in a box

[Guest Biblicist]

I have been accused of putting God "in a box" before and truly I have absolutly no idea what it means.

If someone could clairify that for me, I'd be eternally in your debt!

How strange that you would post this question, when I have been considering posting the same exact thing. Great minds, I guess!!

Putting God in a box means trying to put limits on Him, so we can quantify Him

Well, what do you mean by putting limits on God? You mean, by being legalistic?

[Emily~Anne]

Jackie, are you speaking more of wether or not Christians or limited to a box or if God is limited to a box?

[jackie d]

Jackie, are you speaking more of wether or not Christians or limited to a box or if God is limited to a box?

both

[Emily~Anne]

Well here's the next scripture that comes to mind:

Isaiah 55:8-9 (New International Version)

8 "For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

neither are your ways my ways,"

declares the LORD.

9 "As the heavens are higher than the earth,

so are my ways higher than your ways

and my thoughts than your thoughts.

So I'd like to ask you to elaborate on what exactly you mean by outside the box? Do you mean like for example, for a couple to cohabitate and consider themselves married in the eyes of God? I need an example before I can really share my thoughts.

The only thought I have so far is we need to really make sure we are depending on God fully and looking to his ways, not our own.

Psalm 119:15 (New International Version)

15 I meditate on your precepts

and consider your ways.

[jackie d]

Well here's the next scripture that comes to mind:

Isaiah 55:8-9 (New International Version)

8 "For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

neither are your ways my ways,"

declares the LORD.

9 "As the heavens are higher than the earth,

so are my ways higher than your ways

and my thoughts than your thoughts.

So I'd like to ask you to elaborate on what exactly you mean by outside the box? Do you mean like for example, for a couple to cohabitate and consider themselves married in the eyes of God? I need an example before I can really share my thoughts.

The only thought I have so far is we need to really make sure we are depending on God fully and looking to his ways, not our own.

Psalm 119:15 (New International Version)

15 I meditate on your precepts

and consider your ways.

no I'm not talking about living in sin or going against the precepts of God...I'm talking about people expecting me and my walk with the Lord, on an individual basis, to be wrong because it isn't like theirs. And I'm talking about assuming that because God works one way in one persons life that that is the way it will be for another's life.

We can still depend fully on God without undue expectations on each other that our lives with the Lord is going to be the same for every body.....

blessings

[Emily~Anne]

Oh, well, I know I myself I am terribly stubborn, and God never gave up on me, and well..let's just say it took alot before I finally laid everything down and surrendered to God 100%. That would be putting it mildly. It's such a long story and I wish I could sum it up in one sentence.

Now God worked through my wrong ways, and made me see the errors of my way. Though God was able to work through those ways, did not make those ways right. I now live according to God's ways and fully rely on him rather than what makes sense to me.

[Neeva Candida]

Perhaps you could eliminate some of the confusion by providing examples of things that you consider as not being absolutes.

~Neeva

[Guest Biblicist]

I googled "Don't put God in a box" and I found this site... http://str.typepad.com/weblog/2006/06/dont_put_god_in.html ....I thought it gave a pretty good explination of the term/phrase. Read the comments too, they are very...enlightening!

"Don't Put God In A Box"

Can we all agree to never use this sentence again? It's an unproductive ad hominem thrown into a potentially productive conversation about understanding God.

I've heard it as the answer to a creationist who thinks God could not have designed using the random mechanism of evolution. I've heard this phrase tossed out after a long Biblical rationale for why God doesn't give personal, specific direction as in "God speaks to me." I've heard it as the only rejoinder when someone explains why they don't believe in charismatic gifts today. I've heard it as the only response after an explanation for why Calvinism is the best systematic understanding of the Bible. I've heard it from Christians as the alternative to the Bible is our sole source of religious authority.

"Don't put God in a box."

What I think that line really means is, "I don't agree with your explanation but I don't have an argument in response." It's a way of dismissing someone's reasons without saying why they're wrong.

And it's actually kind of rude because it implies that we're doing something illegitimate with God. But you know what? We all put God in a box - the box being how we best understand God's revelation of Himself in Scripture. The box is one of God's own nature we're all just trying to figure out what the box looks like.

God should be in a box. What's the alternative? God has no limitations on what He can be like or act like? That is frightening. God Himself is limited by His own nature. He can't lie. He can't sin. He's can't go out of existence. God's box - the definition of what He is like - is what makes Him God and a Person we can love and trust and glorify. If God isn't in some kind of a box, He would be arbitrary.

God's box is the biggest and greatest box there is. He's omniscient - He knows and believes all true things; but He cannot believe false things. He's omnipotent - God can do whatever power can do. His potentialities are at the greatest limit of the attributes He possesses. But those very attributes define Him, they describe His box. Our goal is to get the best idea of what that box looks like.

[jackie d]

"Don't Put God In A Box"

Can we all agree to never use this sentence again? It's an unproductive ad hominem thrown into a potentially productive conversation about understanding God.

life is good that we are all entitled to opinion, isn't it?

[jackie d]

Hey, I googled it too...wanted to see what there was too offer

Isn't it interesting Biblicist how people look at things so differently...while I, attempting to help people embrace the fact that God is bigger than our minds can contain, have managed to find a perfect example of what I mean by putting God in a box...OP, search out what they can find to justify and shut out the concept and will search out something that will support why they can't possibly accept anything different or that they are incapable of understanding...Please read it in its entirety, it really is very good.

(disclaimer: I am not Catholic I am of no denomination)... however, having read the article, if this Rev came to my town I would certainly do what I could to get some good nourishing meat from his sermon. As he has a pretty good concept of the very largeness of God the Father and the small minds of man.

http://www.rmbowman.com/catholic/s980516h.htm

"God of the Universe ... or God of the Box?"

Sermon for Sixth Sunday of Easter, cycle C, May 16, 1998

by Most Rev. Dr. Robert M. Bowman,

Presiding Bishop, United Catholic Church

Acts 15: 1-2, 22-29

Psalm 67: 2-8

Revelation 21: 10-14, 22-23

John 14: 23-29

When I was a young, impressionable teenager and a recent convert to the Roman Catholic Church, a priest giving some kind of mission or revival told a story that made quite an impact on me.

He said that a teenage couple were out on a date and made love in the back seat of the car. As they were driving toward their homes, the boy commented, "You know, that