| Theological Studies: God's Attributes and His Relationship With the World
Alvin Shaul Theology Paper #3-4, Oord October 11, 2005 What are and how would one define God�s attributes? Should these attributes rationally cohere with one another? One might say that God is God for a reason, or that God is only God because there are certain attributes that can only be of supernatural origin and strength. If God were to lack these attributes, He would cease to be God. Some of the principle attributes that make God God are His sovereignty, His love, His aseity, His eternity, His omnipotence, His omnipresence, His omniscience, His immutability, and His character as a personal God. In the Bible we see God as truth, righteousness, and mercy. This list, provided by H. Ray Dunning, well encompasses that which makes God God. I will argue that all of these must be present in one form or another and cohere with one another for God to truly be the God we proclaim Him to be. First, we see that God is a sovereign God. Sovereignty is defined in Easton�s Bible Dictionary as God�s �absolute right to do all things according to his own good pleasure�. The most important part of this definition, if we are to accept it, is the last two words. This �good pleasure� may also be referred to as the love of God. Therefore, when we alter the definition, it reads: God�s absolute right to do all things according to his love. As such, we place sovereignty and love together and say that the sovereignty of God is a sovereignty of love. That is God has power to do as he wishes, and since God�s nature is love, so also His actions must be loving. It is impossible for God to perform an unloving act because his sovereignty only enables Him to perform loving acts. Next we see that God possesses aseity. God is and always has been. God is from Himself. He owes nothing else to his being, but rather is being itself (Dunning 200). Since God is a God of love, his aseity must also be an aseity of love. As God is of himself, so is His aseity of itself. His aseity of love has no bounds as well and as such God can spread it on us without even trying, because it is part of His nature. Thus, we see the aseity of God as a representation of prevenient grace. When we conclude that an attribute of God is his eternity or eternalness, it becomes easy to misinterpret. One of the most common, yet flawed perspectives, is that God is nontemporal and does not experience time as we do. However, the Bible seems to implicate that God is very much pantemporal. Once again we must return the nature of God as love. Now when we speak of the eternity of God we are speaking of the eternity of God�s love. God�s love is unchanging throughout time, though God remains active within time. The ideas of sovereignty and omnipotence are very similar. The same argument applies here that God is a God of love and as such he only has power to do what is by nature loving. A blind acceptance of God as omnipotent will easily lead one to complications. �Can God create a stone so large that He cannot role is away?� Such an unqualified perception will lead one to a misunderstanding and acceptance of God�s omnipotence. �God does and wills nothing else than that wherein divine love realizes itself� (201). Once again we find that a non-metaphysical view, now of the omnipresence of God, is best. Instead of seeing God as present everywhere, which implies He is just as much in the heart of a sinner as in that of a righteous person (202), we should see His love as present wherever it is conceived. Also in relation to this attribute is the attribute of omniscience. To say that God knows everything through all time is a Calvinistic view which supports unconditional election and irresistible grace. If God knows everything there is to know through all of time, then we are but droids living out a life over which we have no true control. Thus, the idea that God is pantemporal is essential at this point. God knows everything there is to know about the past and the present, but only the possibilities for the future. You might say that God has a �choose your own adventure� book written out for all of time, but we get to choose the adventure and He doesn�t know our choices before we make them. Also important in this conception of God�s omniscience is that He is inescapable. God knows every thought and deed performed and to try to escape His eye is to doom oneself to utter failure. God is immutable. This is perhaps one of the most widely accepted attributes of God. But of course, as is with most of God�s attributes, there is more than one way to define God�s immutability. The key difference between Wesleyan thought and others is the idea of immutability in essence and immutability in choice. As Wesleyans we view God as immutable in essence. Other traditions will view God as completely immutable, never changing in any way for any reason. However, the Scripture seems to clearly show that God makes decisions. God gives chances to people that offer multiple outcomes. In this way God is changing all the time. However, we must again return to the sovereignty of God�s love. We believe that God�s essence which is love is unchanging throughout time, and thus immutable. Finally we find that God is a personal God. Much of the concern with such a finding is that it places limitations on God that are not warranted. This view understands the phrasing �personal God� to mean �God is a person�. However, the meaning which we must invoke from this text is that God is personal in nature and in