Who is Noah and How Does Noah's Story Tell Us of God? Part 1

Noah - Official Trailer (2014) [HD] Russel Crowe, Emma Watson




"In its early stages, religion means certainty about many things.

But... he is most religious who is certain of but one thing,

the world-embracing love of God." 

- Charles Hartshorne

Introduction

There are several things I know. I know that we live in a spiritual world as much as a material world. This is my personal belief and the beginning point of my being. It's an admission within me as a poet-theologian as much as it is a statement of skepticism towards modern day religion and human beings search for meaning on whatever basis it comes. Because of this belief, I believe in miracles. In prophecy. And in the inspiration of the Bible. The balances are tipped in the scales of my heart towards the spiritual over the material.

And yet, the materialist in me would deny this belief and say, (i) "everything can be explained naturally - especially biblical miracles" as science continues forward. That, (ii) "prophecy is fore-telling alone without the forth-telling aspect of the aspectual prophecy." That the prophecy's appearance, or expression, to the mind comes with the accompanying observation of its nature, character, or the quality of the thing being viewed, presented, or interpreted by the prophet, his audience, or consequential events. And that, (iii) "the Bible is merely a collection of human writings and gathered stories from the tongues of religious story tellers to communities who were passionate about their beliefs, or emptied of any beliefs whatsoever and wanting answers however they may come. Who passed those storied traditions along  - with or without embellishment (or loss of it) - warts and all, through local colouring and flavoring. So that the story's legend grew through through time into a modern midrash of human compendium and experience. Insights and wisdoms. Beliefs. Superstitions. Heart felt joy. Songs, prayers, and thanksgiving.

And thus the tone and tempo for our discussion of Noah is set. Is it a spiritual story, or a material story, or some admixture of both? Is Noah himself a man or a myth? If prophet, priest, and judge, than by what moral, ethical, or religious standard? Is the Bible's account to be read as literally true or as a literary genre expressing religious values and self-identity. Values as much about life itself as about ourselves, our needs, and our wants... or something that can tells us about who we are? And if there was no global flood than where is the miracle? If the animals were not collected two-by-two than where is the sense of God's preservation, power, and judgment upon man's wickedness and evil? Of the Creator's displeasure with man? Or His abiding patience and longsuffering for His creation? It's caretake and salvation? If the future of the world is not to be one of annihilation by fire than how can we ever again read the Bible without doubting its pages or doubting the God of its pages?

Eh, verily, these and more questions rapidly come to mind. For in truth, we yearn for a fellowship with our Maker. One that would tell us of ourselves, our creation, our sin, and need for redemption. Not a mortal-filled book spilling with ancient beliefs and superstitions, native customs and conventions, local ignorance and regional fables. But a divine book Spirit-made and Spirit-wrought. One honoring universal truths, wisdoms, beliefs, and eternal promises. If the Bible is to be believed than how do we approach the story of Noah? His ark, the flood, man's judgement, and ultimate renewal?

And there is the cusp of the problem when coming to the biblical narrative of Noah. His story sets the tempo in our hearts to challenge all that we think we know of God. Of the world. And of mankind. It challenges our pet beliefs. Our dogmas. And the very fabric of our faith. It tests us by asking us about this "other Noah" that we have made whether by legend or by fact. If whether we have made Noah in our own image (and imaginations) even as we may have crafted the image of God after our own needs and necessities. A God whom we must test to believe in order to live out a God-faith in a sin-filled world racked by human greed and pride. Pain and suffering. Made more of fate than destiny. It is this "other Noah" whom we come to in order to re-discover the God of our lives lest all falls apart within our fragile worlds of faith and belief.

For myself, I realized a profound necessity for my belief in God. That it is this belief that has defined me. That makes me who I am. That marks me. That drives me forward. For without it I would be the poorer. The more wasted. The more ruined. But with it everything I am remade as if by divine hands of love which I see everywhere about. Or everywhere rejected. Or everywhere renewing and redeeming even as it is feared, doubted, spurned, and denied. Even so, by this divine love I must also have a realistic God and not a fanciful one. A realistic faith and not the one of my childhood's youth found upon a Sunday School's faith made of fantasy, fiction, and whim by erstwhile teachers.

