Introduction
We are continuing our series review C. Gordon Olson’s Getting the Gospel Right (GTGR). In this section we will begin to work through chapter two and take issue with several statements that Olson makes. For the entire series, please see the Table of Contents post.
The purpose of chapter two is to discuss man’s bearing of God’s image. However, Olson will begin to discuss and reject the notion of God’s decree. We wholehearted concur with Olson’s statement “Any attempt to develop an inductive theology of salvation must start with the character and attributes of the God who saves sinners” (GTGR, 11). Although Olson rejects that Calvinism is built upon careful study of the text, this inductive approach and foundational aspects of God’s character is precisely where Calvinism starts (logically anyways).
God’s Plan Before Time
Olson beings by stating a key question: “what is mean by the sovereignty of God and the depravity of man?” (GTGR, 11). After quoting Que Sera, Sera, he asks: Is this true? Followed by a series of questions:
“Is God the author of sin? Does God actually change His mind? Is God responsible for atrocities, such as the holocaust or nature’s calamities? Has God really decreed before the creation all that transpires on earth? Is life really a stacked deck?” Etc. etc.
There is perhaps a subtle impression that if you answer no to the first three questions one must answer no to “Has God really decreed…”. Or if one answers yes to the latter question the first three must be answered “yes”. Hopefully that is not what Olson intends to imply for Calvinists distinguish quietly meticulously between a passive decree (what God permits) and an active decree (what God actively establishes). Even Olson’s own notion of ‘God limiting his sovereignty’ is a species of permissive decree although he does not use such language. Nevertheless, we concur with Olson that sovereignty and depravity must be defined directly from Scripture, however, we will demur that Olson has failed to really do this.
Olson goes on to brief mention the eternal Trinity (p.12). Then we find out “Before creation God made a plan for the salvation of the world to be made known through Israel and the church” (p.13). Olson clearly holds that God planned redemption before the foundation of the world but he does not tell us at this point the basis for God’s electing us. Later, he will of course place the emphasis on God’s foreknowledge. Nevertheless, Olson does not reject a plan of God in eternity past as it relates to Jesus Christ’s death. If Christ really is the center of history, do we want to say there are elements of history outside of God’s plan. Ironically, Olson does not see how vital this relates to the decree. If God planned salvation before the foundation of the world He had to either plan to allow man to disobey him or at the very least plan to create man knowing full well that man would sin and fall into evil. If God determined to create man and he determined to send Christ, it would not be possible for man to not sin since once God foreknows something it has to come to pass. If he planned redemption before the foundation of the world there are a host of other things that need to fall into the plan of God including: creation, the fall, the actions of individuals and their consequences throughout history to bring the about Jesus {this would include marriage, acts of procreation, union of specific sperms & eggs, combinations of DNA, the actions of Judah with respect to Tamar, sins Noami’s sons, the actions of Ruth, the actions of Boaz, etc. etc.} Suddenly, we find a whole number of things that must be within the plan of God. Even if some of these acts are things God permits, they do not fall outside of His plan since His plan was to bring Jesus Christ as our salvation.
Olson continues “Unfortunately, theologians of the past centuries developed elaborate notions of a comprehensive decree or decrees of God in the past eternity, by which He determined all that was to take place in the whole world through time” (p.13). Olson is hardly objective in his critique, “In letting their imaginations run, they got involved in sometimes bitter debate about the order of these supposed decrees of God” (p.13).
He tells us the New Testament is silent on the issue of decrees and the only place we read about them in the Old Testament is in the following six passages: Psalm 2:7; Job 28:26; 38:10; Psalm 148:6; Prov. 8:29; Jer. 5:22.
God’s Awesome Creation
In this section, there is very little that a Calvinist or an Arminian would be at odds with. Both happily affirm creation ex nihilo. Both affirm God’s sovereignty in establishing his creation fiat, just as Olson does. With praise and worship, we can all unite in affirming “the majesty of this time-space universe is a growing testimony to the majesty of the infinite God Who created it all” (GTGR, 14).
