Psalm 19 certainly confirms what Beth Ellen is saying!
Psalm 19 begins in the following way:
1. The heavens are telling the glory of God;
and the firmament proclaims his handiwork.
2. Day to day pours forth speech,
and night to night declares knowledge.
3. There is no speech, nor are their words;
their voice is not heard;
4. yet their voice goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. NRSV
Paul tells us that revelation of God through nature is unceasing and omnipresent Romans 1:20
Paul quotes a pagan poet with approval in Acts 17:28: "In
him, we live and move and have our being"
Of course in Genesis 1, we read that God speaks and things come into being, we read in Colossians 1:15-20 that Jesus Christ is the creator and the sustainer of all created being. We know that all creation was created for God's purposes etc. It stands to reason, given the abundance of Biblical texts, to see that there is a depth grammar of being consisting in the laws of nature, the structures of created beings, and even human behavior for good or ill that shows forth God's thoughts even on the natural or general level of revelation. For me, everything that is that exists in whatever way, other than God depends on God for existence at every time t that it exists. I have an argument in S5 modal logic that shows that the affirmation of the existence of any contingent being and the denial of the non-contingent being God generates a logical contradiction! So, God, as I understand and experience reveals Himself in every thing at every time and in every place! In regard to born again people, I believe that He unceasingly reveals Himself to them in manifold ways and one of our jobs, as it were, is to learn how to receive His communications in the many modes by which He communicates to us, in our hearts, minds, through other people, events etc.
All of this is speech! Even wordless events are speech from Him that are causal effects of His Eternal Decree!
I am working on a three volume work called "Existential foundations: Being, Knowing, and Doing. These thoughts will be elaborated and extended there. I have a 500 page draft on the Being volume and I am beginning work on Knowing and Doing this academic year.
Feel free to criticise, object, provide evidence against my claims. All of that would help sharpen my thought and vision!!!!
Beth Ellen keep sharing your thoughts! I think you have exciting thoughts and please continue to share!
Your brother in Christ,
Jon
Stephen Shields wrote:
Beth Ellen wrote:
“This excerpt (dialogue) was very helpful. I appreciate the balanced view on
pomo attributes. You sure have a nice handle on this topic!”
It was helpful to try to summarize in just a few sentences.Thank you for your gracious comments.Surely my insight is also the reflection of the insights many have shared here!
“On the topic of "words". I immediately thought of the Decalogue and the
command to not take the LORD'S name in vain. Interestingly it his name that
makes him known. I think it can be inferred from this that God makes his
name known in the things that are made. Are we not constantly in
"revelation"? Kind of like a constant stream of "The WORD"? Basically we
should not take lightlessly or thoughtlessly The WORD or "words" that are
spoken. I am not making an equivication here between WORD and word but
mainly emphasizing the revelatory mode of words. Man's dignity is tied in
with words. Man as rational (broadly understood) is the basis of his
dignity. We need to listen.”
Good thoughts, Beth Ellen; I’m looking forward to hearing jon gold’s comments!
Stephen Shields
stephen@...
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