If it is to be a mature faith than it will have to look at the stories of the Bible and see them for what they are, as much as for what they are not. And to not think that the God I know of in the Bible can be lost. Or in need of my defense for His existence. Or denial. But through their collective narratives I must come to see the God who spoke in-and-through the ancients of His will and power, grace and love, mercy and forgiveness. Who gave hope even as He forewarned and judged. A God who rules today EVEN as He did so many long eons ago through the many lives - and life's events - that surrounds and moves us within its heavenly streams.

That the only difference between my faith and the ancients' faith of yesteryear will be one of material knowledge based upon science and research, time and event, reason and discourse. But it can also be a journey of faith within all the material discovery and theological arguments made in a grown-up world based upon a grown-up faith that hasn't outgrown its youthful images of God's certainty and guidance. Even in its adult years of skepticism and agnosticism.

This then must be the beginning of our discussion if we are to have a discussion. One that doubts and questions, believes and yearns for the spiritual in a material world. Without this beginning point we can only reinforce our own beliefs about the story of Noah and what it has come to mean to so many today both up-and-down the religious or non-religious aisles. And so, by way of an extended introduction I leave an earlier article written not long ago that might continue this discussion in the weeks ahead as we look into the story of Noah for today's postmodern times. Its academic disbeliefs, its Christian fantasies, its fairytales, its time honored traditions, and amassing lores. Peace.

R.E. Slater

April 10, 2014

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Excerpt

from Archaeology and the Bible: Sorting through Fact from Fiction

"Bible bashing is not an activity that can be found here at Relevancy22. The Bible is considered God's Holy Word to mankind that is authoritative and inspired but not inerrant. As such, this site does work at conveying to readers how the Bible may be read without adding the forced doctrine of inerrancy (a doctrinal creed that comes courtesy of the Evangelical Theological Society's Chicago Statement of 1980), without losing its spiritual authority in our lives when reading of God's wondrous story of redemption for creation and mankind. That this spiritual recount is inspired by His Spirit and guided by His hand placed upon the passions and burdens of His people over  a very long period of time. That it began as oral history in the form of story telling, religious poems, hymns, songs, incantations, or recitals; to people who were weary, joyful, hopeful, religious, not religious, fearful,  or superstitious; and conveyed by priests, prophets, community leaders, country folk, Bedouins, villagers, city folk, foreigners; who may have been oppressed, humbled, persecuted, enslaved, and exiled, to name a few circumstances and instances.

"So today's topic will review two kinds of reading of the Bible - one that is not-inerrant as versus one that is inerrant - by using an archaeological discovery which is acting like a fast spreading wildfire of public opinion and news. At the outset it is important to notice that we didn't say an "errant" reading of the Bible because that type of reading can be true of both groups - both for the one not holding to inerrancy as well as for the one holding to it. So what does this mean? Well, for the scientist - or archaeologist in this case - rather than to describe something in "error" the preferred term might be "anachronism," meaning something that is unique, different, or a-typical, of what you are studying. That is, one's findings, or discoveries, or calculations, have turned up a salient, singular, result that requires further investigation. And in the case of archaeology, more than in the case of physics or chemistry, those findings may still be hiding in the dirt. And so you wait. You hypothesize. You reflect on patterns and meaning to what is known and what is not known.

a·nach·ro·nism

  [uh-nak-ruh-niz-uh m] Show IPA

noun

1.

something or someone that is not in its correct historical or chronological time, especially a thing orperson that belongs to an earlier time: The sword is an anachronism in modern warfare.

2.

an error in chronology in which a person, object, event, etc., is assigned a date or period other thanthe correct one: To assign Michelangelo to the 14th century is an anachronism.

