Matthew’s Mosaic Motifs

Titian's "Transfiguration," c.1560, San Salvador

Matthew’s Mosaic Motifs

by R.E. Slater & ChatGPT

Jesus as the New Moses in the Gospel of Matthew

The Gospel of Matthew presents Jesus not simply as a moral teacher, but as the culmination and fulfillment of Israel’s sacred history (otherwise expressed as “the continuity and fulfillment of the Old Testament Covenant”).

One of the most profound thematic motifs in Matthew is his presentation of Jesus as the 'New Moses.' This typological parallel runs through the structure, content, and symbolism of the Gospel, creating a powerful narrative bridge between the Old and New Testaments.

Just as Moses delivered Israel from Egypt and mediated the covenant at Mount Sinai, Jesus inaugurates a new covenant and delivers a sermon on a mountain—hence the title 'Sermon on the Mount'—which echoes and reinterprets the giving of the Torah. In Matthew 5–7, Jesus teaches with divine authority ('But I say to you...'), positioning himself not as a mere interpreter of the Law but as one who fulfills and transcends it (Matt 5:17).

Matthew’s Gospel is also structured around five major teaching discourses (Matt 5–7; 10; 13; 18; 24–25), which many scholars interpret as a deliberate parallel to the *five books of the Torah (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy). This literary structure further reinforces the Mosaic framework, suggesting that Jesus offers a new 'Torah' for the people of God. The infancy narrative (Matt 2) includes the flight to Egypt, Herod’s slaughter of the innocents, and the call out of Egypt (Matt 2:15)—all recalling the early life of Moses. Moreover, both Moses and Jesus fast for forty days, and both perform miracles that establish divine legitimacy.

This Mosaic typology emphasizes Jesus as the authoritative revealer of God's will, but in a more intimate and incarnational way than Moses. Whereas Moses ascended a mountain to receive the Law, Jesus ascends the mountain to give the Law. In Matthew’s theological imagination, Jesus is not just a prophet like Moses—he is the Incarnate embodiment of divine wisdom, the one through whom God's ultimate will is expressed. This typology sets the stage for understanding the Sermon on the Mount not only as a set of ethical teachings but as the charter of the Kingdom of Heaven, echoing and surpassing Sinai in scope and significance.

In summary, Jesus fulfills the Law of Moses; is a type of Mosaic figure in leadership and authority; delivers His people Israel from their bondage of sin as Atoning Sacrifice; inaugurates and establishes a New Covenant that undergirds / grounds Israel’s former (old) covenant with God; is transfigured in parallel to Moses’ transfiguration on Mt. Sinai; is God’s New Discipler / Prophet to His people; and comes as One who will write God’s love upon the living hearts of mortal men rather than on the cold, stony tablets of Moses.

Thus and thus, Jesus is the New Moses who highlights the continuity between the Old and New Testamental eras marked by the Old Covenant of Moses and the New Covenant in Jesus each emphasizing the fulfillment that Jesus has brought to the prophecies and promises of God in securing not only a new heart, soul, or work but ultimately a new way of living out God’s love to family, friends, neighbors, stranger, foreigner, alien, and enemy.

 

The Five Books of Moses

1 - *Bereishit “In the beginning” (Genesis): The creation of the world and the early history of the Jewish nation, including the stories of Adam and Eve, Noah, Abraham and Sarah, and Joseph. 

2 - Shemot “names” (Exodus): The slavery in Egypt, the Exodus, the Giving of the Torah, and the building of the Tabernacle.

3 - Vayikra “And He Called” (Leviticus): Deals with the Temple sacrifices, kosher, and other aspects of Jewish ritual life.

4 - Bamidbar “In the wilderness / desert” (Numbers): Many events that happened to the Israelites on their way to the promised land, including G‑d counting the people, the Spies debacle, the Korach uprising.

5 - Devarim “Words or Things”(Deuteronomy): Nearing the end of his 40 years of leadership, Moses speaks to the people, preparing them for life in the Promised Land.

 

Typological Comparison: Moses and Jesus

The following table compares major events in the life of Moses with those in the Gospel of Matthew that reflect Jesus as the 'New Moses'.

Moses (OT)	Jesus (Matthew)
Pharaoh orders infant deaths	Herod orders infant deaths (Matt 2)
Moses escapes death as infant	Jesus escapes to Egypt (Matt 2)
Leads Israel out of Egypt	Returns from Egypt (Matt 2:15)
Receives Law on Mount Sinai	Sermon on the Mount (Matt 5)
Fasts 40 days on mountain	Fasts 40 days in wilderness (Matt 4)
Gives covenant to Israel	Inaugurates Kingdom ethics (Matt 5–7)

Visual Timeline and Mosaic Typology
Below is a visual timeline of key events in Matthew's Gospel that reflect Mosaic themes:

Conclusion

The Gospel of Matthew intricately weaves the motif of Jesus as the 'New Moses,' presenting him as the fulfillment of Israel’s sacred history. This typological parallel is evident in the structure, content, and symbolism of the Gospel, creating a powerful narrative bridge between the Old and New Testaments. Jesus, like Moses, delivers a new covenant and teaches with divine authority, positioning himself as the embodiment of divine wisdom and the ultimate revealer of God's will.

