Fulfillment

The notion which provides the title for this post finds use in a rather wide spread of "western" thought. Whether or not it finds use outside of thought which the West has drawn from, I cannot say. There are two distinct sources which come into understanding this notion: one is the Aristotelian concept of the fulfillment of a telos, the other is the Biblical concept of fulfillment of a prophetic theme. These are connected concepts, but not identical.

The Aristotelian concept of fulfillment is that of satisfaction. A fulfills something (a telos or desire) B if, and only if, B had specified A, or an item with property P where A has P, as its condition of satisfaction. Thus, a desire for something sweet can be satisfied by chocolate because chocolate is sweet, although a desire for chocolate cannot be satisfied by candy corn. On this notion of fulfillment, something can only be the fulfillment of a desire or something else which has a telos, and can only do so by meeting that telos. A human can only be fulfilled, in this sense, by becoming all that a human is supposed to be, by fulfilling the human telos, by matching the goal specified by one's human nature. One cannot fulfill the telos of a being by altering the underlying nature, for then one is simply altering the being to be a different being. Turning a human into a giraffe does not change the telos of the same being, but eliminates one being and brings another into existence, and this is precisely because the telos changes so fundamentally.

The Biblical concept of fulfillment is similar, but different. It is evident that Biblical fulfillment can apply to things which do not possess inherent teloi, or can apply to things which possess inherent teloi without satisfying their surface level satisfaction conditions. Thus, Jesus can fulfill the law while, on the face of it, breaking the Sabbath. This is because the Biblical concept of fulfillment is a narrative-based concept. To fulfill something in this sense is to bring the story of which it is a part to completion in such a way that the part one is fulfilling is evidenced as important to the plot. This variety of fulfillment not only brings an underlying pervasive telos to satisfaction, but draws together the narrative threads which pointed to it and exhibits them in such a way as to accomplish their sense. The Biblical concept thus adds a narrative component which is lacking in the Aristotelian desire satisfaction account. The Biblical concept does not specify that it is the essence of a thing which specifies the telos to be satisfied, however. This is not to say that the Bible excludes that possibility, it simply does not tend to operate in terms of essences and teloi so much as narratives.

Hegel's reinterpretation of Christianity and drawing of the Creation-Fall-Redemption cycle together with an expressive account of reality brings the Biblical concept into philosophy and begins to unify the Aristotelian and Biblical concepts, but I find the existentialist account of action brings these two concepts together more clearly. Ironically, we can see this most clearly in thinkers like Sartre and Merleau-Ponty whose metaphysics generally seem opposed to Christian metaphysics. Sartre emphasizes that we lay down a past behind us, a sediment as it were, which makes us a certain way which we never at the same time are. One's past defines one, in a way, that is, one's objective being is only how one has been in appearance, yet that appearance cannot limit you. Sartre is opposed to a narrative construal of life, yet emphasizes the way that my past can only be understood in light of the future it gave rise to--if one finds oneself weeping over one's faults, this may be a moment of repentance or of weakness, depending on what one does from there. One's sincerity or insincerity can only be ascertained--only holds, even--in light of how one lives from there.

Merleau-Ponty is more sympathetic to a narrative understanding of life. His thought operates in terms of Gestalts. That is, he thinks in terms of wholes which are composed of parts in dynamic relation to each other. In this way of thinking, the whole can only be understood in terms of its parts and vice-versa. Applied to a life as a whole, then, there is a kind of unity which is to be attained, and that unity is a unity which must be constructed by living in such a way that one's life forms a narrative whole. For Merleau-Ponty as for Sartre this narrative whole does not pre-exist our construction of it, but unlike Sartre, the narrative has validity to it. One's past thus makes a certain demand on one's present and future to be such that the whole life forms a unified whole and not merely a set of moments one outside the other, as Sartre seems to claim all lives essentially are.

This narrative notion of life as being such that it ought to be unified presses us towards a Biblical concept of fulfillment. Yet Merleau-Ponty has not abandoned the Aristotelian concept, either. The essence has been replaced by a dynamic of forces which seek equilibrium and that equilibrium specifies a telos. This is a telos of self-maintenance, but self-maintenance as the kind of being one is, and thus this notion draws in the narrative concept of fulfillment because it endorses Sartre's idea of sedimentation. If we sediment ourselves, then that becomes part of who we are which must be maintained, any break with it must itself have a place in the narrative unity we are making of our lives.

From this vantage point, there is another kind of fulfillment which we can make out in the Bible. I do not think it is ever called fulfillment, but it is, itself, fulfilled in light of this concept of fulfillment I am drawing out here. Take the story of Abraham and Isaac or the story of Job, or really any of the stories which mirror Christ's cycle of life, death, and resurrection. In all of these stories, an inner reality is expressed, sedimented, proved. Abraham's faith is proven to the highest extent, it is given opportunity to express itself and sediment itself as a part of his life. Job's faith, likewise, is expressed in his life in a way it could not have been otherwise. In these stories we find God desiring to make evident what is only visible to himself. Even in Creation we see God wanting to make himself visible to others. Abraham fulfills his faith by offering his son. Job fulfills his faith by holding fast to God in suffering. In this way, we can see these events as generous gifts of God both to those who went through the trials and to us. For them, they are fulfilled by fulfilling who they have become in a hidden manner. For us, we are granted to see what only God could see before.

There is a general principle which I draw from all this: whatever exists is proven to exist in the way it exists. This can be applied as a principle of metaphysics, epistemology, or value-theory. What is good is proven good, what is real is proven real. The notion of proof here is correlative to the notion of fulfillment. I could equally say: whatever exists is fulfilled. This is a very Hegelian claim, but it does not require the rest of Hegel's metaphysics, and fits well with existentialist thought as well as Christian thought about the eschaton, when Christ will be proven Lord of all and all things will be made right.

This does not mean that it is fulfilled in the straightforward Aristotelian manner. It does not mean that everyone will one day have their telos satisfied completely. Rather, there is a narrative dimension which also applies. Those of us who have faith in Christ, who participate in his death and therefore also in his life, will be fulfilled in our narrative and fulfill the narrative which Christ has lived ahead of us. Yet this ending which we look forward to is tied to the life, death, and resurrection of Christ, and that narrative must be made our own. This is not to say that we must act perfectly like Christ or forego Christ's ending, but it does mean that we must recognize our lives as narratives in his mold. We can only claim our lives as of our own writing in ways which we also live as moments, not of sincerity, but of weakness. Our sins must take a particular role in our narratives, and Christ must take his place as Lord of our lives. The unrighteous, on the other hand, will receive their due punishment in order that their actions may form a narrative which fulfills the nature of injustice. If this attempt at explaining how this principle does not give rise to universalism makes little sense, do not worry. It is a single paragraph tackling a subject on which books are written.

Pragmatist Argument for The Presumption of Goodness

In the previous post, I explained the presumption of goodness and argued for it from theological considerations. In this post, I want to present an account of what good is, and argue from there to a presumption of goodness.

The account of good is a pragmatist account. It is related to a pragmatist account of what things are. The general account says that whatever exists shows itself to be  what it is in the long run. As it relates to good, then, it says that whatever is good, whatever one ought to do, in the long run it will become clear that it was so. Thus, whatever is good will be proven good, and whatever is bad will be proven bad.

Note that this account can be agnostic as to whether what proves something good or bad makes it so. My preferred view is that actions and events are good or bad on account of how they impact the flourishing of various entities, and are proven such because of a coherence among various things in the world. The view also makes no definite claims about what something's being proven good would amount to, but the obstruction of the ordinary or intended consequences of an act or event is likely to count, ceteris paribus.