"Which in this case is whether camels (both the one-hump variety and the two-hump kind) were domesticated in Abraham's day (that is, from Genesis 11 onwards). And if they weren't then why are they described in Genesis (and the Pentateuch) as being present and being used as beasts of burden? Now this isn't new news for those studying ancient biblical ruins, times, or events... but it is to us non-archaeological types that read the news and react to its discourses when it runs afoul of our thinking, prejudices, biblical systems, conventions, and philosophies. It can dissettle us. And when it does we may have one of three reactions: (i) stay calm by reading onwards while reflecting upon the meaning of the discovery; (ii) say "yeah, I suspected this all along!" and excitedly push on into the story as it reflects our pet beliefs, idiosyncrasies, or skepticisms; (iii) or, react in disgust and anger saying, "Confound it, those liberals are at it again, telling me my Bible is wrong, and I am wrong! Anathema on all science and archaeology!" Which is my poor attempt at being humorous over a very serious subject for many, which may hold very serious implications if preferred readings and traditional interpretations of the Bible are being forthrightly challenged to the degree that it requires personal, if not system-wide change and rethinking.

"Which begs the question, how are we to read the Bible? Especially if what we're reading may not be true but filled with authorial largesse more concerned with great story telling than historical accuracy. Which hits at the nub of the problem as any new discovery may conflict with our own private interpretations of a very complex book we know as the Bible. A book spoken, sung, and much later written, by burdened story tellers wishing to convey how God came to them and spoke to their hearts redemptive truths. Truths that required telling - whether it was wanted or not. Perhaps at story teller's own peril or community standing. And, unlike modern day storytelling, the ancients weren't particularly worried about facts, more probably because of their mindset, and just as likely because there were no resources to verify them as there is today in our digital age of "ready online information." As such, biblical story tellers were not buttoned down by the convention of historical accuracy. Rather, they were more concerned in telling of God's great passion, burden, and heart, by using whatever conventions they could to drive home the point which the Lord had so placed upon their heart.

"So when we, as modern day readers, come to this very ancient process of oral tradition that was much, much later written down and then imperfectly preserved through the long centuries of personal and national disruption created by ethos wars, cultural exiles, and civil disobedience, we should not expect a "Star Trek type of Bible" dropped out of the sky into our lap to read unmarred by the many disjointed personalities, events, past traditions, and interpretations of the ancient story tellers. To read the Bible is to try to read, and interpret, its narrative while holding in abeyance its many anachronisms, which are no threat to God or His Word. Though they may be to us and our biblical systems and doctrines which we have built upon select readings of the Bible's "airs and atmospheres." For the scholar, as for the biblical reader in general, the trick is to read its center, and there find God's message of redemption. Of personal sacrifice and love for a creation and for mankind gone off track because of sin and desire. Its spiritual message is deep, and wide, and pregnant with meaning for the empty lives we would live without the presence of our kind Lord and almighty Saviour....."

R.E. Slater

February 21, 2014

More Reference Material -

Michael Graves: The Early Church Father's Many Methods of Interpretation of the Bible

Hermeneutics and Interpretation

The Land of the Dead, Noah by Director/Writer Darren Aronofsky

Anthony Hopkins, Noah by Director/Writer Darren Aronofsky

Jennifer Connelly, Russell Crowe, Noah by Director/Writer Darren Aronofsky

Good v. Evil, Noah by Director/Writer Darren Aronofsky

And so it begins, Noah by Director/Writer Darren Aronofsky

Emma Watson, Noah by Director/Writer Darren Aronofsky

Does God Change?

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/rogereolson/2014/04/does-god-change/?utm_source=SilverpopMailing&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=rogereolson_040814UTC010425_daily&utm_content=&spMailingID=45571177&spUserID=Nzg4MDU4NjI4MjkS1&spJobID=420935271&spReportId=NDIwOTM1MjcxS0

by Roger Olson

April 6, 2014

Comments

Statement of Problem

I don’t remember when it happened, but I remember the shock I felt when I first encountered the idea that God cannot change—as an idea I was supposed to believe as an evangelical Christian. It was probably sometime during seminary, but it may have been before in some college religion class. I’m almost certain I never heard it growing up in my evangelical church—except as an expression of God’s faithfulness to himself and to us (viz., that God cannot become someone other than he is).

