How does God Work?

One of the theological puzzles we have is how does God work? How does he achieve his will with (currently) 8 billion people doing their own thing?

The two classical answers post Augustine and even more so post the Reformation are "Calvinism" (re-badged Augustinianism) and "Arminianism", which amounts to a reconfigured Calvinism.

So-called "Provisionism" so-branded by its opponents, is the classic Baptist approach to both soteriology and divine sovereignty in terms of creatures in his image ( which God must take seriously as he called it very good), I don't think takes much time, explicitly, over this issue.

In short terms, Calvinism holds that God 'meticulously pre-determines' all things whatsoever, down to the organization of sub-atomic particles (not that he knew about them, but it follows), This extends to who will be 'saved' and who will be 'damned'. Not a good look, in my view, based as it is on pagan philosophy mixed with a misreading of Romans 8-11 and a God who is as limited as is man.

Arminians have a similar end state but by a different route: God knows what will happen as from his timeless existence can see it into the future and chooses those who he knows will turn to him in Ephesians 1:13 style. These he reflexively chooses to save, the others not so.

This makes too many assumptions about time, God's state of being and what human volition truly is or is not.

I think there is a simpler approach.

Firstly, God and time.

Whatever we might think theoretically about time and timelessness, the creation account shows God present and active in the days of our lives (to quite a TV show), or to be more existential, the days in which we have our life-world, in which we live. So God is here, with us, in time, in our history and in fellowship.

How this works out.

Calvinists and Arminians and other determinists seem to have a small God, projected in terms of the nature of limited human decision matrices. But God is far bigger than that.

First off, God created all being we experience. We are in the restricted domain of his creating. A domain he is exhaustively knowledgeable of. Nothing that happens in that domain can catch him out. He will always have an answer to achieve his ends despite anything man can do or imagine.

So, he has no need to 'determine' anything. Given his knowledge of the existential structures and the nature of man he has created, nothing can out-wit him. He neither needs to determine (eviscerating our true freedom as in his image), or see into a yet to exist future.

Even with the vast number of consequential choice options on earth (say 5 to the power of 8 billion at each choice node) and along consequential choice pathways, the options remain a tiny number for God to comprehend and manage. As a participant in history, which he shows he is, he is well able to use focused interventions (those quiet prompts we might feel, for example or circumstantial events) to bring special circumstances to action, in reflection of Romans 8:28.

No matter what puny man with his tiny intellect and dull imagination: just above the level of a gnat's from God's perspective, can do, nothing can derail God's objective which he has for the ultimate good of those in Christ and adopted into his family.

 Soli Deo Gloria!

Pastor or Preacher or both together?

 Mr YouTube landed this podcast on my screen recently, about preaching and pastors.

 Some good points made, but others needed some pondering,

 Obviously he's on about "preaching", "pastors" and touches "teachers", inter alia.

 First thing I noticed was a tendentious mistranslation of kerux (κῆρυξ). Sochor (the presenter) claimed it was "a herald of divine truth; work of proclaiming the word of God", Now it  might have that meaning in Christian usage, but that is NOT the translation, Thayer, for instance, has: "a herald or messenger vested with public authority, who conveyed the official messages of kings, magistrates, princes, military commanders, or who gave a public summons or demand"
 
Simply a proclaimer...of the gospel to non-believers. I guess so many non-believers attended congregations as "cultural Christians" the gospel had to be preached therein.

Paul showed us how this works in Acts 17 talking to the pagans.

I wonder how many congregations have an active community outreach? You know, a booth in the main street, a drop-in coffee and book shop, a stall at community markets, evening courses in the local college on Bible, church history, "True Spirituality", "Inner Peace" the "twisted tale of Christian thought". Titles to be attractive in the marketplace of ideas.

Even a well-structured "in-drag" program of introductory courses could work.

However, Paul tells us what happens in a gathering of the saints in 1 Corinthians 14:26b-33: teaching, revelation, a tongue (foreign language needing interpretation), prophesy.

What we have habituated to call "preaching" is probably more like "prophesy" for exhortation. But note: lots of contributors! No 'main man' and all in love (ch 13) for edification.

Then we go on to "pastor".

This role is derived from the Roman Catholic priest and not from the NT elder, although happily some congregations do have elders. Unfortunately, too often they are seen more as a board of directors than the gentle spiritual guides of 1 Peter 5:5 and Titus 1:5. Note Titus talks also of female elders,

This has rather tendentiously (again) been rendered as "older women" but the word is the feminine  of 'elder'. The qualification of only one wife obviously is to ban polygamists. There were no polyandrous women so no need to mention.

Now, on to the meat of it.

Being derived from the priest, the modern "pastor" is not seen in the NT at all. It's a fabrication of men and has been the greatest dis-empowerer of the church over centuries. It's main function is to train the congregation that its members have nothing to say and to "outsource" its learning and giving an account, proclamation, etc. to that one man, while inhibiting the growth of people to true Christian maturity and for many to be teachers (Hebrews 5:12).