This view presumes that the world works together in some kind of coherent manner, and holds that this coherent manner is, in total, good. Particular events or actions can still be bad, so long as other parts of the system, as it were, "reject" them, but the entirety of the system over the long haul has to cohere in such a manner that particular things show up as good and other particular things show up as bad. On this basis, then, we wind up at the same place when considering the world as created good: the way the world works must be, at root, good.

Creation and The Presumption of Goodness

I mentioned in my post on Empiricism and Theism that one might reach the conclusion that our desires are supposed to be fulfilled via a presumption in favor of the goodness of creation. In this post, I want to defend that presumption and articulate how it functions.

First off, then, what do I mean by a presumption of goodness? I mean that we presume things are good unless and until we have reason to think that they are not. This presumption can be based on the original goodness of creation, but more is needed: creation is no longer in its original state.

It is quite easy to view the fall as resulting in the world going from good to bad, and there is truth to that. The world is not purely and very good, as it once was. Nevertheless, it is the same world. Thus, the fundamental structures are the same. Gravity is not a result of the fall, and more importantly, the general constitution of human bodies, when they are functioning well, is not a result of the fall. It is possible that some quirks of human biology are a result of the fall and are bad, but this cannot be the usual case.

So the heuristic can be framed as follows: whatever we expect will remain in heaven, or already existed before the fall, is good. In order to claim that something is bad, then, we need to be able to articulate how a world without it could operate. In some cases, this is easy. In others, however, it is not so easy.

Further, what is bad can only be a twisting of what is good. It is bad because it either obstructs something serving its purpose or because it is no longer properly oriented to its purpose. So even when we identify something bad, we are constrained to say what good it corrupts.

There are some patterns of fallacious reasoning that we are prone to fall into as humans. We tend to justify our claims after the fact, for instance. If our reasoning is purely for the sake of truth, then this is a curious pattern for us to fall into. If we presume that this pattern has some basis in God's good creation, even though it now operates in bad ways, we are directed to ask what purpose something like this might play.

Possibility of Best of All Possible Worlds

It has been argued that there might be no best of all possible worlds. Alvin Plantinga finds it suspect in God, Freedom, and Evil, and I believe argues against it elsewhere. I am only vaguely aware of the argument at this point, so the following should be taken as my starting point prior to investigation.

The argument that there might be no best of all possible worlds seems to go as follows. Suppose you have some possible world. It has various properties in virtue of which it is a world of such-and-such goodness. If it had more of this sort of property, called "world-great-making properties," it would be a better world. But there seems to be no reason to suppose that we could not add some of these world-great-making properties on to a world ad infinitum, and thus there would be no cap to greatness of worlds.

The examples of world-great-making properties tend to be physical things like happy people and beautiful beaches. Other examples are also possible, such as good deeds or magnificent accomplishments. Where I seem to disagree with those who hold that there may be no best of all possible worlds is that I find the idea that we could keep on adding world-great-making properties on ad infinitum without consequence.

Take the example of possession of beautiful beaches. Suppose that a world is better the more beautiful beaches it has. In that case, we would, all else being equal, want as many beautiful beaches as we could. Not all else would be equal, however, because the world is one where beaches take up space and physics is set up in such a way that one cannot just keep enlarging the earth. Even if one did, perhaps at some size it would be a world-ungreat-making property in virtue of making it take so long for civilizations to communicate with each other.

One might respond that God could have altered the laws of physics to accommodate the scale of the planet and thus the beaches. This is not obvious, however. Physics is rather elegantly set up. This elegance is quite likely a world-great-making property. It is not at all obvious what options God had for logically consistent, life enabling physics systems. Perhaps others were too clunky, or had other problematic side effects.

A similar response can be given to the case of good deeds. Given that time does not end, in fact, if good deeds are a world-great-making property, then this world has an infinite quantity of greatness, since we will do an infinite number of good deeds after the resurrection. Nevertheless, it is plausible that, in actualizing some world, God might bracket that phase of each world. What we seem to be interested in is, rather, whether this is the best of all possible world segments from creation up to, but not including, heaven.

Each good deed takes some amount of time. Actually reaching heaven seems to be a world-great-making property, and the supposition that God might bracket heaven out of the best-world equation relies on heaven actually occurring in each possible world under consideration. So one could not have an infinite number of good deeds, and one might only be able to fit so many before the amount of time added counteracted the greatness added to the world.

Just as world-great-making properties might not be worth adding because of world-ungreat-making properties which they require, some world-ungreat-making properties might be mitigated or redeemed by world-great-making properties which they enable. Our understanding of how various events interact and the values of various world-great- and world-ungreat-making properties makes it quite difficult to tell preecisely how great of a world we have ended up with. As a case in point, the death of Jesus Christ occurring is a very large world-ungreat-making property. However, the resurrection is a much greater world-great-making property which the disciples did not anticipate.

My argument is not a knock-down argument, of course, but neither is the one I am responding to. What I have read of Plantinga seems to say little more than that it is not obvious that one could not keep increasing greatness by adding various items or states of affairs. I am responding that it is not obvious that one could do so. It may well come down to a clash of intuitions.

Perspective on Evil

As human beings, we desire to see the big picture of what is going on. I think this is partly behind the success of news outlets: they give us a sense of knowing what is happening all over. And because we do not trust that someone is in control of things, we get upset by what is happening, and want to fix things. But we cannot.

Anyone can recognize that worrying about the direction the world is headed does not do any good. Many recognize that we surely are not all supposed to uproot our lives to do something about it, and even that if we did, we likely would make only a small dent in things. Others devote themselves to causes, good causes, but so often the cause becomes all that matters.

The true worldview must be able to handle this situation. That is, whatever is ultimately true, it must enable us both to care about the sorrows of this world, and yet live balanced lives. It is ironic that the extremes tend to be callousness toward sorrows and caring about some cause, and that the causes can so often overshadow people. People become so passionate about causes that they no longer care about other people.

We must see even our causes as overshadowed by something greater, or our causes will become more ultimate than the people we claim to serve.

"And when you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed. This must take place, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be earthquakes in various places; there will be famines. These are but the beginning of the birth pains.

"But be on your guard. For they will deliver you over to counsels, and you will be beaten in synagogues, and you will stand before governors and kings for my sake, to bear witness before them. And the gospel must first be proclaimed to all nations. And when they bring you to trial and deliver you over, do not be anxious beforehand what you are to say, but say whatever is given you in that hour, for it is not you who speak, but the Holy Spirit. And brother will deliver brother over to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death. And you will be hated by all for my name's sake. But the one who endures to the end will be saved" Mark 13:7-13

 In this passage, Jesus places the news into perspective. The bad stuff--and it is bad--is to be expected. Expected, but not minimized. Yet it is placed in perspective by the last sentence: "But the one who endures to the end will be saved" There is a hope that we hold, that there is a God who holds the whole world in his hands, and who will, in the end, make all things right. So we work hard to make things better now, but we know we will not make things all better, for only God can, and God will. It is in light of the finished work of Christ that we can claim that we already have the victory, and this enables us to care, knowing that God, too cares. And it enables us to put causes in perspective, caring for others with the love of God, which we have seen in Christ, rather than caring first about what we do, for in Christ it is all done.

The Problem of Evil

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. This world which he created currently has much evil in it. The question is why? Most responses try to show how the evil might be permitted for the sake of some good which either results in it or from it while being unobtainable otherwise.

God created the world for the sake of his glory. Further, I believe that he governs the world sovereignly. Therefore all that occurs in the world is meant by God for his glory. Romans 8:28 "And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose." This places the problem of evil in the strongest light: evil exists, yet all that happens happens to the glory of God. How can this be?