Almost all theologies today acknowledge the created nobility of humanity. In fact, Calvinsim would affirm it also. With Olson, Calvinism affirms that man is created in God’s image. However, Olson assumes that since Adam bear’s viceregency, God must limit his regency: “In the very act of creating human beings in His own image, God voluntarily limited the exercise of His own sovereignty” (p.16).
He argues that “What man does (relate to God and other people) and is able to do (exercise rule over nature) is dependent upon who he is (the substantive reality)” (p. 16). This substantive reality is the eternality of man. He further defines the image of God as “man’s intelligence to his knowledge of God’s revealed truth, which needs to be restored in fallen man through the new birth and the ongoing renewal process of the mind of the mind of the believer” (p.16). “Man was created as a moral being with moral choices, which animals are incapable of making” (p.16).
Olson takes a trichotomist position—that man is soul, spirit and body. Most theologians today would probably take a dichotomist position—that man is made up of a body and spirit that exists in pschysomatic union. This is no major area of contention. Although, Olson is unclear what he means when he says “Although the human spirit died in the fall, when we trust Christ our spirit is actually made alive and functional again, so that we can relate to God personally” (p.17).
Again, we find that God’s delegating Adam with authority is “in itself a further self-limitation of the exercise of God’s sovereignty.” Certainly, Adam was created to rule over creation but delegating authority is not abdication of authority in that area. But for Olson, “In these delegated areas God was no longer exercising His sovereignty” (p.18).
The two examples Olson gives is Adam’s naming the animals and Adam’s choice to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But did God’s establishing of Adam’s vice-regency necessarily entail a restrictions of His own regency? There is no explicit or obvious statements that this must entail God’s limiting of His sovereignty. Why can’t vice-regency function within and under the regency of God? It is hardly the case that man is autonomous, quite the opposite, He is under God’s covenant Lordship and is given at least one instruction for operating in the garden. If he truly bore the image of God, he was further responsibility to conduct himself as that image, exercising vice-regency after the pattern of God’s regency. We should remind Olson of the quote he uses from John Frame:
“Use of it [the concept of “sovereignty”] requires some careful thinking rather than jumping to conclusions that seem intuitive. What seems intuitive for one theologian will be counter-intuitive for another.” (qtd. p. 11 & 18).
Olson seems to argue that it is natural or “intuitive” to assume that since sovereignty is delegated this must entail a self-restriction of the one who delegates it. But is this how God portrays his sovereignty? When a human wills something to be has God restrained His will in that area? Does the human will function outside the plan and purpose of God. Let us consider some Biblical examples.
Does God willing restrict His Sovereignty in Human affairs?
Let us first consider another example, particularly as it pertains to regency:
I don’t think we need to establish that God raises up kings and delegates authority to them. For example:
Daniel 4:32 32 and you shall be driven from among men, and your dwelling shall be with the beasts of the field. And you shall be made to eat grass like an ox, and seven periods of time shall pass over you, until you know that the Most High rules the kingdom of men and gives it to whom he will."
So God has ultimately given the kingdom of Babylon to Nebuchadnezzar. Does this entail God limiting His sovereignty?
This delegating of authority does not mean that God abdicates authority, or as Olson puts it “self-limitation of exercising authority” and “no longer exercising His sovereignty”. In fact, we read just the opposite:
Daniel 4:34-35 34 At the end of the days I, Nebuchadnezzar, lifted my eyes to heaven, and my reason returned to me, and I blessed the Most High, and praised and honored him who lives forever, for his dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom endures from generation to generation; 35 all the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, and he does according to his will among the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay his hand or say to him, "What have you done?"
