Considering The Goodness of God

We’ve had a number of events recently that have shaken many Americans to the core. The reality of evil was pressed home in painful fashion. Sadly, most Americans aren’t prepared to face the reality of evil. If people are considered basically good, then we essentially think such things should not happen here where we are educated and prosperous. Those things only happen there, wherever there may be. But not to us, not on our shores.

There are a number of books that have tried to tackle this problem. Some good. Some bland. And some quite horrible, like the sadly popular book by Rabbi Kushner about the God who wants to help but really can’t. He also assumes there are good people.

“To come to grips with the problem of evil and suffering, you must do more than hear heart-wrenching stories about suffering people. You must hear God’s truth to help you interpret those stories.”

Randy Alcorn has released The Goodness of God: Assurance of Purpose in the Midst of Suffering for this reason. It is a shorter version (120 pages) of his book If God is Good: Faith in the Midst of Suffering. It makes a readable, meaningful book that you can hand out to people who are suffering, or struggling with the suffering of others. He covers lots of ground in succinct fashion, including illustrations and examples to help people understand his point. It is not dry and academic. He writes of his own suffering and how he had to make sense of it. He believes any faith that doesn’t prepare you for suffering is not a biblical faith, and our churches must do a better job teaching biblical theology to prepare people for suffering.

“The pain of suffering points to something deeply and unacceptably flawed about this world we inhabit.”

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Considering Baptism: the First View

My journey on the doctrine of baptism was long and at times arduous.  I think it may be pertinent as I review this book about baptism.  I was raised Roman Catholic, and was “baptized” as an infant (I say “baptized” since my parents are nominally Catholic and I question whether I had a right to baptism).  As a new convert, I unknowingly fell into a campus cult that taught you needed to be baptized to be saved.  I knew I was already saved by grace thru faith, but believed I should be baptized so I was.  Soon I was engaging my “discipler” on the issue, driven to better understand Scripture and leave that “ministry”.  I found a Conservative Baptist church in my hometown and enjoyed my new life as a Christian there until I left for Seminary 5 years later.  At seminary I was a credobaptist among paedobaptists, and I was thankful for Dr. Nicole as I also read Kingdon & Jewette to defend my credobaptism from a covenantal perspective.

Finally, 2 years after I graduated from seminary (the first time), the light bulb went on.  A friend jokingly challenged me that my resistance was a reaction to growing up Catholic.  I re-entered my study with “Lord, if this is true help me to see it.”  I saw that I had erroneous presuppositions that led to my resistance of a fully biblical view of baptism.  I had it partially right, but not wholly right.

So, my cards are on the table- are yours?  The power of presuppositions is one of the reasons this discussion is so difficult.  We are not just dealing with biblical texts, but all the presuppositions about Scripture we bring to the table.  This is true about all doctrinal discussions, but this discussion is particularly laden with landmines.  Baptism: Three Views brings three respected theologians together to work through it.

The introduction quotes from Barth, who after writing the quote moved from a paedobaptist position to credobaptist position, about how your anger reveals a vulnerable point in your position.  Could be.  Or it could also be that your sanctification has not sufficiently progressed to patiently deal with a person who is either unteachable or utterly blind of the presuppositions he or she brings to the table.  So be careful about using that quote, folks.

Dr. Bruce Ware, a self-described Progressive Dispensationalist (footnote, pp. 42), is the first to present his view.  He has written many books I’ve found edifying, including God’s Lessor Glory: The Diminished God of Open Theism and the books he edited defending the 5 Points of Calvinism.   He is no theological slouch, which is what makes his presentation all the more disappointing.  I see within it the power of his presuppositions, to it’s detriment.

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Considering Jonah 3

Jonah miraculously survived 3 days in the belly of the fish/whale.  There he was humbled, submitting himself to God who then had the sea dwelling creature spit him up on the shore.

Then the Word of the Lord came to Jonah again.  He is again sent to Ninevah, the difference in wording being “the message that I give you.”  He is still to call out against it, warning the people to prompt repentance.

Some have argued that it could not have been a genuine revival.  How, they argue, could these coverted Ninevites then resume their conquering ways resulting in the defeat and exile of the Northern Kingdom?  Students of revivals will notice that often revivals last but a generation.  The effects are not permanent.  For instance, barely 100 years after the Welsh revivals, Christianity is nearly extinct there.  This shows how long their declension has lasted.

