Limits of a Limitless God

The idea of limitations is normally spoken of with some kind of negative connotation to it. For one to be limited by something is for that individual is to be without or incapable of something. So for a Christian to imagine God, who is the creator of all is through all and is in all, to have limitations is a relatively difficult concept to struggle with. How could a being that created something have limitations within that which it created? Now do not here me to say that God is limited by any force other than that which he has established because in order for that to be possible something would have to have existed prior to God. And seeing as how God does not know the bounds of time there could not be anything before His existence. But that does not mean that God is not without limitations. How could a being that is above the concept of human understanding operate within human understanding without having some form of limitations? And because of His love for us we see instances in the scriptures and in our own lives of His workings. So therefore since God has always been and cannot have had limitations on Him yet still has them they must have come from Him Himself. God has limited himself in order to operate to where humans can understand some concept of Him through becoming a human being in Jesus Christ, through his the way he operates within the realm of being a “good” God, and also through the gift of free will.
The Trinitarian belief of Jesus is that he was fully man and fully Divine. Outside of the fact that this is a paradox in and of itself, it is a paradox in that man is far less than God yet God becomes a man. Since God operates outside of that which Man can understand in order for God to become a man he would have to in some fashion limit his powers and capabilities. If he did not than Jesus could not have been one hundred percent human.
Many modern day and classical theologians are under the impression that God is a good God. In that God does not do evil and if God did anything other than good he would cease to be God. But God is the creator of all things, if anything is existence than it was created by God. Because God always has been there was nothing before Him, and since He created all nothing was created other than by Him. That leads one to believe that in some form God is responsible for the creation of evil. Not saying that God necessarily created the evil but created the means in which that evil could come about. C.S Lewis, in his book Mere Christianity, describes evil as nothing other than the perversion of good. So God created the good and it was perverted due to some other action other than His own. Since God is a good God He cannot operate with the realm of evil and doing so would change Him from being good. But since God, in a sense, created evil he would be capable of operating within it because it is His creation. But since operating within it would make Him cease to be good He has limited His abilities to operate within the concept of evil. That is not to say that He cannot redeem evil that is to say he does not partake in doing anything that is evil.
The fact that evil is a perversion of good comes from the understanding that humans have the free will to pervert that which is good. Even to the point that a human can know what is truly good and still is capable of doing the exact opposite. This is a gift from God due to the fact that God wants humans to choose to love Him and a forced love, or one without free will, is not a true love but an obligation. So because God created humans and has reign over them and has ultimate power of every facet of their life He has the capabilities to control everything about them. But because he operates under concept of Love He cannot force humans to do anything, and any attempt to do so would be a removal of free will. So God has again limited his capabilities out of love for the human race.
God is ultimate good and is capable of having ultimate control of everything in the entire cosmos of existence. But because God is Love and has love for his creations he has taken certain measures in which he limits his abilities. This does not speak to a lack of power to a most powerful God, but speaks to the complex and complete Love that is God. For one to relinquish power over another individual shows that that being has true love for the other.

Love........All Encompassing

What is Love, what are different kinds of Love........what is Love to you........yes i know very broad but we will narrow the scope of this Convo tonight and this post will be continued later tonight or tomorrow.

Sorry the continuation of this post took so long to get up. But here is part of the process the conversation went through the other night.

1.What is Love?
*I know its vague but it goes somewhere
2.What Does Love Mean to You?
3. What does it even matter? Why care about love?
4.Why should an individual even bother showing love?
5.What does love look like?
*Love = (verb)
*God = Love
*God = (verb)?.....
So diffrent rationals came about for these and other questions but insted of putting everything that has already been said i would love some new imput.
Here is a little bit more that was discussed.
We believe God is a limitless God which means God is huge and operates outside the realm of our understanding and language. We dont comprehend that because our thoughts our constrained to that which we can know express and comprehend. So therefore we cannot get a grasp on who or what God is or can do. Since God is love the same is true for Love. Because God is that big Love is that big and our minds cannot fully comprehend what all that entails. The thing is we are called to Love everyone.....so we are called to "God"(verb) everyone? So that means we have at our disposable the endless possablilities of all which Love encompasses. Which yet again we do not fully get a grasp on. But when we think of limitless capabilites we have to try and get our mind out of the norm. For example when we refer to things such as carrying eachothers burdens. Because of love that is no longer a metophorical thing but an actual physical process because Love has the capabilites to transced our understanding.

Spiritual Connection Between Man and Earth(Nature)

This "Convo" began Sunday morning September 2oth. Well actually it started earlier on in the week but we opened it up for discussion in the bible study that morning. Actually I'm sure this convo has been going on far before our time. Anyway lets get down to the meat of the matter.
I will give a short run through of our questions and thought processes as I best remember them from yesterday morning in order to keep the conversation going and open new thoughts or views.
If i get anything mixed up or out of order forgive me please.
If there is a * it is identifing some rational that i remember and though noteworthy.

1. What Kind of connection does Man (all genders encompassed) have to the earth.
*Physical - Pollution, cutting down forests...etc
*Emotional - It is our home and we feel a since of ownership to it as well
2. Is there a kind of Spiritual connection to the Earth, and if yes how so?
3. Does Man have Dominion over the Earth or does the Earth have Dominion over man?
* Common answer was symbiotic relationship.
4.Since it is described in Genesis as being under Man to be ruled why can Man not control natural disasters?
5. The general consensus of the church is that the Earth fell when Man fell (aka. when Man sinned) Do you buy that?
*Which would be the Spiritual Connection refferd to earlier.
*Thats why natures pattern is to degierate and die, but God's is preftection and eternal life.
6.So since man was designed to govern Earth and Earth designed to submit, when man sinned did he lose dominion over the earth? And in doing so was the Spiritual Connection severed?
*Explaining the lack of control on Natural Disasters.
7.If the above is true were there natural disasters before the fall of man?
8. If the connection was severed could we have regained it by new life in Christ?(aka. becoming a Christian)

I know there is way more to the conversation and i have not done that great of a job walking us through our study and thought process next week ill keep notes as we go through our topic. Please feel free to post a response to any of the questions above, anything else we talked about, any new ideas that have popped in your head, or an research you have found on the subject.

Keep checking for updates to this subject as well as what the conversation topic for next Sunday will be that way you can do some of your own research and thinking before hand so that our conversations can be even more informed.