Redeeming Sociology by Vern S. Poythress

Author:Vern S. Poythress [Vern Sheridan Poythress]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-4335-2132-4
Publisher: Crossway
Published: 2011-04-19T16:00:00+00:00

Three Perspectives on God’s Actions

Now let us concentrate on insights that can come from using the three perspectives—particle, wave, and field (from chap. 7).

A Particle Perspective on Interpreting God’s Action

First, let us apply the particle perspective to understanding God’s actions. God knows beforehand all of the ways in which he desires people to understand and appropriate an action of his—whether one of the great acts of redemption, such as the exodus from Egypt, or an “ordinary” providential action, such as causing the opening of a flower bud into a blossom or empowering a father to move a puzzle piece into place. God’s knowledge encompasses all the reactions to what he has done throughout history. All the approved reactions are part of his intention. Even reactions that God does not approve of are still within his sovereign control. In fact, in a larger sense God’s intention for the exodus would include hypothetical approved reactions that do not happen to occur in the actual historical process. God knows the possibilities as well as the actualities (see, e.g., 1 Sam. 23:9–12).

The knowledge of God is complete and does not change. So his total intention for the exodus, the total meaning of the exodus, does not change with time. The same is true for his total intention for the moving of a jigsaw piece. In the particle perspective, we would focus on this unchanging total intention. If we equate God’s meaning with his intention, we can say that the meaning is unchanging. “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away,” Jesus says (Matt. 24:35). The same kind of unchanging meaning belongs to an act like the exodus.

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