I'd like to think more precisely about the relationships between nature and grace, or creation and covenant.
My basic framework is that grace neither abolishes nor merely tops up nature. It transofrms and glorifies it but how exacltly would we formulate it all?
For example:
To what extent would we distinguish “predicatble covenant sanctions” and blessings of faithfulness to the terms of the covenant, and God-appointed “natural consequences” of living wisely in God’s world?
For example, is it all covenantal and is the covenant with all people? What covenants are we talking about and with whom are they?
I guess this is a specific form of the question of the relation between nature and grace – creation and covenant.
If we wanted to speak of a creation (or cultural) mandate would we say that too is a covenant with the whole of humanity?
E.g. can non-Christians expect the curse of the creation covenant but not other covenantal curses since they are not in those covenants (e..g. Abrahamic covenant / renewed covenant)?
Thursday, July 10, 2008
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13 comments:
How about this:
"Grace does not supplement a lack in nature, or complete an already pregnant potentiality within nature; rather grace interrupts, overturns and supercedes the natural, only thus fulfilling God’s intention for all created being which is revealed in Christ. Moreover this fulfillment is not a restoration of a primal order, but rather its transcendence in an unprecedented superabundance of new creation that can only be known through Christ and his act of apocalyptic redemption."
From Inhabitatio Dei.
http://inhabitatiodei.wordpress.com/2008/07/10/theology-ethics-and-the-natural/
Don't ask me what it means. As anyone knows who's heard me preach, I just pass on undigested theology culled from the internet.
:) Thanks, Glen.
Well, it does depend what it means!
Nature is "lacking" in that it is immature, but this is not a sinful lack. Immaturity is appropriate in the immature! It needs to be filled, completed, transformed from one degree of glory to another.
And it does have great potential, but it needs transforming from without.
We must distinguish fallen and unfallen nature. Grace interrupts and overturns sin, of course. It is congruent with God's original purposes.
Is that right? Does it satisfy?
I remember you being ambivalent about the supra / infra-lapsarian debate. I wonder though whether it cuts to the heart of this. The key question is: Does God redeem/judge men as men (the supra position - the decree to elect comes logically before the decree to permit the fall)? Or does God redeem/judge men as *sinners* only (the infra position - the decree to permit the fall comes before election). I'm all for supra as it happens (I'll say why below). But here's what it commits me to: God judges/redeems men as men (and not simply fallen men). Thus *redemption* is applied to nature - even unfallen nature. This is quite different to saying *maturation* would be applied to unfallen nature. This is an always-intended death and resurrection of nature.
Why would I want to be supra? Well chiefly because of the centrality of Christ and Him crucified.
"The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life." (John 10:17)
"Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world." (John 17:24)
"The Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." (Rev 13:8)
The eternal glory of God is manifested at the cross. Given this Johannine sense of 'glory', Calvin's statement that 'creation is the theatre of God's glory' is jaw-dropping. The heavens and earth are created for a quite definite event - the last Adam, suspended between the two, rejected by both, reconciling one to the other.
The glory of God is not an abstract fulness of His creative work - the glory of God is the cross. The Son taking on Headship of the old creation and putting it to death and rising again to Headship of the new creation.
In this light we read 1 Corinthians 15 (all of it really). But notice that the natural comes first and then the spiritual. And notice that "flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God." (v50) The whole analogy of the seeds => plants implies a kind of death and resurrection to this process (not simply a flowering of a bud for instance).
As a six-day creationist I can affirm that death is not a natural creative process but a curse - the wages of sin. And therefore for those sorts of reasons I plump for supra. And this means nature needs *redeeming*. The realm of Adam is to be killed and raised, judged and renewed. And here recapitulation is a very handy doctrine. Christ heads up the old to kill it and heads up the new to raise it up. In that sense grace does abolish nature (it crucifies it) only to transform it (raise it up).
Perhaps there's ambiguity to what 'transformed from glory to glory' means. To me it means the Spirit uniting us to the Head of the new creation and, through participation in His death and resurrection, raising us to new glory.
The path to the new heavens and new earth *must* go through the cross. This must be uppermost in our thinking as we consider nature and grace.
Well, okay, good. Fascinating stuff.
I guess there's some limitation to the hypothetical what if questions. Things are the best possible way they were meant to be.
But men are not judeged / condemned for being men / creature, are they?
Creation is good.
Now, how was it always intended to be brought to its fullness - through Christ.
Would there have been cross / death and resurrection without sin?
Would penal substitution have been necessary without sin? No.
Death (at least in its penal acpect) seems to me in a response to sin.
I'd love to hear you again on this subect.
Ah, that was me (Marc) above not Ros! She's been staying and seemed to have nicked my lap top and logged herself in so for all those who Ros had acquired a new brilliance or as she says were disappointed to see the fuzziness of her argument and lack of Biblical data...
