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I am a born-again Christian, who is Reformed, but also charismatic, spiritually speaking. (I do not speak in tongues, but I believe glossalalia is a bona fide gift not given to all, and not as great as prophecy, for example.) I have several years of college education but only completed a two-year degree. I was raised Lutheran and confirmed, but I didn't "find Christ" until I was in the Army and responded to a Billy Graham crusade in 1973. I was mentored or discipled by the Navigators in the army and upon discharge joined several evangelical, Bible-teaching churches. I was baptized as an infant, but believe in believer baptism, of which I was a partaker after my conversion experience. I believe in the "5 Onlys" of the reformation: sola fide (faith alone); sola Scriptura (Scripture alone); soli Christo (Christ alone), sola gratia (grace alone), and soli Deo gloria (to God alone be the glory). I affirm TULIP as defended in the Reformation.. I affirm most of The Westminster Confession of Faith, especially pertaining to Providence.

Friday, May 28, 2021

Is God Beyond Existence?


I’m not quite sure what you mean by “beyond,” but God is above and beyond; He is both transcendent or other-worldly and immanent or nearby and close at hand or His everywhere-ness or ubiquity or omnipresence is obvious. He is God nearby and far away (cf. Jer. 23:23). He fills the heavens and the earth (cf. Jer. 23:24). He is also fully present everywhere and we call that His immensity. He is not far from every one of us! (cf Acts 17:27). And He indwells all believers through His Spirit. (cf. 1 Cor. 3:16). The Scriptures say the heavens cannot contain Him! (cf. 1 Kings 8:27). In Him, we live and move and have our being.” (cf. Acts 17:28).

But His existence itself is called self-existence or aseity. That means He is totally and fully complete in and of Himself needing no one or nothing besides His own self. (cf. Acts 17:25). We are dependent and contingent beings but not God. His presence is surreal in a sense because we cannot comprehend what spirit is and how He can be a Spirit (cf. John 4:24–25). “Canst thou by searching find out God?” (cf. Job 11:7).

“God is not a man,” (cf. Hosea 11:9; 1 Sam. 15:29; Num. 23:19; Job 9:32). We think of persons as having bodies but God has nobody except for in His incarnation or personification in the Personage of Christ, His only begotten Son, who is as real physically as we are; “In Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead [deity] bodily,” (cf. Col. 2:9).

God is without limit and can't be defined in terms of space, time, or dimension either for He is spirit (cf. John 4:24) without beginning or eternal. Only that which begins to exist can indwell the time-space continuum. He created that and is independent of it just like the rest of His creation. God never began to exist His name I AM says that) which proves He is not an effect, which all have beginnings, but the First Cause as Aristotle reasoned. That’s why His name can be interpreted: I CAUSE TO BE.  Soli Deo Gloria! 

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