God: Sovereign?

One doctrine of the Christian Faith that should be of no controversy but is of immense, is God’s sovereignty. It is a simple concept that takes many twist and turns, argued for centuries about its significance. When using the word ‘sovereign’ in relation to national politics we mean that a country, like the United States, doesn’t allow another country to dictate what they do in their own country. National sovereignty is paramount to a country’s stability and ability to govern itself. When describing God’s sovereignty, a simple definition could be, “…his absolute right to do all things according to his own good pleasure” (‘Illustrated Bible Dictionary: And Treasury of Biblical History, Biography, Geography, Doctrine, and Literature’, Easton’s). God can do what He wants, and I think that is a good definition, simple and tidy. Problems come in when we begin asking what that means. Does God ‘control’ everything or is He sitting back watching it happen.

I think the extreme positions, left or right, are often the seeds of many heresies and wrong teachings. A ‘hyper’ Calvinist may claim God’s sovereignty includes God ‘causing’ Adam and Eve to sin, clearly in violation of what scripture teaches, 1 Corinthians 14:33 (HCSB) “since God is not a God of disorder but of peace. As in all the churches of the saints,” and, James 1:13 (ASV) “Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God; for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempteth no man.” On the other end of the spectrum would be Open Theism or even Deism, God started it all, and then steps back waiting to see what happens, clearly not what God’s Word claims, Revelation 4:11 (KJV) “Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.” Isaiah 46:9-10 (KJV) “Remember the former things of old: for I am God, and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me, 10 Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure.” So we are stuck with something in the middle, danger occurs when we go too far to the left or the right.

Most ‘High Sovereign’ guys (I love that term, as if a ‘Low Sovereign’ person existed) I know are in the Reform/Calvinist camp, believing God’s hand is in control, even to the point of predestinating the salvation/destruction of every individual in human history and in the future. There is a logical issue, they see, that if God ‘sees’ it (as in the future) then He must ‘cause’ it to happen. Others, like many Arminians, believe God is able to ‘see’ in the future without ‘causing’ it to be. In this middle section, where I think most Orthodox Christians are, we argue what God ‘causes’ and what He ‘allows’. There is no doubt that the vast majority of Christendom believe God is in control, He is never surprised, or that there is anything that happens that is not part of His divine will, of this very little argument is made.

These issues are really dealing with the idea of free will. Does man have free will, or is he only bound to the decrees and plans God has predetermined in the eternal past? This tension is argued within tribes (Arminians and Calvinist, both as well as other versions in between) and is described using words like ‘Compatibilism’ and ‘libertarian free will’ to describe in essence much of the same things. Notice the definition for compatibilism, “Compatibilism, sometimes called soft determinism, is a theological term that deals with the topics of free will and predestination. It seeks to show that God's exhaustive sovereignty is compatible with human freedom, or in other words, it claims that determinism and free will are compatible. Rather than limit the exercise of God's sovereignty in order to preserve man's freedom, compatibilists say that there must be a different way to define what freedom really means.” (http://www.theopedia.com/compatibilism). Now here is the definition for libertarian free will (LFW), “Libertarian free will means that our choices are free from the determination or constraints of human nature and free from any predetermination by God. All "free will theists" hold that libertarian freedom is essential for moral responsibility, for if our choice is determined or caused by anything, including our own desires, they reason, it cannot properly be called a free choice. Libertarian freedom is, therefore, the freedom to act contrary to one's nature, predisposition and greatest desires. Responsibility, in this view, always means that one could have done otherwise.” (http://www.theopedia.com/libertarian-free-will). Do we act based on someone/something else or do we act, unrestrained by determination? It probably lies somewhere in the middle (doesn’t it always).

Sadly, it seems the argument comes down to is man free to do A or not A, in other words, is man’s freedom a part of God’s decree or is God’s decrees dependent upon man’s actions. I am a LFW-kinda-of-guy that holds to soft determinism, in a sense. I think the sovereignty of God is not at all hindered or impacted by my free will. God’s ability to ‘know’ everything gives Him ample opportunity to decree all that needs to be to make up for my stupid mistakes. I can feel the heat right now, as my philosophy and Reform friends are screaming, with their hair on fire. “So,” they would ask, “you think God is ‘reacting’ to your choices?” No, simply put, God acts in accordance to what He wants, most freely and actually the only real ‘free’ person in the Universe, unencumbered by my choices, I would suggest. The mystery is explained I believe best at the Cross, as Christ came to Earth to die, John 18:37 (KJV) “Pilate therefore said unto him, Art thou a king then? Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth my voice.” This plan to die for mankind was eternal, well before man even fell, Revelation 13:8 (NLT) “And all the people who belong to this world worshiped the beast. They are the ones whose names were not written in the Book of Life before the world was made—the Book that belongs to the Lamb who was slaughtered.”

By definition, God would be greater, wiser, and more able than we. I thought of this in talking to Roger Browning of clearlens.org, and some articles he wrote. Terminology is often a hindrance to conversation with those we ‘disagree’ with, even theologically. We attach meaning to words, then defend our notion of it, even from those that are not disagreeing, if they can’t use the word ‘right’. Maybe I am wrong, maybe God has predestined all things, down to the minute detail. I often think, maybe I do believe that, after all. If God is the ‘greatest maximal being’ then nothing happens that He is not cognizant of, allowing, and/or ordaining to be. I believe that as He swept the Universe into motion, I was in His plan, Adam’s fall was planned for, and the culmination of all history into a fixed moment on a Roman cross in First Century Israel, happened as God had planned. Maybe that’s all that matters…

#sovereignty #God