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Turn these stones into bread.
General Boards - Religion & Philosophy
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Turn these stones into bread.

2

Jun 4, 2023, 5:35 PM
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Was the Enemy asking Jesus to do a magic trick they both knew He could do? That sounds a little simplistic, doesn't it? These two guys had known each other since eternity, so what was that about?

Here's a take (not mine): "We both know why you are here. You want them to return to you, to follow you. Well, down here, here are the rules: We are judged on competence. You need to have answers for problems. Solve them, they will all follow you. You can solve world hunger: you can turn rocks into food."

"Yeah, you are right. But no. The Father will give me all of that I need. You have nothing I need."

Most, if not all, conflicts seem to be due to our chasing of competence and respect. We all want to be the answer man, which is one of the rules we have created since the Fall. Jesus could have succeeded by those rules. Chose not to. Which is why I get to sing Amazing Grace.


Message was edited by: CUintulsa®


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Satan tempted Jesus with those things that He

4

Jun 5, 2023, 11:47 AM
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had to willingly forfeit in order to become the Savior. Read the temptation story in parallel with Philippians 2:5-8

5 Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:
6 Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:
7 But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men:
8 And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.


He tempted Him with a relief from his human suffering, in the form of food. At stake was Jesus's will to be "in the likeness of men".

He tempted Him with taking His life in His own hands ("cast thyself down"). At stake was Jesus's will to be "obedient unto death, even the death of the cross".

He tempted Him with earthly power and glory. At stake was Jesus's will to be "of no reputation...the form of a servant".

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Agree with all that. It also seems clear, to me,

1

Jun 5, 2023, 2:36 PM
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that Jesus was confronted with the truth that his human side would have to say no to the most powerful motivations that drive the fallen world. When the Enemy offered Jesus control of all earthly kingdoms, he was not wrong. I have always heard that conversation as "Do it our way, and I will not even oppose you. But if you dont ...". I heard someone say, "If Jesus didn't know he was a dead man walking going into the wilderness, he knew it coming out." We can't know what He knew, but that did seem to be the tone of the conversation. These two had known each other a long, long time, so I don't think this was a negotiation; it was time to call or fold.

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Re: Turn these stones into bread.

1

Jun 5, 2023, 1:12 PM
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So Satan was there at the beginning of time as well?

This brings up quite a few questions.

Who created Satan?

If he is eternal he is like god and wasn't created.

However, the bible does say "in the beginning was the word"...

That would seem to imply that Jesus is not eternal, but had a beginning, and therefor not god.

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Re: Turn these stones into bread.

2

Jun 5, 2023, 3:07 PM
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Your friendly neighborhood atheist here.

I always thought of "in the beginning was the word" referring to the consciousness of god. Metaphor. Before there was anything physical, there was that consciousness that eventually created matter. But what do I know?

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Re: Turn these stones into bread.

3

Jun 5, 2023, 6:02 PM
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If you look at the passage it's hard to say what the writer is trying to communicate exactly.

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. 4 In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. 5 And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not [a]comprehend it."

What is the "word"? Is it the bible? Is it the New Testament? Is it god's thoughts? His goodness?

But then he says "He", referring to this word, was in the beginning with god as if it's a distinct being from god.

And then says ALL THINGS were made through him. Does this mean Satan and evil were created by this "word"?

Or did it already exist?

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Re: Turn these stones into bread.

3

Jun 5, 2023, 11:23 PM
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This ought to bake your noodle... In the beginning, God said, "Let there be light..." And there was. What light was that... since the sun and moon were not yet "created"?

It is not really hard to say what the writer is trying to communicate at all. You must be willing to admit it, though. Read a little further in that chapter and you will get a hint as to the [light] question. Also, there in Revelation 21:23.

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John 3:16; 14:1-6


Re: Turn these stones into bread.

1

Jun 6, 2023, 7:14 AM
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I'd say (and maybe it is what you are saying?) that, in the context, "light" is similar to "the word," some infinite metaphorical consciousness of a supreme being.

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Re: Turn these stones into bread.

1

Jun 6, 2023, 1:23 PM
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Light, I believe, is exactly that. The light in the beginning was the revealing of God's presence through Jesus, who is the light of the world and what disperses darkness. He is the light that illuminates the heaven to come - Revelation as mentioned earlier. The sun and the moon are no more, and not even needed.

