Moving on let’s dissect some more of their constructive debate on Christianity featuring a christian son versus an atheist father…  sounds clever adventure <wink><wink>

Correspondence 11: Why would an all-powerful God need prayer?

—
Date: December 15, 1989

Dear Greg,
…
As I said before, I don’t see that prayer ever works. Not only this but I don’t see how prayer ever could work. If God is all-good and all-powerful, and concerned about us, doesn’t He already want the best for us? And so wouldn’t he already be doing as much as He can ever do for us? So what are you asking for prayer? For Him to care more? He supposedly already cares as much as He could. Are you asking Him to do more? He’s supposedly already doing everything He can. Are you informing Him of some problem so He’ll do something about it? He supposedly already knows everything. So you can’t inform Him about anything, you can’t coax Him to do anything, and you can’t empower Him to do anything. So what the hell are you doing when you pray! The whole thing seems like a total waste of time to me.
…

Love always,
Dad

—
Date: December 28, 1989

Dear Dad,
…
Now on to your question about prayer. The main purpose of talking to God (that’s all prayer really is) has little to do with asking for things, Dad. It’s to build a faith-filled, loving relationship with our Creator and Redeemer… The main purpose of prayer is simply to be with Someone you love: to talk, to listen, or to simply “commune” with your Creator.
…
Asking for things – what’s called “petitionary payer” – is simply one minor aspect of this total relationship…

A genuine relationship, I believe, can only occur where there is personal interaction between two persons, where there is “give and take” between two parties. In other words, any genuine relationship requires that both parties are to some extent empower  over and against the other… God doesn’t want to be the only one calling the shots… So God ordains things so that we are to some degree empowered in our relationship with Him.
…
First, Dad, given the complexity of reality. I think it would be virtually impossible to “test” the effectiveness of prayers… If petitionary prayers could be conclusively “verified,” it would turn God into a sort of cosmic vending machine. Make your requests, pull the lever, and abracadabra, you have your wish granted… it takes faith to pray, and faith to see the answer to prayer.

Secondly, I’d again reiterate that, far more important than knowing the mechanics of unanswered prayer is knowing that God’s on your side even when the prayer is unanswered.
… And to communicate at all – anything! Is the beginning of a relationship with Him.

Hope to hear from you soon,
Greg

]]> http://girliemangalo.wordpress.com/2009/03/16/letters-from-a-skeptic-correspondence-11-why-would-an-all-powerful-god-need-prayer/ Mon, 16 Mar 2009 05:11:11 +0000 girlie http://girliemangalo.wordpress.com/2009/03/16/letters-from-a-skeptic-correspondence-11-why-would-an-all-powerful-god-need-prayer/

As promised, here are some exchange of opinions between Dr. Greg Boyd and his atheist father which I found tough but very enlightening:

Correspondence 2: Why is the world so full of suffering?

———-

Date: March 23, 1989

Dear Greg:

…

If God created this world and cares about it, why is there so damn much suffering in it? In your letter your answer was that God can’t be held responsible because He gave man the freedom to choose to do right or wrong. But Greg, I don’t feel that the question can be swept away so easily. When the freedom to decide to do harm results in pain and suffering to innocent people, God is simply not the “loving” God you make Him out to be!

I though about this when I read about this lunatic down here in Florida who was released from jail after seven or eight years for raping a teenage girl and then chopping off both her arms, leaving her for dead. It was his free choice to commit the crime, but what choice did the innocent girl have?… Why does God value the freedom of the criminal, but not the freedom of the victim?

…

The point is , this world doesn’t look at all like the kind of world we’d have if there were an all-powerful, all-loving God behind it. And I don’t see the freedom improves the situation much.

Well enough for now. Look forward to your letter.

Lots of love,

Dad

———-

Date: March 29, 1989

Dear Dad,

Well, Dad, I’ve got to admit that you are raising some extremely good points in your letters. You are raising the most difficult questions atheist can face. This is a good material.

It seems to me, Dad, that if God is going to give free wills to His creatures, He has to allow the possibility of them misusing that freedom, even if it means hurting others. To be significantly free is to be morally responsible to each other. What is the freedom to love or not love unless it is freedom to enrich or harm another? God structured things this way because the alternative would be to have a race of robots who can’t genuinely love – but that’s hardly worth creating, is it?

So why doesn’t God intervene every time someone is going to misuse his freedom and hurt another person? The answer, I believe, is found in the nature of freedom itself. A freedom which was prevented from being exercised whenever it was going to be misused simply wouldn’t be freedom.

