JW Burgeson wrote:
> Glenn wrote, in art: " I am using Ugaboogah to illustrate that if the
> theology/requirements of Ugaboogah are mutually incompatible with the
> theology/requirements of Jehovah, then they can no more be the same god any
> more than Zeus and Jehovah are the same."
>
> Yeah -- I understand that. The problem I have is that all of us worship a
> god who is "just a little bit different" than the one our neighbor worships.
> That is because we all "see through a glass, darkly."
>
> Among the liberal Presbyterians at my church, Montview Blvd in Denver, I
> know that I perceive God in some ways -- perhaps many ways -- differently
> than they do. They are still my kinfolk in Christ.
>
> Among the conservative Presbyterians at my home church in Durango, the same
> statement applies.
>
> And when I worship with my son, a Southern Baptist minster in West Texas, or
> my brother, a Lutheran pastor in Ohio, the same statement applies.
>
> The relationship with Christ is what matters, not the doctrines, the
> understandings.
>
> You made up "Ugaboobah" and you are entitled to define him as you wish.
> That Ugaboobah is not "God" is evident from your definition. My question is
> "how far off from the "true view of God" can we be? I don't know the answer
> to this, and I am sure scholars differ.
>
> What we all do is make models of God. What we ought not do is worship those
> models.
Burgy -
I think there is a good deal in common between what you are
saying & the
point that Glenn is making if one emphasizes the phrases "in Christ" and "the
relationship with Christ" in your post. At least when I use phrases like that
they are connected with the belief that the true character of God is
revealed in
Christ. I.e., our relationship with Christ is not simply that of students to a
teacher & being in Christ is not just a designation for our
particular religious
group. If the one who encounters us distinctively in Christ is God the we have
some criterion by which we can decide whether or not some other claimant to
deity is the same as the God Christians trust in & worship.
Now of course there are different ways of reading the New Testament
portrayals of Christ so there will still be differences among Christians about
just what the character of God revelaed in him is. But those
portrayals are not
infinitely elastic. And there are different models of how God is present in
Christ - i.e., different christologies and doctrines of the Trinity.
But again,
not anything goes. E.g., the gnostic models in which the Father who sends
Christ into the world is not the creator - i.e., the God of the OT - can be
rejected.
(& in fact I'm implicitly assuming that the Gods of the OT & of the NT
can be identified when I express agreement with Glenn on this point: When one
speaks of Jesus, one speaks of Jehovah.)
Shalom,
George
George L. Murphy
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
"The Science-Theology Interface"
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