Implausible fantasies
Preface
The image is from Facebook and thank you to Miss CIA.
This is cited from a satire website.
My website is satire AND theology.
Years ago, someone complained he did not know (paraphrased) really what was what on this website. My reply was (paraphrased): Well I suppose one needs to think about it.
Further, if it was primarily serious material, one would still need to think about it. If it was primarily satirical material, one would still need to think about it.
There is a comments section to discuss posts on Blogger. There is also one on the Facebook Business Page version.
This person, eventually defriended me on Facebook.
Cited
BURNABY, BC – A published study out of Simon Fraser university on generational sexuality has found that the most popular sexual kink among millennials is roleplaying as a couple that owns a house.
I am pleased by God's grace, to have inherited my Mother's condominium, after approximately 19 years of homecaring for her. I am a homeowner of sorts.
As I am presently single, this place is not particularly 'sexy'. No type of roleplaying takes place in my residence, whatsoever.
Our weekly Zoom meeting, hosted from this residence, is definitely, definitively, exceptionally and positively, not 'sexy'. Neither myself, nor any of my Zoom friends are too 'sexy' for 'x' or 'y', at least as far as I am concerned. I suppose to some, my friendly neighbour, Mr. Bobby Buff, might be considered 'sexy', with assistance from Crisco, but he does not attend our Zoom meetings.
Cited
While older generations have often used role-play as a way to simulate various power dynamics or unlikely encounters, millennials are using the popular kink to indulge their own implausible fantasies, both sexually and monetarily.
I try to avoid 'fantasies' unless from fiction as entertainment and labelled as such. I have to state that I have viewed many 'implausible fantasies' in much of the writing I have consumed online, from various sources, over the years.
But, yes, I still revise my work...
Cooperation
Martin Luther
Martin Luther, The Bondage of the Will, 268.
LUTHER, MARTIN. (1525)(1972) ‘The Bondage of the Will’, in F.W. Strothmann and Frederick W. Locke (eds.), Erasmus-Luther: Discourse on Free Will, New York, Frederick Ungar Publishing Co., INC.
I have written on the theological doctrine, within, in particular, Orthodoxy, of cooperation in regards to grace and the atoning and resurrection work of Jesus Christ applied to believers.
This versus a Reformed theological doctrine of the embracing by believers, of divine regeneration (John 3, Titus 3), and the applied atoning and resurrection work of Jesus Christ, in grace through faith for salvation.
John Hick and Soul-Making Theodicy
From my PhD thesis, John Hick as his Soul-Making Theodicy, rejected compatibilism and held to a view of human cooperation:
Human beings must, through uncompelled responses and co-operation with the creator, become children of God. Hick (1970: 291). Since Hick rejects compatibilism (Hick (1970: 381), ultimately God must inevitably convince human beings to freely follow him in a way that was amiss for many in their earthly lives. Hick (1970: 381).
Hick and his Soul-Making Theodicy holds to universalism, unlike Orthodoxy, which does not.
Orthodoxy versus Reformed
Edited
The Orthodox Study Bible, New Testament and Psalms, (1993) Saint Athanasius Orthodox Academy,Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee.
The Orthodox Study Bible text states that Christ's righteousness is given to us and by our own cooperation with God, we continue to be righteous, in it. (338-339). This participation takes place via human faith.
A Protestant and especially Reformed concern with the concept of cooperation, is the danger (s) of works righteousness.
My Reformed theology views the human embracing of salvation, including justification and imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ, in a sense as philosophically and theologically, a human secondary cause; but very importantly, only the primary cause, the triune God creates the means and application of salvation through the atonement and resurrection.
I might coin the secondary cause here as a 'passive cause'.
Collins is rather helpful here:
secondary cause in British English
philosophy
a cause which is not the primary or ultimate cause
the distinction between the universal and primary cause and the particular and secondary cause
Not the ultimate cause, exactly.