I think that's the issue with the centrality of the cross - the 'what if' of an ongoingly-unfallen nature is called into question. (ie. it moves you towards an inevitable fall).
Let me affirm:
* creation is very good
* no person will be judged for being a person but for being sinners, but...
* the path on which the Father has set the creation is through bloody redemption.
Reading 1 Cor 15 again Paul makes it clear that "What you sow does not come to life unless it dies." (v36) Couple this with the fact that I don't think I can make a biblical case for 'death' that is not in some sense the penalty for sin, and you arrive pretty much at my position.
I guess the question is: What biblical account of death is there that's not the wage of sin?
Glen
Try this: http://reformedcatholic.wordpress.com/2008/01/24/good-death/
Blessings
Matthew
Glen,
Thanks. Yes.
I'm not sure I'm totally clear what you're saying?
And I'm not sure how I'd say the fulfillment of creation would have related to Christ apart from sin? What I meant is its hard to understand how the cross could fit in without sin since the crucifixion of Jesus itself would have to be a sin.
Clearly an incarnate Christ could still have been the prototype head of the new creation etc.
Hi Matthew, the blogosphere works! A very apt article indeed. Thank you. Great read, learnt a lot.
Four malformed thoughts in response:
1) (I don't think you're doing this, but I see it as a danger in these discussion) We don't want to make the cross a part of a bigger dynamic (some cosmic death-resurrection cycle). There is not a world-principle of 'all things must die and be made new' into which Christ fits. Instead the cross shapes all else - the seed dying being a good example. I read John 12 as saying these third day creations are proclaiming the death (and resurrection!) of Christ - the cross written into the smallest details of creation. But it's the cross that determines there is death in creation, not the other way around.
2) Penal substitution is true - as is "Judgement begins at the house of God." 1 Pet 4:17. To put it another way: James and John both cannot and will drink the cup. (Mk 10:38-39) We share in some senses in Christ's suffering - even as the house of God. On the Head of the house it is a judging fire, on those hidden in Him a refining fire, and as it goes out to "those who do not obey the gospel of God" they face it uncovered. In this way I believe death as primarily a judgement can be upheld, even as it is experienced by believers.
3) Does it make a difference that Jesus is the *Lamb slain* from the foundation of the earth (rather than simply One who would lay down His life)?
4) The love that God *is* is manifested in atoning sacrifice (1 John 4:8-10) - not just 'laying down life'). He demonstrates this love in Christ's death for *sinners* (Rom 5:8). That kind of thing.
Marc,
Would it necessarily be a sin for Christ to be killed in an unfallen world? Well I don't want to make yours and Matthew's arguments for you but one thought off the top of my head - it might be a bit like Jonah asking them to throw him overboard. There are parallels anyway.
Could an incarnate Christ be prototype of new creation? Well I think death and resurrection is essential: John 10:17; 17:24; 1 Cor 15:36; Rev 13:8.
Matthew's provided good arguments for death not always being penal, but I maintain that the primary meaning of death is found in Christ's death 'for sins' - though as that flows from the Head down to His body, out to all humanity and is proclaimed in creation it is experienced differently (and of course the Father, through Christ's death, can redeem our experiences of death and make them fruitful etc.)
Very sorry for taking some excellent questions about nature and grace and turning us all off track! I've enjoyed the interactions anyway.
Glen
Glen
Great stuff - really stimulating, thank you. I, like Marc, am ambivalent about the supra/infra debate, in part through not having thought enough about it. I find that when I do think about it, I have problems with both positions, and depending on my mood, swing one way or the other...
As an aside, I'm not sure that, if I understand you correctly, your view would count as a classic supra view. The classic supra view goes (i) decree to elect; (ii) decree to create; (iii) decree to permit fall; (iv) decree to send Christ to provide atonement.... Both supra and infra place the decree to send Christ in the same place, the difference is the ordering of the decrees of creation, fall, and election. If I understand you correctly, you'd want to put the decree to send Christ to provide atonement first? And that being the case wouldn't be particularly happy with either view as traditionally expressed. As it happens, i'm sympathetic on this point, not least because it in some sense separates the decree of election from Christ.
I'd also want to say that I think I'm with Marc, that there is a certain necessity about this creation being the one God created, and thus I think we'd probably all be happy with an, in some sense, inevitable Fall and atonement from sin.
In response to your responses (!):
(1) Yes, I'm absolutely with you. There is no sense in which Christ's death is a subset of a larger creational pattern, or the outworking of an inevitable historical process, or any other such horror. Yes, it's the real deal, the big thing, to which all other deaths and resurrections point. Having said that, i wonder whether there's a sense in which some kind of death is eternally part of God's life (the Father pouring himself out in love for the Son, the Son for the Father etc. And each Person of the Trinity glorified through this 'death' as they receive back double - the Father love from the Son and Spirit, the Son from the Fatheer and Spirit etc. (sorry, I don't mean to reduce the Spirit to an 'etc'!) Thus, this self-giving love is the pattern for the Son's giving of himself within history, and consequently of all death/resurrections within history.
