Deeper Waters

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters as we continue our dive into the ocean of truth searching for those pearls. We’re going through the Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas now in an attempt to understand the doctrine of God fuller. Our guide for this has been the Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas. That can be read for free at newadvent.org. Those who have products like the IPhone or Kindle can also download it. Best, however, would be to just purchase your own copy someday, at least the Prima Pars. We’re talking about the Will of God and today we’re going to be talking about the Will of Sign. Is that something distinguishable?

The Will of Sign refers more to the moral relationship that exists between God and men. This would mean such things like the Ten Commandments. Now in idea, we can speak about different wills in God. There is his sovereign will and there is his moral will. Sometimes, we speak of an individual will for some people, but I often think this falls more under the sovereign will in that he has a desire and he’s chosen certain individuals to fulfill that. In other words, the individuals play a part in the greater will of God. The will of God is not subservient to the individuals. We make it all about us, when really, if “God has a plan for our life” it is all about him. Not us.

The way we know what God’s will is also is that he has revealed it and he acts in accordance with what he desires. He punishes sin and he rewards goodness. We read in the Bible that God gets angry at sin. However, this is for our understanding of God’s view of sin. God does not get angry in the literal sense, but anger is a characteristic of one who punishes another and so when we see God acting in this way, we say of him that he is angry in the sense that he acts the way that an angry person acts.

The reason of course that God has only one will ultimately is that God is simple as has been said and what he has, he is. If there were two wills in God, then there would be parts to him. Once again, we are reminded that God is simple in his nature and why this is important. Aquinas went through his work in the order that he did for a reason and as we’ve gone through, we’ve seen that each part beautifully comes and builds on the part that came before it.

Today, we Christians should get out of this that we ought not to focus on so much an individual will for our lives but building on the nature of holiness in our lives. Is it not so much if you’re marrying the right person as it is if you are going to be the kind of spouse that you ought to be. It is not so much that you are picking the right career so much as if you are being the kind of employee you ought to be. It is not so much that you are going to the right school so much as you are being the right kind of student. God’s will for you, in fact, is not about you but about his glory.

I hope this has been a help to you. Remember everyone that what I do does depend on part from the help of people like you. I encourage any way in which you might want to help to make that a reality.

We shall continue tomorrow.

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters where we are diving into the ocean of truth. We’re going through the Summa Theologica now of Thomas Aquinas in an attempt to better understand the doctrine of God. This can be read for free at newadvent.org. After all, if we are to truly worship God and live out his teachings for a lost and dying world, we need to know who he is. We’ve been studying the will of God and tonight we’re going to look at the question of if God has free-will.

This is a really short question, but I do hope to expand it some. I also desire to bring in some personal application for us. The first objection to the idea that God has free-will is that God does not have free choice because according to Jerome, who was the church father who translated the Bible into the Latin Vulgate, God cannot sin.

Aquinas answers that this is not an objection against free will in the absolute sense. It only means that God is not free to sin. This is not a deficiency on the part of God. It is like the question of which general in a war is the deficient one? Is it the one who wins every battle and cannot lose or the one who can lose a battle? To answer this question, just choose which one you want to go out fighting your battles for you and which one you want to put your trust in.

This also applies to us. When we get to Heaven, we will not be able to sin because upon seeing God, our wills will be moved towards him and we cannot move away from his utter goodness and perfection. Freedom is not an end but a means and it will have met its means, that we will always be doing the good.

The second objection tells us that freedom is a matter of the reason and the will. However, God cannot will evil. Thus, he could only will the good. Since it is only the good that he is capable of willing, then it would seem to be that God does not have free will.

However, while God cannot will evil, God can will to choose between two opposites where neither one is evil. For instance, I can choose to stand up now or stay seated. Neither one is evil. Either choice can be made and neither choice will involve sin.

The ultimate reason for why this is the case however is that God must only will one thing necessarily and that is his own goodness. God cannot be bound by anything external to him as if he has to will that thing. God did not have to will our creation, but it was because of his love and his grace that he chose to bring this about. God did this freely. It is our privilege that we can truly turn in freedom and praise the Father above who gives us every good and gracious gift.

