Quotes & Sayings


We, and creation itself, actualize the possibilities of the God who sustains the world, towards becoming in the world in a fuller, more deeper way. - R.E. Slater

There is urgency in coming to see the world as a web of interrelated processes of which we are integral parts, so that all of our choices and actions have [consequential effects upon] the world around us. - Process Metaphysician Alfred North Whitehead

Kurt Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem says (i) all closed systems are unprovable within themselves and, that (ii) all open systems are rightly understood as incomplete. - R.E. Slater

The most true thing about you is what God has said to you in Christ, "You are My Beloved." - Tripp Fuller

The God among us is the God who refuses to be God without us, so great is God's Love. - Tripp Fuller

According to some Christian outlooks we were made for another world. Perhaps, rather, we were made for this world to recreate, reclaim, redeem, and renew unto God's future aspiration by the power of His Spirit. - R.E. Slater

Our eschatological ethos is to love. To stand with those who are oppressed. To stand against those who are oppressing. It is that simple. Love is our only calling and Christian Hope. - R.E. Slater

Secularization theory has been massively falsified. We don't live in an age of secularity. We live in an age of explosive, pervasive religiosity... an age of religious pluralism. - Peter L. Berger

Exploring the edge of life and faith in a post-everything world. - Todd Littleton

I don't need another reason to believe, your love is all around for me to see. – Anon

Thou art our need; and in giving us more of thyself thou givest us all. - Khalil Gibran, Prayer XXIII

Be careful what you pretend to be. You become what you pretend to be. - Kurt Vonnegut

Religious beliefs, far from being primary, are often shaped and adjusted by our social goals. - Jim Forest

We become who we are by what we believe and can justify. - R.E. Slater

People, even more than things, need to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; never throw out anyone. – Anon

Certainly, God's love has made fools of us all. - R.E. Slater

An apocalyptic Christian faith doesn't wait for Jesus to come, but for Jesus to become in our midst. - R.E. Slater

Christian belief in God begins with the cross and resurrection of Jesus, not with rational apologetics. - Eberhard Jüngel, Jürgen Moltmann

Our knowledge of God is through the 'I-Thou' encounter, not in finding God at the end of a syllogism or argument. There is a grave danger in any Christian treatment of God as an object. The God of Jesus Christ and Scripture is irreducibly subject and never made as an object, a force, a power, or a principle that can be manipulated. - Emil Brunner

“Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh” means "I will be that who I have yet to become." - God (Ex 3.14) or, conversely, “I AM who I AM Becoming.”

Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy. - Thomas Merton

The church is God's world-changing social experiment of bringing unlikes and differents to the Eucharist/Communion table to share life with one another as a new kind of family. When this happens, we show to the world what love, justice, peace, reconciliation, and life together is designed by God to be. The church is God's show-and-tell for the world to see how God wants us to live as a blended, global, polypluralistic family united with one will, by one Lord, and baptized by one Spirit. – Anon

The cross that is planted at the heart of the history of the world cannot be uprooted. - Jacques Ellul

The Unity in whose loving presence the universe unfolds is inside each person as a call to welcome the stranger, protect animals and the earth, respect the dignity of each person, think new thoughts, and help bring about ecological civilizations. - John Cobb & Farhan A. Shah

If you board the wrong train it is of no use running along the corridors of the train in the other direction. - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

God's justice is restorative rather than punitive; His discipline is merciful rather than punishing; His power is made perfect in weakness; and His grace is sufficient for all. – Anon

Our little [biblical] systems have their day; they have their day and cease to be. They are but broken lights of Thee, and Thou, O God art more than they. - Alfred Lord Tennyson

We can’t control God; God is uncontrollable. God can’t control us; God’s love is uncontrolling! - Thomas Jay Oord

Life in perspective but always in process... as we are relational beings in process to one another, so life events are in process in relation to each event... as God is to Self, is to world, is to us... like Father, like sons and daughters, like events... life in process yet always in perspective. - R.E. Slater

To promote societal transition to sustainable ways of living and a global society founded on a shared ethical framework which includes respect and care for the community of life, ecological integrity, universal human rights, respect for diversity, economic justice, democracy, and a culture of peace. - The Earth Charter Mission Statement

Christian humanism is the belief that human freedom, individual conscience, and unencumbered rational inquiry are compatible with the practice of Christianity or even intrinsic in its doctrine. It represents a philosophical union of Christian faith and classical humanist principles. - Scott Postma

It is never wise to have a self-appointed religious institution determine a nation's moral code. The opportunities for moral compromise and failure are high; the moral codes and creeds assuredly racist, discriminatory, or subjectively and religiously defined; and the pronouncement of inhumanitarian political objectives quite predictable. - R.E. Slater

God's love must both center and define the Christian faith and all religious or human faiths seeking human and ecological balance in worlds of subtraction, harm, tragedy, and evil. - R.E. Slater

In Whitehead’s process ontology, we can think of the experiential ground of reality as an eternal pulse whereby what is objectively public in one moment becomes subjectively prehended in the next, and whereby the subject that emerges from its feelings then perishes into public expression as an object (or “superject”) aiming for novelty. There is a rhythm of Being between object and subject, not an ontological division. This rhythm powers the creative growth of the universe from one occasion of experience to the next. This is the Whiteheadian mantra: “The many become one and are increased by one.” - Matthew Segall

Without Love there is no Truth. And True Truth is always Loving. There is no dichotomy between these terms but only seamless integration. This is the premier centering focus of a Processual Theology of Love. - R.E. Slater