(2) Yeah, I think I'm also happy with this if I've understood you correctly. But I'd want to distinguish fiery discipline/refinement from penal judgment. That's in part what sparked my blog post: in Ps 90, death is clearly penal; as I said there, i do think that Christian death is disciplinary/refining, it's just I think there's more to it.
(3) & (4) Good points. But I'm not (yet!) convinced they're germane to the supra/infra debate, i think. We need to distinguish GOd's decree to do something, and his actually doing it. For both sides of that debate, the fall and the atonement are part of God's sovereign purpose for creation from before the creation. So both would be happy to describe Jesus as the lamb slain from before the foundation of the world, even though the decree for him to die comes after the decree to create. I think an infra would respond to your point 4 by saying, "Given the Fall, absolutely." And, of course, any Reformed theologian would say, and God permitted the fall precisely to show the full extent and glory of his love and justice, in a way that wouldn't have been seen without it.
Best
Matthew
On the nature/grace thing. i'm also not entirely sure what Halden means (as quoted by you, Glen). However, it sounds to me like he's pitting nature and grace against each other. And I don't buy that. nature is graced from the beginning. All is grace: God's decision to create, his making Adam in his image, giving him breath, placing him in the Garden. It's grace from top to bottom. So, yes God's intention for all created being is revealed and accomplished in Christ; yes, grace interrupts, overturns, and supercedes fallen nature, but no, it doesn't do that to nature qua nature.
Thanks very much for your responses Matthew. Didn't know you'd commented (can't seem to get the email notification option when I comment).
No, not saying I'm classic supra. I would lump myself into a broader category with people like Irenaeus and Barth as well as Rutherford etc. Barth (for reasons of not wanting to separate election from Christ as you state) called himself a purified supra. Irenaeus would be a good example of someone who in practice was supra though he predated the classic formulation (by about 1400 years!) and so doesn't fit in many senses.
But see this for instance from Adv.H. III.22.3:
“The Word – the Creator of all – prefigured in Adam the future economy of his own incarnation. God first sketched out the ensouled human being, with a view to his being saved by the spiritual human being. Since the Saviour was already in existence, the one who was to be saved had to come into existence, or the Saviour would have been Saviour of no one.”
Christ *is* Saviour – thus, whatever creation there will be is to be *saved* by Him. I think this is where I’m coming from. For this reason I put him (and myself) in a supra camp that is broader than the classical definition. I do think the important distinction b/w supra and infra (classical or otherwise) is whether it is man as man who God wills to save or man as sinner. That is why I think it's germane to the nature-grace debate. For me the essence of supra is that man as man (Adam as Adam; nature as nature) must be *saved*.
I actually see yours and Marc's position as getting close to this depending on our definitions of 'nature' and 'saved'. I think the issues that we agree on are these:
* self-giving, cruciform love is at the heart of the trinity.
* the creation needs transformation from without - there is no latent power in nature to blossom into new creation.
* if nature = Adam (and his realm) and grace = Christ (and His realm) then we're agreed that Adam and his realm is never the end-point.
* the path from Adam to Christ goes through death and resurrection (and that this is true regardless of the fall - cf Gen 2:16-17; Rev 13:8 and the nature of the triune glory).
A few definitional issues:
* Are you happy with nature and grace being defined as ‘Adam’s realm’ and ‘Christ’s realm’? That’s basically where I’m coming from (and I hazard to guess Halden also).
* Does ‘grace’ in nature-and-grace debates simply refer to God’s sovereign activity? I’m thinking that if this definition is adopted then Roman Catholic concepts of ‘grace’ as infusion are admitted. But I’m not sure I want to say ‘infused grace’ is the kind of grace I’m concerned to uphold as a signed-up Protestant. I want to locate grace outside myself (and nature) in the activity of Christ alone. With this definition of grace then I think in the interests of solus Christus I want to resist the urge to co-ordinate the two.
* Does Christ’s death define what death is for us? I’m thinking that we need to come to Christ to learn what death is – and when I do that I learn that it is a judgement upon sin.
* Does Jesus (ie "Saviour") define / perfectly reveal the eternal life of God or is His Saviour-ness separable from His one-substance-with-the-Father-ness? I go for the former because if I start to see some aspects of Jesus as separable from the homo-ousios I'm on a very slippery slope. If the Saviour is the revelation of the eternal God then whatever there is besides this eternal God is going to get *saved* (not just made or developed).
* Isn’t ‘putting to death and raising it up new’ kind of equal to ‘salvation’? I think I would say so.
Those kinda thoughts. Anyway, very stimulating stuff indeed.
Blessings in Jesus,
Glen
On creation and covenant just read N. T. Wright's article "Creation and Covenant".
I have also begun to explore "Creation, Covenant and Tabernacles".
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