My Personal Philosophy Philosophy, being the study of knowledge, reality, and existence, is flawed without a proper understanding of the Creator God. When God is made the firm foundation upon which philosophical arguments are presented, philosophy becomes a concrete science. Without God, it is an abstract science that cannot have any real answers. My philosophical beliefs are founded above all else on the existence of God. God, the source of ultimate truth and reality, has given me knowledge through His revelations that He may be all the more glorified by the way I live my life.
1. Reality is God and that which corresponds to Him. God is limitless, transcendent, all-present, all-knowing, and indivisible. There is nothing in this universe …show more content…
Rene Descartes has played a major role in my life. His famous saying, “I think, therefore I am” had somehow wiggled its way into my life without my noticing. For as long as I can remember, I have pictured the center of human existence as the brain. In You are What You Love by James K. A. Smith, Smith described Descartes’ philosophy as seeing people as “brains on a stick.” (Smith 3). Thinking of humans as “brains on a stick” is exactly what I had been doing. I have always pictured my own brain as a computer with files. To me, it made sense that the brain was the ultimate source of existence and knowledge. In God’s commandment to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind”, I had only been focusing on the mind aspect. While studying Plato, I again found myself leaning toward the focus on the mind. God has blessed me in the academic arena and I tend to gravitate toward being able to think my way to God. I tend to put my faith in my own reasoning capabilities. Since Pastor Belcher’s class, I have been struggling with the difference between knowledge and truth. Plato describes knowledge as involving truth and never changing. Aristotle describes knowledge as perception. But if knowledge is never changing and involves truth, does that mean there are degrees of knowledge? How much truth is involved in knowledge? What is the difference between truth and knowledge? These are all questions that I have been pondering since Pastor Belcher’s class that before the class I had never spent one minute thinking about. While reading R. C. Sproul’s The Consequences of Ideas, my mind was easily persuaded by each new philosophy that I read. However, in Colossians, we are told to not be swayed by every philosophy that comes along, but to hold fast to God’s Word and truth. When I compared the philosophies to the Bible and measured it according to truth, each one fell short. (Matt 22:37, John 17:17, Col.
1. Reality is God and that which corresponds to Him. God is limitless, transcendent, all-present, all-knowing, and indivisible. There is nothing in this universe …show more content…
Rene Descartes has played a major role in my life. His famous saying, “I think, therefore I am” had somehow wiggled its way into my life without my noticing. For as long as I can remember, I have pictured the center of human existence as the brain. In You are What You Love by James K. A. Smith, Smith described Descartes’ philosophy as seeing people as “brains on a stick.” (Smith 3). Thinking of humans as “brains on a stick” is exactly what I had been doing. I have always pictured my own brain as a computer with files. To me, it made sense that the brain was the ultimate source of existence and knowledge. In God’s commandment to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind”, I had only been focusing on the mind aspect. While studying Plato, I again found myself leaning toward the focus on the mind. God has blessed me in the academic arena and I tend to gravitate toward being able to think my way to God. I tend to put my faith in my own reasoning capabilities. Since Pastor Belcher’s class, I have been struggling with the difference between knowledge and truth. Plato describes knowledge as involving truth and never changing. Aristotle describes knowledge as perception. But if knowledge is never changing and involves truth, does that mean there are degrees of knowledge? How much truth is involved in knowledge? What is the difference between truth and knowledge? These are all questions that I have been pondering since Pastor Belcher’s class that before the class I had never spent one minute thinking about. While reading R. C. Sproul’s The Consequences of Ideas, my mind was easily persuaded by each new philosophy that I read. However, in Colossians, we are told to not be swayed by every philosophy that comes along, but to hold fast to God’s Word and truth. When I compared the philosophies to the Bible and measured it according to truth, each one fell short. (Matt 22:37, John 17:17, Col.