In the beginning, in the garden, what do you believe The Father most desired – obedience or relationship?
Is obedience all that God wanted? Is it possible to obey God yet not trust Him thus missing out on a relationship with Him? Can we trust without obeying?
Pondering this quote from Catherine Marshall in Beyond Ourselves
By giving humans freedom of will, the Creator has chosen to limit his own power. He risked the daring experiment of giving us the freedom to make good or bad decisions, to live decent or evil lives, because God does not want the forced obedience of slaves. Instead, he covets the voluntary love and obedience of sons who love him for himself.
Share your thoughts with me… I’d love to hear them.
I believe the statement by Catherine Marshall. I believe we have freedom of will. Tell me, does Calvinism (Grace theology) embrace this notion as well?? I didn’t think they did, but perhaps I have it confused with something else :S
We can obey without relationship, but we can’t trust without relationship. Trust and relationship go hand in hand (even though we grow in trust, as it doesn’t happen overnight).
To quote the Word… obedience is better than sacrifice. What this has to do with this post, I don’t know. Just thought I would throw it in 😉
Hi sweet Amanda,
Mmm, you have asked me about Calvinism yet that isn’t where I was going at all with this train of thought so I’m afraid that you have caught me unawares. 😉 More on that later though…
Yes, I think you have hit the nail on the head. We can obey without relationship… but to trust without relationship is very difficult.
Hi Amanda,
Yes I believe in free will. To hold otherwise surely would be to believe that we are robots?
I believe fully that God works through the Holy Spirit to bring about the salvation of man (spiritual regeneration) without the cooperation of that man. (And this may be where we differ in our belief)
Some believe that man cooperates with grace in order to be regenerated and that salvation is not complete until some action/actions have been performed by the individual whereas I believe that only God can open the ears and eyes to the beauty that is the gospel. It is God alone (and not anything in or of ourselves) that could turn to Him. In our hard hearted state that loved the darkness, how could we understand spiritual things? Reading the word and hearing the word do not elicit salvation in the reader UNLESS God has plowed up the ground (their heart), unless he germinates the seed of the word thereby opening our eyes to see Christ and the Cross. This takes the emphasis off of man and puts it squarely onto God and His mercy. No one can believe the gospel unless God grants it. (John 6:63-65) The whole idea behind my website (kerugma) is the proclamation of the gospel which we are to do. However, no one will hear the message unless the Spirit gives them ears to hear.
Where or to what point Calvinism holds to this I could not say for sure. There are varying degrees of Calvinism- from low Calvinists to high Calvinists. I just couldn’t say. I’m just studying the Word. 🙂
Where am I going with all this, I can hear my dear readers cry? I’m not 100% sure of how to word it all but I’ll give it a go.
In the garden God provided Adam and Eve with everything that the needed and wanted. Did this include the freedom to live apart from Him?
God put every type of yummy fruit tree in the garden yet in the middle he planted two trees- the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge. Why did God put the latter tree in the garden? Surely He could have hidden it away on another continent? That tree had the potential for man’s demise or for something else???
Now before some of my readers gasp and email me with wonderment of where I’m going with this and what I’m getting into, let me put your mind at rest. I am not going off making a whole doctrine out of this thought… I’m not being heretical. I’m questioning… yet I have experienced what I believe to be an answer of sorts.
In looking at the garden life of Eve I have asked myself many questions- naturally most of them require speculation to be answered so I am treading cautiously. Eve was in the garden. She had everything she needed- fellowship with God, a relationship with Adam, something to do each day, etc. yet the serpent throws a question at her which causes her to ponder.
I realise that I am not Eve and that this situation is not my marriage but if I can share what I have pondered…
I love my husband. I know my husband pretty well. I know how he responds in situations. I know how he thinks in situations. I know his character. if someone approached me and told me something strange about John then I’m pretty sure I’d question it with,
“What? Are you sure you’re talking about My John? My husband? For that doesn’t sound like him at all. Nah, I don’t think so.”
I’d respond like that because I know my husband. I trust him. I know his nature.
It seems that Eve didn’t share this kind of relationship with God. If so, where was the trust? Did she know God’s nature… did she not realise that the serpent was spewing lies? What sort of relationship did Adam and Eve have with God?
I believe that God was there in the garden during all that. However, He did not intervene. He could have! He’s THAT big. He could have made Adam and Eve choose correctly. Yet He didn’t.
Which leads me back to my original question…
Surely if God wanted only obedience He could have created man with more robotic thinking- without the ability to have free will. Then He would have had obedience. But with that, would there have been trust… love… relationship?
Ah, I know what is on my heart but I cannot seem to convey my thoughts without implying things which I do not mean. I hope my dear friends and blogging buddies will hear my heart voice and not just my doctrinal consistencies/inconsistencies.
Ok, it’s me again…
Just wanted to mention that I have been trying to avoid using terms like ‘free will’. Maybe, before we even discussed it, we would need to define what we each mean by the term, free will? 😉
In the beginning… in the Garden, what do you believe The Father most desired – obedience or relationship?
Hmm. Tricky. Jesus said, “If you love Me (relationship), obey my commands (obedience)”. While we can only speculate as to which He wanted more, He clearly wants both. 🙂
By giving humans freedom of will, the Creator has chosen to limit his own power. He risked the daring experiment of giving us the freedom to make good or bad decisions, to live decent or evil lives, because God does not want the forced obedience of slaves. Instead, he covets the voluntary love and obedience of sons who love him for himself.
I’m having trouble with this on a couple of levels. Here’s my straight off the top of my head response:
“Choosing to limit His own power” assumes that He would choose to intervene, other than for the fact that He wants us to love Him voluntarily. It’s a *very big* assumption. What is the primary purpose of man? It is to glorify God. It is not that God was sitting up there lonely, and He badly hoped that His creation would learn to love Him. He created us, knew perfectly well that we would sin, and had a plan of redemption ready….why? For His glory.
