How free is God? Did he have to make precisely this world? Could he have done other than he has done at any point?
Jonathan Edwards rightly argues that all of God’s actions are freely necessary and necessarily free. All that God does flows infallibly from who he is and is governed by his perfect wisdom so that God always does what he wants, which is the best, and delights so to do. God could never do anything differently.
Unfortunately, Edwards is a lone voice even amongst the giants of Reformed theology in asserting the necessity of all God’s actions, but his view deserves to be the Reformed consensus.
Download my essay on this subject (a Word document) here.
Friday, January 13, 2006
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2 comments:
Obviously I haven't read your essay but I think you probably mean to say 'freely necessary and necessarily free' rather than 'freely necessary and freely necessary' since in this case the former necessarily implies the latter!
Are you planning to blog all your essays? Do you have anything to say about the church in Hebrews? The world waits with bated breath...
Ah! Thank you, Ros. I think you could be right. Why do you say "obviously" you haven't read the essay? I might blog most of the old essays depending on free webspace. I guess the world could have a good laugh at Lloydie's doctrine of the church from Hebrews. A challenge for someone to do better!
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