The comparison between Matthew’s 'Sermon on the Mount' and Luke’s 'Sermon on the Plain' highlights the differences in location, tone, theological framing, and intended audience. While Matthew’s sermon emphasizes spiritual blessings and the fulfillment of the Torah, Luke’s sermon focuses on social and economic blessings, with a universal tone and social focus.

The visual timeline and typological comparison further reinforce the Mosaic themes, illustrating key events in the life of Moses and their parallels in the Gospel of Matthew. The insights from Church Fathers on the Sermon on the Mount provide additional theological depth, emphasizing the foundational virtues, spiritual fullness, and ethical teachings of Jesus.

Overall, Matthew’s Gospel presents Jesus as the authoritative revealer of God's will, surpassing Moses in scope and significance, and offering a new 'Torah' for the people of God.

Confusing Judaism's Covenantal Nomism with Evangelic Terms

Challenging the New Perspective on Paul

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2013/09/26/challenging-the-new-perspective-on-paul/

 

by Scot McKnight

edited by R.E. Slater

Sep 26, 2013

Comments

E.P. Sanders, and then following him J.D.G. Dunn and N.T. Wright, challenged the traditional Christian consensus of how to “read” Judaism at the time of Paul (and Jesus) in 1977 with his well-known and must-read Paul and Palestinian Judaism. The consensus was that Judaism was a works-righteousness religion in which Jews, not on the basis of their covenant-based election by God but on the basis of merit and works, sought to earn favor with God. While there was nuance, and dissenting voices like G.F. Moore, this was the ruling paradigm. So, when Paul said “not by works of the law” most people thought they knew exactly what Paul meant: human pride, self-justification, and weighing one’s merits in a scale so the tip favored the human’s accumulation of merits.

Amazon Book Links

 

Paul and Palestinian Judaism

Paul, the Law, and the Jewish People

Jesus and Judaism

Sanders proved that Judaism was far more complex than this and that its “pattern of religion” was in fact a covenant based summons by God to obey the Torah. So Sanders said Judaism’s pattern of religion was not merit seeking but instead “covenantal nomism” (covenant-based call to do the Law [nomos]). This required a re-evaluation of what Paul was opposing and what “works of the law” meant and whether or not the opponents of Paul were seeking to establish themselves by earning favor with God.

 

Sanders won the day; the vast majority of NT scholars believe today that Judaism was not a merit-seeking system and, in fact, if one is not careful one ends up either in anti-Semitism or its softer version anti-Judaism or in some kind of Marcionite denial of the truth of the Old Testament. [This paragraph deserves extensive commentary but this is not the place.]

 

But Sanders and the so-called “New Perspective on Paul” were challenged by some, most notably Reformed or Calvinistic thinkers and exegetes. I am persuaded that the “problems” for the NPP are far more problems for Calvinists and Lutherans and much less so for Arminians, who have never had as much of a problem with the issue of obedience and works, and in some ways for Anabaptists, who valued obedience and discipleship as central to what faith means. (Frustratingly to many of us, many critics repeat talking points and have not read the Jewish evidence at all.) The most recent challenge, a nuanced one, comes from Preston Sprinkle, Paul and Judaism Revisited: A Study of Divine and Human Agency in Salvation (2013). It’s a good book though whether or not his proposals will satisfy deserves more than can be said here, and whether or not his sketch of Paul would fit Jesus is yet another one worthy of discussion. [Preston and I have corresponded about this review and his comments made this post better.]

 

Preston’s big ideas:

 

The Old Testament, when it comes to “divine and human agency” (how much are humans involved in salvation? how are they involved?) and “continuity vs. discontinuity” (how different is Paul from Judaism?), reveals two major strands of thinking. Preston calls these the “Deuteronomic” and the “Prophetic.” By these he means that one must repent before one gets restoration or salvation and the other that it all comes from the grace and intervention of God (so that repentance is not the precipitating factor).

 

He then examines these themes, examining what the Dead Sea Scrolls teach and comparing that with what the apostle Paul teaches: the curse of the law, the eschatological spirit, anthropological pessimism, justification, and judgment according to works. Each of these concludes with admirable nuance for each side of the comparison — Qumran and Paul.

 

His fundamental conclusion is that pockets (sectarian elements) of Judaism are Deuteronomic, or mostly so, while the apostle Paul is Prophetic, with some nuances all over the place. In essence, then, he comes out suggesting that the New Perspective overcooked “continuity” between Paul and Judaism and undercooked the discontinuity and that while Judaism has a stronger emphasis on human agency Paul had a stronger emphasis on divine agency in salvation.

 

A few questions:

 

1 - An Artificial Division.

 

I wonder if Deuteronomic vs. Prophetic doesn’t deny the coherency of these two themes in the authors of the Old Testament and therefore the coherency of grace and election and covenant and the simultaneous demand of repentance and obedience for salvation. In other words, at times some suggest Judaism’s emphasis is Deuteronomic without the Prophetic. I doubt any Jewish text is entirely Deuteronomic and I doubt any Prophetic text is not also Deuteronomic. One text he saw as almost entirely Prophetic has some core statements about covenant that are relentlessly Deuteronomic, and Preston Sprinkle is aware of such texts and offers reasonable explanations. Notice  Jeremiah 7:23; 11:4; where covenant election and grace are set up in conditionality, and the point must be seen: we are dealing here with covenant status dependent upon or shaped by or conditioned by obedience:

Jer 7:23 But this command I gave them, “Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people; and walk only in the way that I command you, so that it may be well with you.” 