-----

Note: Generally I do not respond to commentary. I may read the comments but wish to reserve my time to write (or write off the comments I read). Instead, I'd like to see our community help one another and in the helping encourage and exhort each of us towards Christian love in Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior. - re slater

Wednesday, March 30, 2022

Marjorie Suchocki - The Heart of Process Theology





The Heart of Process Theology
by Marjorie Suchocki


What follows is my abridged commentary of Dr. Suchocki
as I heard and understood her. Enjoy. - R.E. Slater



* * * * * * *

"Everything is related to everything else... No thing is an island unto itself. This is the heart of relational process theology."
- Marjorie Suchocki, Process Theologian [as abridged by R.E. Slater]

"A relational, process theology isn't afraid of the sciences, but embraces and delights in the sciences. It enhances the sciences and increases the wonders of this world." 
- Marjorie Suchocki, Process Theologian [as abridged by R.E. Slater]


* * * * * * *


What Is PROCESS Theology?
A Conversation with Marjorie

by Marjorie Hewitt Suchocki

The 21pp .pdf link here - 



* * * * * * *


Marjorie Suchocki - An Introduction to Process Theology
Feb 13, 2015



Check out (http://www.whitehead2015.com) -- Seizing an Alternative Conference
Marjorie Suchocki: "An Introduction to Process Theology," Jan. 27, 2004.



* * * * * * *


"Because creation is relational there exists a communal well-being throughout the cosmos. A divine, universal, unbounded grace permeating creation with possibilities of future wellbeing. A presentness of care founded and sustained by the Creator-God's relational presence of love and provision of generative wellbeing which can be found everywhere should we allow God's presence not only to be, but to become."
- Marjorie Suchocki, Process Theologian [as abridged by R.E. Slater]

Process theology makes sense through the presence of prayer which is open to the influences of God through ourselves and others and creation. Our prayers are requests for God to act into-and-through the lives of His creation regardless of geography. God hears everywhere and can act everywhere.
- Marjorie Suchocki, Process Theologian [as abridged by R.E. Slater]





God's whispered words of love flows through all, dwells within all, binds all to all else. Everything is relational because God is relational. In God's world it is not the particle which is important but its relationship to other particles which may then propagate the fullness of possible being through the potentiality of possible becomings.
- Marjorie Suchocki, Process Theologian [as abridged by R.E. Slater]


Process Theology makes sense in a world where evil occurs and where redemption may occur. Where the responsibility of creational freedom is placed upon creation itself. And within our freedom God may enter and create redemption from freedom gone wrong - commonly described as the harming affects of sin and evil upon God's creation. God can-and-will take the awful things of life and bring intentional redemption into those living streams of suffering and death. This is how a process God of beneficial relationships works.

- Marjorie Suchocki, Process Theologian [as abridged by R.E. Slater]





* * * * * * *



Marjorie Suchocki - The Heart of Process Theology
Aug 30, 2021



Marjorie Suchocki speaks to the key ideas of Process Theology.



* * * * * * *






Marjorie H. Suchocki - Prayer in Troubling Times
A Process Perspective, 2010
Feb 9, 2021


In this 2010 video, Marjorie Suchocki discusses the place and relevance of prayer in process perspective. Through personal narrative and concrete examples, she addresses the challenge of God's activity in the face of truly troubling times. Arguing against the notion that there is a God "up there" to which we pray, Suchocki expounds the fundamental conviction of process theology: God is immanently present to all things and in attentive relationship to all contextual experience. The immanence of God is not coercive, but pervasive and persuasive, constantly adjusting experience to the Good. This framework, Suchocki argues, opens up a new way of understanding how prayer influences God and the world in relation to what is possible for both.


* * * * * * *





Marjorie Hewitt Suchocki

Marjorie Hewitt Suchocki (born 1933) is an author and United Methodist professor emerita of theology at Claremont School of Theology. She is also co-director of the Center for Process Studies at Claremont.

Suchocki earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in philosophy from Pomona College in 1970 and both Master of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy degrees in religion from Claremont Graduate School in 1974. She taught at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary from 1977 to 1983. From 1983 to 1990 she was professor of systematic theology and dean of Wesley Theological Seminary. In 1990 Suchocki returned to Claremont School of Theology, where she held the endowed Ingraham chair in theology and joint appointment at the Claremont Graduate School until her retirement in 2002. She has held visiting professorships at Vanderbilt University in 1996 and 1999, and at the Ruprecht Karl University of Heidelberg in Heidelberg, Germany, in 1992.

Since 2001 Suchocki has been director of the Whitehead International Film Festival. She is considered along with John B. Cobb and David Ray Griffin as one of the leaders in the field of process theology.

Books

  • God Christ Church: A Practical Guide to Process Theology, Crossroad, 1982 (227 p.), ISBN 0-8245-0464-X, revised ed. 1989 (263 p.): ISBN 0-8245-0970-6
  • The End of Evil: Process Eschatology in Historical Context, State University of New York Press, 1988, ISBN 0-88706-724-7
  • The Fall to Violence: Original Sin in Relational Theology, Continuum International, 1995, ISBN 0-8264-0860-5
  • Trinity in Process: A Relational Theology of God, (coeditor with Joseph A. Bracken), Continuum International, 1996, ISBN 0-8264-0878-8
  • In God's Presence: Theological Reflections on Prayer, Chalice Press, 1996, ISBN 0-8272-1615-7
  • The Whispered Word: A Theology of Preaching, Chalice Press, 1999, ISBN 0-8272-4239-5
  • Divinity and Diversity: A Christian Affirmation of Religious Pluralism, Abingdon Press, 2003, ISBN 0-687-02194-4

External links

  • Works by or about Marjorie Hewitt Suchocki in libraries (WorldCat catalog)


* * * * * * *


COMMON QUESTIONS & ANSWERS
OF PROCESS THEOLOGY

by R.E. Slater


Jesus is the music we seek to hear


What are the four main branches of philosophy?
  • metaphysics - being and becoming
  • epistemology - knowing
  • axiology, and - inherent value pertaining to i) aesthetics and, ii) ethics
  • logic - forms of reasoning

What is Process Philosophy?