“People who experience mighty revivals may be all the more hardened against God in the generations that follow.  The presence of the Spirit of God is a far more delicate matter than we are prone to imagine.”  Sinclair Ferguson

This is illustrated in the life of Jonah, and repeatedly in the history of Israel and Judah.  So we mich take Paul’s warning against greiving the Spirit seriously.  We cannot be sure we will repent of any sin we are tempted to commit.  But such disobedience will produce spiritual declension at the least, if not be evidence that the person was spiritually dead to begin with.

God’s evangelistic sovereignty is revealed in this passage, as Ferguson notes.  God sent a messenger in Jonah.  He authorized the message Jonah would declare.  It is good to pray for revival, but we must also evangelize for revival.  The God-declared end has a God-ordained means.  He sent an evangelist AND He opened their hearts to the message.  This is the very reason He sent Jonah in the first place.

The message was simple, but the effect was profound.  Historically the Spirit works in 2 ways.  The first is in the messenger or preacher, and is called unction (anointing has also been used but this term has recently been hijacked by televangelists like Benny Hinn to mean something quite different).  The message is delivered with power and conviction.

“That word can only come with power to our hearers when it has come with power to our own hearts.”  John Owen

The Spirit also works in the hearers to illumine them.  Paul describes this in 2 Corinthians 3-4.  God sheds His light into our hearts that we might see the glory of Jesus.  Suddenly people see their need AND the sufficiency of Jesus’ work on behalf of sinners.

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The Bottom Line of Open Theism

(This is the 3rd in a series on Open Theism)

Review and Summary

Pardon my polemics as I sum this up.  The god that Open Theism offers you and me is a diminished deity.  Much of his power and glory have been sacrificed at the altar of human pride.  People want genuine human freedom; a freedom from God’s control.  They strip him of sovereignty so he resembles rabbi Harold Kushner’s very good but essentially powerless deity.  This is the god who can’t help you very much.  This is the god who can’t really keep his promises because he cannot control all of the factors necessary to keeping his promises.  This god might not be able to save you.  You will get a warm fuzzy because he loves you, but this is a teddy bear against the things that terrify you by night.  This god’s will is altered by prayer, but he can’t necessarily fulfill his will.  The god Open Theism offers in clearly not the God of the Bible.  Therefore he is not a God worth worshipping.

The God who presents Himself in the Bible is one who rules nature.  He rules all of creation.  He is the One who knows the end from the beginning.  He is the One who works out everything according to His purpose.  He is the One who chose who would be saved by Christ before the creation.  He possesses a freedom far greater than ours.  He involves Himself in the affairs of life to accomplish those purposes.  He is actively engaged with us, but is not at our mercy.

I hope that we don’t have to learn this the hard way, as Nebuchadnezzar did.  In his arrogance he exalted himself.  God opposed and humbled him.  When he came to his senses he declared that no one can thwart God’s will (Daniel 4:34-35).  If we continue to exalt ourselves (particularly at His expense), God will oppose and humble even His church.  To embrace this doctrine is to place ourselves under God’s curse.  Indeed, “no one can deliver us from His hand”.

 For More Study:

God at War: The Bible and Spiritual Conflict.  Gregory Boyd (IV Press)

God of the Possible.  Gregory Boyd (Baker Books)

God’s Lesser Glory: The Diminished God of Open Theism.  Bruce Ware (Crossway Books)

No Other God: A Response to Open Theism by John Frame (P&R Publishing)

The Case of Freewill Theism: A Philosophical Assessment.  David Basinger (IV Press)

The God Who Risks: A Theology of Providence.  John Sanders (IV Press)

The Openness of God: A Biblical Challenge to the Traditional Understanding of God.  Pinnock, Rice, Sanders, Hasker and Basinger (IV Press)

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The Curse of Open Theism

  

(This is the 2nd in a series on Open Theism)

 

The Curse of Open Theism

Genuine human freedom would be a morally neutral will.  I could freely choose from any number of options without any outside interference.  That identical set of circumstances may produce any number of choices. 

