to the power, the truth of the Jesus story, whether it’s true or not.
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I think the assertion about no need for God is sufficient for a separate post
I’d say, the longer I live the more aware I become of the presence and contribution of something more beyond my own ruminations and intentions working in my life. Had I been raised to call that something more God/Jesus I’m sure I would, like you, become ever more confirmed in my faith commitments. But since I don’t name it and don’t expect to learn of it in historic records of what others have thought and experienced, I just become more confident that this mystery is important and worth making room for. For those brought up in Christianity I suspect the stories of the Bible provide an Iconography for interpreting the activity of the mystery in our lives. Maybe that is an advantage. But given that I’m this far along in my journey I intend to go along noting its manifestations in my live on its own terms without presuppositions.
For what it is worth, while I don’t call it God I don’t think there is any harm in doing so and there may in fact be an advantage for those who do.
That is very nice and condescending of you, your not having experienced the reality. You obviously did not get far reading George Müller or about him.
I was raised with information about God and Jesus but it wasn’t until God showed me how wicked I was that I called out to God. At that point it wasn’t the information that was told to me when I was young that made me believe, it was my encounter with the Father and the Son that delivered me from my wickedness. It was after the Spirit of God entered me that I became aware of how He caused the change from a lover of self and wickedness to a lover of righteousness to happen. How could I, a lover of self and sin change on my own? I couldn’t. I was a slave to them. But what I could not do, God did by uniting me to Jesus. Through Jesus death to sin, I died to its mastery over me. Through Jesus resurrection, I was literally raise up from the nature of spiritual death and made alive in Christ. He freed me from what I was unable to free myself from. Now Christ lives in me, delivering me daily from temptation. That is the power of God in those who trust, rely, and lean on Him.
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Actually, I should thank for your condescension. It prompted me to learn a couple of things accidentally:
Wondering what other synonyms there were for it besides ‘patronizing’, my wife and I, loving Britishisms, had a chuckle over ‘toffee-nosed’. 
The other was the discovery of this NGO, continuing his work with his name: Müllers.org.
If you want to be a patron, they might be worthy.
Thanks for the thoughts Mark. The “It” generally has a male pronoun. At any rate, the other post-er brought up a subject that could be a whole discussion of its own. Your topic, which is also a great one, invites musings on an aspect of the Baby Boom Generation’s new reality — that is, “all things must pass” --and how that impacts Christians differently (if it does) than it affects others.
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Please start one. Metaphysical naturalism, the default, means that.
It just means that legitimate testimony is denied.
Disappointing that anyone would feel that merely holding a different opinion would be felt as condescending by anyone. I appreciate the grace demonstrated by everyone else who has responded to this thread. Dale, if you have more to say to me I’ll give it a look in two weeks. I understand that the feelings you express are absolutely real, however I’m not responsible for them and I’d rather take a break than lose patience altogether.
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And I always appreciate your feedback. I think I’ve been addressing God as He when a pronoun is needed. When addressing the mystery which I think is associated with God belief I generally use “it”. It isn’t clear to me whether using a capitalized and gendered pronoun in those cases is actually less respectful by assuming an equivalence which only I feel is there. Tricky territory.