There are two kinds of evil: natural evil, as in natural disasters, and moral evil, as in the evil actions of moral agents. The first can be explained as God's punishment for sin. Since no one is innocent, but all are sinners and therefore worthy of death, when bad happens to us we are only getting what we deserve. When we escape bad happening to us it is God's grace to us.

The latter kind of evil is harder to explain. If God is in control of all that happens, then that includes our actions. How can a good God will that we sin? First, we must note that it is possible for us to will something for evil, i.e., with evil intent, while God wills it for good, i.e., for his glory. Genesis 50:20 "As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today." The question is only how God gets glory from evil actions.

God gets glory from our evil actions in at least two ways. First, for those who remain apart from him, he shows his righteousness and justice on them by punishing them. Second, for those who repent, he shows how great his mercy and grace are to those whom he loves, whom he has called. This is an exhibition of his holiness greater than would be possible if there were no sin.

This explains how there can be sin, but it does not explain why there is so much sin. To answer that question, we may note, first, that by allowing the full extent of our depravity, the full extent of what we will tend to do apart from him, he shows how good and necessary he is for us to live as we were made to live. Secondly, by letting our evil be shown in diverse ways in various times he warns us of our evil and exhibits our own evil to us, in order that we might repent, and in order that we might recognize our need for his righteousness to work in our lives. Thirdly, we are punished for our rejection of God by the moral evil of those around us, as when the Israelites were punished by God sending foreign nations to conquer them.

In addition to these reasons why we might expect evil to be as great as it is, and why evil actually serves to glorify God, and so is involved in countering itself, we may note that the cross of Christ is a place where evil is directly confronted as evil. Our answer to the problem of evil is twofold: that it has been conquered in Christ's death, and that it is being turned to good. We, then, as the body of Christ, must be involved in the task of bringing the kingdom of God to earth in this way: combating sin and death by the power of Christ who defeated both sin and death once and for all.


Any answer to the problem of evil will imply a response to evil. The ultimate response to the problem of evil was Christ's death on the cross in which God's justice and grace were shown together. This is where we must go in responding to evil. God's justice is shown in it, and so is his grace, and in Christ God is reconciling all things to himself. We, because we are joined to Christ in his life and death, are joined to Christ in his defeat of sin and death. In light of that, we should live lives which redeem the evil in our lives by showing the power of God in our weakness.

The Atonement

The atonement which Christ wrought for us he did through his life, death, and resurrection. The question, then, is: What is the nature of this atonement? In order to draw this out, first: What is the purpose of the atonement? i.e., What problem did Christ set out to fix by means of coming to live, die, and by raised? Second: What does the nature of the purpose of the atonement, i.e., the nature of the problem to be fixed, require that the atonement involve?

The Problem

The problem is sin. Genesis 2:16-17 "And the LORD God said to the man, saying, 'You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.'" Then, when Adam and Eve do eat of that fruit, God gives the first pointer to Christ when he curses the serpent, 3:15 "I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel." Even clearer, Genesis 6:5-7 "The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the LORD was sorry that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart. So the LORD said, 'I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens, for I am sorry that I have made them.'" Here we see clearly God's hatred of sin such that he desires that it be destroyed, this is his righteousness. This can be seen again in Genesis 18 and 19, where God destroys Sodom and Gomorrah because "their sin is very grave" Genesis 18:20. Isaiah 1:27-28 "Zion shall be redeemed by justice, and those in her who repent, by righteousness. But rebels and sinners shall be broken together, and those who forsake the LORD shall be consumed." Yet we cannot of ourselves be righteous, "As it is written: 'none is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.'" Romans 3:10-12, and, verse 20, "For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin" Further, we cannot bear this ourselves, "For the wages of sin is death," Romans 6:23.

So, the problem is that we carry the weight of sin, and God is righteous and cannot, therefore, bear to allow sin to remain in his sight. The purpose of the atonement, then, is to remove that sin apart from blotting out all of humanity, which he would be justified in doing. Thus John the baptist calls Jesus "the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!" when he sees him, John 1:29.

Requirements of the Atonement

From the problem, we can see certain requirements which God has implied are required of any solution to the problem of sin. First: there must be a sacrifice, as the old testament has sacrifices for sins. "But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God" Hebrews 10:12.

Second, the sins must be removed from us, and placed on this sacrifice, who is Christ. If the sin remains on us, then we still must bear it. This is the same as it was when animal sacrifices were offered, for "And Aaron shall lay both his hands on the head of the live goat, and confess over it all the iniquities of the people of Israel, and all their transgressions, all their sins. And he shall put them on the head of the goat and send it away into the wilderness by the hand of a man who is in readiness. The goat shall bear all their iniquities on itself to a remote area, and he shall let the goat go free in the wilderness." Leviticus 16:21-22. But, rather, "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us--for it is written, 'Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree.'" and, 1 Peter 2:24 "He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed." And, similarly, Romans 6:5- "For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin." This is how God may forgive us, because in Christ's death, the suffering due sin has been paid, so that the wrath of God against our sin has been satisfied. It is not as though there is some well from which to draw for forgiveness of sins, but rather the sins themselves were laid upon Christ such that he bore the punishment due to each of them. It is by Christ's death that we are reconciled, Romans 5:10, so that there is nothing we need to do to gain that reconciliation, but if we had to go and ask for that forgiveness, then we would be utterly lost, since there would be no reconciliation by which we might draw near to ask for that forgiveness we so desperately need. It is sin that keeps us apart from God, so that if we had to ask that he remove our sin, he would not hear us, for he does not hear the prayers of the wicked, which we certainly are if we are still in sin, which is precisely why we need this reconciliation.

Third, the atonement is the defeat of Satan, that is, it destroys Satan's power over those it is effectual for, since it was promised that "he shall bruise your head." Thus Romans 6:17 "But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed." From which flows, Colossians 2:6, "Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him," that is, since Christ not only bore the penalty for our sin but bruised the head of the enemy, and since we, in him, die to sin, and as sin is thus dead to us, walk in that life which you have as one who is risen with Christ and therefore not under the power of sin, just as you are no longer under the guilt of sin.

Fourth, the atonement was costly. That is, we had a debt which Christ payed, or again, Christ ransomed us. This does not seem to me to flow quite so neatly from the above problem, however, Numbers 18:15 "Everything that opens the womb of all flesh, whether man or beast, which they offer to the LORD, shall be yours. Nevertheless, the firstborn of man you shall redeem, and the firstborn of unclean animals you shall redeem." Here is a redeeming, i.e., a lamb is put in the place of a man. Psalm 111:9 "He sent redemption to his people; he has commanded his covenant forever. Holy and awesome is his name!" And yet, Psalm 49:7-9 "Truly no man can ransom another, or give to God the price of his life, for the ransom of their life is costly and can never suffice, that he should live on forever and never see the pit." Thus the necessity of a man who is without blemish to be the ransom, and verse 15 "But God will ransom my soul from the power of Sheol, for he will receive me." 1 Peter 1:18-19 "knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot." Thus we have the picture of Christ being the lamb who comes as the ransom who takes our place as the perfect sacrifice.

Defense

Some have argued that Christ's being punished in our place is inconsistent with saying that our sins have been forgiven. At the same time, I find it hard to say, "Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed." Isaiah 53:4-5 if he was not truly wounded for our transgressions, etc., rather it would appear that he was wounded so that God could forgive our transgressions. This is a strange use of the word "for" in English, and I would expect better of translators than to use a word with such different connotations, and so regularly, and to have so few commentaries note it! Have a look: http://bible.cc/isaiah/53-5.htm.