Daryl Erkel  has a good essay on this: "The Urgent Need For Reformation in Pastoral Ministry" at www.semonindex.net website.

The sameness of all religions?

A not uncommon remark today is that all religions are basically the same.

Frank Turek speaks to this claim. 

For Christians the first impulse might be to say "no they are not".

Better, IMO (and Greg Koukl's in his books "Tactics" and "Street Smarts") is to find out more.

Here's a paradigmatic pattern that might help.

Let's start with your first clarifying question:

> Really, sounds interesting, can you tell me more?

OR

> What do you mean by [that/'religion' and 'same'?]

This might bring some summary remarks about being kind and loving, or similar superficial existential affect. But what you are after is their basis for their claim. Their "why" they think that.

You might be able to respond: 

>Your view seems to be focused on a basic Christian structure, but that's not surprising because Christianity has influenced the Western worldview with varying success for many centuries. How would that apply to other transcendental world views?

The discussion could go in many ways from here.

A couple of points to keep in mind:

What 'religion' is.

The best general definition of religion is given by Clouser in his "The Myth of Religious Neutrality" page 18 in the edition I use. It is:

"the non-dependent reality on which all else depends"

In other words: the world-view that structures one's view/concept/understanding of man and his relation to the world/reality/what basically is, etc.

So you might ask the person to stand back from the word "religion" and suggest that it is:

1 - the basic conception one has of the nature of man/mankind/humanity, that either differentiates from the rest of the biota or merges into it, and

2 - the basic conception of 'reality' and man's/mankind's/humanities' relation to it.

and in so doing how it accounts for Schaeffer's "dilemma": that man (or the alternative locutions) is noble yet cruel. One could alternatively say: Magnificent, yet flawed. Loves yet hates! Is generous yet selfish.

It is in these basic conceptions that Westphal's tripartite taxonomy works: 

1. Exilic Religion

Core View: Takes life in the material world to be an exile from the soul's true home.

Salvation: The process of returning to that spiritual home.

Key Focus: The divide between the transcendent/spiritual and the physical world, often viewing the latter as fallen or a place of alienation.

 

2. Mimetic Religion

Core View: Views life as normatively controlled by a right, harmonious relationship with nature.

Salvation: Achieved by rehearsing or participating in the origins and depths of nature, often guided by myth and ritual.

Key Focus: Cosmic order, cyclical time, and living in accordance with the rhythms of the natural universe.

 

3. Covenantal Religion

Core View: Adds a historical dimension to the cosmological focus of mimetic religion.

Salvation: Finds ultimate meaning in historical interactions between the divine and humanity, giving specific historical context to human guilt, death, and redemption.

Key Focus: Time as linear, historical responsibility, and moral obligations to a personal, active deity.

(AI summary)

 

Now we can have a conversation about 'religion' and its connection with the world as it is. 

 

[BTW, I don't agree with all Greg's theology, but his apologetics approach is second to none, IMO.] 

 

 

 

 

Whence materialism?

Materialism (and Physicalism) collapse quite quickly into impersonalism.

A universe that "created itself", oxymoronic tangles aside, results in the denial of humanity as of real persons and reduces the person to a configuration of matter (atoms and photons, presumably). Not a person at all.

Yet, in this it fails to explain our transcendental conceptions and our immateriality in teleological self-consciousness that conceives of a real future. That is, a future we can reasonably contemplate and invest in by acting now. Axiological drives and indeed all metaphysics become epistemologically barren without an immaterial grounding.

But no one lives as this is so! 

Words to use and points of departure.

In the formal addresses given in congregational gatherings (what we irrelevantly call 'sermons' in church 'services') the speaker can take the opportunity to give tips on personal evangelism and apologetics.

Here are three recent examples I've heard, with excellent springing-points for steering the conversation.

1 - This morning in our assembly the speaker, discussing Luke 16:19, etc. (the rich man and Lazarus) and 1 Timothy 6:17 commented, inter alia, "the Christian vision is not anti-joy or anti-material. It is anti-idolatry".

2 -  A dinner talk recently attended had the speaker sketch the rich man of the above parable (a type of fable) as one "living his best life" or "he doing him" to adopt a modern trope. But it can only end in dissolution, in death, and achieve nothing! And how does one know it is their 'best life'. It is simply unremarkable to seek self! The talk was entitled "The paradox of being true to yourself".

3 - I wrote about this one a while ago. The talk was on Luke 13:1-5. The often missed point here..no, in my hearing the perpetually missed point, is that Yeshua explains the so-called "problem of evil/suffering".

This is only a problem for non-believers, which is rarely explored with any rhetorical power: the disjunct between desire and experience show there is a problem, a big problem brought by our alienation from our Creator. It shows us the consequential state of the cosmos and who we are, prompting the only resolution of repentance (and commitment to our Creator in Yeshua -- who is the Creator incarnate).

Each of these can be used to steer a conversation and used as a springboard for some conversational evangelism: connecting the gospel with the fruitless conceptions of the world most cultures engender. 