Not even a human king, delegated sovereignty by God, limits the hand of God who does what is according to His will. This includes establishing and tearing down kingdoms according to His divine plan:
Acts 17:26-27 26 And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, 27 that they should seek God, in the hope that they might feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us,
Here, God determines [o`ri,saj-set, fix, determine, declare… i.e. a decree] how long nations should stand, when they should fall, and what there boundaries are. God has not limited authority over the nation just because He establishes a king to rule over it. One could hypothetically say, “well determining the allotted period is just determine the beginning and end points of handing over that sovereignty.” This would be quite a stretch but we will handle this potential objection. God still acts sovereignly within the Kingdom.
ESV Proverbs 21:1 The king's heart is a stream of water in the hand of the LORD; he turns it wherever he will.
Notice the imagery: just as one can turn the course of the stream, the Lord turns the heart of the king. God does not abdicate his sovereignty or self-limit it. In fact, God fashions all our hearts (Ps. 33:15). In fact, God determines all our steps:
Proverbs 16:1 The plans of the heart belong to man, but the answer of the tongue is from the LORD.
Proverbs 16:9 9 The heart of man plans his way, but the LORD establishes his steps.
Proverbs 20:24 A man's steps are from the LORD; how then can man understand his way?
This verb establishes in 16:9 is the same verb used to describe how God establishes the earth.
Jeremiah 10:12 It is he who made the earth by his power, who established the world by his wisdom, and by his understanding stretched out the heavens.
Man can have many plans but only those of the Lord’s succeed:
Proverbs 19:21 Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the LORD that will stand.
So for example, God changes the heart of the king of Assyria:
Ezra 6:22 And they kept the Feast of Unleavened Bread seven days with joy, for the LORD had made them joyful and had turned the heart of the king of Assyria to them, so that he aided them in the work of the house of God, the God of Israel.
God promises to harden Pharoah’s heart even before Pharoah made any decision. Pharoah’s response in hardening His heart is the result of God’s activity.
Exodus 4:21 21 And the LORD said to Moses, "When you go back to Egypt, see that you do before Pharaoh all the miracles that I have put in your power. But I will harden his heart, so that he will not let the people go.
Exodus 7:3 3 But I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and though I multiply my signs and wonders in the land of Egypt,
Exodus 14:4 4 And I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and he will pursue them, and I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his host, and the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD." And they did so.
Exodus 14:17 17 And I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they shall go in after them, and I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his host, his chariots, and his horsemen.
Exodus 7:13-14 13 Still Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and he would not listen to them, as the LORD had said. 14 Then the LORD said to Moses, "Pharaoh's heart is hardened; he refuses to let the people go.
Exodus 7:22 22 But the magicians of Egypt did the same by their secret arts. So Pharaoh's heart remained hardened, and he would not listen to them, as the LORD had said.
Exodus 8:15 15 But when Pharaoh saw that there was a respite, he hardened his heart and would not listen to them, as the LORD had said.
Exodus 8:19 19 Then the magicians said to Pharaoh, "This is the finger of God." But Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and he would not listen to them, as the LORD had said.
Exodus 8:32 32 But Pharaoh hardened his heart this time also, and did not let the people go.
Exodus 9:7 7 And Pharaoh sent, and behold, not one of the livestock of Israel was dead. But the heart of Pharaoh was hardened, and he did not let the people go.
Exodus 9:12 12 But the LORD hardened the heart of Pharaoh, and he did not listen to them, as the LORD had spoken to Moses.
Exodus 9:34 34 But when Pharaoh saw that the rain and the hail and the thunder had ceased, he sinned yet again and hardened his heart, he and his servants.
Exodus 9:35 35 So the heart of Pharaoh was hardened, and he did not let the people of Israel go, just as the LORD had spoken through Moses.
ESV Exodus 10:1 Then the LORD said to Moses, "Go in to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the heart of his servants, that I may show these signs of mine among them,
Exodus 10:20 20 But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he did not let the people of Israel go.
Exodus 10:27 27 But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he would not let them go.
Exodus 11:10 10 Moses and Aaron did all these wonders before Pharaoh, and the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he did not let the people of Israel go out of his land.
Exodus 14:8 8 And the LORD hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and he pursued the people of Israel while the people of Israel were going out defiantly.