I have remained faithful all these years as an evangelical Christian theologian to what I learned in Sunday School and from my pastor and other spiritual mentors of my youth: God is faithful to himself and to us and always keeps his promises and cannot be anything but good, but he is affected by what happens in our world and by our prayers.

I was shocked and dismayed to learn that evangelical theologians, by and large, rejected that simple biblical view of God and replaced it with what I have learned to call the “logic of perfection”—that a perfect being cannot change in any way or even be affected by anything that happens in his creation.

What I “saw” early on in my theological training, however, was that those evangelical theologians who strongly touted God’s “immutability” were not very consistent about it. At least that’s what I thought I noticed in their writings. On the one hand, I was told, a good evangelical believes God is impervious to any change including having new experiences. On the other hand, I was told, it was the Son of God, the second person of the Trinity, equal with the Father and Holy Spirit, who experienced the incarnation including hunger, thirst, temptation, sorrow, pain and even death. The explanation? That he experienced these things only “through the human nature he took on” through Mary.

In other words, these conservative evangelical theologians told me (through their writings), God-in-himself, God in his divinity, cannot experience anything new or suffer. But God-in-incarnation, the human nature of Jesus, can experience new things and suffer.

---

Observations re Statement

I’m not even going to go into all the problems this raises for Christology. I’ll just say I do believe in the hypostatic union, but not for that reason! Not to protect the deity of Christ from change and suffering.

I will also never forget the relief I felt when I first heard that Pascal said “The God of the philosophers is not the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob!” And when I read the evangelical theology of Donald Bloesch who rejected the philosophical logic of perfection in favor of what Emil Brunner called “biblical personalism”—that the God of the Bible is personal and therefore capable of experiencing what is outside of himself including new experiences including suffering.

Bloesch and Bunner held onto the idea I was taught in Sunday School and church as a child and youth—that God is faithful in every way and that is God’s immutability. But they rejected the philosophical (Platonic and Aristotelian) idea of God as an uncarved, immovable, impervious block of stone.

I read conservative evangelical theologians who attempted to reconcile the “orthodox” idea of God’s immutability with God as living by referring to God’s activeness in relation to creation. That is, they said (and still say), that God’s immutability does not mean that God is immobile or passive. But I remember sitting in class and reading this and wondering how that is supposed to solve anything when the same theologians say God is “pure actuality” without any potential to experience anything new? [That is,] such a God may be active but cannot be fully personal in his relations with creatures. And he cannot be the God of the Bible who does not have wings (an anthropomorphism) but does have emotions provoked by creatures (not anthropomorphism).

How do I know this? Well, all one has to do is not ignore or explain away the entire book of Hosea (just one example). The whole story of Hosea requires that God has emotions that require experiences God would not have without rebellious, sinful creatures. The story has no point once you extract that from it. The whole point is the pain Israel’s unfaithfulness caused God.

When I left America to study theology with Wolfhart Pannenberg at the University of Munich I took one theological tome with me: Hendrikus’ Berkhof’s Christian Faith: An Introduction to the Study of the Faith. (Of course I bought and borrowed other theological tomes while in Munich; this is the only one I had room for in my luggage!) I read it twice in Munich and found Berkhof a breath of fresh air (except his functional Christology). I especially like his description of God as our superior, faithful covenant partner who voluntarily allows himself to be affected deeply by us (“changeable faithfulness”).

What’s ironic about all this is that, when it comes to belief about God’s ability to change (or not) my view has not changed significantly since Sunday School and the church of my youth. “Changeable faithfulness” sums it up well. After four degrees in theology and thirty-two years teaching Christian theology in three universities, my belief about God’s immutability remains the same even if somewhat more sophisticated (by being supported by personalist theologians such as Bloesch, Brunner and Berkhof).

So, to put it in theological terms:

"God, I believe, could have remained fully God without lack or need, without any creation. However, creation out of love (the overflowing of the inner-trinitarian love of Father, Son and Holy Spirit) is the most understandable thing because of God’s great love."

Just as a married couple want (not need) a child to share their “couple love” with, so God wanted (not needed) a creation and beings created in his own image and likeness with whom to share his/their love. But because God is personal love, the history of creation affects God inwardly and not only outwardly. God’s emotional life is affected by what creatures do because God is love.

