God With Us

Levering also cleverly argues, drawing again from Aquinas, that a “metaphysical” account of God’s being and knowledge accomplishes the aims of “non-metaphysical” accounts, but better. Non-metaphysical theologies claim that classical theism has rendered God inert and static, distant and cold. But according to Aquinas God knows everything outside Himself in knowing Himself, and this includes knowing “all possible statements or judgments of truth” and this includes all the “infinite number of thoughts and affections of the heart” that immortal human beings have.

Thus: “Aquinas cuts away, with clear scriptural warrant , any possible ‘distance’ of human beings from God; God is not ‘over against’ human beings, but rather everything that human beings are and do is wonderfully present in God. God truly knows and loves us, from within, not extrinsically.”

Precisely by limiting God, opponents of classical theism construct a theology where God’s relation with creation must be extrinsic, and to that extent, distant. By insisting on the infinity of God, Aquinas can say, with Paul, “in Him we live and move and have our being.”