Certainly, Pharaoh hardened his heart but before Pharaoh’s own actions God says “I will harden his heart.” We are told time and time again that Pharaoh hardened his heart as the Lord said. Notice however, God does not merely predict that Pharaoh will harden his heart, but God is the active agent, the subject of the verb: “I will harden his heart.” [ABli-ta, qZEx;a] ynIa]w:]. There is no possible way to say that God had limited his sovereignty in these matters.
Furthermore, God is the one who has brought Pharaoh into this position. God has actually raised up Pharaoh to be king so that God could show His own power and might.
Exodus 9:16 But for this purpose I have raised you up, to show you my power, so that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth.
Olson’s comment on this comes much later, which we will deal with in due course. However, it is relevant to note here: “There are seven clear references to Pharoah’s heart being characteristically hard (Ex. 7:13-14, 22; 8:19; 9:7) and even to Pharaoh hardening his own heart (8:15, 32), and before God then hardened his heart even further judgmentally (Ex. 9:12; 10:1; 11:10 and 14:8)” (p. 300-1, italic original). However, the very first thing before any of the action is God promising: “I will harden his heart.” However in 7:13-14, 7:22; 8:19 we are told that Pharaoh hardening his heart was “as the LORD said.” Not to put to fine a point on it but what did the LORD say? Pharaoh will harden his heart? I will allow Pharaoh to harden his heart? Or I will harden Pharaoh’s heart? This does not deny Pharaoh’s activity and guilt in the matter but the initiating agents is God’s action “I will harden His heart.”
One more example from Isaiah 10:
First, we find God promising to send Assyria to destroy the nation of Israel. God determines and commands that Assyria should attack Israel:
Isaiah 10:5-6 5 Ah, Assyria, the rod of my anger; the staff in their hands is my fury! 6 Against a godless nation I send him, and against the people of my wrath I command him, to take spoil and seize plunder, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets.
Second, the king of Assyria fulfills this plan but not with acknowledge of God’s hand but in prideful arrogance assuming his own glory:
Isaiah 10:7 7 But he does not so intend, and his heart does not so think; but it is in his heart to destroy, and to cut off nations not a few;
Isaiah 10:12-13 12 When the Lord has finished all his work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem, he will punish the speech of the arrogant heart of the king of Assyria and the boastful look in his eyes. 13 For he says: "By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom, for I have understanding; I remove the boundaries of peoples, and plunder their treasures; like a bull I bring down those who sit on thrones.
Third, Israel is not to worry because of God’s hand upon all of these events that are carried out by the rebellious will of the Assyrian king:
Isaiah 10:24-27 24 Therefore thus says the Lord GOD of hosts: "O my people, who dwell in Zion, be not afraid of the Assyrians when they strike with the rod and lift up their staff against you as the Egyptians did. 25 For in a very little while my fury will come to an end, and my anger will be directed to their destruction. 26 And the LORD of hosts will wield against them a whip, as when he struck Midian at the rock of Oreb. And his staff will be over the sea, and he will lift it as he did in Egypt. 27 And in that day his burden will depart from your shoulder, and his yoke from your neck; and the yoke will be broken because of the fat."
What we find then is that these things are part of God’s purpose and plan. Once God has planned it, it will not be thwarted, stopped or turned back. God does not limit His sovereignty in these matters but His sovereignty carries forward His intent to the desired end:
Isaiah 14:24-27 24 The LORD of hosts has sworn: "As I have planned, so shall it be, and as I have purposed, so shall it stand, 25 that I will break the Assyrian in my land, and on my mountains trample him underfoot; and his yoke shall depart from them, and his burden from their shoulder." 26 This is the purpose that is purposed concerning the whole earth, and this is the hand that is stretched out over all the nations. 27 For the LORD of hosts has purposed, and who will annul it? His hand is stretched out, and who will turn it back?