Jer 11:4 which I commanded your ancestors when I brought them out of the land of Egypt, from the iron-smelter, saying, Listen to my voice, and do all that I command you. So shall you be my people, and I will be your God…

At work here in theological hermeneutics is what is sometimes called the “failure” of the Mosaic covenant and the completion (words are important here and I chose a neutral one) of that covenant with the New Covenant. This entire approach is shaped by Augustinian, Lutheran and Calvinist hermeneutics. Part of the NPP is that those categories do not emerge sufficiently from a 1st Century Jewish framework. I will emphasize that Preston knows these texts and seeks to resolve them within his Deuteronomic and Prophetic approach.

 

2 - The Many Faces of Salvation. The bigger issue for me is that this term “salvation” is slippery. Frankly, the OT texts are not about personal salvation but about Israel; so too Judaism mostly. But the NT stuff is more or less taken to be personal and individual. What happens, then, to “restoration” or “salvation” when it is more corporate focused?

 

At work, as well, is that soteriology is shaped by discussing in the OT how covenant people are restored (top of p. 34). I wonder if that how most in the Protestant tradition understand “salvation” in the NT — in fact, I’m confident they see it as “entry” into the covenant. Hence, for me there is a lingering question: Are we comparing the same senses of salvation?

 

3 - Evangelic Terms Do Not Equate with Biblical Terms. I do wonder how much rhetoric and choice of terms shapes how much “works-based” stuff we see in Judaism, and now that Gary Anderson has virtually proven that “debt” and “merit” were the new commercial metaphor at work in Judaism for “sin” and “obedience” (see his book Sin: A History), I have to ask if we have not overdone the works element in Judaism while ignoring the covenant and grace themes. To his credit, Preston works hard to nuance works and grace and divine and human agency with variety in each text. But for me the positing of the Deuteronomic over against the Prophetic is shaped by that very issue — how much is human agency involved?

 

4 - The Use of Law within the NT. But this simply misses how we have learned to read our own faith. Read the Gospel of Matthew (e.g., Matthew 6:1, 2, 5, 16) and watch this word “reward” on the part of Jesus. Is Jesus Deuteronomic? (Preston doesn’t answer this but I don’t know how one could read Jesus and not see his term Deuterononomic instead of Prophetic.) And doesn’t Paul say our final state is on the basis of works in his judgment by works texts, like 2 Cor 5? So, are we minimizing the Deuteronomic in our faith and maximizing it in Judaism? All in the attempt to prove we are better and right?

 

This is a big one: Let us assume my suspicion is right, namely, that Jesus fits the Deuteronomic paradigm. What does that say about Paul? That he departed? That we need to re-visit Paul? (This is what the NPP does, after all.) Or does it suggest the Deuteronomic and the Prophetic fit more closely into a single coherency? Anyway, the two approaches to OT themes sure makes me wonder what Preston does with Jesus.

 

5 - The NPP Remains a Tour de Force. OK, there’s something at work here in Paul especially about grace that shapes the whole system of thought. And there is discontinuity here. But in my judgment the New Perspective offered an important and enduring correction from which we cannot move back. Sprinkle’s effort here is a good one with plenty of sensitive nuance, but this is not the final word.


 

Of Sons and Daughters Lost to the Fathers and Mothers of this World

Rembrandt, The Return of the Prodigal Son, 1662–1669 | Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg

The Parable of the Prodigal Sons

Commentaries by Pete Enns & R.E. Slater

A Parable of the $20 Bill

Sermon by James Grier

“But While He was Still Far Off” (or, what if God actually loves us?)

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/peterenns/2013/01/but-while-he-was-still-far-off-or-what-if-god-actually-loves-us/

by Pete Enns

January 6, 2013

Comments

But while he was still far off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion (Luke 15:20).

A lot of people have heard of “the parable of the prodigal (i.e., wasteful) son.” Some translations call it “the parable of the lost son,” which is better but not quite there. I prefer “the parable of the jerk loser son.”

Long story short (you can read the full version anytime you want to), the younger of two sons demands that his father give him his inheritance right now. This move is majorly disrespectful, for a inheritance is given only when the father dies and also the older son is supposed to get his first. The younger son isn’t being a little forward. He’s leaping over his older brother and in effect saying to his father, “you are dead to me.”

So, he left to live the life that mimicked Animal House and - spoiler alert - "ran out of money!" Of course, what should happen next but a famine and so he roamed the streets hungry and alone. He finally decided he actually has to get a job, and so wound up taking care of pigs–which, if you recall your Judaism, is about as bad an animal as you can come in contact with. He’s so hungry, he even started daydreaming about eating pig food.

He figured he needed to do something about his predicament before he starved, so his sense of self-preservation kicked in. (If you haven’t caught on, this guy is pretty focused on himself, even here.) ”I know, I’ll go back home and grovel a bit. ‘Oh father, I am not worthy to be your son. Treat me like one of your hired hands.’ That should work.”

"The Parable of the Lost Son" by Christopher W. French.
"Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight."

So, he sucks it up and heads back home.

I’m talking now to you parents out there, especially with high school and college age offspring. If you’ve ever been in the place where you son or daughter has left the straight and narrow, slammed the door in your face (actually or metaphorically), and began making some life choices that keep you up nights worrying yourself sick if they are OK, what they’re doing, are they alive, are they ever coming home–if you’ve ever been there, you know what’s going on here.