Offense

A further two brief notes against other views. First, the governmental theory of the atonement denies that Christ was made a curse for us, in that it denies that Christ literally bore our sins on the cross so that there was guilt on him such that the Father would be just to literally punish him. Second, there is a ransom theory which holds that Christ's death acted as a ransom payed to Satan to free us from his domain, however, this implies that Satan has some kind of power such that he could demand something from God, but it is plain that Christ died not to pay a price to Satan, but to defeat and to bind Satan, which makes paying a price unnecessary.

Think-skinned

There is, in a recent post by Thabiti Anyabwile, what I assume is a typo, but which is a rather fitting one.

Something is not right. I know the world is so relentlessly and consistently twisted and touched by evil that men and women can become too think-skinned in the face of tragedy. I know that’s possible, but I don’t want to settle for that in my own heart. I don’t want to be so tough, calloused, jaded, or whatever that I can easily “move on” from the wicked shooting of twenty children–children!–and their teachers–teachers! (emphasis added)

There is a struggle to live in this world without adjusting too it in some way. Too be in the world, but not of it. It is easy to start looking at the world as if we are supposed to fit in it, but we are told that we don't, nor are we supposed to, fit in this world, but to be in it and stick out as sore thumbs, or, more appropriately, lighthouses. We are not fit to it, we are of heaven, but we belong in this world in that we are supposed to make it fit us. The way I am most tempted to adjust to this world is by trying to rationalize away the pain and sorrow and evil, to try to explain why it is unavoidable or not really that bad. There are three traditional theodicies which each appear to try to do this: the soul-making defense, the free will defense, and the ultimate harmony defense.

Soul-Making

This argument is that, in order for us to grow in godliness, we need suffering. That is, in order for us to be sanctified, we need there to be evil to act as the hammer which fashions us into Christ-likeness. All well and good, but this gives no answer. Isn't this just to say that there must be evil for us to grow away from our evil nature? Why not be rid of the evil nature in the first place? There is some truth to this, we may grow in our suffering, but it does not really offer comfort to us at the root where we need it. We need to know that we are right when we say that the evils of this world are evils, not that they are good because they build us into Christ-likeness.

Free Will

I've argued against this before. I have also argued against it much more vigorously than against the soul-making defense, mostly because I hear it more and find it more seductive. The problem with it is that it provides no comfort. Whether right or not, I would rather be a puppet than have people made in God's own image die. If you say I should accept that there is evil in the world because it is necessary for us to truly love God, then why are we not praising God for this huge display of the free will of man that shows how free we are and thus how real our love for him is? What will we do in heaven? If these things were to continue to happen there, then I doubt I would be alone in being tempted by the consistency of hell. Even Pascal complains about how Creation does not seem to give a clear answer, and asks it to give him a straight yes or no, so that he would at least know what to think. Or if we remain loving by free will in heaven, then why is it not possible that the same force that keeps us from sin there should keep us from sin here? Even if all of these are resolved, however, does the evil remain? Then the sorrow will too, and the evil, the affront to the glory of God, will too, and the defense fails to offer any comfort, and it fails to defend the holiness of God. How can the evil remain as an affront to God? It must be dealt with, this is the point of the cross, on which is payed the penalty of sin for those who believe. But then our sins must be removed. Well, what if the evil goes away? Then this is not by virtue of the free will defense, but something beyond it, and this is not truly the defense.

Ultimate Harmony

Everything must be as it turns out, all is foreordained. This is the one I come closest to agreeing with, but it is not a defense. If it is all foreordained as good, then how can we call anything evil? If it is foreordained evil, then how is God good? If all is necessary, then, like the free will defense, like the atheists' response, "Evil just happens" and that is no defense. How can God create an affront to himself? He must not; or he is not himself, since it would throw himself into contradiction. Any defense must allow us to call evil evil. How can this one do that? Only by the truth that what is evil now will one day cease and be made good in Christ.

The Cross

There is one theodicy which maintains evil as evil, and God as good, and proclaims the death of death. It does not depend upon any of these theodicies. It is that, on the cross, Christ bore the pain and suffering of the world, as he bore the sin of the world which gave birth to death. That we are in Christ and thus share in his suffering as a privilege. That we are raised to newness of life with him and are thus free from the power of sin and death. In him our sins are removed. He is glorified even by our sins because they show how merciful and gracious he is, and how mighty he is that he works through even us. Soon Christ will return, and in that day the evil that fills the world will be made glorifying to God in the same way as our sins have already been made glorifying to him on the cross. In his suffering for our sins, he glorified himself by showing his ability to overcome sin, in that day he will glorify himself by overcoming all the sins that have been committed in the world. In our day, these things are as evil as our sins are in our committing of them, but in that day, they will give greater glory to God just as our sins, since we have been saved from them, give greater glory to God for his mercy and grace in saving us, and in who knows how many other ways. Sin is sin, God is good, and Christ is coming again to cast out sin and death in all ways. There shall be no more evil on the face of the earth. This is a theodicy that does not ask that we stop crying, but is sought through tears. The others suffice only when the tears run out, only when the philosopher ceases to be a man. We stop because we start to slip back into the thinking of this world, that this is the world we have, and we must find a way to cope with it. Instead, says this answer, this is not just the world we have, but that this is a shadow of how the world will be, that this world is the world we have, but not just, for it will be changed, renewed by fire, when the world is judged, when Christ returns, then this world will be one we will fit in, but now we are being fit for that one, and so will find ourselves dissonant with this one. This is not all there is, but the suffering in it is real, and will not cease until that day when Christ makes all things so fully new. Weep with those who weep, be homesick.

Be A Passionate Philosopher

The logic may work, but if it does not answer the question, then we must keep looking. There is always the possibility that we are overlooking premises, that we are presuming that things must be a certain way, when in fact they are another way. Not that we should reject answers that we cannot bear, necessarily, but that, if we cannot bear the answer, then we do not have the whole answer. It may be that we have all the facts of the matter, but if we cannot see them in the right light, then we will reject them. Look carefully, and all the more because you are crying. Look with the eyes of the ones who are hurt. Look with the eyes of a cynic. But in all things, look with the eyes of a worshiper of the God who is full of Grace and Truth, the God who is Love. Look, as well as you can, with the eyes you are given in Christ, and see how wrong this world is, see how much different this is from what we want to see, and know that you are not home yet, that you are a stranger in a foreign land, and call others to come with you. Be homesick, you aren't there yet, but it is coming soon. Do not be satisfied, do not settle down, as good as things are, they are wretched compared with how they will be when Christ returns. As bad as things are, Christ will be glorified in them and through them.

The Hope Everlasting

And he said to me, “These words are trustworthy and true. And the Lord, the God of the spirits of the prophets, has sent his angel to show his servants what must soon take place.”

“And behold, I am coming soon. Blessed is the one who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book.”

I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things. And when I heard and saw them, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who showed them to me, but he said to me, “You must not do that! I am a fellow servant with you and your brothers the prophets, and with those who keep the words of this book. Worship God.”

And he said to me, “Do not seal up the words of the prophecy of this book, for the time is near. Let the evildoer still do evil, and the filthy still be filthy, and the righteous still do right, and the holy still be holy.”

“Behold, I am coming soon, bringing my recompense with me, to repay everyone for what he has done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.”

Blessed are those who wash their robes, so that they may have the right to the tree of life and that they may enter the city by the gates. Outside are the dogs and sorcerers and the sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood.

“I, Jesus, have sent my angel to testify to you about these things for the churches. I am the root and the descendant of David, the bright morning star.”

The Spirit and the Bride say, “Come.” And let the one who hears say, “Come.” And let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who desires take the water of life without price.

I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book, and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.

He who testifies to these things says, “Surely I am coming soon.” Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!