But through it all, God remains who he is and always has been and always will be. God’s relation to creation does not take anything away from God’s being or character or add anything to it—ethically or ontologically. Emotionally, however, creation does affect God. And God experiences new things in relation to creation. But all this is by God’s free choice; not necessity.

I must admit that I tend to think any other view tends to elevate philosophy over the biblical revelation of God and therefore is, in the most important sense, unorthodox.

continue to -

Index to past articles on "Calvinism v. Arminianism"

      

Arminianism re God's Providence, Free Will, Sin, and Evil

Arminianism and God's Providence
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/rogereolson/2014/03/arminianism-and-providence/

by Roger Olson

March 1, 2014

Comments

One of the questions I’m asked most often is about God’s providence in Arminian theology. Most people know that Arminians do not believe that God micromanages history or human lives–especially not in terms of evil. That is, Arminians do not believe that God designs, foreordains or renders certain sinful acts. Sin and evil are included in God’s consequent will, not God’s antecedent will. God governs them but does not design, foreordain or render them certain.

I have expressed my own overall view of God’s providence this way: “God is in charge but not in control”. However, some Arminians objected to that. I’m not going to repeat my explanation or defense of that here. My one concern here, right now, is to explain THAT being Arminian does not require one to believe that God NEVER interferes with free will.

The only category of creaturely decisions and actions where God NEVER interferes with free will IN THE SENSE OF rendering them certain is sin and evil. God permits them but does not design, foreordain or render them certain.

One qualification is necessary even here. In relation to creaturely decisions and actions that are sinful, God never designs, foreordains or renders certain individuals’ evil decisions and actions that would cause their condemnation.

But my main concern here, now, is to say that God DOES interfere in free will in guiding and directing our lives as his people. He is not the author of our sins or failures, but he does direct our lives in terms of opening and closing doors.

My point is that for the Arminian, God is not a “deist God”–uninvolved and only observing. God is intimately involved in the details of our lives–to the extent that we allow him to be. If we shut him out of our lives and tell him to leave us alone he will, saying, reluctantly, “Okay, thy will, not mine be done.” This, too, of course, is within his will–consequently but not antecedently.

This is how I understand God’s providence in my life when I sing, for example, hymns that talk about God “appointing my pathway, knowing just what is needful and best.” I never think such lyrics mean God designs, foreordains, or renders certain, my sins or failures. I take them to mean that God has a plan for my life and, insofar as I surrender to his will, whatever happens to me is “needful and best.”

Of course, God does not design, foreordain or render certain OTHERS’ sins that impact my life. In that case he permits me to be impacted by their sins and brings good for me out of them. But I have no problem believing that he foresees their sinful intentions and allows me to be in the path of their consequences insofar as that “needful and best” for me.

I do not think God is particularly concerned about my comfort. My life is what philosopher-theologian John Hick called a “vale of soul making”–a space for God to test me, strengthen me, prepare me, use me. Much of what I suffer may very well be His will. I do not expect God to be “fair” to me or keep me from harm (although I believe praying for him to preserve my life and help me in times of trial is always good).

People who think that the Arminian God must be thought of as remote, distant, uninvolved need to be corrected. I hope I have helped with that.

continue to -

Index to past articles on "Calvinism v. Arminianism"

      

God's Glory is God's Love and Nothing Less

The “Chief End of Man”…God’s Glory…Yes and Amen (But…)

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/rogereolson/2014/04/the-chief-end-of-man-gods-glory-yes-and-amen-but/

by Roger Olson

April 4, 2014

Comments

Recently I re-read Jonathan Edwards “Dissertation on the End for Which God Created the World.” And I watched and listened to John Piper’s address about why the evangelical church needs Edwards’ “God-entranced vision” today. (It’s on Youtube.)

Some people would be surprised to hear that I agree ALMOST entirely with Edwards and Piper about this subject. First, yes, I agree, whole heartedly, that everything, without exception, is created for God’s glory and that everything’s chief end (purpose) is God’s glory. Edwards’ and Piper’s “God-entranced vision” is needed by evangelicals (and others) today…with a few important qualifications. (The devil is always in the details.)