…

So too, If God really gives gives us freedom, it must be, at least to a large extent, irrevocable. He must have, within limits, a “hands off” attitude towards it. God creates free people who can do as they please, not determined instruments who always end up doing what He pleases.

…

I look forward to your response

As always, with all my love,

Greg

]]> http://girliemangalo.wordpress.com/2009/02/21/excerpts-of-letters-from-a-skeptic-by-gregory-boyd/ Sat, 21 Feb 2009 04:29:24 +0000 girlie http://girliemangalo.wordpress.com/2009/02/21/excerpts-of-letters-from-a-skeptic-by-gregory-boyd/

“Letters from a Skeptic” is a collection of letters between a son by the name of Dr. Gregory Boyd, Theology professor at Bethel College in Minnesota, author and believer of the Christian faith, and his exceptionally intelligent, intensely skeptical, very strong-willed, 70 year-old father Edward K. Boyd.

A book that is very useful, not only as a source of hope, but also as a resource of information for Christians who have loved ones who are not believers.

Watch out for more post featuring actual correspondence between Dr. Boyd and his father…

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I often don’t have too much trouble admitting that I’ve got it wrong. It’s become easier these days, as black-and-white, all-or-nothing scales fall from my eyes to reveal a beautiful world of gray. All sorts of possibilities wait for me in the gray, one of which is freedom. Refreshing freedom. Freedom in discovering that there are countless non-essential type matters to which several “right” answers may be found.

It’s just ironic that one of the people who showed that to me was Greg Boyd.  If you had known me eight years ago, you would know that I despised Greg Boyd.  I didn’t know him; I only knew what I had heard about him through other bullheaded college co-eds like myself.  It was all “Greg Boyd is a heretic” and “Did you know Greg Boyd doesn’t think God is sovereign?”

As I stood my unreasonable ground firmly in the Calvinist, T.U.L.I.P.-sniffing camp, I lashed out at those who aligned themselves with Boyd and his teaching.  Having very little clue as to what his true convictions were, I smeared his name with friends and laughed with those who feigned to know something about his beliefs.

Then, a couple years ago, Boyd’s name came across my path. I think it started with his book, Letters From a Skeptic, three-years-worth of correspondence between Boyd and his unbelieving father. Not long after, I heard Boyd teach at Mars Hill Bible Church in Grand Rapids, Mich. His teaching was vibrant, full of love, and overflowing with passion for God. Finally, I stumbled on an article that revealed more about Boyd’s heart for God and for others.

Today, I sit here halfway through my first podcast from Woodland Hills Church in Minnesota, where Boyd pastors. He is a loose cannon; his ADD-ness making him hard to follow at times, his speed-talk hilarious as he trips over words to get everything in his brain past his lips, his intelligence refreshing as it flows out tempered with compassion.

And I was wrong.

Wrong about Greg Boyd. Wrong about Calvinism and Arminianism (which I will avoid discussing altogether for the rest of my life…something to do with resounding gongs and clanging cymbals). Wrong about so many things I always thought were utterly indisputable and solidly concrete. In fact, it is concrete that has finally been broken up, jackhammer-style, in my heart in recent days. Thanks, in part, to Greg Boyd.

I mean, how can I dispute Boyd when he says this:

By definition you can only call ‘Christian’ what looks like Jesus. That’s what the word ‘Christian’ means. Christ-like. And since Jesus never voted and never weighed in on those issues, you can’t call your particular opinion about how we should weigh on those issues or if we should weigh on those issues the ‘Christian’ way to weigh on those issues.

Love the unloveable.  That is Christian because Jesus did that.

Forgive people really quick.  That’s Christian because Jesus did that and He told us to do the same.

Love your enemies, turn the other cheek, don’t engage in violence. That’s Christian because Jesus did that.

Don’t judge sinners, don’t look down on others. That’s Christian because Jesus did that.

Befriend people that society has walls against you befriending, reach out across racial lines. That’s Christian because Jesus did that.

Feed the hungry, care about the homeless, visit people in prison, serve drug addicts, give generously to the poor, heal the sick, free people from demonic oppression.

Proclaim the good news to everybody.  That’s Christian because Jesus did that.

That is Christian. That is the Kingdom. But what you think ‘Caesar’ should do, or who’s going to run what, or what policy you think should be placed: these undoubtedly are right and smart.  But they are not Christian. So don’t give your position more clout by attaching His name to it. And don’t pay a whole lot of attention to folks who do that.

I’m glad I was mistaken about Greg Boyd.  I’m glad I’ve given myself permission to hear all kinds of opinions on all sorts of things, opinions I’m right and wrong about. I’m glad about so many old lies unweaved, untangled. It’s refreshing out here in the gray.