Three types of religion

When we start to consider 'world-views' we can be met immediately with the falsehood that "all religions are the same"

 

Clouser in "The Myth of Religious Neutrality" goes a way to identifying how this is an inadequate analysis, even at the most superficial level, but Westphal is even more helpful. 

Westphal presents an interesting taxonomy of religions in his book "God, Guilt  and Death" that shows that they very much are not, on their own terms, the same as each other.

Mr AI summarizes it below

"AI Overview

              

In his book God, Guilt, and Death, philosopher Merold Westphal categorizes religious sensibilities into three main classes to explain human responses to finitude: exilic, mimetic, and covenantal religion. These are structural classes of religious thought rather than rigid historical traditions.

1. Exilic Religion

Core View: Takes life in the material world to be an exile from the soul's true home.

Salvation: The process of returning to that spiritual home.

Key Focus: The divide between the transcendent/spiritual and the physical world, often viewing the latter as fallen or a place of alienation.

2. Mimetic Religion

Core View: Views life as normatively controlled by a right, harmonious relationship with nature.

Salvation: Achieved by rehearsing or participating in the origins and depths of nature, often guided by myth and ritual.

Key Focus: Cosmic order, cyclical time, and living in accordance with the rhythms of the natural universe.

3. Covenantal Religion

Core View: Adds a historical dimension to the cosmological focus of mimetic religion.

Salvation: Finds ultimate meaning in historical interactions between the divine and humanity, giving specific historical context to human guilt, death, and redemption.

Key Focus: Time as linear, historical responsibility, and moral obligations to a personal, active deity.

While Westphal uses these three categories to describe the phenomenology of religion, he also famously explored the Phenomenology of religion broadly, and examined how modern critiques of religion can function as a tool for Religious Belief.

If you are exploring Westphal's work, I [Mr AI] can:

Detail how these categories apply to specific traditions (e.g., how Christianity blends these elements).

Summarize his concepts of faith and reason.

Provide an overview of his views on the hermeneutics of suspicion (Marx, Nietzsche, Freud).

Let me know which of these you'd like to focus on! "

[end of AI]

 

Some people are faced with contention about the 'rightness' of seeking to persuade others to change religion.

Two thoughts on this:

Firstly it raises an interesting question of moral epistemology and the possible source of 'rights' along with the basis for any ethical or moral judgement, because those who would reprimand for proselytizing are themselves seeking to impose their 'religious' belief on us!

Secondly, we typically have initial evangelistic conversations that 1. seek to understand the other's belief system, and 2. seek  to explain ours. No push to 'convert at all"

Greg Koukl has two excellent books on this: "Tactics" and "Street Smarts".

 

On covenantal religions.

 

The three main ones are often said to be Judaism, Christianity and Islam. There are others of course but very small. Perhaps Zoroastrianism, for example.

Islam is interesting in this category as its conception of Allah ("the god") has mimetic characteristics.

 

Allah seems to be contained in the cosmos, has physical characteristics and seems to be physically localized. His "word" seems also to be both "Isa" (the Islamic misnamed distortion of Yeshua) and the 'eternal Quran', which itself is eternally physical on tablets in 'heaven'. This latter is strange given its occasionalist references, historical errors, physical mistakes and inclusion of late Christian pseudepigrapha .

 

How this plays out

In the idea of man and the idea of of mans relation to the world are different across the three types.

Mimetic religions have man as an integral part of the world and not substantially differentiated from it.

It is finally monastic.

Materialism/physicalism reflect this in that man is an assembly of basic particles and everything about man is founded in his material substance. Man has no more status, finally, than a rock!

Exilic religions depict man as separated from the basic IS: an impersonal undifferentiatedness. There is no innate significance to man or, it seems, the basic "IS". Man's 'object' (the worth of which fails to be established by the nature of the basic being espoused) is to be unified or undifferentiated with the basic "IS". Upon this the individual dissolves into the IS.

Against these conceptions covenental religions set man in contrast to both the material cosmos and the separate self-existent Creator: Yahweh in both Judaism and Christianity. Fundamental to man is relationships, which are real and substantial.

Man is distinguished from both other types in a combination of his substance and his dependence. While similar materially to the cosmos is differentiated by virtue of spiritual self-consciousness that is only resolved in relationship with Yahweh through his Spirit sent by the incarnate Messiah. The Genesis creation account in chapters 1-3 illuminates this.

  

 

Why only 1 way?

At my youth group (attendee only) back last century (I love saying that), one of the other attendees asked why Jesus was the only way. She had become quite upset at the exclusivity as she perceived it that this claim seemed to entail.

All I can recall of the answer was a repetition of the relevant scriptural passage, with no further discussion, and much frustration and bemusement all around.

In later years the obvious answer has come to mind and one that reaches back into the scriptural framing of reality: Jesus, is the creator! That's why he is the only way!

 

He is the "reference point" for all that exists and the integration point for we who are alienated from our creator, which alienation only he is able to overcome by giving us new life.

Nothing and no one from within the creation can resolve its final dilemma of estrangement (Romans 8:19ff), only one from without the creation.