Or maybe things have not been all that dramatic for you. You child disrespects you and storms out the door to go who knows where and do who knows what with who knows whom. You’re worried and mad. The next day, the car pulls in the drive way and s/he clearly has that look of remorse.

If you’re a like most parents I’ve met (including me), you’re relieved but you also want to make a point. So you play it cool, stand at the door, and give you son or daughter that “I told you so, c’mon, admit it, admit it, you were wrong and I was right” look.

And this is where the parable hits me between the eyes.

When the son was still a far way off, rather than going back into his tent to play it cool (“Oh…You’re back. I hadn’t noticed. How have you been?”), rather than doing what normal fathers do, he was filled with compassion and ran out to meet him.

But while he was still far off…

He couldn’t wait. Even though the son had done his best to bring shame and hurt to his family and his faith …

... his father saw him and was filled with compassion; he ran and put his arms around him and kissed him.

The son delivered his limp, rehearsed, apology, hoping at least to get a bite to eat. Instead the father ignored the speech and ordered that his son be fully restored: a clean robe, a ring (representing family membership), and sandals where he had been barefoot.

As for a bite to eat? Forget it. How about a feast? And why not, as the father says, “for this son of mine was dead and is alive; he was lost and is found.”

You get the feeling the father was pretty excited.

Frans Francken (II) - The Parable of the Prodigal Son

The father, obviously, represents God in this parable, but this isn’t a “get saved and go to heaven after you die” story. The son is, well, a son–already part of the family.

In Jesus’ day, he was addressing his stubborn fellow Jewish countrymen, reminding them about the love of God and that it’s never too late to come home. When this and other stories were adapted for the Christian faith, that same point remained but with a broader [non-Jewish] audience.

The story isn’t about conversion to Christianity. It’s about God being on the look out for those in the family who have wandered off, and God simply can’t wait to welcome them home.

I read stories like this and I wonder, What if this is actually true? What if there is a God who is really like this? What if God can’t wait to have us around–even with the garbage we keep carrying around and our half hearted “I’m sorries?”

What if God is glad to see us?

And the much more threatening question, What difference would really believing all that make in how I look at, well, pretty much everything?

And, what would it look like if I loved the way God loved?

- Pete Enns

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

How Does One become "Family"?

R.E. Slater

January 11, 2012

I'd like to make one small addition and add the following observation....

The traditional church view here is that "the family" refers to believers of God who follow after Jesus. To a Spirit-baptized, confessing believer, who has left God and now wishes to come back, to whom God says to His child, "Eh, verily, even now, do I love thee! Thou art my child and ever will I love thee." Of course this doesn't answer the question of "faith and works" (James, Peter, etc) so much as state a profundity of church dogma which we must save for another day's examination.

But this isn't what Jesus was saying....

Certainly Jesus had this in mind when speaking to the Pharisees about belonging to God through the covenants made in Abraham, Moses and David. As Jews under covenant (esp. the unconditional covenant of Abraham) they were part of God's people. Even if, after having broken covenant with God (sic, the Mosaic Law, and Suzerainty-Lordship of God in the Abrahamic Covenant) they were welcomed back. It's what God does as One who Loves and Redeems.

But how can one come back when covenant has been broken?

In the OT sense of "remnant (theology)" those Jews who broke covenant were no longer part of God's blessings and fidelity. They stood in jeopardy of judgment and would be treated as a non-covenanted people God knew not. This is the sense you get when reading the prophets of the OT as they preached against the sins of the people of Israel who hardened their hearts against God and persisted in refusing to repent to the prophets message that they had broken covenant with God. That they were faithless, refusing His will and word in their lives. So too had the younger son in the parable acted by rejecting his father, collecting his inheritance, and leaving the community of his birthright.

Under the Abrahamic Covenant there was a way back to God. But how?

In essence, God Himself would become the sacrifice for His people's sin, as the Lamb of God, pictured in Jesus (who was very God himself!). Hence, when God had Abraham bring a sacrifice for his, and his family's (and his future descendant's) ratification of the covenant (... a ratification that in essence was an atoning covenant for sin, a family covenant for membership, and a submittal covenant for duration of treaty, among other things... ). When this sacrifice was brought it was God Himself who cleaved the oxen in two, who functioned as both the priest and the mediating sacrifice, before Himself and Abraham (Abraham here is pictured as yet another typological figure like that of Adam for mankind).

Thus was God both the Suzerainty who treated with Abraham, and the undergirding foundation for the covenant itself, when it surely would be broken by Abraham in his doubts and faithless acts soon to come.

Even so did Jesus remind the Pharisees and religious leaders of His day of their faithlessness to God. Of their need to repent (sic, as such, Jesus was acting as God's prophet to His people Israel... ). Of their rightness of restoration based upon God's faithfulness and love as their Suzerainty who had become their surety as sacrifice upon creation of their treaty with YHWH. Which Jesus Himself would someday soon perform in His own body and spirit as Exemplar Magnifique, by way of re-establishing Israel's broken covenant with God through Himself, as God's perfect, and acceptable sacrifice.

To whom does this apply? To Israel alone?