I say genuine human freedom is a myth because they fail to account for, or minimize, depravity and its effects on human freedom.  They ignore the Bible’s assessment that we are slaves to sin and enemies of God.  God’s Word declares that we do not possess genuine human freedom.  Their theological system is built to protect a philosophical idea we do not find in Scripture.

Jonathan Edwards called the will “the mind choosing”.  We choose, freely, according to our character.  Unfortunately, we are sinners.  We make our choices on the basis of our impure motives, desires and longings.  We are not morally neutral!

However, this assumption of genuine human freedom affects how Open Theists interpret some key Bible passages.  In Genesis 28 they believe that God actually learned that Abraham feared Him.  They use a “face value” model of interpretation.  They claim God had to learn this piece of information about Abraham by testing him.  This despite the fact they still claim God has full knowledge of the past and present.  If God has full knowledge of the present, He would have known that Abraham feared Him.  If we have genuine human freedom, this test is irrelevant.  God cannot base any of His future actions on Abraham’s fear and faithfulness because God does not know if Abraham will continue to fear God and be faithful in the future.  Tested again, Abraham could choose differently.

In his book God’s Lesser Glory, Bruce Ware does an excellent job examining these and other passages related to this discussion. He shows that a “face value” method of interpretation would strip God of His present and past knowledge (He had to see if Sodom and Gemorrah were really that bad).  It would also mean that God is not present everywhere at every moment (He had to go to Sodom and Gemorrah!).  They fail to test their interpretation of these passages against the clear teaching of Scripture elsewhere.  We do this because God cannot lie.  As a result, Scripture will not contradict itself.  The clear passages illumine the unclear passages.

So, part of the curse of Open Theism is that it is a slippery slope whereby God’s glory continues to decrease.  The same method of interpretation that robs us of God’s knowledge of the future robs us of other attributes of God.  We end up with a god more like ourselves, and less like the Savior, Redeemer and Defender we need.  They give us a god who could not know the Fall would happen, Jesus would die on the cross, Peter would deny Jesus three times (how’d he even know Peter would be questioned three times), that Hezekiah would live 15 more years (that is a whole lot of possible accidents, injuries, illnesses and possible assassination attempts), much less that you would exist in order to be adopted in Christ.  The Bible, and our faith, begins to unravel.

Bruce Ware also does an excellent job building the biblical case for God’s foreknowledge (in the Calvinistic sense).  In Isaiah 40-48, God declares that what separates Him for the numerous idols the people worshipped is the fact that He does declare the future.  He points to past prophecies that have come true.  He points to past prophecies that are about to come true.  He is specific about many of those.  In order for God to bring His purpose to completion, He must know and control the choices of a vast number of volitional beings.  The mystery is how He can do this “without violating the will of the creature” as the Westminster Confession of Faith asserts.  The claims of Open Theism that God does not know the future do not stand up to the teaching of Scripture.

The curse of Open Theism is not limited to theology proper.  It has a practical outworking in the lives of those who believe it (Bruce Ware is once again extremely helpful).  This is why Paul told Timothy “watch your life and doctrine closely”.  One area of concern is prayer. 

Proponents of Open Theism declare that prayer really matters.  They believe that prayer really matters only if we have genuine human freedom.  In prayer, our relationship with God is built.  We are able to share our feelings and desires.  In their view, foreknowledge would mean that our prayers do not change anything.

In Reformed Theology (summed up in the Westminster Confession of Faith) prayer has two primary purposes (at least).  God has not just ordained what will happen, but also how.  Some the instruments God uses to accomplish His will are the prayers of His people.  Our prayers matter, even in a theological system where God is in complete control. 

Prayer is also related to our adoption as God’s children.  We express our needs, longings and feelings to our Father who expresses His loving involvement with us by responding to our prayers.  One need not accept the views of Open Theism to have a prayer life that matters and builds one’s relationship with God.

Open Theism seems to forget that God knows everything past and present.  Our prayers are significant, in their opinion, because God learns something new.  But He knows what we think, feel and desire.  If God’s knowledge of the future makes prayer useless (as they claim), so would God’s complete knowledge of the present.  We don’t need to pray because God already knows. 

Their own argument backfires (as if the purpose of prayer were to inform God of something).  God will not learn something new which will cause Him to change His mind.  The point would rather seem to be integrity in our relationship with God and ourselves.  God seems to be letting us know our hearts better.  But they insist on using a human model for communication between God and man.  This is part of the same problem we saw before- making God in our image!

