foresight<\/em>. That is, God provides for humans in the present because he can anticipate, or foresee, their need before it happens. Reichenbach identifies three \u201cdimensions\u201d that demonstration divine providence.<\/p>\nFirst, it proclaims God\u2019s goodness insofar as God declares what he makes to be good and through love and grace seeks the good of blessing for what he created. God in his goodness is the source of blessing or happiness. Second, providence presupposes God\u2019s power by which God realizes his purposes by his actions in the cosmos and, more especially, in the affairs of humanity. Third, providence invokes God\u2019s wisdom revealed in his plans and purposes, to his understanding of the present and further, by which God directs us to what is good for us.<\/p>\n
It is this third dimension that I want to touch on briefly here, for it speaks to the core argument of Reichenbach\u2019s book. So: What are God\u2019s purposes? Again, going back to Scripture, Reichenbach says that, \u201cScripture reveals that God has purposes for the universe as a whole, for groups and nations, and for particular individuals.\u201d As to the first of these, he points to Ephesians 1:10: God intends \u201cto sum up all things in heaven and on earth in Christ.\u201d As to the second and third, he directs us to God\u2019s intentions to graft the Gentiles into Israel to create one family with Christ as the head (Rom. 11). And as to the last, individuals, God desires to conform them to the image of his Son, Jesus Christ (Rom 8:39), and to show \u201cthe immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness towards us\u201d (Eph. 2:7). Throughout Scripture, moreover, we can see God calling particular individuals to carry out his purposes not only for their own sakes, but for the nation of Israel, the church, or the world as a whole. King Cyrus, the Apostle Paul, and Abraham would fit neatly into these categories.<\/p>\n
Reichenbach warns against turning these particular callings into a normative rule for our own lives \u2013 as many are inclined to do. These are clearly examples of God working through select individuals in order to fulfill his promises and to further his plan of cosmic redemption realized in Christ. My calling to be a pastor, or your calling to be a doctor, or teacher, or whatever, are not the same as David\u2019s calling to be King of Israel. Concerning God\u2019s plans for human vocation, Reichenbach says rightly, I think: \u201cGod calls us to bring him into what we do, making him an essential aspect of our being and doing, wherein we take pleasure in our doing and serve others.\u201d He goes on to suggest that, \u201cgenerally vocation is not to be understood in the sense that God wants you to do this particular task in contrast to everything else, such that engaging in any other task runs counter to God\u2019s will for you.\u201d Your vocation is not cemented in the mind of God, in other words. To make it such may place an enormous degree of stress on a person. After all, what if you missed your calling?<\/p>\n
The primary question is, What is the scope of God\u2019s plans and purposes for creation? No one doubts that God has plans and purposes for us. The heart of the matters is to what degree do those plans situate the details of our daily lives? To suggest that every aspect of our existence is planed according to a pre-determined blueprint is to advance a view known as meticulous sovereignty<\/em>. On this view, \u201cbelievers . . . say that whatever happens to them \u2013 good, bad, or indifferent \u2013 is part of God\u2019s plan; God has and works his purpose in each event that he realizes.\u201d As I mentioned in my first post, the view of meticulous sovereignty is often used by pastors to comfort the bereaved or to offer solace to those experiencing difficult, seemingly insurmountable, circumstances. The intentions behind its use are understandable, and I am deeply sympathetic to them. But by the same token, there is another, very disturbing side to this view that often escapes our sight, which is:<\/p>\nSome events bring unrelieved pain, serious suffering, and dysfunction that seem individually unrequited. Other events introduce obstacles to our realizing our perceived vocation. On the large scale it is difficult, if not impossible, to think that Stalin\u2019s ruthless pogroms and murders in the Katyn Forest, the deadly deportation marches of the Armenians, Hitler\u2019s racial cleansing and hideous concentration camps, Pol Pot\u2019s massacres of his Cambodian people, that brutal Hutu genocide against the Tutsis in Rwanda, the Serbian massacres of Bosnian Muslim men and boys at Srebrenica, and the tragic slaughters