This is not a metaphorical reference to Jesus.

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John 3:16; 14:1-6


Re: Turn these stones into bread.

2

Jun 6, 2023, 11:29 AM [ in reply to Re: Turn these stones into bread. ]
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Well I get what you and other Christians say his overall point is that Jesus is the word. t it still raises more questions than answers.

And if he created everything did he create satan and evil? Or did those things already exist along side god/Jesus/word/light?

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Re: Turn these stones into bread.

2

Jun 6, 2023, 7:58 AM
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Certainly, Satan is a created being. He was created the highest of all the angels. Somewhere along the way, though, he began to think more of himself than he should. He even stated he would make his seat higher than God's. So, again, evil was made possible by God, but made a reality by the one who chose to live it.

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John 3:16; 14:1-6


Re: Turn these stones into bread.

1

Jun 7, 2023, 6:16 PM
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I think Lucifer just wanted to be his own god, do his will rather than God's. I read Isaiah 14 and wonder about my childhood concepts of the war in Heaven. My believe in the struggle was highly influenced by the movies.

We're given parable after parable to help us relate to spiritual truths. The things which confound us do so because we can't get past the temporal and relate it to the spiritual. Imo, that war was simply, 'I'm doing what I want from now on!' - Lucifer.

" God says: 'Out of the pool!' - Gabriel

Evidently 1/3rd of the angels agreed with Lucifer. We have a few who agree with them here. I want them to know that the Pool is clean and open for all who will enter by accepting God's will.

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Re: Turn these stones into bread.

1

Jun 7, 2023, 6:06 PM [ in reply to Re: Turn these stones into bread. ]
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Technically speaking, in the beginning God created the heavens and earth and the earth was without form and void...and darkness was upon the face of the deep.

When God said 'Let there be light,' that was the creation of light. A generator of light such as our Sun and the stars would have generated no light for light did not exist. Although, the Sun and stars may have already been created. I think that's likely.

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Re: Turn these stones into bread.

2

Jun 6, 2023, 12:35 PM [ in reply to Re: Turn these stones into bread. ]
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Here's the long answer. It's Jesus.

But to understand where John is coming from you have to know a little Greek philosophy, which, since the whole region had been conquered by and populated by the Greeks, a lot of people did at the time.

So, John is probably talking to that Greek population in the Levant, in concepts they understood. And, he’s blending it with Jewish concepts. Here’s how.

In the Greek Platonic and Stoic schools, the natural world is viewed as a less perfect version of the supernatural world. That is, in your mind, you can think of a perfect “cat” or a perfect “cube”, but nowhere in the physical world can such a thing be found. Anslem used a similar philosophy in his proof of God argument. “You can always ‘think’ something more perfect than what you can actually find.”

So hold that thought.

A second concept was that the thing that separated man from the animals was logical thought, or reason. And the way that logical thought is shared is through speech. They called it the ‘logos,’ or, the ‘word.’ Not the written word though, that was ‘lexis.’ Logos is the spoken word. The way men communicate, and show, their reason.

Here’s an Oxford definition of logos:
(Greek, statement, principle, law, reason, proportion)
For Heraclitus, [logos is] the cosmic principle that gives order and rationality to the world, in a way analogous to that in which human reason orders human action. In Stoicism reason is the cosmic source of order; its aspects are fate, providence, and nature.

So it’s very significant that in the first version of creation, Gen 1, God ‘speaks’ the universe into creation. That would suggest that whoever wrote Gen 1 was learned in Greek philosophy. Note the difference in the Gen 2 version. God ‘makes’, not speaks creation. That’s Jewish, not Greek thought. Two versions, two philosophies.

So with all that in mind, let’s look at John.

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
What it seems John is saying here is: “Jesus is the physical manifestation of the perfection of God. God is the perfect cat, and Jesus is the physical cat, or God is the mental reasoning, and Jesus is the speech that communicated that mental reasoning.”
Just replace “the Word” with “Jesus”, in John 1:1 and it will make much more sense.