The Westminster Shorter Catechism says that “The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy him forever.” I say “amen” to that. We do not exist for ourselves; nothing exists for itself. Everything was created for God’s glory and exists to glorify him. As Edwards acknowledges, there are subordinate “ends” (purposes) for things, but the chief end, purpose, of whatever exists, has being, is God’s glory.

I sympathize with Piper’s (and others’) concerns about contemporary evangelical Christianity in America. We have fallen into various forms of human-centeredness. “Moralistic, therapeutic deism” is one of them. Another is worship and preaching that focuses on creation and human “success in life” (happiness, fulfillment, prosperity, etc.). I do not recognize much that is called “evangelical” as that.

So what is my problem with Edwards’ and Piper’s vision (they are basically the same) of this “God entranced vision?” They and I part ways over some very important details.

1

First, INSOFAR as they imply that sin and evil and hell are “designed, foreordained and governed” by God for his glory I demur. These are PERMITTED reluctantly by God and he uses them to glorify himself.

How so? Because God’s glory is his love. Even Edwards seemed to acknowledge this in The Nature of True Virtue by defining “true virtue” as “benevolence toward being.” Love does not coerce others into loving oneself. Sin, evil and hell are permitted by God as part of his consequent will, not “designed, foreordained and governed” by God as part of his antecedent will. But they still exist to glorify God–not because God planned them for his self-glory but because their existence is the result of his love for creatures which glorifies him. A God who permits creatures to resist him is more glorious than one who meticulously controls every thought and intention and decision and action of every creature.

How does hell glorify God? Not by being NECESSARY for the display of God’s justice in wrath (Edwards) but by being God’s painful refuge for those who reject him.

(For you Edwards experts out there…yes, I know Edwards also said that God “permitted” sin and evil to enter his creation, but he clearly MEANT “efficacious permission.” He clearly meant that the fall and all its consequences were planned by God and rendered certain by God according to a great plan and scheme to glorify himself by displaying his justice through wrath.)

2

Second, INSOFAR as they (Edwards, Piper and their ilk) imply that POWER takes precedence over LOVE in God’s glory, I demur.

God’s glory IS his love–first his innertrinitarian love between Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and second his love flowing out from the Trinity toward creatures.

God is glorious BECAUSE he is perfectly loving as well as perfectly powerful. BUT, since love is his essence, he can restrict his power (but not his love).

To be sure, Edwards believed in God’s love, but he MEANT God’s self-love and then, secondarily, his love for the elect. Piper tries to rescue God’s love even for the non-elect by saying he gives them “temporal blessings” on their way to hell. That’s absurd, of course. It is the same as saying he give them a little bit heaven to go to hell in. Wesley said that is such as “love” as makes the blood run cold. I agree.

My point is that, in my view, anyway, while Edwards and Piper are correct to emphasize God’s glory as the chief end, purpose, of everything, they are wrong to empty God’s glory of meaningful love and focus it on power. Power without love is not glorious.

Church father Irenaeus is famous for saying that “the glory of God is man fully alive.” So, yes, everything in creation exists for God’s glory, but God’s glory is not narcissistic. It is his perfect benevolence and ability to display it and give it to creatures.

As my friend Austin Fischer says in his wonderful book Young, Restless, No Longer Reformed (Wipf & Stock) “Love is not a cog in the glory machine.” But in our opinion, Edwards and Piper make it just that.

Rather, as Scripture itself testifies, “God is love.” God IS love. That is God’s glory.

So, let me say again, loudly this time: TRUE ARMINIANS ALSO BELIEVE GOD’S GLORY IS THE CHIEF END OF EVERYTHING. But we disagree with Edwards and Piper about the NATURE of God’s glory. Yes, it is his beauty and perfection, but his beauty and perfection are his perfect love, his benevolence toward being–his own and creatures’.

continue to -

Index to past articles on "Calvinism v. Arminianism"

      

Why High Calvinism is Impossible: The Importance of Language

Why (High) Calvinism Is Impossible

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/rogereolson/2014/03/why-high-calvinism-is-impossible/

by Roger Olson

March 16, 2014

Comments

By “impossible” I don’t mean, of course, “doesn’t exist.” I mean “exists but doesn’t work.” By “doesn’t work” I mean “cannot be believed consistently and coherently.”