Process philosophy is an early 20th-century school of Western philosophy that emphasizes the elements of becoming, change, and novelty in experienced reality. It opposes the traditional Western philosophical stress on being, permanence, and uniformity.

Often times Process Philosophy is equated with Panentheism. What is it?

I

In pan-en-theism, the Spirit of God is present everywhere (sic, omnipresence) whose universal Spirit in the same instance transcends all things created (thus emphasizing God's ontological difference from creation). Meaning, God is in some sense "greater" than the universe.

Conversely, pan-theism asserts that "all is God" or, expressed differently, all that is (such as creation) is God's very self. That is, there is no difference between God or creation in any way, shape, or form. God is "the All" and "the All" is God. Typically confessed in South & East Asian religions - notably Sikhism, Hinduism, Sanamahism, Confucianism, and Taoism.

It is important to know that though Process Theology distinguishes God from creation ontologically, it also teaches God is within the world sustaining it, imbuing it with possibilities for loving wellbeing, indwelling and urging the world away from its "dark side" and towards its "light side" as provided to the world through Jesus' death to sin-and-evil and resurrection unto light-and-life.

II

Lastly, the church's more traditional teaching of classic theism leans into God's "apartness" from creation. That is, it emphasizes God's transcendence from the world and can be found in  the Baha'i Faith, Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Sikhism, as well as Christianity.

Importantly, process theology states the necessity of God's immanence as a requisite "job description" to God being Creator while not denying God's ontological difference from Creation. Though God could be independent from His Creation God cannot be, and will not be, as the Creator. It becomes a philosophically moot question of divine Beingness to the more important observation of God's Love which will never leave but always abide with creation. Unlike the Greek gods who abandoned mankind the Hebraic God of Christianity will not. God is as bound to us and we are to God.

What is Process Theology's History?

Process theology might be described as a neoclassical theology because of its intentional-and-metaphysical differences with popular Platonic and Neo-Platonic philosophies supporting Greek Hellenized forms of religious belief found throughout the history of the church... even up to the Modern Era of the 20th Century.

Process theology is a school of thought influenced by the metaphysical process philosophies of Alfred North Whitehead (1861-1947) and other process philosophers around the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It may also be found in the non-Platonic philosophers of Ancient Greece as well as in earlier Semitic cultures such as the Hebrew religion.

How is Process Theology different from Classical Theology?

I

A criticism of process theology is that it offers a severely diminished conception of God's power. Process theologians argue that God does not have unilateral, coercive control over everything in the universe. However, a process theologian would ask the details of "In how, and in what way" does God not control outcome? Plainly process-based panentheism would state that God is in the very substance of creation itself recharging its freely evolutionary character from stages of darkness to stages of light. Control is a very American word bespeaking forced progress over all obstacles. Divine Sovereignty is unlike American Destiny or the Roman Will of the Caesars and Senate, or the Dominance of the Egyptian  Pharaoh over all other cultures. Divine Sovereignty works with and within a freewill creation; it lends a redemptive kind of weakness which might empower the world towards love and wellbeing; it is measured by God's selfless, sacrificial, servanthood to not only man but all created things in restoring atoning, renewing, healing redemption to all. Control is a very un-sovereign kind of description of God's innate power.

II

Thus, the concepts of process theology sees God not in terms of controlling omnipotence, in the sense of divine coerciveness, but in non-controlling terms measured in divine love. That if God uses any power at all it would be in the form of a guiding persuasion as versus the church teachings of Calvinism advocating a God who uses a coercive, overruling, dictating force succumbing creaturely will to divine will.

Moreover, process theology's biblical bedrock can be ascribed to Calvinism's opposite, that of Arminian theology, emphasizing a freewill creation born from God's Love (rather than by divine fiat). As God's very Self is love and free, so too is the creation God formed out of His Imago Dei qualified, or measured in, divine love and freedom. Even as God is love and free in Himself, so too creation may love and is free in its own self to determine its own wonderous destiny (or darkest of worlds).

III

A process-based corollary to these principles is that God will not, and does not, determine creation's destiny. Creation's destiny is as indeterminant as it is free to do how it wishes.

Destiny, creation's future... humanity's future... is determined by our own actions of loving or not loving. Hence, God does not predestine any to hell as 1) If there were a hell we would consign ourselves, but 2) there is no hell as described in the bible (it became a gnostic eschatological teaching later popularized many centuries later by the Italian poet Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy of a Catholic purgatory gone extremely wrong).

Let us repeat the above statements: 1) God does not determine a person's eternal fate, we do. And, 2) how the world operates - and how it becomes - is determined by the world itself. We are free to create our own futures. But... importantly... with the caveat that we do so from within the cosmic framework of love and wellbeing.

The God who created in God's own Image... who indwells God's own creation immanently... is the same God who grants to creation (through His Image of Love) the opportunities and possibilities for a free creation to lean into - and become - one communal organism energized by the greater flow and energies of the Spirit of God who is everywhere present urging all things human, or not human, towards oneness, wholeness, community, and peace.