Hence, under Paul and NT theology, God's covenant has been expanded to all men - both Jews and Gentiles alike - in and through Jesus. Jesus is mankind's surety of covenant in/under/before/beside/by God. Through Jesus is our sin removed. Through Jesus may we become adopted into God's covenant as His people. And through Jesus has Israel's covenant with God has become enlarged to all men everywhere. And if - and when - broken, as it surely will be, it will ever remain in force because it is based upon the eternal God Himself, and through His Son, and not upon our own selves. So that even in our sin, we are God's "family". By right of creation (Genesis). By right of concession (Abraham). By right of redemption (Jesus).  By right of sustenance (the Holy Spirit). We are God's lost and straying remnant. We are God's faithless people to whom He seeks day and night.

And it is to this idea that God says to us today - to those standing outside His covenant, as well as to those standing inside His covenant - that all may come. And when we fail that He will be our surety. Our sacrifice. Our Oxen and Lamb. Our High Priest and Mediator. Our Savior and Redeemer. That His covenantal love restores, as well as makes, covenant with us. That He understands our brokenness and fallibility. Our sins, selfishness, pride, ego, faults, and small-mindedness. Our hesitancies, doubts, misgivings, hurts, shames, and failures. And yet, reaches out to all who wish to enter in to His grace and mercy, peace and forgiveness, healing and strength.

Then what is our answer this day? Shall we continue to despise the Father or return home?

Regardless if you have left "the covenanted family" or not. Regardless if you were not part of that family (like Abram first was before God had ever established covenant with him). It is to you that God has made covenant. A covenant that will stand the test of time through God Himself and through His work on Calvary's cross for all Jews and non-Jews alike. He is our Redeemer. Our surety. Our Promise-Keeper. Our faithful Lord and Sovereign who seeks all who are lost, and weary, and filled with the pain of this world.

Where money and riches and fast friends never brought satisfaction. Where the pigstys and self-imposed poverties of this world would grind upon our souls in our lostness and inability to find safe haven and rest. Yet God is there. He waits for you to leave yourself behind and to come to Him. Willingly. In hope and desire. Bearing ruin and destruction in your bones through the mangle of sin in our lives. Even as He searches for you. And is pained by your absence. And when seeing you come, will run to you. Embrace you. Hold you. And never let you go. Inviting all who will come to a feast held in your honor, reveling with God's broken heart of joy that yet another sinner has come home from the pigstys of the human heart and lost dens of this world. Wherever they be. For all are sought, and longed for by God, our Creator-Redeemer, with a broken and heavy heart, until "found" on the road leading back to "home". Come. And wait no longer.

R.E. Slater

January 11, 2012

The Parable of the $20 Bill

A well-known speaker started off his seminar holding up a $20.00 bill. In the room of 200, he asked, "Who would like this $20 bill?" Hands started going up. He said, "I am going to give this $20 to one of you but first, let me do this."

He proceeded to crumple up the $20 dollar bill. He then asked, "Who still wants it...?" Still the hands were up in the air. "Well," he replied, "What if I do this?" And he dropped it on the ground and started to grind it into the floor with his shoe. He picked it up, now crumpled and dirty. "Now, who still wants it?" Still the hands went into the air.

"My friends, we have all learned a very valuable lesson. No matter what I did to the money, you still wanted it because it did not decrease in value. It was still worth $20. Many times in our lives, we are dropped, crumpled, and ground into the dirt by the decisions we make and the circumstances that come our way. We may feel as though we are worthless. But no matter what has happened or what will happen, you will never lose your value.

Dirty or clean, crumpled or finely creased, you are still priceless to those who DO LOVE you. The worth of our lives comes not in what we do or who we know, but by WHO WE ARE. For you are priceless in the eyes of God who loves you.

AUDIO FILE

James Grier: Sermon on the Parable of the Two Lost Sons

The Father of Two Lost Sons – Luke 15

Additional Sermons on Luke: http://jamesmgrier.org/sermons/

Is God Always in Control?

 

 

Since inception of this website I have been attempting to wrestle with the legitimate question of whether God is in control of this world or not, having presented it in differing contexts from salvation history (the history of Israel and the Church); to scientific (found in the science sidebars here relative to anthropologic and cosmic evolution); to mundane world and personal events (floods, hurricanes, tornadoes, personal experiences of tragedy, unnecessary suffering, abusive families, friends, religions and governments); to present day Church and fellowship experiences (found in the turbulent ecclesiastical reformations occurring in today's denominations, associations, universities, media outlets, and even political parties). What I have discovered is that I can answer this question both ways by accepting, or not accepting, the updated responses of (i)  Evangelic Classical Theism (God IS in control) or of (ii) Process Theology (God is NOT in control). However, what I fundamentally believe is that it is the question itself which is wrong. To ask the question is to show both our ignorance and our fundamental misperceptions of our view of God and the world. It is a complex relationship and cannot be treated so naively nor simply.

 

 

And so, having striven to re-contextualize this question through my own views of Relational Theism (which is currently in the rough stages of development) I have been attempting to define this subject by what it is not - in relation to other systems of doctrinal thought (sic, Calvinistic Classicism and Process Thought) - but have yet to fully recreate a set of criteria of what Relational Theology could be or might become. To some extent we have already done this here through our simple explorations of emergent subject matters and topical themes. However, it has not been laid out rigorously as a (i) doctrinal theology or as a (ii) philosophical behavior and belief. And to some extent we should probably avoid this... but to the extent that this task is avoided (for fearing of misrepresenting God and His Word by systematizing Scripture) to that extent other lesser views will come along to expunge common sense biblical viewpoints with something else even less desirable. And so, it is accepted that whenever there are two strong opinions of oppositional thought, a third will mostly likely synthesize. This third I am describing as Relational Thought which may behave as an eclectic mix between Calvinism and Progress Theology until it can find a "stream of its own." In the meantime, the easy answer to our dilemma would be to continue to explore Narrative Theology which by its form and definition resists more systematic perceptions of God and his world.