The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all. Amen. --Revelation 22:6-21

 Well, then, my response has been: Come, but why the wait? Why not now?

How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?
How long will you hide your face from me?
  How long must I take counsel in my soul
and have sorrow in my heart all the day?
How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?

 Consider and answer me, O Lord my God;
light up my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death,
  lest my enemy say, “I have prevailed over him,”
lest my foes rejoice because I am shaken.

 But I have trusted in your steadfast love;
my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.
  I will sing to the Lord,
because he has dealt bountifully with me. --Psalm 13

 Why does the psalmist let God's steadfast love and salvation be enough in his time of trouble? Surely, this is the salvation of the Lord through Christ, and so he is right to rejoice in it, but what makes that enough of a comfort?

This is now the second letter that I am writing to you, beloved. In both of them I am stirring up your sincere mind by way of reminder, that you should remember the predictions of the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles, knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. They will say, “Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation.” For they deliberately overlook this fact, that the heavens existed long ago, and the earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of God, and that by means of these the world that then existed was deluged with water and perished. But by the same word the heavens and earth that now exist are stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly.

But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.

Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn! But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.

Therefore, beloved, since you are waiting for these, be diligent to be found by him without spot or blemish, and at peace. And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures. You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen. --2 Peter 3

Yes, he is coming, but he waits patiently in order that some may be saved. He is patient toward you.

But what of those who have been born, some of whom, whether you believe in predestination or not, will surely be among those who die without God? Do they count as nothing? Why not rather end the world, that fewer may be lost? What hope do we have? That by allowing the world to continue on more will be saved than damned? Can you promise me that? I do not want the ungodly destroyed by hell, I want them destroyed in the destruction of Christ, that they may also live in the life of Christ, in whom I also I live.

I can come up with theories that make sense of the world ending, or of the world continuing to be, but of the world now continuing, and yet coming to an end at a certain appointed time? This is too great for me, a glorious absurdity. Why not now? Why later? I can only assume that in this way my God will be shown more glorious, and thus my joy made greater. And I can look to this: when Christ returns, all the pain of suffering, all the sin and death, will not be allowed to blemish anything that is. Indeed, even my memories will be made perfect--not that they will be altered, but that they will be refocused--so that I will see in all that has happened the glory of God, even in what is now evil. What is evil will be made right, the enemy will be slain in fullness, just as we shall live in fullness, and death and sin and suffering will be no more. We will not have amnesia concerning these things, rather, we will see these things rightly, and in light of the light of the world. Now we see little of what God is doing, let alone what he will do. Now we see as things are, then we will also see as things are, but not as they are now, rather, when the end comes we will see things as they are then. Thus, the evil of this time will kill itself, just as Satan killed himself by hoisting Christ onto the cross.

"is everything sad going to come untrue?"--Sam Gamgee

It is for the world as it is for us "For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain." Philippians 1:21, so I want to live as long as possible, yet I cannot wait for the time when I will see my savior and my God face to face. So it is with the world, we desire that the world continue on as long as possible, that God's glory and works might be done in it, yet we cannot wait for the time when both we and it are released from our agony and when everything sad will have become untrue.

Water

Let rivers of living water flow, from the tear ducts of our eyes.

We are united to Christ in his suffering for sin. We weep in him.

We also laugh in him, because we know the end. Death inevitably kills itself. The power of death was killed by Christ's death, and the very existence of death will have been killed by Christ's death when he returns in victory to make the world new. All the pain and suffering will, at that end, somehow, someway, inexplicably, by the power of God, kill itself and give way to the glory of God.

That day is not yet come, and so we do still weep. Evil is still evil, but it will not be allowed to remain in this world, because this world, ultimately, is God's. Though it is under the power of the prince of darkness now, he has no more power over it than he did over Job, whom he had to ask permission from God in order to be able to take even one ox from. Yet evil is a shadow. It will pass away in the light of the dawn of the coming of the King. We are Christians, we ought to feel the most pain in this, yet also the most joy in the good that flows from it. We ought to be the most even-tempered, bipolar, stoic, passionate people on the face of this earth.

Leave just the spiritual evil:
--An affront to God's image in us. However blemished that image is by the fall, there is enough that God sent his only Son to remove that blemish from us.
--A man cutting himself off from all hope of redemption.
--People tempted, some certainly falling to the temptation, to call God unjust, unloving, impotent, or finite. They were children, how much more innocent can you get!? Even allowing for original sin: were these worse than others? They're guns, how much easier to stop can you get? They can jam! There are already those who say he did not stop it because "he's not allowed in schools." Unloving, impotent, finite, and pretty hard to argue that that is a just god, too. I'd rather a loving, just, omnipotent God who is called a jerk than this "gentleman god."

So we must cry for this, even as we cry with others for all the physical and psychological evil.

Leave just the spiritual good:
--Proof of the moral worth of humans beings. No one would dare say "they were just children." The reaction to this is many times greater than if they had been any other form of animal life.
--An opportunity for Christians to show how much they desire that many would inherit the life everlasting, and to declare the mercies of God to even the worst of sinners. We ought to openly cry because of Adam Lanza's sin and even more his death, since it cuts him off from any possibility of reconciliation of God.
--People are seeking answers to this, surely some will find God to be the answer.

So we must rejoice in this.

Bipolar, just... both at the same time.

Crying dehydrates. Christ is the living water, "but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life." John 4:14. Perhaps this is beyond what is warranted by the text, but he is, nevertheless, our sustenance in suffering. We cannot carry this pain alone, we must, and can only, carry it in Christ who carried all our pain and is making all things right. As we are made right in Christ, so the world is made right in him. As we are being sanctified, so the world is being made new. Ours is not despair, it is sorrow and hope and joy unexplainable.

The victory is won, it is accomplished, Christ has accomplished the victory to come. There is no question, Christ shall return in victory over the world and establish his kingdom of life over it, which shall have no end. Our joy is unshakeable, for it is found in our unshakeable union with Christ the king. Stoic, but in a fully loving way. Indeed, it is this joy which enables us to love, since our happiness is found in Christ, not in what others think, or in some other thing which humans could take away. No, our children are not our joy, and so our joy is not shaken by this. Yet our sorrow is still stirred by it, because it is an affront to our God whom we love. These were made in the image of God, yet they were murdered. Christ, too, broken for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities. Sorrow and joy. Love. Holy, holy, holy, merciful and mighty, God in three persons, blessed Trinity!

Bloody

I was born and raised in Connecticut. I have not cried like this for over 2 years. I have for a long time been almost obsessed with trying to answer the problem of evil. I am a philosopher, I want answers, looking for answers is a sort of coping mechanism for me. Let the answer be centered on God: if there is no such answer, then God is nothing, if there is none which yields hope, then the God of all hope offers no hope, in either case, I become an atheist.

What then? What can we say? "Be still and know that he is God"? "God will work all things together for good"? All very true, but they sound as mere platitudes.

Death was crushed to death, how long until we find ourselves where this is true in every sense? Where is the goodness of God? Come Lord Jesus! Oh, but come off it, that time is far off, how can we be encouraged by it now? Look! Christ came as a child, Mary saw her perfectly innocent son murdered. God knows the evil that took place today: his son was killed. But how is this hopeful? How is the mere fact that God knows what we go through enough? I thought he was omnipotent! Why not use some of that boundless power to fulfill the desire of that boundless love? Surely he knows how, since he made us!

"But he knows our suffering, he even feels it with us" Oh, shut it. If he's not going to do anything about, what do I care? "But he has done something about it: The Cross!" Bah, how does that help? It only promises life to an individual, I cannot save those children by my belief.