IV

Lastly, another corollary to the outcomes of process theology is that it teaches of a God who moves along the same cosmic time-line as we do. A God who does not know the future even as we do not know the future. A God who cannot force people to behave in a way which compromises their free will however dark or unloving it may be. A strong God who become weak for our sakes that we might become strong in his love and determination... and then become weak in the service of others. A God who keeps the heavens in their orbits while overcoming the chaos of evolutionary freewill inhabited by a creaturely nature of imagination and wellbeing. A God who gave His life for us (and for creation) that God's Love Wins by winning with us, and with creation, as we submit and obey.


Jesus is the script we wish to play


What are the four types of theology?

The four types include:

  • biblical theology - themes, narratives, typologies, continuance, etc
  • historical theology - how God's people respond to God's Love, or not...
  • systematic (or dogmatic) theology - boxing God into various kinds of religious systems
  • and practical theology - the ministration of God's grace to others, or not...

From the works of Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria and Origen, and Ireanaeus of Lyon come the models of moral theology, metaphysical theology, and pastoral theology. This categorization helps students understand the validity and application of all three models in the study of theology today.


Which Comes First, Philosophical Chicken or the Theological Egg?

Though people assume what one individual believes determines the philosophies one follows, more commonly, what a cutural era enacts through its beliefs and deeds will shaped the micro/macro-regional philosophies arising from a civilization's standards and mores.

A good philosophic theology attempts to create the broadest possible philosophic platform upon which to form the broadest kind of theology which might more clearly see our loving God more truly than how God appears in humanity's man-made religion. Bibliotry, God-alotry, Easter-alotry, faith-alotry are ever present dangers humanity will always face in its most sincerest efforts to be true to God. But if all religion is measured in selfless love, leaving all to God to work out, it would be a far better religion than those measured in doctrines, rules, creeds, and confessions.

Conversely, a theology which ignores, and will not examine, its historical philosophic foundations and inherited religious/cultural milieu - including it's own regional beliefs - will always adhere to a (mis-)doctrine of God more akin to its own image of itself than to the God it is attempting to know and follow.

Recent examples of good religion gone bad would be that of Evangelical Trumpian Christianity embracing God, guns, and bible under the banners of White Christian  Nationalism as versus a Post-Evangelical Progressive Christianity wishing to embrace people and races of all colors and beliefs....

A progressive Christianity which is willing to examine its beliefs while discontinuing from any actions or attitudes which cannot be identified with 1) Jesus; 2) Jesus' Beatitudes as taught on the Sermons on the Mount; or, 3) the golden rule of "Loving thy neighbor as you would yourself" (sic, cup of cold water kind of stuff such as provision of food, shelter, kindness, respect, listening well to one another, eschewing differences of color and gender, etc).


Jesus is our Lord and Savior we confess and follow


What does it mean to ascribe to a Toxic Theology?

Theology is toxic when it limits spiritual growth and experience to accepting unhealthy beliefs and practices. These would broadly include: An authoritarian power hierarchy which demands obedience along with internal/external policies of doctrinal separatism.

The key difference between religion and theology is that religion is a specific system of belief and/or worship, often involving a code of ethics and philosophy whereas theology is the rational analysis of religious belief, either of which may turn bad.


What are the 10 Major Categories of Systematic Theology?
  1. Angelology – The study of angels
  2. Bibliology – The study of the Bible
  3. Christology – The study of Christ
  4. Ecclesiology – The study of the church
  5. Eschatology – The study of the end times
  6. Hamartiology – The study of sin
  7. Pneumatology – The study of the Holy Spirit
  8. Soteriology – The study of salvation
  9. Theological anthropology – The study of the nature of humanity.
  10. Theology proper – The study of the character of God


* * * * * * *


Systematic theology


Systematic theology is a discipline of Christian theology that formulates an orderly, rational, and coherent account of the doctrines of the Christian faith. It addresses issues such as what the Bible teaches about certain topics or what is true about God and His universe.[1] It also builds on biblical disciplines, church history, as well as biblical and historical theology.[2] Systematic theology shares its systematic tasks with other disciplines such as constructive theology, dogmatics, ethics, apologetics, and philosophy of religion.[3]

Method

With a methodological tradition that differs somewhat from biblical theology, systematic theology draws on the core sacred texts of Christianity, while simultaneously investigating the development of Christian doctrine over the course of history, particularly through philosophy, ethics, social sciences, and natural sciences. Using biblical texts, it attempts to compare and relate all of scripture which led to the creation of a systematized statement on what the whole Bible says about particular issues.

Within Christianity, different traditions (both intellectual and ecclesial) approach systematic theology in different ways impacting a) the method employed to develop the system, b) the understanding of theology's task, c) the doctrines included in the system, and d) the order those doctrines appear. Even with such diversity, it is generally the case that works that one can describe as systematic theologies to begin with revelation and conclude with eschatology.

Since it is focused on truth, systematic theology is also framed to interact with and address the contemporary world. There are numerous authors who explored this area such as the case of Charles Gore, John Walvoord, Lindsay Dewar, and Charles Moule, among others. The framework developed by these theologians involved a review of postbiblical history of a doctrine after first treating the biblical materials.[4] This process concludes with applications to contemporary issues.