 

Man made in the Image of God (Genesis 1:26 to 2:3)
Illustration from a Bible card published 1906 by the Providence Lithograph Company

 

Accordingly, the story of man is found in the story of God. And the larger story of God is found in the larger story of man (which means all of man's history - from world events to each person's experiences). God did not begin an act of holy creation to simply abandon it. No. Any artist can tell you that whether through creating a poem, a painting, a sculpture, a piece of music, all were some kind of personal expression. And to look upon our cosmos as God's expression of Himself is to re-visualize all that God is... for creation is the revelation of God. But not the perfect revelation of God. At least not yet. Only One has come to be this perfect reflection - both in essence (hupostasis) and in glory - and that is Jesus who perfectly revealed the Godhead exactly (Col. 2.9, Heb 1.1-3).

 

When God revealed Himself to man it looked like Jesus, exactly -

• "Show us the Father!" say the Pharisees and Scribes...
• "Why?" says Jesus. "In seeing me you see the Father!" (Jn 8.12-30)
 
•  "I and the Father are One" (Jn 14.7-8) -
• http://www.biblegateway.com/quicksearch/?quicksearch=+i+and+the+father+are+one&qs_version=ESV
 
• "I AM" - (Jn 18.6 and other NT references)
• http://www.biblegateway.com/quicksearch/?quicksearch=+i+am&qs_version=ESV
 

Other comparisons between the God of the OT and Jesus of the NT -

• In commanding the wind and waves to be still (Mt 14.22-36 comp. Psalm 77.16, Psalms 18.16, Psalm 144.7, Psalm 107.29)
 
• In declarations, "Before Abraham was, I AM" (Jn 8.58)
 
• In rebuking demons as He did storms -
•  http://www.biblegateway.com/quicksearch/?quicksearch=demons&qs_version=ESV
 
• Jesus is worshipped by believing NT Jews just as they would worship Yahweh of the OT -
• Psalm 81.9, http://www.biblegateway.com/quicksearch/?quicksearch=lord+jesus&qs_version=ESV)
 
• Jesus as the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53 who was the long awaited One (Is 52.13-15; Is 53.1-12, Acts 8.32-33, 1 Peter 2:24 ("by His wounds have you been healed"), Matthew 8:17)

 

 

 

 

However, we also have the cruel distortions brought about by sin and death that arose to undo God's joy and fellowship. How it arose we cannot know. Genesis says that is came through Adam and Eve's disobedience. However, it was there before the Garden of Eden when discovering in Scripture Lucifer's angelic disobedience of pride and rebellion; and of a third of heaven's angelic beings falling likewise into the sin of pride and rebellion (Ez 28.1-19; Isa 14.1-22). And through astrophysics we've discovered that even in the very elemental stages of our universe's birth (sic, singularities and multiverses) death and destruction were the very ingredients used by God in creation's very nature of indeterminacy (sic, elementary particles being momentarily birthed and colliding to create reactive energies and forces). Of course, this last illustration differs from the first two in that those were instances of creaturely willful disobedience and pride; whereas the latter is of nature itself which is not so much "willful" but indeterminate (sic, see the science sections). Further, it is not a moral/ethical act of a sentient being but an amoral/non-ethical activity found within matter's interaction with itself and other bodies of matter. And so, how sin and death arose is unknown (I sometimes think it comes as part-and-parcel with the sublime act of creating a willful creation itself - as an allowed reactive process - but not as emanating from God Himself in His essence).

 

What we do know is that God is using sin and death, devil and demon, the cosmos, and human experience, to evolve this world into a renewed creation - into a heavenly kingdom of light-and-life. Where no sin exists. Where no death can be found. How this occurs is a mystery. How this is unlike our old cosmos is a mystery for it seems that the death of particulate matter (from cells to atoms) must still occur in our new world if life is to continue and so, cannot be abandoned but re-purposed. We do not understand these things. Nor can we so simply say that God is in control (for this would ignore the ravages of life) or is not in control (which would then ignore the redemptive story of the bible as found in this world's history and present circumstances). Consequently, it is both. In some complex mix of divine sovereignty and indeterminacy (sic, which would also include the "unknowingness of the future" which theology falls yet into another "sea of turbulent debate" known as Open Theology... also examined here in the sidebars).

For me, it is enough to know that God is God. And that He is my God. And that I am His. Beyond that we can debate and argue around-and-around-and-around our particulate views of the world we think we apprehend but can not. For God is beyond our comprehension and He will do as He will do. He will react as He will act. He will grieve as He will sing for joy. He will suffer as He will bring healing. This we do not understand but know that God is our Redeemer. And that through God His creation will be redeemed from the final throes of sin and death by the atoning work of Jesus made on the cross of Calvary.