Look: death came into the world through sin, and sin came into the world through the one man, Adam. On the cross, the one man Jesus killed death by stripping sin of its power in us. I will not say that the shooting took place because of our sins, though perhaps it did, but certainly did because humanity is sinful. If this is the problem, what is the solution? Be sinless. You cannot do it yourself, but in Christ is sinlessness. Be joined to him, then, in the cross. Thus you must die to yourself, as Christ died for you, and live to Christ, as he was raised from the dead. Then you shall be the salt and light, from whom will come no death. Strive, then, that all the world may be saved to the glory of God, for only on that day will children be safe anywhere.

Ah, so... no real comfort? Just commands? Laws. "No, not Laws, it is by grace. The world is being made new!" Well get on with it! Why doesn't God just finish the job? What is the delay? "God is patient, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should be saved." What about all those children who perished today! His patience meant their deaths. "Yet if he were impatient, if the world had ended beforehand, there would be many who would have died apart from the love of God, would you doom them to hell for the sake of these children?" And yet you still have not answered: why did those guns work? "If I answer that it is in order that some may be saved, you ask 'why not some other way?' If I say it is for consistency's sake, then I lose all miracles, and you have every right to say 'inconsistency be damned!' It is a judgement." What? Then why not everywhere? Or why Newtown specifically? "Who knows? Why did God allow so many children to be murdered in seeking to kill the Christ? But this I know:"

The salvation from Christ brings fullness of life. We are all dead, indeed we are all as dead as that shooter, and all, apart from the grace of God, just as bad. Would that he had lived to receive the grace of God, that grace which is for the ugly and the wicked, which makes them righteous before God and brings about a heart of flesh to replace the heart of stone, this grace, this salvation, is for those like him. Yet there must be justice, if not in this life, then the next, and so the shooter, since his punishment was not taken by Christ, must bear the infinite weight of it on his own person. But we all stand able to do the same sorts of things. Who will bear that punishment? God stands ready and able to take the burden on himself, this was the reason Christ came to die. Come to the cross, receive the life which no human can take away, lest you receive the death which no human can escape. Yes, you must have faith, but this will be accomplished by God.

I am not an atheist. No, but rather, this is my hope, this is why I am still alive, this is what I live for.

How God Gets All the Praise and No Blame

I said in passing in my last post that if free will exists, and is a factor in salvation, then humans have some claim to some praise. This is an old Calvinist argument which has been plausibly refuted. Along with this, I would like to note the requirement that salvation be "only by grace" in some way .

Refutation 1:

God gave us free will, thus our good actions that are done by means of free will are only able to be done because God, in his grace, gave us the free will that extends to the ability to do them. Everything is by grace alone, whether our having a body or our having a free will, and thus whatever good we do with our free will is also by grace alone.

Response 1:

Well, then, if we praise God alone for our salvation, done by our free will, which is given by his grace. What about those bad actions, the ones free will is supposed to free God from the blame of? If we praise God for our salvation because he gave us the ability to freely accept it, then why not blame God for our sins, since he gave us the free will which extends to the ability to do that too?

Refutation 2:

Since Christ died on the cross for our salvation, and this being his grace to us, therefore our salvation is by grace alone, not of ourselves, since we did nothing to force God to offer this salvation to us.

Response 2:

This only accounts for it being somewhat of grace. To be all of grace, all the components that are necessary for one's being saved must be out of grace. This attempted refutation leaves the act of free will as a component that is not of grace, yet which  is necessary for one's being saved. How is it that we do not incur praise by accepting salvation, then? Or, if we do not, how do incur blame by our freely willed sin?

Refutation 3:

God, in his grace, gives us a free will which extends to both allow us to accept the free gift of salvation, and to sin, as in Refutation 1, but in such a way that neither blame nor praise passes through that. We praise God, instead, for the act of grace which is Christ's work on the cross, as in Refutation 2.

Response 3:

This seems to suffer from the same problem as either Refutation 1 or 2. If praise or blame can still be incurred by freely willed human acts, then there is still praise that seems due to human beings. If praise and blame instead cannot be incurred by freely willed human acts, then we can blame no one for sin, nor can God. This removes all possibility for freely willed acts which result in guilt, and thus, either the only morally significant acts are determined, or it removes the necessity for salvation and the justice of hell.

The Problem:

Either free will incurs both praise and blame to us, or it incurs neither. If both, then there is some praise which is due us, but not God. If neither, then there is no blame due to us such that we need salvation and are justly under the penalty of death.

Transcendence/Immanence: Solution For Determinists or Compatibilists.

At first look, the same problem seems to rear its head for one who says that God actually does ordain everything as the one who grants God praise because he gave us the free will with which we accept salvation. The distinction I would like to make here, as usual, is between God's transcendent and his immanent acts. In the refutations above, I have assumed that all actions are immanent. This works, because God's giving us free will would presumably be an immanent act in his creating us, and humans can only act immanently.

When a human being acts due to an immanent act of God, the praise passes through the human and arrives at God. I doubt anyone will have a problem with this. However, God's immanent acts are always good even with respect only to what has occurred up to that point. All of God's acts are good transcendently. Thus, all that occurs due to a transcendent act of God is good transcendently, i.e., it is good that it happens in the final analysis, though not necessarily in the present moment when it occurs.

When a person sins due to a transcendent act of God, which I believe happens, since all things are at least transcendently caused by God, why is the person blamed but God is praised? The reason is that they are different actions. When the person sins he does so for some purpose that is not for God's glory--else it would not be sin. When God acts, however, it is for his name's sake, his glory, and out of the abundance of his wisdom and loving-kindness. Also, all transcendent acts are but one total singular act of the creation of all things, and thus the same act whereby he causes someone to sin is the act whereby he brings about the redemption of his chosen people by the death of his Son. Transcendent acts cannot be compared with immanent acts, nor can a transcendent act be assumed to be the same as an immanent act, unless the immanent act is the last act, done at the last time, in which case they are both done with respect to the entirety of history. I do not expect that such an act is possible, but even if it is, I also know that it will be good, for it will be done after Christ has redeemed his world.

God's Good Selfishness and the Problem of Hell

I have previously argued that God is most, in fact infinitely, to be valued, and that we ought to therefore seek him, i.e., his glory, with all of our being. I have further argued from God's honesty that he must himself seek his own glory with all of his own being. In this post I will attempt to show how it is that God is still love. I shall finish by attempting to show how hell exists because of God's love for us just as much as because of his love for himself, since they are inextricable, and go from there into an attempt at showing how free will is not desirable in solving the problem of evil at this level.

What is it to say that God is love? We tend to take it to mean that God loves everyone with a pure love, whether or not they have done anything to warrant his love or the removal thereof. It certainly seems to be right to say that God fulfills completely what is to be expected from one who loves. What does it define to say that "God is love," though? Does it define love, or does it define God?

So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. --1 John 4:16

It seems as if it is not a matter of defining one by the other, but rather, declaring the inextricable link between the two. God is the source of all love, and God's love is the source of all that which he does. Note that his love is not here limited in direction merely to human beings, though it is clear that his love is directed toward us.

It is impossible that God should exist by causing his own existence and not be selfish, since there is nothing but his own nature to cause him to will that he be. If he did not love himself then he would not have caused his own existence except in order that some other exist. If he caused himself to exist only so that some other might exist, then he ascribes value to himself only because of some value in that thing for the existence of which he causes himself to exist. But if he can cause that thing to exist from nothing, then he has in himself all that which went into that which he caused, and he is therefore more valuable than that which he caused. Thus, if God causes himself to exist for some reason other than self-love, then he is a liar.

