hey there @blockurator. After reading your post I got more questions than critique, but my questions may carry a little nugget of critique...
As some comments already pointed this out - Any position can be justified with faith. If 5 different people can use faith and arrive to 5 absolutely different conclusions, then faith is not a reliable method to discover what is actually true... so from this, my immediate question is why attempt to test something that doesn't actually aid us in getting closer to truth?
Also i feel like I cant really hone in on the argument itself... Can you please describe what you mean by 'faithfulness'? To me the 'ness' part signifies that there is some sort of 'faith scale'... For example if you say it's 'dark' then you are describing a quality of something, but if you want to discuss the degree to which it is dark you'd talk about 'darkness' as it signifies a scale... i'd like to hear your definition though, cause i might be way off...
I'm also very puzzled by the phrase "God's Faithfulness"... Its hard for me to understand your stance without fully grasping the meaning of what it is. I would like to know the definition of what you mean when you say "God's Faithfulness" I think that will help me understand what you are trying to test and experiment with.
@ankapolo, that's a great question!
You are right in saying that faithfulness is a quality, but it has to be a quality of a sentient thing. Tables and chairs, for instance, can't be faithful. They may be reliable, but only insofar as the materials used to make them and the workmanship that goes into manufacturing them can be trusted. Your dog, on the other hand, can be faithful. So what does that mean?
Let's take a scenario: If you are on a lake and in a boat, let's say, and you fall out. If you don't know how to swim and aren't wearing a life jacket, you might be in danger of drowning. That would be a terrible predicament, wouldn't it? But let's say you are not alone. You were with one other person in that boat. That person, thankfully, does know how to swim; and there happens to be a life preserver on that boat, which you, unfortunately, were not wearing. So your companion tosses you the life preserver and you manage to slip it over your head, despite your near panic. Your companion next holds an oar out over the side of the boat, which you wrap your hands around, and he assists you in getting back into the boat. He has saved your life.
Now let's imagine that scenario plays itself out every day. Like Groundhog Day. Ever see that movie? Over and over again, you fall out of the boat and your companion, over and over again, manages to save your life. He never fails. He is always there, always prepared and well-composed, and knows just what to do to get you back in the boat. That is what I mean by faithfulness. It's a quality of a trustworthy companion on whom you can always rely without fail.
Humans fail. Your mother, your brother, your sister, your lover, your bestie, they may all fail you at some point. That is, you may have certain expectations of them to which they are incapable of rising. That could be because your expectations are unrealistic, but it may also be because they simply aren't always, 100 percent, able to meet those expectations. Maybe, on a certain day, their priorities shift and something else becomes more important for a time, or maybe they lose sight of a certain thing and forget what is important to you. As faithful a friend any individual might be, there comes a time when even the most faithful human friend can fail you. Even your dog, upon seeing that cute little poodle across the street, may wander off to play at a time when you need it the most. God, on the other hand, is always there, always ready to be your life preserver.
Now, that comes with some caveats. God has made Himself known in history in certain ways, and He's made it clear that He has a certain standard for His creation to live by. God is not obligated to give us whatever we want just for the asking. He's not Santa Claus. We can't say, "Well, I want a Rolls Royce" and expect God to provide it to show his faithfulness. That isn't how it works.
As I expound on these ideas more in the coming weeks, I'll discuss this a bit more - What is faithfulness? How is God faithful? How can we test Him on that faithfulness, and why should we? I hope you'll come along for the ride.
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