“He risked the daring experiment” risked the daring experiment, my foot! Like He didn’t already KNOW how it would turn out.
“because God does not want the forced obedience of slaves.” Assumption. Pure speculation. Projection of human emotion, even. There’s a lot of “slave” analogies/language used in the Word, regarding the relationship between Creator and Creation. I know there are plenty of references to “adoption” and “joint heirs” and such too, but you can’t discount the other because it doesn’t suit hearers. (Not saying you are, Susan, just saying that it is not a popular line of thought, and thus many modern translations have removed a lot of the language that offends – being a ‘slave’ (bond servant) of Christ, is a typical example.) I sometimes think it is pride that we don’t like to think God would want us to be robots: like it is somehow a better deal that He ended up with “dead in sin” people that He had to “quicken”.
But with that, would there have been trust… love… relationship?
I hear what you’re saying, I do. But I often wonder if we don’t miss something bigger (because it is the nature of man to think it’s all about me 😛 ). God could have chosen all sorts of alternative paths. He could have punished Satan straight up, instead of letting him loose in the world. But I wonder… since our primary purpose is to glorify God, and since we can’t love Him without His intervention anyway (which makes the whole robot argument seem .. not so relevant, to me) and since God clearly still communicates with Satan (think of His pointing out Job to Satan for his attention), could not the purpose of man, the bringing glory to God, be about the events that happened before we came into being? Could it be that He chose man to show the heavenly hosts Who He is? His creative and redemptive powers? After all, Satan, being a created being, previously only had God’s word for it that God was not created Himself (just as the fool (who rejects the knowledge of God) says – if God created us, who created Him?)
And (tangent warning!) don’t you think it’s interesting that He gave the angels, and Lucifer, who by all accounts were many times more magnificent creations than we, the ability to sin, and yet He DIDN’T put a plan of redemption into place for them? My brain hurts just thinking about it.
Just some thoughts. 🙂 Possibly don’t make sense, but… that’s my reaction to the quote above. xx
Thumbs up to BB’s comments 🙂
Loathe to wade in here but just a thought re what you would do if someone told you something about John etc. Fact is, scripture makes it clear we would all have done the very same. Adam (and Eve) represented us. We should not think we would have done any better. 🙁
You are affirming above that God’s Grace is irresistable. Not only can one not choose Christ without first the movement of the HS but neither can he ignore or refuse it when it calls him effectually.
I don’t think it is good to speculate too much beyond what God has been pleased to reveal to us in His Word. As I commented on a previous post, He has ordained all things for His glory and the good of His people. Amen.
BTW Calvinism is really just a label and often very poorly applied or understood. As one who believes in the Sovereignty of God, The doctrines of Grace and many of the truths affirmed at the time of the Reformation I would much prefer to be called a Bible believing Christian. So many misconceptions, judgements and name calling. And may I say, often by those who really just want to stamp their feet and have it their way, instead of seeing what God really requires of us. We divide the body of Christ which is in fact one.
Ruby, I apologise if you felt I have labelled you or anyone by using the word ‘Calvinism’. To be frank, I had no idea what this was until a couple of years ago. I still don’t know the nuts and bolts of it all.
You mentioned ‘so many misconceptions, judgements and name calling.’ I hope you don’t mean me! I certainly loathe to be guilty of that! I have had it happen to me not so very long ago, and would be most grieved if I came across in that way. I might lack understanding about what someone of a Calvinist persuasion believes (which is why I made the comment to this post in the first place), but I don’t cast an stones at anyone, no matter the bent of their doctrinal beliefs.
I consider my self as you do… a Bible believing Christian. A ‘Spirit-led’ bible believing Christian, to be exact. That is what I identify with really. I don’t want to be labelled or put in a box either… just like I don’t want to do that to God.
I just noticed your annoyance, and I was hoping it wasn’t with me. I meant no offense to anyone, by referring to a man who started a movement of belief, or whatever anyone calls it. Sorry, I am not the most articulate person when it comes to ‘theology’ matters. 😉
You are very sweet, Amanda. I was in fact, not annoyed. Forgive me is I sounded so, or defencive. It takes a lot to stoke this old fire! Sometimes, we of “Calvinistic” persuasion are thought to be loveless, robotic etc. and this is where I feel it is a poor labeling. Even of John Calvin himself. Because one believes that salvation is all of grace and none of man’s doing does not mean we do not believe that man is responsible. Nor does it mean we do not believe in the preachin of the gospel, the calling to repentence of sinners because we know that this work is of the Holy spirit.
You did not say those accusations ~ I am merely saying what some of the misconceptions are. Some of these thoughts have been mentioned or implied in some of the posts here. Believe me, we are continually accused of being Hyper Calvinists. Esteem the man as I do, we do not hold his works about the scriputres or the clear teaching of it.
One of my desires in my own blog has been to present my thoughts from a practical and loving christian view point. I hope that is in a small way reflected there and I do not strike people as one of those frozen chosen ~ the dreaded Calvinist!
As I said in the above comment. We are one body. It is good to discuss the Word and what God requires of us. It is not good to divide the body of Christ.
Ruby, to coin a phrase you used here in a previous post: “PHEW”! LOL
Thank you for clarifying things for me. Often we don’t know what another person has been through, or had to deal with, concerning their beliefs etc, and along comes someone (like me), who a bit green when it comes to certain theological-type discussions, and feels completely like a duck out of water…
I am so glad all is well with us… I don’t like division one little bit 😉
“Phew” I coined that? Yes, one of my high literary moments!:handshake: