LIBERTY UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF DIVINITY
Love in Classic Theology and the Contemporary Discussion of God’s Immutability
Submitted to Dr. Todd Buck
In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the completion of
THEO 626 D01
Fall 2018
The Doctrine of God
by
Robert Beanblossom
21 November 2018
Contents
Love in Classic Theology and the Contemporary Discussion of God’s Immutability ………………………………………………………………………………………………..1
Feinberg’s Contribution to Openness Theology .…………………3
Bibliography……………………………………………………………….…….…… 5
Love in classic theology and the contemporary discussion of God’s Immutability
The biblical God has continually interacted with man since Creation. In classic theology God extends universal love for man (John 3:16a), offering an eternal relationship with those who accept Him (John 3:16b), and judgement for those who reject Him (Rom 2:5-6).
Contemporary theology minimizes or even discards God’s righteousness, inventing a relativistic benevolent God who responds to the love (eros) extended man-to man and, as a by-product, to Him. This a “paradigm revolution”[1] that discards the sovereignty of God for human “bilateral fellowship,” according to Kevin J. Vanhoozer’s interpretation of Sallie McFague.[2] This relativism attacks God’s own claim: “I am the LORD, I change not” (Mal 3:6). Gary D. Badcock says, “with love, we are at the center of everything in the teaching of Jesus,” based upon His Great Commandment (Matt 22:36-40).[3] In contrast the biblical God places Himself at the center (Jer 32:27a).
Badcock contrasts Plato’s (428-348 BC) definition of love with that of Anders Nygren (AD 1890-1978).[4] Plato holds love to be an attempt to fill a need arising from an absence of good in man.[5] Nygren is diametrically opposed (totaliter aliter).”[6] He writes, “nothing but that which bears the impress of agape has a right to be called Christian love.”[7] Christian love (man to man) is not found in man, but is spontaneous and unmotivated, it is God’s creative activity, that when initiated by man brings fellowship with God.[8] It is difficult to understand that it is not found in man, is God’s creative activity, yet is initiated by man. God’s agape is “indifferent to human merit.”[9] God’s sovereign immutability is discarded for a relativistic man-centric theology in contrast to His revealed sovereign relationship with man. Badcock, arguing for Nygren, attempts to bridge this chasm, stating that “agape is creative,”[10] compromising Nygren’s claim that God is creative, and giving agape power to create. This brings worth into the object of love, opening the way for “fellowship with God.”[11] Braddock says that Nygren is “unable to see any good remaining within human nature after the fall.”[12] Nygren actually stated, “Agape is sovereign and independent with regard to its object, and is poured out upon the evil and the good.”[13] God’s love has no power, while Nygren’s agape has exclusive power over God when exercised by man. Nahum addresses this heresy (Nah 1:2-3), as does Paul (Rom 3:23). As noted, Nygren’s agape is a force is a logical contradiction, a fatal error to the argument. Braddock finds Nygren’s God to be “an unhelpful disjunction” with the doctrines of creation and redemption while carefully avoiding the doctrine of original and personal sin.[14] The disjunction is with Braddock’s presentation of Nygren.
Feinberg’s Contribution to Openness Theism
This is but another attack on the infinitude of God. His immutability is foundational in Christian theology: Louis Berkhof says it is “that perfection … by which He is devoid of all change, not only in His Being, but also in His perfections, and in His purposes and promises:”[15] “all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Rom 3:23); “God so loved the world, that He gave His only Begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. … he that believeth not is condemned already” (John 3:16, 18b); at the judgement, when you “knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open unto us; and He shall answer and say unto you, I know not whence ye are: Then shall ye begin to say, We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets. But He shall say … depart from Me all ye workers of iniquity. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (cf. Luke 13:25-28).
Heresies do not affect the will or purpose of God or the efficacy of His Church. But they eternally affect those who believe them.
Bibliography
Gary D. Badcock, “The Concept of Love: Divine and Human.” Nothing Greater, Nothing Better: Theological Essays on the Love of God. Editor Kevin J. Vanhoozer. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2001.
Berkhof, Louis. Systematic Theology. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishers, 1941.
Feinberg, John. No One Like Him: The Doctrine of God. Wheaton, IL: Crossway Publishers, 2001.
McFague, Sallie. “An Epilogue: The Christian Paradigm,” Christian Theology: An Introduction to Its Traditions and Tasks, 2nd Edition. Editors Peter Hodgson and Robert King. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1985.
Nygren, Anders. Agape and Eros, trans. A. G. Herbert, et al. Vol. 1. London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1932.
––––––. Agape and Eros. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982.
Vanhoozer, Kevin J. “Introduction: The Love of God—Its Place, Meaning, and Function in Systematic Theology. Nothing Greater, Nothing Better: Theological Essays on the Love of God. Editor Kevin J. Vanhoozer.Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2001.
Warfield, B. B. “Trinity.” The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, Vol. 5.Editor James Orr. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1930.
[1] Kevin J. Vanhoozer, “Introduction: The Love of God—Its Place, Meaning, and Function in Systematic Theology,” Nothing Greater, Nothing Better: Theological Essays on the Love of God, ed Kevin J. Vanhoozer(Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2001), 1.
[2] Vanhoozer, Nothing Greater, 2-3, citing Sallie McFague, “An Epilogue: The Christian Paradigm,” Christian Theology: An Introduction to Its Traditions and Tasks, 2nd ed, ed. Peter Hodgson and Robert King (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1985), 382.
[3] Gary D. Badcock, “The Concept of Love: Divine and Human,” Nothing Greater, Nothing Better: Theological Essays on the Love of God, ed Kevin J. Vanhoozer(Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2001), 30-31.
[4] Anders Nygren, Agape and Eros (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982).
[5] Badcock, “The Concept, 31-32.
[6] Ibid., 33.
[7] Nygren, Agape and Eros, Chicago, 92.
[8] Ibid., 45.
[9] Anders Nygren, Agape and Eros, trans. A. G. Herbert, et al., vol. 1 (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1932), 52. (Emphasis is Badcock’s).
[10] Badcock, “The Concept,” 35.
[11] Badcock, “The Concept,” 35. Emphasis is Badcock’s.
[12] Badcock, “The Concept,” 35.
[13] Nygren, “Agape,” London, 165.
[14] Ibid.
[15] Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishers, 1941), 58.