In this way, those in Christ, being regenerated by God alone, only accept salvation as a divine gift and this also avoids the problem of divine force or coercion. People are not saved or damned through hard determinism, with no secondary agency involved. It is also not a (fallen) human work of salvation. Human righteousness (the human nature) is universally fallen and tainted in sin. Christ's righteousness as both God and man, is still divine righteousness and a gift of God (Ephesians 2: 8). It is a divine righteousness which is incarnated into a perfect human being. It is not universal, human righteousness as we know it in this present realm.
It might be more clear to state that a human being has secondary agency in embracing salvation. The secondary cause in secondary agencies, merely embraces the applied atoning and resurrection work of Jesus Christ, including justification and sanctification.
Philippians 2:12-13 New American Standard Bible
12 So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; 13 for it is God who is at work in you, both to [a]desire and to work for His good pleasure. Footnotes Philippians 2:13 Or be willing
As secondary causes, as secondary agents, we embrace and work through, by grace through faith, the salvific work that only God has completed and applied through Christ.
From my MPhil
John Calvin (1543) stated concerning free will: If freedom is opposed to coercion, I both acknowledge and consistently maintain that choice is free and I hold anyone who thinks otherwise to be a heretic. If, I say, it were called free in this sense of not being coerced nor forcibly moved by an external impulse, but moving of its own accord, I have no objection. Calvin (1543)(1996: 68).
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By the leading of God the Holy Spirit, in regeneration, I have decided, as a secondary cause to grow in Christ, to work out my salvation. But there is no works righteousness on my part to create or apply salvation. God can be a primary cause by willing directly or allowing, a human being, that can be a secondary cause, by embracing what God has caused. God directly wills regeneration each time it occurs.
Again, to be clear, human secondary cause, is embracing and not creating salvation through any work of (fallen) human righteousness. There is the imputed, divine, righteousness of Jesus Christ, the perfect God-man (Romans, Galatians, as examples). Orthodoxy holds to a form of justification by faith (348, 801). But by my theological reasoning, by adding the concept of cooperation by His grace, it denies justification by grace through faith alone, which is especially key from Romans, Galatians, Ephesians and Hebrews.
If by works righteousness, concepts within James and Romans 4 (4: 22 Therefore it was also credited to him as righteousness) are meant, as in showing salvific faith by works and obedience, I can accept that as embracing salvation, but I would not use the term 'cooperation'.
CALVIN, JOHN (1543)(1996) The Bondage and Liberation of the Will, Translated by G.I. Davies, Grand Rapids, Baker Book House.
HICK, JOHN(1970) Evil and The God of Love, London, The Fontana Library.
HICK, JOHN(1978) ‘Present and Future Life’, Harvard Theological Review, Volume 71, Number 1-2, January-April, HarvardUniversity.
HICK, JOHN(1981) Encountering Evil, Stephen T.Davis (ed.), Atlanta, John Knox Press.
HICK, JOHN(1993) ‘Afterword’ in GEIVETT, R.DOUGLAS (1993) Evil and the Evidence for God, Philadelphia, Temple University Press.
HICK, JOHN(1993) The Metaphor of God Incarnate, Louisville, Kentucky, John Know Press.
HICK, JOHN(1994) Death and Eternal Life, Louisville, Kentucky, John Knox Press.
HICK, JOHN(1999) ‘Life after Death’, in Alan Richardson and John Bowden (eds.), A New Dictionary of Christian Theology ,Kent, SCM Press.
LUTHER, MARTIN. (1525)(1972) ‘The Bondage of the Will’, in F.W. Strothmann and Frederick W. Locke (eds.), Erasmus-Luther: Discourse on Free Will, New York, Frederick Ungar Publishing Co., INC.
The Orthodox Study Bible, New Testament and Psalms, (1993) Saint Athanasius Orthodox Academy,Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee.
2003 The Problem of Evil: Anglican and Baptist Perspectives: MPhil thesis, Bangor University
2010 Theodicy and Practical Theology: PhD thesis, the University of Wales, Trinity Saint David, Lampeter
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