h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I have one simple question for all the Christians in this Forum...

Was God really man enough to die for us?

For the past six years I have been devoted to the Church and to God, but of recent times I have begun to question things somewhat. I understand what most of you will say, but I must ask again. Was God man enough to understand what we went through, to be able to be tempted like we are apparently tempted?

Indeed, God always knew he would rise from the dead. Always knew that he could not be tempted by the Devil. Not really. Do we know that we cannot be tempted, do we know that we will live even after our deaths? Many issue is simple. We do not know, God did. Therefore God was never man enough to die as one of us, in out sted.

Comments please.

andie. you know as well as i HE was completely human. tempted in EVERY way.

But that is the thing... I do not KNOW, and neither can anybody. It makes no sense. Fully God yet fully man....

Someone who is fully man would be tempted, would yeild to it. And someone fully God could never understand temptation. It would never really be there for them. Sure, someone could tempt them, but the possibility of them yeilding was never there. Therefore, for them, the temptation was never there.

Hence he cannot relate to us...

"Someone who is fully man would be tempted, would yeild to it. And someone fully God could never understand temptation. It would never really be there for them. Sure, someone could tempt them, but the possibility of them yeilding was never there. Therefore, for them, the temptation was never there.

Hence he cannot relate to us... "

Um, I believe you've made some faulty assumptions.... #1, have you, as a human being, ever been tempted and not yeilded to it? I would hope the answer's yes. #2, why do you say someone who was fully God couldn't understand temptation? I don't understand that at all. God would have to understand temptation more than anyone or anything else in all the universe (and whatever's beyond it) ever could. That's one of the attributes of an omnipotent, omnipresent, and all seeing God. (of course, if you don't believe in that, then I can see where you're coming from... but that *is* what the Christian God is...).

Strangely enough, with those faulty assumptions, you've come to some right conclusions. The possiblity of God being tempted is real and has happened. (just look at Jesus-- the 40 days in the desert, Gesthemane). However, what you say about temptation never being there only because God never yeilding to it doesn't seem to make sense. Again, use the example of yourself-- just because you didn't yeild to a temptation, does that mean it never existed?

Therefore, your conclusion is false. Sorry. *hopeful grin*

~Amy †

*L* No need to apologise, I am just simply getting some views on what has become a big issue with me.

Actually, from July 1993 to November 1999 I was a Christian, so I know exactly where you are coming from. But for a long time I have been having these kind of questions rolling around in my mind, however I could never quite figure out what exactly the point of the questions were. They were all in my head, but a wee bit hazy. After reading Anne Rice's "Memnoch The Devil" I realised that the questions that Lestat had for the Devil, and the questions the Devil had for God, were the same questions going around in my head.

Yes, I have been tempted and I have given into temptation - to use the Christian idioms. But God has not. Sure, according to the Bible, God as a "man" was tempted, but he did not give in to it. Now giving in to the "temptation" around us is a part of what makes us human. Our failures as well as our successes define our humanity. God had none of these. He never gave in to the temptation, so how can he possibly "know" what it is to fail? Of course he can "understand"... heck there are things we do not know but can understand.

Yes, I am attributing human values and thoughts to God, but that is all I have to go by. Surely God would expect us to view him in such a way. How else can we view him? To accept that God "has" to understand is folly... I mean, why does he have to understand? By our own human mindsets we assume that God must know everything to be God. But what if it is our reasoning that is faulty?

I just cannot buy into the opinion that God relates to our sufferings - thus he could not possibly die for our sins. Sins he could never possibly understand, according to the Christian view of the Almighty God!

As a bonus question I ask: Since God knew that he would be raised from the dead, was always in touch with his divinity, how could he die as one of us? We have no such divinity to get in touch with, no 100% proof that we will survive our deaths.

all the best....

"Now giving in to the "temptation" around us is a part of what makes us human. Our failures as well as our successes define our humanity." -- question-- do they? This is totally off topic, but I always thought that our ability to overcome such faliures (and the egoisms of) successes was what defined our humanity...

Another step off topic- " heck there are things we do not know but can understand. " I believe you have this backwards. How could one possibly understand something that they don't know? Unless you're talking about something like... wait, no, that doesn't work. There are plenty of things that I do not understand (and do not want to understand) but I know to be true.

Back to topic. hehehe. ok. "I just cannot buy into the opinion that God relates to our sufferings - thus he could not possibly die for our sins." These two things, of course, are related, but do not create, as mathematicians say, a biconditional. (you know... a requires b to happen, and b requires a to happen) Christ died for our sins because He loved us, not because He understood our sufferings. As a result of His living with humans and experiencing human life and yes, being human, He experienced everything that we do. I don't know how else to explain that. Except, perhaps, if you realize that God exists in infinate dimensions and we only exist in four. In infinate dimensions it would have to be possible to be more than one thing-- be both human and God at the same time. And, it would be possible for someone to understand something and relate to it without actually experiencing it. I hope you understand what I'm getting at...

As for your bonus question... (the part about us not being 100% sure that we will survive our deaths) I read this in one of the other H2G2 Christian Forums about the scientist Pascal... well, lemme just quote you what Gwen said... "On night, at dinner, Pascal - yes, the scientist Psacal - who was an ardent Christian was seated next to an athiest. When asked why he believed in God, Pascal responded that he liked to play it safe. If the atheist was correct and there was nothing after death, then Pascal had lost nothing for his faith. If, however, there was a God and life after death - both in whatever forms you see fit - then Pascal had won and the atheist was doomed. Either way, Pascal was none the worse for his faith and, since it brought him joy and comfort, was probably better off anyway. There's my reasoning." Perhaps in some ways, I want to be safe in either case... and never sorry. There's a CS Lewis quote that says something similiar... but I don't want this entry to go on forever, and besides, it's on my home site (which you can get to off of my h2g2 site)

I know some of my reasoning can seem rather blind... but truly, I've been asking myself many of the same questions atheists and agnostics and deists ask themselves all the time. But somehow... they have no effect on me anymore. The only thing that I've been able to come up with as a response is that there are some things that I simply know that I know that I know that I know to be true, and the existance of the Christian God is one of those things. It makes no scientific sense logically, but... faith and science have rarely been compatible.

Okay. That's all for now.

~Amy †

God not make scientific sense!? Do my ears deceive me? In truth, God made scientific sense (literally created it, that is, pun intended).

I think I meant the existance of God being proven by scientific means (more than apologia and such). I don't really even remember writing that, perhaps that's why I said that.

Ah. You brought up one of my favorite points about the existance of God: no one ever said that He couldn't use scientific ways to create the universe and what happens outside of it. Like, I have very few problems with the big bang/evoloution if one says that God directed it. Like this morning, at church, we were deeply studying parts of Genesis 2, and according to my youth group leader, the Hebrew word used in the creation of man means mud, not dust or dirt. Sounds kinda like primordial goo to me. I dunno, I just thought that was really interesting...

~Amy †

Hi.
I shouldn't have read this, and apologies for the intusion, but I noticed a reference in Amy's post to Pascal, and his Wager on God, and thought I might as well plug my entry on the subject...

It's at http://www.h2g2.com/A341920. All comments are welcome.

Right, I'll leave now before I get tempted to contribute to a thread I have no place being in...