In brief, my argument is that belief in the Bible as God’s Word and motivation to engage in its exegesis presupposes belief that God is trustworthy, that God cannot deceive. But this assumes that God has a stable, enduring, eternal character that is “good” in a way analogous to our highest and best intuitions of “goodness”—whatever their source may be.

Put another way, negatively, if one believes that God’s goodness is nothing like our best intuitions of goodness, that God’s goodness is possibly compatible with anything capable of being put into words (i.e., ultimately and finally mysterious), then there is no good reason to trust him. Trust in a person, even God, necessarily requires belief that the person is good and belief that the person is good necessarily requires some content and not “good” as a cipher for something totally beyond comprehension and unlike anything else we call “good.”

Put in technical language, if “good” applied to God is equivocal and not even analogical, then it is useless for describing God. If “God is good” is qualified with “but his goodness is completely different from ours” (meaning our highest and best ideas of goodness), then it is meaningless.

Not all Calvinists say that God’s goodness is completely different from ours. Paul Helm, for example, in The Providence of God, argues that “goodness” attributed to God cannot be totally other than goodness attributed to human beings (even as an impossible ideal). Unfortunately for him, I believe, he does not follow that insight through consistently but undermines it by attempting to combine assertion of God’s essential goodness with belief in double predestination.

I argue that belief in double predestination is simply logically incompatible with the claim that God is good—unless “good” is emptied of all meaning so that it is a useless cipher for something we don’t know.

But if God is not good in some way analogous to our highest and best intuitions, insights, into “goodness,” then there is no reason to trust the Bible. And if there is no reason to trust the Bible (because God, being not good in any sense meaningful to us, might be deceiving us), then there is no clear motive for intense biblical exegesis.

Every devout, evangelical Christian believer I have ever met or heard of approaches Bible reading and study (including exegesis) with the assumption that the Bible is true (even if not strictly inerrant)—that it does not misidentify God and God’s will for us. But built into that assumption is that God, the Bible’s author (by inspiration of the human authors) is good (which is why he is trustworthy and cannot deceive). But belief that God “designs, foreordains, and governs” hell for the reprobate who are chosen by God for hell for his glory without regard to any truly free choices they make undermines belief in God’s goodness. So does belief that God “passes over” some he could easily save (because election to salvation is unconditional and saving grace is irresistible), damning them to hell, for his glory.

There is no conceivable analogous human behavior that we would call “good.” The very concept of “good” rules out such behavior. (To say nothing of Jesus’ own goodness and the New Testament’s commands for us to love our enemies and do good to them.)

My point is, of course, that there exists a contradiction between two Calvinist beliefs: 1) that the Bible is inherently and unconditionally trustworthy, and 2) that God, its author, is not good in any sense meaningful to us. Belief “1″ assumes that God is good in a sense meaningful to us—comparable with our highest and best intuitions of goodness. Belief “2″ (necessarily implied by double predestination) empties belief “1″ of foundation.

Therefore, any exegesis of the Bible that ends up portraying God as not good, which high Calvinism (belief in double predestination) inexorably does, cannot be believed because it self-referentially turns back against the very reason for believing the Bible. In order to be consistent one must choose between belief in the Bible as God’s Word and belief in double predestination.

This is why I say with John Wesley about the Calvinist interpretation of Romans 9 “Whatever it means it cannot mean that.”