And that during those experiences of suffering and death to not accuse God as the author for someone's cancer or a child's death, but as the God who suffers with us in our pains and losses. Who will do anything and everything that He can to help us within the parameters of this sinful world's free will turbulence and turmoil. Who allows sin and death its course but who also will direct sin and death to His ultimate ends of renewal and recreative wholeness with His Spirit. Even in sin and death, even in pain and suffering, even in defeat and death, shall God "win" and reign. God will not be defeated though we suffer. For we suffer towards renewal and recreation. Though harm and destruction comes still God's Spirit continues to work through holiness, love, justice and truth all that is Himself into the very corners and textures of a comos and humanity held in the grip of sin and death. At the last, these too shall be put  away with finality (Rev 21-22).

What this means we cannot explain. Our present cosmos is unimagined in its current construction and operation without the reality of death present within its very framework  (perhaps not sin, but death certainly, as is the bedrock of indeterminant re-creative construction of something from nothing formed within the continual process of randomness and evolution). For myself, I don't normally link sin with death (that is physically, not spiritually)... for physical death feels more natural within this world of ours and I can't imagine a physical world without it. However, sin seems very destructive and unnatural within this world of ours. It speaks to a spiritual death to be borne by sentient beings - be they human or angelic or some other form - who are willfully at cross purposes with their Creator. Each though, in their constitutions as sin or death, do bring harm and ruin to our mortal bodies.

Curiously, sin's effects upon our mortal bodies (not our souls) cannot be death... only its results. But on our souls it is immediate (thus we can effectively say that sin brings death). Sin is a process of dying. A presence of death. But I speak in spiritual terms of sin and not in physical terms. In comparison, death's effects can be seen upon our mortal bodies immediately beginning at birth as it wears away at our soul and upon our bodies. But for the Christian, death is seen as a period of transformation towards God. It can begin early in life when discovering Jesus' love for us while taking a lifetime of spiritually transformative living to fully-and-finally occur... this is what we mean by the term "salvation" (in its fullest sense). Though saved in Christ we are in the process of becoming saved in this life as we work out the effects of our salvation against the countermanding effects of sin's spiritual death. But eventually we die and must return to the earthen soil of our constitution (dust we are and dust we become - but remember, we are made of stardust!). However, with sin, it is there with us from the start. And like death, continually wears away upon us, only to be prevented when met by the power of the Holy Spirit begun at the birthing of faith come through the spiritually transformative event of Christ Jesus' living atonement and abiding resurrection. From that point onwards we are removed from spiritual death though we remain within our bodies and souls to suffer sin and death's adverse affects upon us. Even so, the cycle has been broken with promising renewal and recreation at the hands of an Almighty God. These things are mysteries and within Christianity we have all kinds of doctrines that help us explain what this means more explicitly. But this is my simplified understanding of how our Sovereign God rules in, through, and over a cosmos of sin and death.

So then, be at peace and know that our God reigns - despite what we think of the unhelpfulness of the Christianized word, control. A word I don't necessarily prefer as an explanation for this current cosmos we live within at its behest. For with its usage comes our expectations placed upon God which asks when bad things happen "Why didn't you stop this!?? Where were you when we needed you?!!" A God who controls is a God that is weak when He doesn't answer. Or is unable to help us in dire straits. Or is unwise within the predicaments of sin and death. Or has become a futile figment of the human psyche built as a dithering idol to our hopeless predicaments within this life's never-ending perturbations and agonies.

But a God who reigns, who is Sovereign, is a God who suffers with us in our tragedies. Who comes to assist us in every way possible, even until the end. This kind of God is strong. He can deliver. If not by our own expectation, then by His own expectations of renewal and recreation. The God of the Bible is the God who works within the constraints of a freewill system of this created world. Who is present with us even in our worse moments. And so, we proclaim that our God reigns sovereignly - whether He controls this old creation or not is to ask the wrong question and see the solution in the wrong perspective. No. God doesn't control anything that has its own free will. But yes, God is creation's Sovereign. And as its Sovereign He reigns over heaven and earth, hell and death, even over sin and all its miseries. God is no more and no less - though He be Creator He was  ever-and-always first creation's Redeemer! And He is our Redeemer-Creator who will rule ever-and-always to that end. Amen and Amen.

R.E. Slater

August 27, 2012
updated November 3, 2012

 

Praise the Lord; praise God our savior!
For each day he carries us in his arms (Psalm 68.19)

 

 

1 John 1

 

English Standard Version (ESV)

 

The Word of Life

 

1 That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life— ² the life was made manifest, and we have seen it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us— ³ that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. ⁴ And we are writing these things so that our^[a] joy may be complete.

 

Walking in the Light

 

⁵ This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. ⁶ If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. ⁷ But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. ⁸ If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. ⁹ If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. ¹⁰ If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.

 

 

 

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 

 

Does God always get his way?

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/rogereolson/2012/08/does-god-always-get-his-way/

 

by Roger Olson

August 20, 2012

Comments

 

Does God Always Get His Way?

 

I suspect that question would surprise most Christians and atheists alike. Most atheists I read seem to operate on the assumption that Western monotheism includes God’s absolute sovereignty such that whatever happens is God’s will. Most of them fall back on some version of the problem of evil to attempt to sweep away belief in God as impossible (because no one expressly questions God’s goodness). But Christians (I’ll limit my comments here to Christians although they could apply to other monotheists) give atheists their ammunition by believing that “God is in control” (a bumper sticker I often see).

 

I see two versions of “God is in control” among Christians. One is theological and the other is folk religious. The difference lies in considered reflection versus unreflective assumption.

