Okay, maybe the Universe doesn’t turn
on a word. However, it certainly does
turn on the Nature of God. Everything we
talk about will ultimately start and end with the Nature of God. That’s why the word ousia is so important and
why we must find a way to agree about it.
Singling
out a Single Attribute
Eventually
we want to look at all the attributes of God’s Nature together. That investigation is way down the road. What’s important here is the realization that
God’s Nature is one piece, and doesn’t function in parts. The problem of taking things one-at-a-time
constantly confronts us humans. We must
do our best to understand that each piece fits into the whole picture. That’s hard, but we’ve got to do this if
we’re going to keep any sense of balance, or even sort things out halfway
right. We must struggle to understand
God as three persons, not as one attribute, or a collection of attributes, or a
series of attributes.
We
can’t help the one-at-a-time problem.
That’s built into us; it’s just another human weakness. However, we’re not forced to pick out one
attribute of God, throw all the other attributes away, and build up a wall of
separation with anybody who dares to disagree.
That’s the source of tension.
That’s what causes the problem.
That’s what no one has any right to do.
Yet, it happens all the time.
Sources
of Single Attribute Thinking
We
might suppose that certain logic methods are less prone to this error. But, lo and behold apophatic thinkers are
just as guilty of this as cataphatic ones.
Now why would anybody be so fussy about logic structure and walk into a
silly blunder like this? I think it’s
because we have an inherent love for idols, and we just hate it that God is Who
He says He is. How dare God behave like
that? Just Who does He think He is? In any case, the sources of single attribute
thinking are all around us everywhere.
We even have to fight and work to avoid this human tendency in ourselves. The source of single attribute thinking is
our human flesh, which is always at war with God.
Attributes
don’t Define God
“God
is defined by His unknowability.” That’s
a really dumb thing to say. Sorry, I
don’t mean to be rude. But, that’s a
really dumb thing to say. Nothing defines
God. God is undefined and
undefinable. Doesn’t anybody study logic
anymore? Legs don’t define the cow. The cow defines the legs. Nothing defines God. God defines everything else. God defines what it means to know, and God
defines what it means not to know; what is possible to know, and what is
impossible to know. Nothing makes sense
if you try to take God out of the equation.
Love
is the Popular Single Attribute
Are
you surprised? It’s very cool to say
things like, “Love defines God.” I even
know of examples where apophatic theologians say such absurd things. What an apophatic theologian ought to be
saying is something like, “God is not unloving.” Nobody should be saying anything as
outrageous as, “Love defines God.” God
defines love! We wouldn’t even have a
clue of what love is like if God hadn’t taught us what it is on the Cross.
People
who say things like, “Love defines God,” or Love is God, and sometimes even, “God
is Love,” are guilty of creating an idol.
Yes, even though, “God is Love,” comes right out of the Bible, you don’t
have to follow the conversation very far to realize that some speakers mean the
exact opposite. We just want to have an
idol created in our own image. I suppose
we instinctively know that idols only do what we tell them to do; even though
God is “not a tame lion,” and we do have to obey Him (C. S. Lewis, The
Chronicles of Narnia).
I
don’t suppose that this is a hangover from Hasidism, though sometimes it feels
that way. Hesed is one of the Hebrew
words for love. The tendency of this
kind of love is toward a manufactured piety and a superficial mysticism. It tends to produce the sort of person that
is “so heavenly minded, they’re of no earthly good (Oliver Wendell Holmes,
perhaps).” No, I’m not criticizing
monasticism. I have great respect for
monasticism. I’m criticizing folks that
have forgotten that the God Who defines love also defines righteousness, and a
ton of other things.
I’m
addressing folks who have forgotten that our Lord Jesus Christ is a priest
forever after the order of Melchisedec (Hebrews 5:6, 10; 7:1, 17, 21).” Since Paul takes pains to repeat this four
times, it must be important. Zedek is
the Hebrew word for justice or righteousness, and Melchisedec means king of
justice or righteousness. In spite of
the fact that the Psalms are filled with the word Hesed, the King of Love is
not found in the Bible, but the King of Righteousness is. Certainly, Jesus is the King of Love, but
without the King of Righteousness, the King of Love does not exist.
Most
of us have figured out that you can’t have one without the other. As soon as righteousness is removed from the
equation, a false sort of love is fabricated which is “of no earthly
good.” Not only is it devoid of reality,
but it’s even devoid of love, for love is now reduced to nothing more than a
subjective, senseless, nihilism.
Even
so, there are multitudes of those who loath any juridical idea of God. For them a juridical God is a God of
hate. Their denial of reality is
astounding.
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