* * * * * * * * * * *

Follow Up to Why (High) Calvinism Is Impossible

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/rogereolson/2014/03/follow-up-to-why-high-calvinism-is-impossible/

by Roger Olson

March 19, 2014

Comments

Suppose someone said “God is sovereign but God’s sovereignty is different from our ideas of sovereignty. God is sovereign but possesses only the power of persuasion.” Someone else objects saying “But wait. There is no meaning of ‘sovereignty’ known to man that is compatible with having only the power of persuasion.” The first person responds, “Oh, but you are assuming a human idea of sovereignty; God’s sovereignty is higher and better than any human idea of sovereignty. We can’t project our ideas onto God; we must learn from God what ‘sovereignty’ means.” The second person says “But wait again. When you say God is ‘sovereign,’ then, we have no idea what you mean because the word ‘sovereign’ becomes equivocal. It is compatible with anything.” The first person responds, “Well, God is mysterious and his ways are higher than our ways.”

In other words, two can play this game. The Calvinist believes God predestines people to eternal torment in hell apart from any truly free decisions they make (since he “designs, foreordains, and governs” all creaturely decisions) and could rescue them from it (because election to salvation is unconditional and grace is irresistible) but doesn’t say “God is good,” even though there is no OTHER meaning of “good” compatible with such behavior. This is no different from, say, a process theologian saying “God is sovereign” even though there is no OTHER meaning of “sovereign” compatible with total lack of power other than power of persuasion. In both cases we really have no idea what the words mean.

Almost all Calvinists insist that God is NOT the “author of sin and evil.” Why? Because that would be incompatible with being “good.” SOME Calvinists challenge that and ask why God can’t be good AND the author of sin and evil? The other Calvinists really have no answer to that because they have already emptied “good” of all meaningful content by saying it is compatible with God predestining people to hell (as described above).

Words cannot mean whatever we say they mean (contrary to the character in Alice in Wonderland). This is the whole point of saying that theological language must be analogical and not equivocal. High Calvinism makes “good” equivocal. Then, “good” becomes possibly compatible with anything and everything–including deceiving others. If God’s “goodness” is so elastic and equivocal, then there is no reason to expect that it could NOT be compatible with God deceiving us in which case we have no good ground for trusting the Bible.

I am convinced that all objectors so far have missed the point entirely. What scenario in human existence and experience can you think of in which something like predestining fellow human beings to eternal torment in hell apart from any free decisions they make would possibly be compatible with “goodness?” What scenario in human existence and experience can you think of in which refusing to rescue a fellow human person from eternal torment when one could rescue him is compatible with “goodness.”

If you say “Well, whatever God does is automatically ‘good’ just because God does it,” then you have made my point for me. We don’t have any dependable understanding of what that might exclude. In that case “good” MIGHT include deceiving us in God’s “Word” such that the reality is exactly the opposite of what it says–viz., that salvation is by works alone rather than by grace alone.

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Index to past articles on "Calvinism v. Arminianism"

      

The Bible: Jesus Son of God Tour 2014 Songs & Videos

http://thebibletourexperience.com/

Not For A Moment (After All) - Vertical Church Band w/ Meredith Andrews

Write Your Story by Francesca Battistelli Lyrics

Francesca Battistelli - Strangely Dim (Official Lyric Video)

Jesus Savior - Music Video from Movie Son Of God - Legendado

Meredith Andrews - "Pieces" [Official Music Video]

Strong God - Meredith Andrews - Lyric Video Strong God

Película "Son Of God" (HIJO DE DIOS) | Jesus Savior - CHRIS August

Jason Gray- Nothing Is Wasted (Official Music Video)

Francesca Battistelli - Beautiful, Beautiful (Official Video)

Be Born In Me(Mary) - Francesca Battistelli

Jason Gray - Remind Me Who I Am

I Believe - Natalie Grant

Chris August - "Center Of It" (Lyrics)

MEREDITH ANDREWS - DRAW ME NEARER LYRICS 

The Bible: Son Of God Tour - "You Love Me Anyway"

Sidewalk Prophets- Help Me Find It (Official Lyric Video)

Your Great Name by Natalie Grant with Lyrics (HD)

Natalie Grant - Films and Music Inspired by THE STORY "Alive

Sidewalk Prophets - "The Words I Would Say" with Lyrics

Jason Gray - I Am New

Meredith Andrews - Revelation Song - HQ MEREDITH ANDR

Son of God: Music Inspired By Epic Motion Picture. Full Soundtrack