I'm sorry, but that thinking reduces everything to a flat plane — whereas in fact, the mineral world is transcended by the flora world, the fauna transcends the fauna, the human transcends the fauna, the angelic transcends the human, and the Divine transcends the lot.
No it does not! If something exists then it exists, whether it exists within space and time or outside of. If something exists, it exists! It can be no other way!
The problem with your line of thinking is that it assumes God is a thing, like any other thing ... whereas God is not like any other thing and surpasses every other thing to an absolute and infinite degree.
I don't view God to be a thing, but rather our parental reality.
In God, but not as God. God sustains all created nature, God is immanently present in and to all created nature, but created nature is not God, and God is not created.
I never said it was. What I did suggest is that all things are a part of God, and as such derive from God. God is our ultimate reality.
God does not exist within space and time, were that true, then God would be subject to empirical determination. God is Immanently present in and to creation, but God is not creation, and creation is not God.
Black holes, the earth, outer space, the universe are but a grain of sand compared to God's infinity. One might compare the universe to a single human cell existing within our body. Multiply this thought by infinity and we still will not be able to grasp the depth of God. God has no beginning nor end.
I never suggested that God exists only within space and time. I said God exists both within and outside of space and time. We experience God through our senses and through life itself. We cannot comprehend God wholly as God is infinite, but we can experience and learn of God through what has been made, through all that exists.
God is knowable (in part) by all that exists. God is knowable (in part) by our ability to hear, feel, see, smell, and taste. God is the great I Am (as the scriptures state). We are merely pilgrims on a journey in God.
There is no end destination to reach for us, but rather a continual communion with God, a coming to know life and love more full as we move forward. Life is an ongoing relationship between God and man. We live through and in God, and perhaps in much the same way, God lives through and in us as living, breathing creatures.
Put another way, if creation were to cease to exist, God would not be changed or altered in any way.
God is as God is, unchanging as God exists. Yet, God like everything else, is in constant motion. Water doesn't cease to be the substance known as h2o, but it can change from one form to another. Like wise, just because existence moves and changes doesn't mean that existence ceases to be existence.
As an intellectual proposition only ... not as a proof (else, again, God would have been proven a long time ago).
God is a term used to identify the origins of life, but our origins and the nature of cannot be known with any certainty. We speculate, we contemplate, but our origins remain a mystery. Is God intelligent? Is God aware? Is God angry and jealous as many believe? God simply is and we exist as a part of God's being.
From there one can, by faith, proceed, but God is not knowable in any way, other than by self-declaration or self-revelation, to the knower.
I disagree, Thomas. Even your scriptures state the contrary:
"For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened."
I would say God is only knowable to the intellect. God is not an object of the senses, were that so, then God would be empirically demonstrable.
I disagree again, Thomas. If we cannot experience God via our senses and only by intellect, then God is a figment of man's imagination.
But that does not make the 'thing' God.
What thing? God is our parental reality, and the origin of all life.
OK, but then please don't quote from Scripture, as the God of Scripture is not the God you're seeking.
Why? It is the scriptures that stand against your concept of God. God is more than a mental construct, Thomas. God exists beyond our mental imagery. God is the great I Am, in whom we live, and move, and have our being. I'll post to you what I posted to radarmark:
"Maybe it is and maybe it isn't. Our ancestors may have been attempting to explain God, but like us, had difficulty in accuracy. I kinda view religion as yesterday's science, and the bible as a text book that hold records of the the developed theories held at that time. To me, God is a term used to identify the origin of life, and the nature of. Our theories evolve as more evidence is brought to the table."
~GK~
