A Definition of God

A Definition of God

From the time of Plato there have been many attempts to define the term “god” as a way of understanding faith. In Plato’s “Republic” he seemed to imply by definition one god who was from the beginning creator, source of good and justice on an ideal plane. For the Greeks who believed in a great many gods that revelation started a long philosophical discussion.

“God is that being which there can be no greater than.”

That statement is often called an ontological proof of god. Given that there are beings – some greater than others – then the greatest has to be god. There for god could not be born or created or destroyed by any other. There can be by this definition only one god.

This provides a good start for a discussion on theology. How do we talk about god in the most basic sense no matter what our religion might say.

In These Trying TImes

In over 40 years of ministry I have noticed that when people’s lives are under stress from work or other uncontrollable events that they look for places where they can have some control and vent their frustrations. Today we are under a lot of economic stress across the strata of our society. Even people who have jobs are worried about loosing them. The rich are getting a lot richer and the poor are growing in number. The gap between rich and poor is widening.

There are two places where people under stress vent their frustrations. The first is often in the family where more abuse of spouse, children and elderly are on the increase. The second is in volunteer organizations like clubs and church. I have often watched as someone disrupts a church board or committee meeting seemingly without cause. It is all about exerting some control some where. Many church pastors have been attacked simply because some one was venting frustrations in the only place they can.

Being a Pastor in these troubled times takes a lot of prayer.

Question Everything

When ever I start a new Bible Study Class I encourage them to ask questions. I tell them that the only “dumb” question is the one you have and do not ask. We learn best when we ask questions and we should question everything.

I recently finished a book by Karen Armstrong titled “The Great Transformation – The beginning of our religious traditions” and was flooded with questions. She covered religious and political events in four areas during what she calls “The Axial Age” dating from the ninth century BC to the fifth century AD. The areas are China, India, the Middle East and Greece.

One big question she raised is how do we define the term god? This is a real question about a basic definition – of the term not a particular deity. So I ask you what is your definition of god – little g - ??? leave a comment with yours.

The Father of Geology

Today I finished a book called ""The Map That Changed the World” by Simon Winchester. It is an excellent Story about William Smith and the birth of modern Geoglogy.

William Smith was not of noble birth or well educated but we was brilante when it came to observation and conclusions. He taught himself about rocks and fossiles befor it became popular. He figured out that older rock strata was on the bottom and each strata occurred in the same order through out England and perhaps around the world.

He single handlely conceived and published a hand-painted a geological map of England that was eight feet tall and six fee wide. It was he first of its kind.

Late in life he was recognized as the “Father of Geology” and was given great honors that he rightly deserved.

I highly recommend reading this book – Awesome!

Migration

My dad always combed his hair straight back. I never thought all that much about it as it was just his style.

During the last decade of my life physical changes have been under way. One of these changes is that hair folicals have been deserting the top of my head where they are needed and moving to other areas of my body where they are not needed. This leaves the top of my head thin and gaining the look of a comb over even though I come it the same was as always.

I say all this because I went to a stylist to change my hair style. You guessed it she combed it straight back. When I looked in the mirror I was in shock. There was my father starring back at me in the mirror. I went back to combing my hair the way I always have.

Going Green in my Email

This came in my email

In the line at the store, the cashier told an older woman that she should  bring her own grocery bags because plastic bags weren't good for the environment.

The woman apologized to him and explained, "We didn't have the green  thing back in my day."
 The clerk responded, "That's our problem today. Your generation did not care enough to save our environment."

He was right -- our generation didn't have the green thing in its day.

Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over. So they really were recycled.

But we didn't have the green thing back in our day.

We walked up stairs, because we didn't have an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks.

But she was right. We didn't have the green thing in our day.

Back then, we washed the baby's diapers because we didn't have the throw-away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy gobbling machine burning up 220 volts -- wind and solar power really did dry the clothes.
Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing.

But that old lady is right; we didn't have the green thing back in our day.

Back then, we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of the state of Montana .
In the kitchen, we blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us.
When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used a wadded up old newspaper to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap.
Back then, we didn't fire up an engine and burn gasoline just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power. We exercised by working so we didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity.

 But she's right; we didn't have the green thing back then.

We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the razor blades in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull.

 But we didn't have the green thing back then.

Back then, people took the streetcar or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a 24-hour taxi service.
We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 2,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest pizza joint.

But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn't have the green thing back then?

Does God Exist?

I watched the Discovery Chanel last night dealing with the question “Does God exist” based on Professor Stephen Hawking’s  statement that God does not exist. Theoretical physicist, Professor Stephen W. Hawking has stated that based on his considerable knowledge of the laws of physics, time itself did not exist before the “Big Bang.” He then jumps from physics to theology and says that because time did not exist therefore God did not exist and could not have created the universe.

That show was followed by a show called “Curiosity” with other physicist debating the many sides of that question. Some disagreed with Hawking’s theory of time not existing. The question about the existence of God has been a long standing debate in the world of physicist. Was there are creation event caused by God or did it just happen?

Professor Hawking started with the assumption that there is no god and set out to prove it with science. Theologians start with the assumption that there is God and will accept no proof to the contrary. It is a debate between physical understanding that demands cause and effect testable proofs and the spiritual understanding that need no physical proof but relies on the relationship of our spirits with the holy spirit.

In case you haven’t guessed I do not agree with professor Hawking on this issue.