Categories

Since it is a systemic approach, systematic theology organizes truth under different headings[1] and there are ten basic areas (or categories), although the exact list may vary slightly. These are:

History

The establishment and integration of varied Christian ideas and Christianity-related notions, including diverse topics and themes of the Bible, in a single, coherent and well-ordered presentation is a relatively late development.[6] In Eastern Orthodoxy, an early example is provided by John of Damascus's 8th-century Exposition of the Orthodox Faith, in which he attempts to set in order and demonstrate the coherence of the theology of the classic texts of the Eastern theological tradition.

In the West, Peter Lombard's 12th-century Sentences, wherein he thematically collected a great series of quotations of the Church Fathers, became the basis of a medieval scholastic tradition of thematic commentary and explanation. Thomas Aquinas's Summa Theologiae best exemplifies this scholastic tradition. The Lutheran scholastic tradition of a thematic, ordered exposition of Christian theology emerged in the 16th century with Philipp Melanchthon's Loci Communes, and was countered by a Calvinist scholasticism, which is exemplified by John Calvin's Institutes of the Christian Religion.

In the 19th century, primarily in Protestant groups, a new kind of systematic theology arose that attempted to demonstrate that Christian doctrine formed a more coherent system premised on one or more fundamental axioms. Such theologies often involved a more drastic pruning and reinterpretation of traditional belief in order to cohere with the axiom or axioms.[citation needed] Friedrich Daniel Ernst Schleiermacher, for example, produced Der christliche Glaube nach den Grundsätzen der evangelischen Kirche (The Christian Faith According to the Principles of the Protestant Church) in the 1820s, in which the fundamental idea is the universal presence among humanity, sometimes more hidden, sometimes more explicit, of a feeling or awareness of 'absolute dependence'.

Contemporary usage

There are three overlapping uses of the term 'systematic theology' in contemporary Christian theology.

  • According to some theologians in evangelical circles, it is used to refer to the topical collection and exploration of the content of the Bible, in which a different perspective is provided on the Bible's message than that garnered simply by reading the biblical narratives, poems, proverbs, and letters as a story of redemption or as a manual for how to live a godly life.[citation needed] One advantage of this approach is that it allows one to see all that the Bible says regarding some subject (e.g. the attributes of God), and one danger is a tendency to assign technical definitions to terms based on a few passages and then read that meaning everywhere the term is used in the Bible (e.g. "justification" as Paul uses it in his letter to the Romans) is proposed by some evangelical theologians as being used in a different sense to how James uses it in his letter (Romans 4:25, Romans 5:16–18 and James 2:21–25). In this view, systematic theology is complementary to biblical theology. Biblical theology traces the themes chronologically through the Bible, while systematic theology examines themes topically; biblical theology reflects the diversity of the Bible, while systematic theology reflects its unity. However, there are some contemporary systematic theologians of an evangelical persuasion who would question this configuration of the discipline of systematic theology.[citation needed] Their concerns are twofold. First, instead of being a systematic exploration of theological truth, when systematic theology is defined in such a way as described above, it is synonymous with biblical theology. Instead, some contemporary systematic theologians seek to use all available resources to ascertain the nature of God and God's relationship to the world, including philosophy, history, culture, etc. In sum, these theologians argue that systematic and biblical theology are two separate, though related, disciplines. Second, some systematic theologians claim that evangelicalism itself is far too diverse to describe the above approach as "the" evangelical viewpoint.[citation needed] Instead, these systematic theologians would note that in instances where systematic theology is defined in such a way that it solely depends on the Bible, it is a highly conservative version of evangelical theology and does not speak for evangelical theology in toto.
  • Normally (but not exclusively) in liberal theology, the term can be used to refer to attempts to follow in Friedrich Schleiermacher's footsteps, and reinterpret Christian theology in order to derive it from a core set of axioms or principles.[citation needed]
  • The term can also be used to refer to theology which self-avowedly seeks to perpetuate the classical traditions of thematic exploration of theology described above – often by means of commentary upon the classics of those tradition: the Damascene, Aquinas, John Calvin, Melanchthon and others.

In all three senses, Christian systematic theology will often touch on some or all of the following topics: God, trinitarianism, revelation, creation and divine providence, theodicy, theological anthropology, Christology, soteriology, ecclesiology, eschatology, Israelology, Bibliology, hermeneutics, sacrament, pneumatology, Christian life, Heaven, and interfaith statements on other religions.

See also

References

  1. ^ Jump up to:a b Carson, D.A. (2018). NIV, Biblical Theology Study Bible, eBook: Follow God's Redemptive Plan as It Unfolds throughout Scripture. Grand Rapids: Zondervan. ISBN 9780310450436.
  2. ^ Garrett, James Leo (2014). Systematic Theology, Volume 1, Fourth Edition. Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock Publishers. p. 20. ISBN 9781498206594.
  3. ^ Berkhof, Louis (1938). Systematic Theology. Grand Rapids, Michigan. William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. p. 17.
  4. ^ Garrett, James Leo (2014). Systematic Theology, Volume 2. Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock Publishers. p. 138. ISBN 9781498206600.
  5. ^ "Categories of Theology". www.gcfweb.org. Archived from the original on 1 April 2015. Retrieved 18 September 2014.
  6. ^ Sheldrake, Philip (2016). Christian Spirituality and Social Transformation. Oxford Research Encyclopedias.

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Friday, March 25, 2022

Thomas Jay Oord - A Missional Theology of Love & Peace



God on a Mission: A Missional Theology
article link

Thomas Jay Oord


“Today, salvation has come to this household. For the Son of Man
came to seek and save the lost” (Luke 19:9-10).


