the name of god - YHWH
in speaking about naming & de-naming god at ncyc - that is that the name of god is so beyond our notions that in many ways it can't be captured and needs more words and more experiences to ever possibly attempt to qualify or quantify - Pete Rollins gave us this little perla!
"its not that you can't say that god is speaking to me, its just you always can say 'i think god is saying this, but it could have been the cheese i ate last night'. And thats very important - its that second statement thats vital, thats what i miss, thats what i'm repentant of."
posted by dw at 12:41 PM
3 Comments:
A problem I have with this is, if you're always second guessing the call of God as "the cheese I ate last night" how are you every going
to be able to respond to that call adequately?
As for not being able to capture, qualify or quantify God, and needing more words and experieces to do so, I thought the Christian belief that God is made known in Jesus Christ through the words of the Gospels should be sufficient for the Christian to know God (Not forgetting the role of prayer (in its various forms}, worship, holy communion, but of course based on and put one in touch with the Jesus of the Gospels so I probably didn't even need to mention it.
Granted, many people's lives have been consumed writing about Him and his historical and cultural significance for humanity over many centuries, some of which I've
red or attempted to read anyway, but isn't this just to make clear again the Jesus of the Gospels, whos image may be clouded by history, changes in our society and
our expanding knowledge of the world\universe?
I think what I'm saying is that if you talk about God in this way you don't leave people with much. A God who is incomprehensible and inaccessable, the God of scientists
or philosophers, an abstract concept in the mind is not the God
Christians believe in or at least struggle to :)
Was I mistaken in seeing an article on Pete Rollins blog that defended Creationism? It was around one am that I went there (or at least I think I went there) so I can't be sure. :)
interesting conclusions. unfortunately i think you may have made a few assumptions both on christian belief and my post
if you would like a serious answer i would suggest that:
1. second guessing is far from whats happening - the cheese is being open to discernment
2. I find the inexpressibility of god much more immanent and saturating than being incomprehensible and inaccessible as you suggest. One of Pete's premises is that we know god's immanence through god's transcendence and vice versa...
3. read pete's book - i can't do it justice
Interesting to know.
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