Open theism and God the omelette-maker
"Open theism" or "relational theology" is a knee-jerk
reaction to a hyper-Calvinism that's when it's done talking makes human
life and existence into something like God playing himself a game of
chess with humans as little more than pawns. There ought to be some
biblical response to that nonsense but the dithering Sovereign that's
offered by the "open theism" view is no biblical response. "Open theism"
is more more than a poor response to hyper-Calvinism—it's an attempt to
defend God's reputation by showing us that he's not responsible in any
sense for the suffering in the
world. We have all the suffering in the world because God tied his own
hands and lets creation unfold as it will while he runs around bringing
good out of evil if he can.
I believe God can make an omelette and lemonade at least as good as
anyone else. So it’s no surprise to me that when eggs are broken he can
make a stunning omelette out of them or if life hands him a lemon he can
make the best lemonade make-able. I don’t mind confessing that; bless
me, I don’t mind proclaiming it, because I see it written all
over scripture but the God I read about in scripture is more than a
short-order cook and lemonade-maker. He isn’t pictured as ceaselessly
running around trying to make the best of this or that situation in a
chaotic world—he’s presented as the Sovereign, the Lord Almighty whose
over-arching purpose can't be thwarted.
I don’t think that God’s will is the only will that operates in this
world of ours. You don’t have to be Einstein to know that our own human
and often evil wills are operating at full speed with terrifying effect.
This is old news.
There’s a silly view that continues to make the rounds even in Christianised circles. The view suggests that Bible people didn’t really
take secondary causes into account and so they laid everything at God’s
feet. Had these people understood or at least taken seriously secondary
causes they wouldn’t say about everything that God "did" this or "sent"
that. They would lay the blame right where it belonged, at the feet of
humans. And if it were a natural calamity (like a tornado or a drought
or a flood) they would put it down to chance, random forces. If they
took human and natural forces seriously they wouldn’t always lay the
occurrence at God’s feet. The view is nonsense.
These ancient Israelites knew how rainstorms gathered, they knew the
politics of various nations and their expansionist agendas. They knew
fine well that people acted out of lust and envy and material greed,
abusing power and privilege and that all that affected lives. Do we
think they were idiots? We use to hear that Bible writers talked of
miracles because they didn’t know much about the laws of nature. Can you
imagine? They spoke of the Virgin Birth of Christ because they didn’t
know how babies were made? These people knew very well about the natural
order and about social unrighteousness but they also knew that the
sovereign Lord was at work in history and nature working his holy and
redemptive will. So they laid things like natural calamities and wars at
God’s feet and said he was responsible. In fact, they often quoted him
as saying he was responsible (see places like Amos 4, Isaiah 10 and
Habakkuk 1). They didn’t talk in terms of God always going around making
the best out of a bad job that we have done. That’s certainly an aspect
of the truth and it’s perfectly biblical to say so but that truth is
part of a larger truth that insists that what God "allows" he wills to allow.
Was Joseph’s thirteen years in exile in Egypt an exercise of
sovereignty or was it God omelette-making with already broken eggs? Did
God watch the brothers take Joseph into Egypt and then respond to their
evil by bringing good out of evil or was Joseph right when he said, "You
didn’t send me here; it was God who sent me here"?
Was Assyria’s all-out war against Israel and other nations an
exercise of God’s sovereignty or was it God merely making use of a harsh
reality that happened without him? Or did the prophet quote God
correctly when God said, "Look, I send Assyria against a nation that has
made me angry"?
Was the cross of Jesus Christ an exercise of sovereignty or
lemonade-making? Did Pilate and the boys decide to reject and railroad
the Christ, God saw it and in response to their action turn it into
something that reconciled the whole of creation? Or was Peter right when
he said God delivered Christ to the cross and that Pilate and his
allies were doing what God had foreordained to happen (Acts 2:23 and
4:25-28)?
Joseph’s brothers freely chose to do evil, Assyria freely chose to
wage war against Israel and Jews and Gentiles freely collaborated to do
unspeakable evil. But in their doing what they wickedly wanted to do God was graciously and righteously doing what he wanted to do!
Should such talk frighten us? Why would it? If God were like Stalin
or Papa Doc or Vlad the Impaler I’m certain it should. But God is the
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. If that doesn’t assure us, nothing
will. If we can’t trust that God, look at life and say, "Be still my soul, the Lord is on our side" then there is no comfort to be found.
©2004 Jim McGuiggan. All materials are free to be copied and used as long as money is not being made.
Many thanks to brother Ed Healy, for allowing me to post from his website, the abiding word.com.