Jesus says these words to a rich man, Zacchaeus. But we find the message repeatedly in the Bible that God seeks and saves. The missional adventure these words inspire prompts me to wonder:

What would it mean to believe Jesus’ loving pursuit of the lost – which seems to include you, me, everyone, and everything – tells us something essential about who God is?

This question may seem boring. But upon closer examination, I think it’s revolutionary! In fact, the missional theology emerging from believing God lovingly pursues creation radically alters the status quo.[1]

The God who seeks and saves is a God on a mission!




Overcoming the Status Quo

“Of course, God wants to save us all,” someone might say. “Who would argue otherwise?”

Unfortunately, a host of theological voices in the past and present argue this way. The theology supporting these voices is sometimes hidden or unconscious. But sometimes the not-really-wanting-to-save-all God is explicitly preached.

Let’s start with the easy pickings.

Those who believe God’s sovereignty and election means God predestines some to hell say God doesn’t want to save everyone. At least they would say God’s effective will doesn’t offer salvation to all. They argue for predestination, despite St. Peter’s claim that God is not willing that any should perish but all should come to repentance (2 Pt. 3:9).

Their peculiar interpretation of this verse, in my opinion, undermines their own doctrine of divine sovereignty. I wonder, why isn’t a sovereign God supposedly capable of anything also able to save all?

Those in the Wesleyan tradition walk in step with theologians who reject this view of predestination. Wesleyans, instead, affirm genuine creaturely freedom. In philosophical terms, Wesleyans affirm “libertarian” freedom.[2]

John Wesley stressed the Apostle Paul’s admonition to “work out your own salvation, with fear and trembling, for God is at work in you both to will and to work for God’s good pleasure” (Phil. 2:12). Wesley believes passages such as this one argue that God’s loving action (“prevenient grace”) precedes and makes possible free creaturely responses. He advocates a theology of freedom, not predestination. This freedom has limits, of course. But it is genuine freedom nonetheless.

The God who wants to save all, however, may not actually save all out of respect for creaturely freedom. Wesleyans can affirm a missional theology that says God’s intent is universal salvation. Yet they can also say universal salvation may not occur. After all, free creatures may choose to reject God’s loving invitation. And God respects such decisions, despite their devastating consequences.




God Wants to Save Us?

In criticizing predestination, I picked the easy fruit. I said predestinarians cannot account well for the biblical notion God wants to save us all. But let’s stretch to pick some fruit less often noticed.

Many theologies – at least in their sophisticated forms – affirm an idea at odds with the missional notion God wants to seek and save. They say God lacks nothing whatsoever. God is “without passions,” to use ancient theological language.

Only a needy God, say these theologians, has desires. A perfectly complete God wouldn’t want anything. When the Bible says God seeks us, it isn’t saying God’s love desires or wants.

The Greeks called desiring love “eros.” Today, we unfortunately think of eros in sexual terms. But the original meaning of eros isn’t about sex. Eros love might best be defined as promoting what is good when desiring what is valuable, beautiful, or worthwhile. Eros sees value and seeks to appreciate or enhance it.

In addition to denying divine eros, some theologians believe the doctrine of original sin supports their view God doesn’t really have desires related to creation. Their view of original sin denies that anything good remains in creation. Sin – more particularly, the Fall of Adam and Eve – left creation totally depraved, they say.

A holy God would find nothing valuable in a totally depraved world, say these theologians. In fact, God would not associate with such sinful filth. We hear this argument today, in fact, when some say a holy God cannot be in the presence of sin. A holy God, so this argument goes, cannot relate to unholy people, because sin would taint God’s pure holiness.

To which I say, “Hogwash!” (or utter some other holy expletive)

Jesus Christ best expresses God’s desiring love – even, or especially love for filthy people. Jesus was known for hanging around unholy folk. He earned a reputation for befriending with those of ill repute and ungodly character. He wanted – desired – those sick and broken be healed and whole.

In short, the desire for salvation we see in Jesus reflects the desire we find in God. And vice versa: the desires of God are expressed in the desires Jesus expresses in his missional life. In other words, the incarnation is our best argument that God’s desires are so intense and God’s love so radical “that he gave his only begotten son” (Jn. 3:16a).

A robust missional theology, therefore, returns us to the biblical portrait of a God who desires. While God’s nature is perfect and complete, God’s relational experience and passionate heart include wanting something better: the restoration of God’s leadership of love. God’s salvation derives, at least in part, from eros.




Jesus Wept

Continuing my Christological focus, let’s look at another important issue for missional theology: what the ancients called “divine passability.”

Passability might best be described with contemporary terms like “influence,” “affect,” or “sway.” We certainly see Jesus being influenced, affected, and swayed by others. Jesus was passable.

The shortest verse in Scripture describes Jesus’ passability well: “Jesus wept” (Jn. 11:35). Matthew also reports Jesus had compassion on people, because they were “weary and worn out, like sheep without a shepherd” (9:36). In these instances and others, we find Jesus affected by others.[3]

With skewed views of God’s perfection, some theologians have said God is uninfluenced by others. God is impassable, they argue. God only influences creatures; creatures never influence God. Many classic theologies implicitly adopted Aristotle’s view that God is unmoved.

This vision of an unmoved/uninfluenced/unaffected God doesn’t jibe well with the Bible. The God of Scripture expresses love that both gives and receives. God loves as friend (philia), for instance. When believers respond well to God’s love, we find God rejoicing. When they respond poorly, God is saddened, angry, and even wrathful. According to Scripture, creatures really affect God.