2 He was with God in the beginning.
3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.
4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.
5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

Here, John switches metaphors. He wants to present Jesus as an extension of God, just as speech is an extension of thought and reason, but he now associates Jesus with light as well. That’s a different tradition, more aligned with Gnostic and Zoroastrian concepts of light and dark as signs of good and evil. So, he’s probably addressing those people as well.

6 There was a man sent from God whose name was John (the Baptist).
7 He (JtB) came as a witness to testify concerning that light (Jesus), so that through him all might believe.
8 He (John) himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.
9 The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world.
10 He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him.
11 He came to that which was his own (the Jews), but his own did not receive him.
12 Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God
13 children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.

14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.

(This is a very important verse. It’s the Greek idea of perfect thought becoming earthly matter. The idea of a cat vs. a physical cat. The ‘reasoning’, or the ‘intellect’, or the ‘wisdom’ of God coming to us in the form of Jesus. Jewish philosophy shared the idea of ‘wisdom’ being special, but the connection between thought and matter was a Greek idea)


We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
15 (John [the Baptist] testified concerning him. He cried out, saying, “This is the one I spoke about when I said, ‘He who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’”)
16 Out of his fullness we have all received grace in place of grace already given.
17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
18 No one has ever seen God (well, except for Adam, Moses maybe, and a few others), but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known.

Maybe that helps. Here’s a bit more on “the [spoken] Word” or logos, from the Oxford Dict:
“Logos also has another aspect: it is what enables us to [connect abstract] principles and [physical] forms, i.e. it is an aspect of our own reasoning.
This view becomes fused with Christian doctrine when logos is God's instrument in the development of the world. The notion survives today in the idea of laws of nature, if these are conceived of as independent guides of the natural course of events, existing beyond the temporal world that they order.
(That is, the underlying order behind what we experience with our senses. The 'thing', whatever it is, behind the curtain.)”

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Re: Turn these stones into bread.

1

Jun 6, 2023, 8:15 PM
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Abolish Qualified Immunity


Re: Turn these stones into bread.


Jun 6, 2023, 9:20 PM
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Lol, the TLDR short version:

The people John spoke to, in his day, knew exactly what he was saying in John 1.

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Re: Turn these stones into bread.

1

Jun 7, 2023, 10:18 AM [ in reply to Re: Turn these stones into bread. ]
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That would seem to indicate that “John” was not born and raised Jewish like the disciple would have been.

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Re: Turn these stones into bread.


Jun 7, 2023, 12:32 PM
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It's a possibility. There's some ambiguity over which John is which, and if the writer of the Gospel is the same as Revelations and the three letters.

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Re: Turn these stones into bread.

1

Jun 7, 2023, 10:18 AM [ in reply to Re: Turn these stones into bread. ]
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Could he have been influenced that much by Greek thought?

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Re: Turn these stones into bread.


Jun 7, 2023, 12:54 PM
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Oh sure. Keep in mind that that if the Gospel of John was written in maybe 100AD, that's 400 years after Alexander and the first Greeks came through in 330ish BCE. And their influence and impact was enormous, building entire groups of cities, some that became hugely influential nodes of Christian thought themselves, like Alexandria in Egypt. And Patmos is right across the Aegean from Greece.

Jewish thought, which had always been isolated to the area just around the levant, was surrounded by a sea of Greek influence eventually.


The Decapolis: the 10 black cities were all Greek cities built in the wake of Alexander



"The Decapolis was a region where two cultures interacted: the culture of the Greek colonists and the indigenous Jewish and Aramean cultures. There was some conflict. The Greek inhabitants were shocked by the Jewish practice of circumcision, which was regarded as a cruel and barbaric genital mutilation.

At the same time, cultural blending and borrowing also occurred in the Decapolis region. The cities acted as centers for the diffusion of Hellenistic culture. Some local deities began to be called by the name Zeus, from the chief Greek god. Meanwhile, in some cities Greeks began worshipping these local "Zeus" deities alongside their own Zeus Olympios.

There is evidence that the colonists adopted the worship of other Semitic gods, including Phoenician deities and the chief Nabatean god, Dushara (worshipped under his Hellenized name, Dusares). The worship of these Semitic gods is attested to in coins and inscriptions from the cities."



Everything Orange got "Greeked" when Alex came through and left his settlers




Patmos, right in the middle of all the action



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