Their views once again slight God’s wisdom.  Why does God need our help to make decisions?  He certainly possesses more complete knowledge than we do, is wiser than us, and has much purer motives than us.  To believe that God’s decision making process is incomplete (like mine) without input from others does not make any sense.  It exalts my knowledge and wisdom, and minimizes God’s.  Compare their views with Isaiah 40:13-14.  No one is competent to be God’s counselor.  And God has no need of a counselor.  Open Theism again falls short of God’s glory as revealed in Scripture.

Beyond this, what happens when things turn out to be difficult?  Are we to surmise, as they do, that God was mistaken (since He couldn’t see the future)?  Our disappointment shifts from our circumstances to God’s character.  We depart from Paul’s conviction that God is at work in all our circumstances to make us like Jesus (however painful that might be).  We would be forced to believe that God is a good-hearted bungler who can’t be trusted to protect us.  As a result suffering has little or no meaning in Open Theism.  God’s plan can be ambushed either by Satan or your neighbor.  God’s glory is assaulted by Open Theism once again.  They reject the biblical teaching that God is absolutely in control and that God is absolutely good.  The Bible asserts both, not one at the expense of the other as Openness Theology does.  Once again it fails to measure up to the standard of Scripture.

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The “Blessing” of Open Theism

There is a new theology on the block.  Readers of theology can find an increasing number of books advocating it.  Readers of popular Christian literature can unknowingly be influenced by this theology in the writings of people like Philip Yancey and John Eldredge.  The average Christian probably doesn’t have the first idea what I’m referring to, and why this is an issue dividing some denominations.

 

What is Open Theism? 

It also goes by the names “Openness Theology”, “Presentism” and “Freewill Theism”.  Its goal is to uphold the freedom of our will in a vital, dynamic relationship with God.  It believes that it is logically impossible for God to know the future in a world populated by volitional creatures.  Therefore, the future is open to God just as much as to us.  As a result, God is the ultimate risk-taker.

 

How Did This Arise?

This new theology arose from Arminianism.  Arminianism teaches that God has perfect foreknowledge of the future.  God knows what we will do in the future.  This is primarily a passive knowledge.  He observes (and influences) choices, but does not exert control.  This is different from Calvinism which believes that God knows the future because He controls the future. 

A group of Arminian scholars began to see a philosophical discrepancy between freewill and foreknowledge.  In other words, they saw a fatal flaw in their theology.  They have undermined Calvinism’s theological competitor.  This would be part of the blessing.

Here’s the argument as simply as I can put it.  First, genuine human freedom is not possible if God knows all of our future choices.  If God knows them, they must take place.  This would undermine “genuine human freedom”.  They establish a choice between genuine human freedom and foreknowledge.  They both can’t be true (in the theologians’ opinion).  These men have sided with genuine human freedom.

Second, because they have placed genuine human freedom above foreknowledge, there is no logical reason for God’s foreknowledge.  God can’t know what has not, and may not, happen.  God cannot know the future because it is comprised of choices not made yet.

Third, they realized that the Arminian view of foreknowledge was essentially incompatible with any view of providence.  God knows what will happen, but He exerts little or no control over what will happen.  God is therefore more an observer of history than a participant.

 

The Blessing of Open Theism

This theology is an internal revolt against Arminianism.  It exposes the logical inconsistencies within Arminian theology.  A critique from within is generally harder to answer than one from without.  This does not mean the critique is right.  But in this case, the flaws of the system are exposed.  These theologians are expressing their discontentment with Arminianism.  They only indirectly assault Calvinism.  This is because Calvinism starts from a very different set of priorities than either of these two systems.

Open Theism has a noble intent (I think).  They want people to know God is engaged with history and wants an authentic relationship with us.  We all need to remember that God loves His people and is actively pursuing our good.  But, as you will see, I think they gave up too much (unnecessarily) to gain something already espoused by Calvinism.  They refuse to embrace Calvinism because they want to maintain this “genuine human freedom”.  They embrace a myth (since the Fall at the very least) while they inflate humanity and shrink God. 

(this is the first in a series on Open Theism)

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