What we have is not God limiting his sovereignty but rather his sovereignty and human responsibility going hand in hand. Even as man makes decisions according to his intention, God at the has determined all that will occur. So for example, who sold Joseph into slavery?
Was is God’s plan or the actions of Joseph’s brothers?
Genesis 45:5 And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. 6 For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there are yet five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvest. 7 And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. 8 So it was not you who sent me here, but God. He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house and ruler over all the land of Egypt.
It was God’s actions in sending Joseph so that he would preserve their lives. Yet it was the actions of the brothers that sold Joseph into slavery. So that while the brother meant that these things should be done to harm Joseph, God’s intention was that it should turn out for good. The sovereignty of God—in His free and divine intention—is worked out even in the rebellious heart of humanity as they mean these things for evil.
Genesis 50:20 20 As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.
These passages do not portray God merely working things out after the fact but rather while the humans intend something for one reason, God precisely intends this same action for another reason. God’s sovereignty is not restricted in these matters but rather worked out even through the evil intention of the human heart. We do not find God self-limiting his intentions so that man’s can make free decision rather we find in the human activity with human intention the sovereign intent of God is being carried through to its end.
God can turn the human heart:
Psalm 105:24-25 24 And the LORD made his people very fruitful and made them stronger than their foes. 25 He turned their hearts to hate his people, to deal craftily with his servants.
Deuteronomy 2:30 30 But Sihon the king of Heshbon would not let us pass by him, for the LORD your God hardened his spirit and made his heart obstinate, that he might give him into your hand, as he is this day.
ESV Joshua 11:19 There was not a city that made peace with the people of Israel except the Hivites, the inhabitants of Gibeon. They took them all in battle. 20 For it was the LORD's doing to harden their hearts that they should come against Israel in battle, in order that they should be devoted to destruction and should receive no mercy but be destroyed, just as the LORD commanded Moses.
Isaiah 63:17 17 O LORD, why do you make us wander from your ways and harden our heart, so that we fear you not? Return for the sake of your servants, the tribes of your heritage.
God’s Control over Everything:
The scope of God’s control in this things is universal:
Lamentations 3:37-39 37 Who has spoken and it came to pass, unless the Lord has commanded it? 38 Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that good and bad come? 39 Why should a living man complain, a man, about the punishment of his sins?
The context of the passage is important. God’s people are waiting quietly for the salvation of the Lord (v.26). When God’s people are in grief and strife they cannot escape from God’s steadfast love (vv. 27-32). In fact, the injustice God’s people are suffering is not morally acceptable to God (vv.33-36). Yet, no one can say or do anything unless the Lord commands it. This means the suffering that God’s people are going through at the hands of wicked men is not outside of the plan and control of God, it would not have happened unless He commanded it. In fact, there is a rhetorical question: is it not from the mouth of the Most High that good and bad come? In fact, man has no right to complain when God uses the evils of others to punish us for or sins. The human being may plan to commit evil but God’s intention was that the events should be for punishment for sin. He intended the events. It would not have happened had he not commanded it. The emphasis here is that no one can speak and have their actions come to pass unless God commanded it.
Conclusion:
There is no biblical warrant for assuming that because man is responsible for His actions that God must have restricted His sovereignty over those events. In fact, God’s sovereignty is completely compatible with man’s responsibility in the Biblical model. Man certainly does desire to do evil and carries out heinous deeds (e.g. Pharaoh, Assyrian king, etc.). However, God has not restrained His authority so that “Que Sera, Sera”. Rather, God’s hand and control permits and allows these things. There is divine intentionality behind all things.
Daniel 4:35 all the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, and he does according to his will among the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay his hand or say to him, "What have you done?"
Recommended Reading:
John Frame, The Doctrine of God, (Philipsburg, New Jersey: Presbyterian and Reformed, 2002) especially chapters 4,5,8,9,16, and 23. If anyone doubts that Reformed believers deal with these concepts “inductively” by turning to Scripture, one should read this work which site voluminous Scripture, more than we have briefly cited.