Letters From a Skeptic: A Son Wrestles with His Father’s Questions about Christianity

by Gregory A. Boyd (Author)

Edward Boyd’s agnosticism rested “not … too much on any positive position … but rather on a host of negative ones” about Christianity. In an attempt to address these negative issues, his son Greg, a professor of theology, asked his father, a strong-willed, highly intelligent, and stubborn 70-year-old, to enter into a correspondence in which “all of their cards would be laid on the table.” Greg would give his father the opportunity to raise all his objections to the veracity of Christianity, and Greg would “answer these objections as well as give positive grounds for holding to the Christian faith.”

Three years and more than 30 letters later, Letters from a Skeptic was published and Edward Boyd came to accept Christ. During his journey, he and his son hash through such topics as why the world is so full of suffering; why an all-powerful God needs prayer; how you can believe in someone who rose from the dead; and how another man’s death can pardon others. Despite their brutal honesty, both men exhibit respect and love toward one another as they address these volatile subjects. In Edward’s second response to Greg, he boldly says, “Well, your distinction between the ‘Christian Church’ and ‘Christians’ is interesting and novel, but frankly, I don’t buy it.” Greg responds, saying, “I’ve got to admit that you are raising some extremely good points in your letters. You are raising the most difficult questions a theist can face.” –Jill Heatherly

REVIEW: Brian Lehman

I have found this book very useful in helping me to combat some of the logical arguments against the faith given to me by non-believers. Dr. Boyd’s logic flows very well and provides a great logical argument to many important complaints about Christianity. Don’t rely on this book as your only source, though! It contains only one man’s opinions. Personally, I have found some of his reasons to be a little weak, and on one point I think he is wrong. His point about how God does not know the future is based on what I feel is incorrect theology. A few other points he makes might also be seen as based on some abnormal theological ideas. This is still a very good book, though, as long as it the reader reads it for what it is – one man’s logical defense of Christianity – and also uses other sources (especially the Bible) in defense of the faith. If this book shows you anything, it shows you that Christianity is more than blind faith or emotionalism, it is actually a very logical and intelligent view of the world, one which I am convinced is the correct one.

The author of Letters from a Skeptic (a book I HIGHLY recommend), Greg Boyd is a former atheist who surrendered his life to Christ in 1974. He graduated with honors from Yale Divinity School and Princeton Theological Seminary. Greg was a professor of theology for 16 years at Bethel University and is the founder and senior pastor of Woodland Hills Church, an evangelical megachurch in St. Paul, MN.

I just finished reading his latest blog entry, where he contemplates the issue of a violent God in the Old Testament vs the loving God shown in Jesus in the New Testament. Great reading!

Click Here To Read It For Yourself

Last night, at midnight to be exact, My friend Donny showed up to my door with a brand new hard copy of a book called “Letters from a Skeptic”. This book was purchased for me, and mailed to Donny to bring to me. With the thought in mind that someone that I have never met took the time and money to purchase this book and mail it out just for me was pretty flattering.
Because of this effort that was put fourth by a total stranger, I dove in to this book with the determination to read the entire book weather or not I believe any of it’s content, or weather or not I feel that it is a total waste of words.
Nearly three hours later.. I had to put the book down knowing that I had to go to work the next day (today). I had already read half of the book. I’m devouring this book like candy, I can’t get enough of it. I can’t get over the fact that the very same questions that Edward Boyd has written are the exact questions that I had asked earlier in my blog. And the majority of the answers that were given by his son Gregory Boyd are satisfactory to me. I have to work for the next four days, so I won’t have time to finish it until Wednesday, but I’m looking forward to continue reading where I had left off.
I take pride in the fact that I call it as I see it. If I didn’t care too much for this book then I would have not hesitated in saying so. I believe that honesty is a virtue, even to non believers. This book is like an early Christmas present. I can’t say enough how much I’m getting out of it.
I want to thank ‘John Smulo’ for sending it to me.
I highly recommend this book to people as myself that are agnostic. You will get logical answers to your questions. I will keep you posted on my final thoughts on this book when I finish it. So far, at half way point, it is fantastic.
Here is a fact that you will find hard to believe. Even though I’m a good reader, I have only read 2 books in my entire life. I read web pages, I read magazines, but I can only read things that I’m strongly interested in or my eyes keep following along with the words and my mind changes channels without even notifying me. Next thing I know, I’m half way down the page and have no clue even as to where I had left off.
I do not have that problem with this book due to my strong interest in it’s content.
Thanks again John for sending this book to a total stranger.

I may have some more questions at the end of this book, I’ll have to wait and see.

John