It is impossible that God should be, in an essential way, love, and not be selfish. Whatever is an essential characteristic of a thing is a characteristic that the thing must have or else it would no longer be itself. It may be said that God caused the world out of love for us. However, in the case of God there must be some reason why he loves who he loves, some guiding principle that causes him to love one thing more than another. Whatever this principle is, it must have existed in order to guide him to love himself rather than something he might create, and thus cause himself. I would submit that the principle may be in some sense considered that of self-love, or honesty. If God is honest and most valuable, then he must call himself most valuable in all that he does. God then created the world out of love for himself. This is not to say that he did not in any way create the world out of love for human beings, but only in that we are made in his image, and he loves things with respect to how like him they are.

It is impossible that God should be love and not seek his own glory with all of his being. Because God is most worth seeking, he must speak to us as if he is most worth seeking. To do otherwise--to lie--would be to our detriment. Thus, since in causing the world he had respect to his own glory, whatever a thing is, it exists because of how it reflects God's own glory, i.e., how it looks like him. Because of this, the world is made in such a way as to point us to God, i.e., to tell us that there is a God and what kind of God he is.

For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. --Romans 1:19-20

So we know that God intentionally created the world so as to show us who he is. In a sense, then, creation is a massive--yet still so small, we shall never see all of who God is--self-portrait of God. What displays more self-love than this? Yet he does it because he loves us and wants us to seek him and find him, to taste and see that he is good, to find our joy in the only place where we may find it, which is God alone.

It is impossible for God to act for his glory in all things and not have that bring about the greatest joy for the greatest number of people. It is thus impossible that he act for his glory in all things and not love us with the greatest possible love, which is the same thing. For in creating the world to show his glory he also creates it so that his worth is shown, in the end, by how great the rejoicing in him is. The applause must be the greatest possible when Christ enters the stage. Thus God brings it about that as much cause for rejoicing exists as is possible. He desires glory, and to that end he shows his glory to us, and in seeing his glory we worship him, which is to say that we ascribe ultimate worth to him, that we imitate him, that we act out of love for him. This worship, because God created the world to show his glory, and therefore, because it is this worship for which we were made, is the most joy-inducing activity which a human being can participate in.

The Problem of Hell

The problem of hell is probably the strongest form of the problem of pain, or evil, since it is eternal suffering for the sins of human beings eternally estranged from God, never having fully paid for their infinite sin.

What, then, of Hell? It exists that God might glorify himself. How? By his justice, at least in part, perhaps in other ways. Why is it good that he pour out his justice on so many? Because by so doing he shows his glory in his justice, and also thereby shows his glory in his mercy and grace. How is this still love? By this showing of his justice, grace, and mercy he increases our joy in him that we might glorify him all the more, and this increase in our joy is greater than what might have come from there being fewer in hell and more of us in heaven. For there is no greater way in which we can come to understand to such a degree how great a sin we were once committing, and how great a punishment we have been saved from, and thus how great the mercy of God and the grace of God have been to us that we might enjoy God with us, our greatest joy, forever and ever, than that we see how worthy God takes his glory to be of having value ascribed to it, which is to him, by seeing how worthy those who have failed in ascribing that much glory to his name are to be punished, and thus how worthy we would be to be punished but for the fact that Christ took that punishment for us.

Does God then not love those who are damned? No! He loves them, though he finds his glory better revealed by their punishment than by their salvation, and thus he finds his love better shown by the salvation of some than of others. Can we say who is who? It is futile to try, for, not only does God often finds his glory better shown by surprising those who think they can guess how the mind of God works than by saving the ones we expect, but we do not have access to the inner thoughts of anyone, let alone how history is set to pan out. Indeed, it is nothing in us for which he chose us, but it is only his work in us that is good and brings him glory. Therefore he chooses whom he wills, and whoever he does will, he changes by his power. It is not necessarily the poorest, for some who are rich do end up in the kingdom, nor is it necessarily any other sort, for all sorts will end up in heaven. Indeed, this may be a part of how God chooses: let all kinds come to him, from the most likely to the least likely. And we praise God for this, even more than if we were all the worst of the worst as the world sees it. Though who can say? We are all wretched sinners. Perhaps God did choose the worst of humanity, how could we ever tell? But all this speculation is of no use, let us merely praise our God who did save us, and pray for those not yet saved, that God, in his love, might have mercy on them.

I may be charged with avoiding the question: How is it that God loves those who are damned? Come, I must say from scripture that there is a hell, and that it is not empty. If I say that God puts people there for his glory, at least I have a reason with which to comfort myself that the lost are not wasted. Some ask why God could not have obtained as much glory by people freely choosing to reject him. I find the concept of free will that is not super-ordained by God rather incoherent in the face of God's being the cause of many things in the Bible which are called evils at the human level, Job's suffering being the most obvious. Nevertheless, I shall make an attempt to answer the question.

Does it matter how they get there? Well, if God's ordaining damnation looks like a father picking and choosing which kids to save from running into traffic when he could save all, then God's allowing people to freely will one way or another looks like a father merely shouting at his kids to stay out of traffic when he could save all. If the first is cruel, then the second is apathetic. Surely, the picture is wrong? But if it is a bad picture for one, then it is also for the other. Do not say that God must respect our free will, he must do nothing of the sort. Where has he ever given a promise of free will to anyone? I would rather he shred my free will to pieces. Dash it against the rocks. May I never see it again, if I ever had it. I care nothing for free will, indeed, I hate it if it keeps me from God! Remove all semblance of free will from me if you wish, so long as I am allowed to be with God. We sing "you can have all this world, only give me Jesus." What is wrong with "you can have all my sanity, my free will, my happiness, my life, only give me Jesus"? What is lost in each case is gained in Jesus Christ, apart from, perhaps, if it ever existed, free will, which we rejoice that we shall be free from, in all respects relevant to salvation, in heaven, for we know that when Christ returns he shall renew all the world such that it shall never again fall into sin. I would charge those who prefer free will that it is a sort of squeamishness that is not worthy of one who trusts that God is good, and that it unnecessarily diminishes the sovereignty of God, whether the charge of heresy is avoided by suggesting that God diminished it willingly or not. We ought to weep if we ever find that the good God is not sovereign over something.

Indeed, I avoid the question, for if I have not answered it previously, then I find no sense to the question. I have said how it seems that God must ordain as he has in fact ordained, and even shown how he may do so out of love. Perhaps the glory God would receive from what occurs in hell might turn out the same, but the glory of God is not received only then. Is God as glorious if he is not sovereign over the hearts and minds of all people? No. Indeed, if anything we do can be called good, then we must say that it was caused by our union with Christ, and thus arising from, not our own life, but Christ's life in us. If we say anything else, then we claim glory for ourselves, and so deprive ourselves of joy. Let us, then, rejoice that our good God is sovereign over all creation from beginning to end and is, by his sovereign plan in his wise and loving way, making it new, and that we shall finally see him face to face and see ever more how great and awesome and majestic and glorious he is.

Edit: This post ended in a rant, in which I charged Arminians with theological squeamishness. At this point I am not sure whether to be sorry or not (i.e., whether any offense caused is proper or not), but, when I first posted it, I dreaded anyone seeing it. I do see what makes people squeamish in regard to this view of Hell. The same reasons, however, seem to me to allow the same squeamishness whether there is free will or not. Perhaps free will decreases it a small amount, but how much, really? I find Hell to be both horrendous and necessary. I can say that it is beautiful in how it shows God's justice, yet I still feel crushed by how much suffering there will be there. I do not think that it is wrong to feel both ways. Jesus wept for Jerusalem. Paul was willing to be damned if his kinsmen could then be saved (Romans 9:3). Hell is supposed to make you feel squeamish. More than that: it ought to induce a proper fear of God! Your squeamishness, and your fear, however, ought not lead you to question God's sovereignty over it.

