Inbox: The Questions of Young Jesus

My Christmas present this year from an old friend and mentor was not quite a lump of coal in my stocking, more like a hot potato bouncing from palm to palm to avoid getting singed. He responded to last week’s Anonymous Asks post (subtitled “If Jesus was/is omniscient, why did he ask questions?”) with this query: “What about the questions He asked as a boy (Lk 2:46). Did He know the answers or did He learn?”

I believe the correct theological rejoinder is “Aaargh!”

Divine Multi-Tasking

A teacher once told me about a student who couldn’t walk and chew gum at the same time. He didn’t mean it literally, of course; it was a comment on the student’s intelligence. We assume the smarter a person is, the more things they are capable of doing at the same time.

A juggler keeps multiple balls in the air simultaneously. It can be impressive to watch a skilled multi-tasker at work. But human beings have upper limits on our juggling ability. The maximum number of items ever juggled is either 13 or 14, depending on who you believe. The case has been made that the laws of physics make juggling 15 items impossible. At least, nobody alive can do it.

Inbox: Qualified Omniscience

Qman points out that we have a pachyderm on the premises:

“The word of the Lord came to Samuel: ‘I regret that I have made Saul king, for he has turned back from following me and has not performed my commandments.’ ”

“It is apparent this type of statement does not present a problem to you but it might to the newcomer. It seems to contradict or at least not explain the presumption or notion of God’s omniscience. How can God regret something that he is, by definition, aware of from the beginning?”

Q’s email arrived just as I was sitting down to pick out a topic for today’s post. We may have to change his name to “On-Cue Man”. There’s more to his missive, including thoughts-in-progress about how such a conundrum might be resolved, which you can find here, at the original post.

Anonymous Asks (43)

“Does God know what we will do?”

More than a few Christians have a strong aversion to neo-Calvinist determinism. They don’t agree with the teaching that God micromanages the universe, controlling and pre-arranging everything that happens within it, including the choices made by all created beings.

I don’t blame them. I don’t like that idea much either, and I don’t think it’s an accurate representation of what the Bible teaches about either God’s sovereignty or human choice. Giving us a Bible full of commands seems an unlikely thing for God to have done if our responses to him are all predetermined.

The Divine Memory

“I will not remember your sins.”

Some people teach that God’s knowledge is limited. They rely on verses like the one I have just quoted to make the case that there are boundaries to the Infinite, self-imposed or otherwise.

We may disagree with them, but they bring up a point worth examining, and that is this: What does it mean that God does not “remember” the sins of his people?

After all, it’s a promise, and we know we can put our confidence in God’s promises. That being the case, we might be wise to figure out what exactly it is that God is promising.

Exam Return

I walked by a box in a college foyer last week on which was marked the words “Exam Return”.

A little earlier I had been listening to a meditation on the way the Lord Jesus communicated truth to his disciples. On a number of occasions the speaker recognized in the Lord’s technique what he called the “Teach-Test” method, and gave a few examples that seemed to bear out what he was saying.

Good enough so far.

Exam Return

The most current version of this post is available here.