Open theology & foreknowledge.

McLaren touches on open theology in a New Kind of Christian. While (characteristically) not giving a point by point analysis, he helpfully points out that openness proponents may simply be searching for a model of divine control and divine sovereignty that extends beyond modernistic reductionism. Or in other words, instead of interpreting ‘God is sovereign’ to mean ‘God controls the world like an engineer controls a machine’, they interpret it to mean something more like ‘God controls the world like a good parent controls a child’.

Good parenting involves relinquishing control rather than micromanaging every minute detail. Boyd touches on this in some of his works when he says that Calvinism paints a very ‘insecure’ picture of God (a God who can’t ‘let go’). The Openness claim then, is simply that God sets boundaries within which we are free to operate, not for the sake of autonomy itself (free will is merely a means to an end), but for the sake of genuine relationship.

While I am wary of Boyd’s sometimes simplistic approach to Scripture (though I think he intentionally simplifies his thoughts for the sake of the layperson who might read his works), I am much indebted to openness theologians such as Walter Brueggemann and Terence Fretheim (who show a little more nuance in their exegesis).

For a deeper look into Boyd’s worldview, I recommend God at War and (especially) Satan and the Problem of Evil (though the latter is intended as a sequel to the former). For the continuing conversation, I should confess my bias. I am a regularly attending member of the congregation Greg pastors, and am quite fond of many of his views. His preaching focuses on being the people of God, and on advancing the Kingdom. Something I cannot but embrace whole-heartedly.

Anyway, for the conversation at hand, I think exploring Old Testament speech about God is one place to start. The metaphors of parent and lover (cf. Hosea) are particularly interesting to me.

Open theism as the beginning of a response to the ‘problem of evil’ is maybe a little weak, but that is for another day.

Perhaps if we could stay away from the traditional categories of free will and predestination, that would be good. I like to think more in terms of autonomy, mutuality and co-authorship of history (categories that ‘fit’ with Scripture better than others traditionally used in debates over sovereignty).

Peace, -Daniel-

The view that God is ‘open’ (rather than operating in a closed ‘predestined’ system) is not at all new, and that God changes his mind can be argued from a catalogue of proof texts as well as an understanding of God’s person/nature, or how God characteristically acts. The arguments go back to the Arminius/de Beza debates, sadly foreclosed for the reformed church by the Synod of Doort. In fact they go back further, to philosophical concepts such as Aristotle’s ‘unmoved first mover’ - which may have influenced/distorted later theology more than theologians have realised.

More recently, Gordon C. Olson argued for the ‘openness’ position, succinctly summed up in the phrase ‘God knows everything that is knowable’ (not his phrase, but how an ‘openness’ view came to be adopted in a worldwide mission organisation which leaned towards this thinking - also developed in ‘the moral government of God’ theology). Clark Pinnock pursues the theme from another angle, exploring the social relationship view of the trinity (Eg Flame of Love) - if you don’t just dismiss him as a maverick and opportunist defector from Calvinism.

The article by ‘The Reverend Rebecca’ cited above with the link seems to me to summarise the position quite adequately - with views to which I have been sympathetic for a long time. For me, it has also been a surprising discovery that Calvin did not hold many of the views with which he is credited, and that reformed theology need not be oppressive, provided it is held critically, as one view amongst many, and reflecting the cultural biases of its historical context - especially the rise of ‘modernism’ with its leanings towards foundationalist systems and an individualistic expression of the faith.