tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7748345.post2086932791491489504..comments2023-06-05T06:04:45.791-05:00Comments on Floydville: Graven ImagesDoug Floydhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04216703218746988880noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7748345.post-89200682048099381462007-01-22T11:40:00.000-05:002007-01-22T11:40:00.000-05:00I don't want an argument either, Doug; I'm simply ...I don't want an argument either, Doug; I'm simply trying to understand everything in your essay. I respect you and your reflections. Thanks for the clarification. Peace.Milton Stanleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09235705641913811166noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7748345.post-55389361208468657312007-01-14T18:16:00.000-05:002007-01-14T18:16:00.000-05:00Good question Milton.
Yet I hesitate to respond....Good question Milton. <br /><br />Yet I hesitate to respond. Normally, I use my writings to reflect my devotional journey and am not interested in prolonged arguments. (I've seen it too often online and in the churches I grew up in. While proving they were Biblical people consistently violated the basic command to love one another. Respect vanished and opponents were demonized. That is not my intent.<br /><br />I will answer the question to reveal my conviction, and yet at the same time, I understand other Christians can pray to the same God, study the same Bible and disagree with me.<br /><br />The subtext of your question, assumes that I am making a one to one connection between graven images and my nativity, which I am not. I do not believe the nativity to be a graven image. From reading the passage, in the Old Testament, it seems clear the graven images are intended for worship. (Now there has been debate whether this law extended to all images or just ones related to false worship.) <br /><br />Some argue that it is only images of worship for even God commands the use of images/statues/forms in the construction of the arc of the covenant.<br /><br />My argument/question is how can we understand graven images today? Is it the forbidding of all art? I do not see that the New Testament. But I do see Paul arguing in Romans 1 the danger in reducing the glory of God to something in the image of created things. <br /><br />As I wrestle with this idea, I see our tendency to reduce God from person to an image in our own mind. We lose sight that God is greater than any word, any concept and any idea we can use to explain him. So we must hold his revelation in Jesus (as the image of the unseen God) alongside the realization that we cannot grasp, control, or master Jesus through our ideas. Augustine suggested that any god we grasp is not really god. At the same, we cannot grasp, control, or master other human beings through our ideas. <br /><br />Thus I come to see graven images through the cross as a thing of the heart and the tendency to reduce the person of God and the person of fellow humans to lifeless images instead of persons. <br /><br />In the seventh century, the church wrestled deeply with images/icons and St John of Damascus argued in favor of icons by looking to Jesus' embrace of human flesh (both in the nativity and the resurrection). Jesus is the perfect image. Now I realize some reject the witness of the Fathers (but that is a whole different discussion and I am simply trying to explain how I have wrestled with this idea).Doug Floydhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04216703218746988880noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7748345.post-12882026183618943392007-01-14T14:48:00.000-05:002007-01-14T14:48:00.000-05:00Please forgive me for the indelicate question, but...Please forgive me for the indelicate question, but why were graven images not all right for the ancient Israelites but they're all right for you?Milton Stanleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09235705641913811166noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7748345.post-27411781555915737912007-01-13T12:59:00.000-05:002007-01-13T12:59:00.000-05:00I am not familiar with Jim Palmer's book but I wil...I am not familiar with Jim Palmer's book but I will check on it now.Doug Floydhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04216703218746988880noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7748345.post-87691017088502722812007-01-13T10:37:00.000-05:002007-01-13T10:37:00.000-05:00Dear Doug,
Your post reminds me of something from...Dear Doug,<br /> Your post reminds me of something from Jim Palmer's book Divine Nobodies or blog about a slow Wal Mart clerk and impatient customers. I was convicted in the same way then as I am by this post.<br />EVERYONE counts in the Kingdom of God.truevynehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05998290681038658399noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7748345.post-6337977484566273052007-01-12T18:45:00.000-05:002007-01-12T18:45:00.000-05:00Wow! Great post Doug! It certainly has made me thi...Wow! Great post Doug! It certainly has made me think about the people around me, thanks for this.<br /><br />Be encouraged.<br />GBYAYJohnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09801496014904943835noreply@blogger.com