Wednesday November 30, In the year of our Lord 2011
My House, Caronport Saskatchewan
Still digesting theology, 6:35 PM
Weather = lightly frosted
Within Christian Scripture there is a clear division between God and creation. It can be illustrated like this:
Creator
-----------
creation
God created the world and is distinct from it. It is fundamentally wrong headed to try to take a piece of creation and try to say 'God is like an angel in that he is a spirit' or 'God is like a father in that he cares for us.' No! As I have already written about in the last two sections God is known by his self-revelation in word and deed in Jesus. The reason for this is that God is not 'like' anything in creation. There is nothing we can compare him to. But this is review.
So yes, God is distinct from creation, but that is not the end of the story. The other side of this theological coin is that God 'gets his hands dirty' by being intimately involved with creation. By God's spirit everything is animated and has life. In Genesis 1 God created everything and in Genesis 2 God takes specific interest in humanity, breathing the breath of life into Adam's nostrils (what a picture of closeness!), planting a garden full of good trees pleasing to the eye and good for food, bestowing Adam an incredible honor by allowing him to name the animals and continue in God's work of creating, and taking a special interest in Adam's completeness, creating the first woman, and oh I am sooo glad that he paid such incredible attention to all these things. His action in the world didn't stop there though, when Adam and Eve sinned God lead them out of the garden both as a judgment and a protection lest they live in their sins forever and he promised a savior. When the people tried to built the Tower of Babel God scattered them both as a judgment and as a protection. Then there was God's provision for Noah and his family, the calling and the covenant he made with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He called Moses to work as his agent as he went to war with the gods of Egypt and delivered his chosen people to the Promised Land. God continued to work in the world, revealing himself to the Judges and then to David and the Prophets. Finally he came to earth himself, a man, the historical Jesus of Nazareth who was mighty in word and deed. He revealed a new way of relating to God, as Father by participating in the relationship of The Son by the Holy Spirit! Christ's life, death, Resurrection, and ascension by which he sealed the everlasting relationship and definitive revelation of God to the entire cosmos! Then he sent The Holy Spirit to live inside of those who put their faith into him! God has been living and active in the word from its very creation and will continue to be until the very end of time if such a thing even exists!
There are several heresies that occur when we try to lessen or expand the gap between Creator and creation.
If we try to make God further from creation than is revealed in Scripture then we end up with Allah, or Deism. The Muslims' god is a completely transcendent deity. He is so holy that nothing can come close to him and he does not come close to us. While the Christian god is completely holy and just as transcendent, he speaks into creation in word and deed and chooses to participate (and takes great delight) in creation.
This version of God is basic Deism. The God who wound up the universe like a clock and then left.
If we try to remove the barrier between Creator and creation then we end up with Pantheism where everything is God. God is in every tree, every stone, every human soul, etc. Many First Nations religions and modern 'spirituality,' boil down to basic Pantheism. This is not how God has revealed himself. He is distinct from creation, not part of it.
Also chipping at the edge is Panentheism (there's an extra 'n'). The belief that God is slowly moving into creation or that creation is slowly moving into God. Hegel's theory of continual thesis, antithesis, and synthesis is the root of this heresy in modern Christianity.
So yes, there is a clear division between Creator and created. God is the creator and everything else, every tree, rock, angel, demon, human spirit, and celestial being is creation.
No comments:
Post a Comment