Today, many rightly speak of God’s passability by saying our Savior is the “suffering God.” This suffering was most poignant on the cross. In Christ, God suffers pain and death for the benefit of all. In fact, many theologians agree with Jürgen Moltmann and call the one who seeks and saves, “the crucified God.”[4]

A suffering God – one genuinely affected by creation – is the relational God at the heart of missional theology. The influence creation has upon God does not alter God’s loving nature, of course. We best interpret biblical verses saying there is “no shadow of change” (James 1:17) in God as describing God’s unchanging nature.

But creatures do influence the particular ways God relates to creation. Just as a perfectly loving father always loves his children, that same loving father allows his children to influence him, so he knows how best to love them in specific instances. A living God gives and receives in relationship.

To put it in missional terms, the God who seeks and saves does so to best address the specific ways we need saving! Some of us need saving from alcohol abuse; others need saving from dishonesty; others saving from unhealthy pride. God saves from all sin; but the specific ways God saves are tailor-made for creatures.




Kenosis and Mission

So… God wants to save us all. This is God’s loving desire, the divine eros. And the God of robust missional theology is affected by others. God is relational: both giving to and receiving from creatures. This is neither the God of predestination nor the status quo.

Now it’s time to reach for perhaps the most elusive fruit of all. It’s time to talk about the power of a missional God. We can’t ignore the power issue if we want a robust missional theology. Appealing to utter mystery isn’t helpful.

A number of contemporary theologians consider the Philippian love hymn especially helpful for thinking about God’s sovereignty. To refresh our memory, here’s the key part of that profound praise chorus:

In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness (2:5-7).

Theologians often focus on the Greek word, kenosis, which is translated here, “made himself nothing.” Other translators render kenosis “emptied himself” or “gave of himself.” These translations suggest that Jesus does not overpower or totally control others. Instead, Jesus reveals God’s servant-style power.

Kenosis suggests divine self-limitation. The Bible says Jesus reveals God’s very nature in this kenosis, because Jesus expresses limited power, like a servant.

Perhaps it’s best to say God empowers rather than overpowers. After all, empowering describes servant-style influence better than overpowering or total control. And empowering fits the notion that creatures possess some measure of freedom to respond well or poorly to God. Presumably, God grants power/agency to creatures to make freedom and agency possible. God is our provider.

There are two main ways to talk about God’s self-limitation revealed in Jesus. The first and more common is to say self-limitation is voluntary on God’s part. This view says God could totally control and overpower others. But God voluntarily chooses not to be all determining – at least most of the time. The voluntary self-limitation model says God could totally control others, however, should God so decide.

The main problem with the voluntary divine self-limitation model is the problem of evil. The God who could overpower those who inflict genuine evil should in the name of love. To put it another way, the God who voluntarily self-limits should become un-self-limited to rescue those who suffer needlessly. At least in some cases, God should become un-self-limited to seek and save the lost. Voluntary divine self-limitation cannot provide a satisfactory answer to why God doesn’t prevent unnecessary pain, suffering, and death.

The other way to talk about God’s limited power Jesus reveals says God’s self-limitation is involuntary. It is self-limitation, in the sense that no outside force or factor imposes constraints on God. But it is involuntary, in the sense that God’s power of love derives from God’s own nature.

Because God is love, God never overpowers others. In love, God necessarily provides freedom/agency to others and never completely controls them. God’s loving nature compels God to empower and never overpower others. We might call this “essential kenosis.”

John Wesley endorses involuntarily self-limitation in one of his sermons: “Were human liberty taken away, men would be as incapable of virtue as stones,” Wesley argues. “Therefore (with reverence be it spoken) the Almighty himself cannot do this thing. He cannot thus contradict himself or undo what he has done” (emphases added).[5] God must be God, says Wesley, and God’s nature of love involves giving freedom/agency to others.

Although often unnoticed, the Bible offers examples of things God cannot do. (E.g., God cannot lie; God cannot tempt.) In my view, however, these examples fall under the general category expressed in Paul’s words: “God cannot deny himself” (1 Tim. 2:13). God’s power as involuntary self-limitation says God controlling others entirely – coercion – would require God to deny God’s loving nature. And that’s impossible… even for God.

Of course, affirming involuntary divine self-limitation requires new thinking about doctrines of creation, miracles, and eschatology. But these doctrines can still be affirmed: God is still Creator, miracle-worker, and hope for final redemption. They may need recasting, however, in light of God’s persistently persuasive love. Such recasting is not new to Wesleyans, because they typically try to propose Christian doctrines in light of divine love.[6]

The main point of this section, then, is that the power God exercises in the missional adventure to seek and to save the lost is persuasive power. Missional theologians may prefer one form of divine self-limitation over the other. But they together affirm that God’s power operates through love. God’s kenotic love, revealed in Jesus, is primarily if not exclusively the power of persuasion. God calls instead of controls.

Those called to missions – which includes us all – ought to follow the kenotic example of Jesus: we should express empowering, relational love.




Free, Free, Set Them Free

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,” said Jesus. Standing in his hometown temple, he continues reading a passage from Isaiah: “he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor” (Lk. 4:18-19).

Among the many ways biblical authors talk about God seeking and saving, the themes of healing and freedom from oppression appear often. Healing and deliverance are part of the well-being/abundant life/favor the Lord generously offers. And we desperately need the well-being – shalom – of God’s salvation.

In a world of brokenness, wholeness breaks in. This wholeness is evident in the local church I attend, in which a robust Celebrate Recovery ministry has emerged. Those in this group believe God empowers them to overcome hurts, habits, and hang-ups. God is their deliverer. Through this and other avenues in the church, many find God’s healing and deliverance.