What's Wrong?: Evil in a Determined Universe

Spinoza believed that "good" and "bad" were adjectives without any reality to them. He was a determinist who believed that everything was God, or Nature, and thus everything just is. How can we avoid that conclusion if we believe that God has ordained all events, all happenings?

From the transcendent viewpoint, all things are ordained by God and occur because he choose that they would. He ordained these things in order that he might be glorified, and thus does not sin in doing them. So can we say that anything that happens ought not to have happened? No, not from here.

From the immanent viewpoint, on the other hand, we can say that events ought not to have happened. When we look from the immanent perspective we are not considering that world in all of time and space, and God's ordaining deterministically occurs with a consideration of the whole of time and space. When we view things immanently, we are not considering the future and thus are not considering that when Christ shall return and redeem all things. At that time, which we look forward to, what occurred which was evil in its time shall be taken and untwisted by our Lord and Savior as he redeems the whole of creation. But until then, we can say that it was twisted, and it is twisted that certain things happen. Sin in the world takes the good and twists it into evil, but Christ shall take evil and untwist it into even greater good, because it will be good not only because God made it so, but also because, when it ceased to be good, God took it and did not throw it away, but made it good again. Yet, until that time, there are evils which ought not be, and to add to the evils is to take what God has made and tamper with his creation. It is meddling in the work of God, a claim that we can somehow make the world better than God could alone. We do not act with knowledge and ordination over all of time and space, so we should not act like we do, but like we serve the one who does.

Well, if we should not tamper with what God has made, should we just do nothing? No, even before the fall humans were instructed to tend the garden, be fruitful, and multiply. Now that the world has fallen, and the earth is twisted from how it was in the beginning, we ought to desire to make it as it was originally made to be, glorifying God in every way it can, just as God will finally and fully do when Christ returns.

Thus, destruction of life is an evil because God did not create the world in such a state that it should contain that, and when Christ returns we shall no longer suffer from it. In this time, we encounter it, and fight it, knowing that when it happens God has ordained it for good, but that we are to seek to put creation right, that is, more like the state it will be put in when Christ returns, for the same reason that we are to do good works: it is an overflow of our hearts toward God in worship, that we desire the world to show his glory to all people.

The Justice of Hell

How can a finite being commit a sin worthy of eternal punishment? I have been accustomed to giving an answer along the lines that because God is infinite, any sin against him is an infinite sin, any failure to give him the glory he is due is to rob him of an infinity of glory, and thus to commit an infinite sin, and that an infinite sin is worthy of likewise infinite punishment.

If our failure to give God infinite glory is a sin, then how can any finite being but sin? The question that follows from the above answer is this: "how can a finite being give an infinite amount of glory to anyone?" We do not have an infinite amount of glory to give. But God does. God has expressed his glory in creation, and when we say that each part of creation is glorious, and credit that glory to God, and not to creation in and of itself, then we are still only giving God the glory that we can ascribe back to him that he has shown us, and he has not shown us all of his infinite glory, so we still cannot glorify him infinitely.

Yes, we can say, "God is infinitely glorious," but can we truly ascribe to him infinite glory? Is it even hypothetically possible? Is there a way to conceive of Adam and Eve ascribing infinite glory to God before eating the fruit? To say God is most glorious, and to live in such a way that says the same, would be to ascribe the most glory to God. Is it possible to prove that the most glorious thing must be infinitely glorious, then?

He is omnipresent because otherwise where is was not would cease to be.
He is omniscient because in him is all that is true.
He is omnipotent because he made all things.
He is omnibenevolent because to be otherwise would be to deceive, and the creator cannot deceive.
He is all happy, in and of himself, because otherwise he would be dependent on some other for his happiness

But these are "all"s, not "infinite"s, and besides, none of those are his glory. Right? Well, wrong, actually. His omnipresence is an infinite presence, because otherwise there would be a "beyond God" which would thus not be sustained by God, and thus cease to be. As an infinite being, there is an infinity of things to know about him, and therefore his knowledge of all truth is a knowledge of an infinite number of truths. His omnipotence is infinite potency, because otherwise there would be some thing that he could not do, and therefore he would not be all powerful, but all powerful except that thing that makes him not infinitely powerful. He is infinitely good and happy for similar reasons as he is infinitely powerful. Now, his glory, or worth, consists in these things, i.e., his infinite knowledge (omniscience), infinite goodness (omnibenevolence), and infinite happiness in and of himself (See Edwards, The End for Which God Created the World).

Therefore, as finite beings, we ought to ascribe to God all the glory we are capable of ascribing to him, both by our words, our deeds, and our thoughts. To do otherwise is to say that some other is infinitely glorious and therefore God, and thus to say that God has some amount of glory that is less than infinite. This is to ascribe infinitely less glory to him than he deserves, and thus to commit an infinite sin. Sin is worthy of judgement in respect to how great the sin is, therefore an infinite sin is worthy of infinite judgement, and, as we are finite, we may not bear that judgement all at once, but must bear over time. The punishment being infinite, and our being able to bear only a finite amount at a time, it thus takes an infinite amount of time for us to bear the judgement of our sins.

The Basis of Morality and the Problem of Evil

The timing of this post was completely unplanned. I simply got to the point that this was the next topic to tackle, and happened to have time today, in case anyone wondered.

The Basis of Morality

Recently, I showed that God must be the most valuable thing existent. All ought to ascribe value to things with regard to their actual value, therefore all ought to ascribe God most value of all, since he is most valuable. Furthermore, all ought to ascribe to God all value, since he created all that has value. Worship may be defined as the ascribing of ultimate value to someone or thing. Thus, all ought to worship God.

How does one ascribe value to a thing? One might merely state that the thing is valuable, but if one proceeds to ignore that thing, then people will assume that you are merely saying that, and that you do not actually believe it yourself.Thus, one must act out of a motive of seeking that which is valued. If it were merely to act in those ways that would show that one valued the object, then it could still be faked. If it could be faked, then one could lie in order to do good. But earlier I suggested that God must be entirely honest. Does it show that one values a thing if one does that which is contrary to that thing's purpose? Therefore, to do good is to be motivated by a desire for that which is most valuable.

The Problem of Evil

I have mentioned before my dislike for defenses against the problem of evil that make God seem less powerful than he may be. I have also shown that, from a certain perspective, we do not have freewill. Thus, a defense against the problem of evil must not rely on human freewill in that perspective, nor make any of God's attributes to be less than they may be. It will be helpful to examine the issue from the perspectives of God's transcendence and his immanence, separately.

Transcendent

God must act in such a way that he does not cause evil. This is relatively simple when one focuses on his transcendence, since he may create all the events at once such that the ideal outcome is provided, and therefore God acts with utmost desire for himself. Thus, taken as a whole, across all of its duration across time, this is the best of all possible worlds.

Immanent

This leaves explaining the problem of evil when one focuses on God's immanence. This is not so much of a problem, however, because the perspective from which one may not rely on human freewill was the perspective of God's transcendence. Thus, the traditional freewill defense may be given from this perspective.

This traditional freewill defense supposes that God has given us freewill, and that this freewill is worth the risk of our sin, and that Adam sinned by misusing his freewill. This language does not appear to be open, having denied freewill from one angle. However, in so far as God is in time, and responds to human actions, freewill is granted to us. The language of "risk" may be unacceptable, but if so, then it is because God knows that the end result will be the best of all possible worlds, which is worth whatever finite amount of suffering is experienced before then. The last part of the defense, that Adam sinned by misusing his freewill, may thus stand so long as it is noted that freewill is granted us by God from this perspective.