 

Many Christian theologians believe and teach that whatever happens, without exception, falls into the category “God’s will” in the sense that it conforms to God’s “blueprint” for history and individual lives and, even though evil and innocent suffering may grieve God, God ordains and governs them for a greater good (e.g., his glory). I call this divine determinism because it fits the ordinary definition of “determinism.” Those who teach it often deny that it is deterministic (at the very least it is meticulous providence). Not only Calvinists teach this; it is a view held in a perhaps more nuanced way by many non-Calvinists (e.g., conservative Lutherans).

 

My hunch (I haven’t taken a poll) is that most Christians believe some version of divine determinism often inconsistently. This is revealed when, after a tragedy, they say “God knows what he is doing” and “God is in control.” Very often, however, that is not what they say or appear to believe before the tragedy strikes. That is certainly the view I was taught growing up in the “thick” of evangelicalism. Or perhaps I should say I wasn’t so much taught it as I caught it from my elders. Many of the songs we sang in church reflected some kind of divine determinism or meticulous providence. (E.g., “Day by Day and with Each Passing Moment”)

 

Recently I introduced a group of students to my saying that “God is in charge but not in control.” Some were shocked and indicated they probably could not accept that even though intellectually they do not think God controls everything that happens. My conviction is that “God is in control” is a cliché that has taken on a life of its own among Christians and is inevitably conveys the impression that God plans and renders certain everything that happens without exception. That is, God always gets his way in everything.

 

Let’s look at ordinary language. If I say that so-and-so is “in control” of a certain situation (and not only himself or herself), most people will automatically assume I mean that the person has a plan and is manipulating events to fit that plan. They will assume the person I’m talking about always gets his or her own way in that context. That’s what “in control” means (when said of a person about his or her management of a context).

 

Someone might quibble about that, but I believe especially when “in control” is attributed to God, who is believed to be omnipotent, it always automatically implies meticulous providence.

 

That is a problem, however, in light of Scripture and history (including contemporary events in persons’ lives). Many Scriptures more than imply that God was not getting his way in certain situation. The clearest one to me is Matthew 23:37: Jesus wept over Jerusalem’s rejection. Was God getting his way there and then? The Bible is filled with examples of God not getting his way even though he was able to bring something good out of those disappointments.

 

History also gets in the way of saying “God is in control” or “God always gets his way.” Just the other day I was told about an incident in a poverty-stricken country not far from America’s shores where a woman and her boyfriend invaded an orphanage at gunpoint, kidnapped three children they believed were theirs and took them away. When confronted by police the adults brutally butchered the children. What I want to ask people who say “God is in control” and who believe God always gets his way is: Do you believe God controlled that situation and got his way in it?

 

Now, many theologically minded Calvinists and other divine determinists will, when pushed against the wall and forced to answer, will say yes, even in such a horrible situation of innocent suffering God was getting his way and was totally in control. My complaint here is not with them although such an answer leaves me absolutely bewildered. I do complain about them and that answer, but not right now. Here my complaint is about the widespread, almost universal, unreflective assumption on the parts of non-Calvinists, non-divine determinists, that “God is in control.”

 

I theorize that this folk religious belief in God always getting his way sets especially young people up to adopt divine determinism, meticulous providence, when confronted with it. What’s wrong with that? Well, in my opinion, it can have the effect of making them immune to the real horrors of history and of sin and evil. If all that is God’s will, if in it all God is getting his way, if in it all God is “in control,” then why be fired up with indignation against it and go out to fight against it? Also, it may cause them to ignore whole chunks of Scripture and think dishonoring thoughts about God. Finally, I know from personal experience it leads some young people to think that they don’t need to resist sin in their own lives because, if they are succumbing to temptation, it must be God’s will [(sic, antinomianism - res)].

 

One of my favorite books about all this is by South African theologian Adrio König. It’s title is Here Am I! A Believer’s Reflection on God (Eerdmans, 1982). Here is one of the best statements against meticulous providence (whether theological or folk religious) I have ever read and it is by a Reformed theologian!

 

Anyone who levels things out in vague generalizations by attempting to explain everything and all possible circumstances as the will of God always ends up in the impossible situation that there are more exceptions than rules, more things that are inexplicable and that clash with the picture of God that is given to us in his word, than there are comforting confirmations that he is directing everything.…

 

[And] anyone who tries to use the omnipotence and providence of God to propose a meticulously prepared divine plan which is unfolding in world history (L. Boettner) will always be left with the problem that other believers might not be able to discern the God of love in the actual course of world events.… [i]t must be emphatically stated that… the Scriptures do not present the future as something which materializes [sic] according to a ‘plan’ but according to the covenant [of God].…

 

There are distressingly many thing that happen on earth that are not the will of God (Luke 7:30 and every other sin mentioned in the Bible), that are against his will, and that stem from the incomprehensible and senseless sin in which we are born, in which the greater part of mankind lives, and in which Israel persisted, and against which even the ‘holiest men’…struggled all their days.…

 

To try to interpret all these things by means of the concept of a plan of God, creates intolerable difficulties and gives rise to more exceptions than regularities. But the most important objection is that the idea of a plan is against the message of the Bible since God himself becomes incredible if that against which he has fought with power, and for which he sacrificed his only Son, was nevertheless somehow part and parcel of his eternal counsel. (pp. 198-199) (I apologize for the spaces; I cut and pasted this and some of the formatting went strange. I don’t have time to fix it.)