A Theological Aside… for a Good Cause

I received a tough question by email the end of last week (see below) .  I concluded that it is the kind of question that is worth sharing with you, as well as my attempt to answer it.  See what you think (but please ignore the paragraph spacing–it simply refuses to cooperate!).

I will get back to my spiritual “quest” in Thursday’s post.  For now, let me just say that enough progress and insight have been forthcoming to where I definitely do not think that this is an “impossible dream,” like Don Quixote’s quest.

Hi!  Do you have time to consider a theological question?  If not, don’t be concerned.  We just haven’t been able to find anyone who can give us a good answer and it could be that this is just one of those questions that we will have to wait to get to heaven to obtain an answer!  Anyway, if you have time and feel inclined…

Genesis 6–with respect to the destruction of mankind by flood, with the exception of Noah and his family.  The question is, if God repented that He had made man, why didn’t he just destroy it all and either leave it or make something, someone, different?  Why allow the same sinful man to begin to populate the earth again when God obviously had to know what the outcome would be?  A way is needed to teach Noah’s generation to youth but this question has to be understood clearly in order to do it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

They say “Fools rush in where wise men dare not tread.”  I guess that, since I am going to try to take on this question, that implies I’m a foolish man.  I’ll let the Lord and you be the judge of that.

First, let me say that Christians historically have tried to explain the theological predicament of Genesis 6 in three ways: 1) Leaning too far to the sovereignty of God and attributing all the sin to the plan of God; 2) Leaning too far toward the free will of mankind and acting as if God didn’t really know what was going to happen beforehand and that, as the eternal Optimist, He was willing to let mankind try again through Noah’s descendants, expecting them to succeed and not sin again; or 3) Attempting to balance the sovereignty of God and the true responsibility of mankind by saying that God allowed sin in His plan, but that His plan also included the life and death and resurrection to pay for sin, making it necessary for history to continue until Jesus came, requiring the continuation of the human race, despite the incredibly sinful state of humanity just before the Flood (Gen. 6:5).

In my view, the Bible does clearly teach that it is not either the sovereignty of God or the responsibility of mankind, but both/and–at the same time (see, e.g., Acts 2:23 for a classic example of both truths side by side, with no sense of tension between them).  Thus, explanations 1 and 2 above have to be discarded because they do not adequately take both into account.  Explanation 3 is OK, as far as it goes theologically (i.e., I think it’s right generally, but is not specific enough to be satisfying to people’s heartfelt questions).  But, what it does not account for is the wording in Genesis 6:6 that God “repented” or “regretted” and that “He was grieved in His heart” (HCSB).

What I think needs to be brought into play to fill out this dicussion is the theological concepts of the transcendence and immanence of God.  Divine transcendendence means that God, as Creator and Sustainer, is greater, bigger and, in this one sense, outside of His creation as He has everything under control.  Divine immanence means that God is closer to each of us than any other human being could ever be, not just knowing our thoughts (i.e., omniscience), but caring just as much about our emotions and responding with His own perfect, infinite emotions to our joys and hurts. 

How do these theological counterpart doctrines help us with Genesis 6?  In His transcendence, God knew everything that would happen that would bring on the Flood and everything that needed to happen to move forward toward Jesus.  It was all under His sovereign control.  However, it is just as true that, in His immanence, God “regretted: terribly creating mankind, who had sinned so tragically and almost univerally (Gen. 6:6).  Only if His immanence is that close and personal could it be meaningful to say that God was “grieved” at this setback.  Otherwise, it sounds staged, fakey.

Does this make practical sense?  I think so, if you look at it as a parent of small children.  You have to set up rules and boundaries and consequences for your kids, even though you know in advance (a lower level of “foreknowledge, for sure, than God’s!)–you KNOW–that they are, sooner or later, to one degree or another, going to break the rules.  But, as a loving, caring. emotionally involved parent, you are down there with them, watching carefully, rooting for them to succeed.  However, when they fail–and they always do, to some degree–even though it may “grieve” you greatly, if you really love them, you are there to pick them up, dust them off and caringly set them off on the right path yet again.

There it is: God is the all-knowing and sovereign transcendent God, who was totally unsurprised by the sin leading to the Flood and Who had His act together to deal with it in His plan right on along.  He is also just as much the perfect caring and super-close Divine Parent, whose heart broke with grief (Gen. 6:6) when mankind abused all of His good gifts and turned the pre-Flood world into a spiritual sewer, but still chose to show the love of His incredible grace to Noah and his family (6:8).

Beyond this explanation, I must humble myself before the wisdom of the Lord’s self-revelation in Isaiah 55:8-9: “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, and your ways are not My ways.  This is the Lord’s declaration.  For as heaven is higher than earth, so My ways are higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts” (HCSB).

I do hope this helps at least somewhat,

Boyd 

 

Coming Thursday: “Looking Over My Shoulder at My Spiritual Quest”