The Apostle Paul says liberation comes from the Spirit and becomes effective through Jesus. “The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death,” he says (Rm. 8:2). In this liberation, we see God again empowering us in ways that provide salvation from destruction.

A look at the overall scope of Scripture leads one to believe humans are the focus of God’s seeking and saving. But the Bible also says God cares about nonhumans. In fact, Scripture says God intends to redeem all things. “The whole creation” hopes to be “set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God” (Rm. 8:21-22).

We play a vital role in this mission. We can be co-laborers with God’s work for the redemption of all things. God acts first to call, empower, and guide us in love – prevenient grace. But God seeks our cooperation. This becomes clear in the Revised Standard Version’s translation of Romans 8:28: “We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him” (emphases added).

We can work for good with God. The healing and deliverance God has in mind involves our participation.




Love is on the Move

A God on a mission is a God on the move. And love is the primary and persistent intent of our God-on-the-move. A robust missional theology is a theology of love.

To love is to act intentionally, in response to God and others, to promote overall well-being. God’s initial and empowering action makes response possible. We live in community with others to whom we also respond. We are not isolated individuals, and God desires the common good.

God’s love establishes the God’s kingdom – or what I call God’s loving leadership. Here again, it is through Jesus we believe such things. Jesus preached God’s loving leadership as both possible and actual here in this life. And he proclaimed its fulfillment in the life to come.

As a young child, I learned a chorus I now sing to my kids. It derives from 1 John 4:7-8: “Beloved, let us love one another. For love is from God, and everyone that loves is born of God and knows God. The one that doesn’t love doesn’t know God, for God is love.” John says our best clue about what love entails is this: God sent Jesus.

The God who seeks and saves is revealed best in Jesus Christ. This God of love desires that all creation live shalom. God works powerfully through love to fulfill this desire, and we are invited to join in this love project. The result is the healing, restoration, and liberation of all held captive to sin and death. This holy God revealed best in Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection is on a mission of love.

John takes these truths about God, love, and Jesus a bit further and concludes with this logic: “Since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another” (4:11). Thankfully God makes love possible, says John: “We love, because he first loved us” (4:19). The empowering God enables us to love.

A missional theology supporting the endeavor to seek and save the lost is not based primarily on an evangelistic canvassing strategy. Nor is it based primarily upon duty and obedience to God. It’s not even based primarily upon worship. Strategies, obedience, and worship are all important. But missional theology is based primarily on love.

We ought to be “imitators of God, as dearly love children, and life a life of love, just as Christ loved us...” (Eph. 5:1, 2a). This missional ethic emphasizes generosity, listening and speaking, both influencing and being influenced by, enabling, mutuality, and community. It’s a strategy that cares for the least of these and all creation.

In short: God loves us, and we ought to love one another. We ought to imitate God’s full-orbed love – agape, eros, and philia as we cooperate with God’s mission to seek and save the lost.

The God on a mission invites us on an adventure of love.


Questions
  • In your opinion, what in the theological status quo needs to be changed?
  • How important is it that creatures are genuinely free and the Creator is not in complete control?
  • What does it mean for discipleship to believe God empowers rather than overpowers?
  • What does it mean to say we can and should imitate God by living lives of love?




Recommended Reading

Gregory Boyd, God of the Possible (Grand Rapids, Mi.: Baker Books, 2000).

Philip Clayton, Transforming Christian Theology: For Church and Society (Philadelphia: Fortress, 2009).

Brint Montgomery, Thomas Jay Oord, and Karen Winslow, Relational Theology: A Contemporary Introduction (San Diego, Ca.: Point Loma Press, 2012).

Thomas Jay Oord, The Nature of Love: A Theology (St. Louis, Mo.: Chalice, 2010).

Thomas Jay Oord and Michael Lodahl, Relational Holiness: Responding to the Call of Love (Kansas City, Mo.: Beacon Hill, 2005).


Index

[1] For a short and accessible introduction to the gospel of love, see the evangelistic book I co-wrote with Robert Luhn, The Best News You Will Ever Hear (Boise, ID: Russell Media, 2011).

[2] The distinction about forms of freedom is necessary, because some predestinarians say they affirm creaturely freedom but also the idea God alone decides the chosen few who will be saved. They are, to use the philosophical language, “compatiblists,” at least when it comes to issues of salvation.

[3] For an accessible theology of holiness from a relational perspective, see the book I wrote with Michael Lodahl, Relational Holiness: Responding to the Call of Love (Kansas City, Mo.: Beacon Hill, 2005).

[4] Jürgen Moltmann, The Crucified God: The Cross of Christ as the Foundation and Criticism of Christian Theology (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1993; New York: HarperCollins, 1991; London: SCM, 1974).

[5] John Wesley, “On Divine Providence,” Sermon 67, The Works of John Wesley, vol. 2 (Nashville, Tenn.: Abingdon, 1985) paragraph 15.

[6] See, for instance, my book, The Nature of Love: A Theology (St. Louis, Mo.: Chalice, 2010).

[7] For an exploration of a Wesleyan doctrine of creation, see Michael Lodahl, God of Nature and of Grace: Reading the World in a Wesleyan Way (Nashville, Tenn.: Kingswood, 2003).

[8] I explain the details of this definition from philosophical, scientific, and theological perspectives in my book, Defining Love: A Philosophical, Scientific, and Theological Engagement (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Brazos, 2010).



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