by ISIS in Syria and Iraq are part of God\u2019s plan for the good of the people affected<\/em>. Is is difficult, if not impossible, to think that the colonial, degrading plantation enslavement and mistreatment of Africans and the American willful destruction of Native American cultures, the demeaning segregation of Blacks, Indians, and Colored by white Southern Africans, the trafficking of women and children for prostitution in India, and mass murders in a Colorado theater and a Connecticut elementary school are part of God\u2019s plan for the good of those so maltreated<\/em>. And on the individual level, it is difficult to believe that contracting pancreatic or brain cancer, macular eye degeneration, Parkinson\u2019s and Alzheimer\u2019s diseases, schizophrenia and bi-polar disorders, and so much more are part of God\u2019s detailed plans for an individual\u2019s good and not harm. . .<\/em> In short, not only is it difficult to believe in meticulous providence in the face of this evil, it demeans the sufferers themselves to say that this seemingly gratuitous suffering is part of God\u2019s best plan of blessing for them <\/em>(Italics mine).<\/p>\nSurely you get the point. Better, though, is the view that God\u2019s plans for us are often broad and generalized, while only occasionally being pointed and specifically invoked. This view takes human freedom seriously, and it furthermore maintains the character of God as one of enduring goodness and loving-kindness. For if God planned the atrocities mentioned above and countless others besides, then we have every duty to question his character as a loving God, worthy of our worship, adoration, and sole allegiance.<\/p>\n
To close this chapter, Reichenbach gives us an image. Sovereignty, he suggests, invokes the image of a political relationship, namely, that between a governing ruler and the governed. On this score, not everything that happens aligns with the governors will, nor does he\/she get to determine the outcome of everything they want. The scope of the governor\u2019s rule is set by the freedom allowed for their people. If significant freedom is granted, then it stands to reason that the governor is limited in their range of action \u2013 assuming, of course, they continue to respect the integrity of this arrangement. Thus, \u201cIn granting significant freedom to their subjects, sovereigns make it possible for their authority and will to be freely obeyed and also freely resisted,\u201d Reichenbach notes. Furthermore, \u201cIf sovereigns command their subjects to do some act and if the subjects are free, they can refuse \u2013 although at the same time they must bear the consequences of their refusal.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the Christian tradition, as we see clearly in Scripture, God is sovereign over his creation. God not only oversees it, but has purposes to bring it all to the same fruition. This is not a democracy, however. We do not elect God as our sovereign. No; in his inscrutable grace, God initiates a relationship with humans by offering and binding himself to a covenant, whereby we are his people and he is our God. By virtue of this relationship, humans have a choice in the matter. Abraham had the freedom to reject God\u2019s call. Human freedom is not an illusory proposition labored over by philosophers. Humans are free to respond to God\u2019s love or not. God initiates; humans respond: that is the defining characteristic of our relationship.<\/p>\n
As Reichenbach notes, \u201csignificant sovereignty between free persons, then, is more like a dance between two partners. They need not be equal in skill or ability, power or knowledge. In our case, it is the covenant dace of life. The key to the dance is God\u2019s desire to be in a covenant partnership with those he created.\u201d Thus, as God moves, we move, as we move, God moves \u2013 each movement taken is in a concert of mutual love, joy, and respect \u2013 until we reach our final end, where Christ is all in all to the glory of God the Father.<\/p>\n
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By Ben Davis A review essay of Bruce Reichenbach, Divine Providence Too often, when a discussion of God\u2019s providence is brought to the table, it is framed in such a way that only trained philosophers or theologians can fully understand it. Thus large, awkward words eclipse simple, useable ones, and impenetrable logical syllogisms clash like […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":197,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-67328","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
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<\/a>By Ben Davis<\/p>\n