relationships. Since God is love and He is a personal God, his love then seeks out relationship with people. God is not limited by the bounds of humanity, but rather reaches to us in an effort to be in personal relationship with us. From these attributes of God we now turn to the biblical attributes of God. These attributes help to reveal the nature of biblical revelation. The first of these attributes is truth. Truth in the Old Testament is seen as involving trust and trustworthiness. One can trust God. One can believe that God will keep his promises. �Truth is the correspondence of an idea or word to its reality� (205). Thus, faith is an expected outcome of God�s faithfulness to us. We also see in the Gospel of John that Jesus Christ is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. When we apply this idea of trustworthiness and faithfulness to the Truth, this name for Christ makes perfect sense. The next biblical attribute is righteousness. The core of the attribute of righteousness is salvation. God was righteous in rescuing his people out of Egypt and righteous in leading Moses and Aaron in their decision making. �Paul makes use of the idea of the righteousness of God to refer to His justifying activity toward those who were undeserving, thus preserving the essentially salvific connotation of the idea from the Old Testament� (206). The final biblical attribute to be discussed is the mercy of God. Since mercy ???)) essentially means �steadfast love� in the Hebrew, we must conclude that the rendering of �mercy� must be closely related to that sense of steadfast love. This steadfast, merciful love of God is in direct contrast to the wickedness and faithlessness of His own people all throughout the Old Testament. We see the power of this merciful love in God�s patience and forgiveness of His people. I see no reason as to why all of these attributes of God cannot cohere with one another rationally. It is when one or more of these attribute are skewed from the realization that the very nature of God is love, that problems begin to arise with the attributes not cohering together rationally. For example, let us say that someone accepts all these attributes as stated, with the exception of God�s omnipresence. Instead this person believes that God is non-temporal and thus is outside of time. If God is outside of our time, then we have problems with both the omniscience and omnipotence of God as stated herein. If God is outside of time, he then knows the future and yet allows evil to occur. If we say that God allows evil to occur, we are saying that he is not a loving God, for to allow evil is not to love. However, if we say that God is allowing evil, then God cannot be all-powerful, because God should be able to stop that evil from occurring. Problem after problem occur once one link in the chain of attributes is broken. Therefore, for these attributes to exist rationally together, they must exist as stated herein. How, when and why does God relate to the world? We have partly covered this in the section above dealing with God being a personal God. Since God is a God of love and everything he does is done through love, any relation to us must also be sought with love. God seeks to be in relation with all His creation. Everything He created was �good� and as such worthy to be call �God�s�. God wants to relate to us because it is in His nature to do so. Because I do not necessarily believe in a preexisting love between the Trinity before the creation of the world, it is hard for me to believe there has never been some creation, somewhere. The nature of the love of God requires that there be something or someone to be in relation with and to love. Thus God seeks us out at all times. The preliminary component of God�s love to humankind is prevenient grace. Throughout all of life we have a grace from God, part of the aseity of God that provides a cushion for us to fall on. Prevenient grace saves the ignorant. Once no longer ignorant of the love of God and Christ, we can only be saved by responding to God�s grace. At the same time, this grace is responsible to us. God presents it to us and only asks us to respond it. God relates to the world when individuals conceive of Him and believe in Him. God cannot force himself and his love upon someone and make them accept it. To do so would not only be oppressive to the person, but would negate any reason to seek that relationship. If God could make someone love Him and respond to Him, then no one would ever not love Him and respond to Him to begin with. God would not waste the time letting us fill our lives with sin before we finally accept His grace. God relates to the world every day through nature. Natural revelation is a key element in the power of God. To view nature as it is and deny supernatural formation is in my humble opinion, an extremely ignorant choice of thought. God reveals Himself and His majesty through creation so as to expose Himself to His people. It is not difficult to see God in relation to the world. All of His attributes seem to point to a relationship with humankind. Indeed, to take away those attributes would leave no purpose for humankind, and to take away humankind would leave no purpose for those attributes. Bibliography: Dunning, H. Ray. Grace Faith and Holiness: A Wesleyan Systematic Theology. Beacon Hill Press, Kansas City, Missouri, 1988. Stone, Bryan P. and Thomas Jay Oord. Thy Nature and Thy Name is Love: Wesleyan and Process Theologies in Dialogue. Abington Press, Nashville, TN, 2001. |