I hope this look at God’s freedom has been helpful. If you do support the work that is being done here, I invite your prayers for me in my own walk and if you wish to support financially, that’s welcome as well. Our ministry will be expanding soon and I look forward to sharing that when it happens.

We shall continue tomorrow.

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters where we are diving into the ocean of truth. I hope last night cleared up the issue I wrote for and I do hope my readers understood it. It’s a difficult topic to explain and I certainly won’t claim to have full knowledge of it yet. I see through a glass darkly. Tonight, we’re going to continue looking at the will of God in the Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas. That can be read at newadvent.org for free and I hope that many of you who might be being introduced to Thomas for the first time are really enjoying his knowledge and seeing how he dealt so well with questions we are asking today.

Aquinas says that in no way can God will evil because the good relates to the appetite and a good appetite always seeks the good. A wise man is one who in no way would help someone be worse. If that is the case, how much more would God, in an a fortiori sense, not help someone else be worse seeing as he is not just wise, but wisdom, and not just good, but goodness?

Aquinas does say that God might allow some evils to happen accidentally. The example is given of a lion who kills its prey. What the lion really seeks is the food that he desires. What he does not seek is simply the death of the gazelle simply to kill the gazelle.

In the sense of ethics, Aquinas tells us that no one seeks evil for the sake of evil. They seek it for something else. The man who seeks an adulterous affair does not seek it for the sake of adultery. He seeks it for the sake of pleasure perhaps from secrecy or the idea that he could get caught at any moment.

C.S. Lewis once spoke of a man who is a sex addict and how someone will say of him that he needs a woman and Lewis says that a woman is the last thing he needs. He is seeking instead pleasure and a female body is the apparatus by which he intends to get that pleasure. If he met a woman, he would not know what to do with her.

God then does not seek out evil. he does bring about punishment as a natural order of things and that is in the willing of justice, which is a good. He does will some things to be corrupted, but this is willed in the ordering of the preservation of nature as a whole. In willing the good of human freedom, he also willed that there would be a possibility of evil, but we are the ones who have actualized that possibility.

In conclusion, God being goodness wills the good of all things. We Christians should take heart in that. Whatever is going on in our lives, God is willing our good. He is seeking that which is best for us and what we need to do is submit to the hand of the potter and allow him to operate.

That’s it for tonight and remember dear readers that I do always seek your support be it prayerfully or financially.

We shall continue tomorrow.

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters as we continue our dive into the ocean of truth. I’d like to take the time to respond to a question that came in on the wall. I don’t often do this. This blog is just one aspect of ministry after all and I’d really like to see interaction with those who post on here amongst themselves someday, but that is in the future when this expands. The question was asked by Jwarrend on my stance on God changing his mind. After all, it seems pretty clear from Scripture that he does change his mind doesn’t it?

Well, not so fast.

In Numbers for instance, we find that Balaam implores of God as to whether he should go with the men of Balak to curse Israel. Eventually, God lets him go, but the incident with the donkey shows he isn’t exactly pleased with this. It is later on that Balaam aware of what happened anyway says the following in 23:19.

God is not a man, that he should lie,
nor a son of man, that he should change his mind.
Does he speak and then not act?
Does he promise and not fulfill?

Let’s go to another example. What about 1 Samuel 15? In describing the conquest of the Amalekites, we find the following:

“I am grieved that I have made Saul king, because he has turned away from me and has not carried out my instructions.” Samuel was troubled, and he cried out to the LORD all that night.

Yet what do verses 28 and 29 have to say about this?

Samuel said to him, “The LORD has torn the kingdom of Israel from you today and has given it to one of your neighbors—to one better than you. 29 He who is the Glory of Israel does not lie or change his mind; for he is not a man, that he should change his mind.”

Here’s the point I want you readers to see. The clash is intended! How do we know what to take as literal however and what to take as metaphorical? What’s going on in these passages? Has God changed his mind or not?

An analogy of this would be to see numerous passages that describe a body of God. They speak of his hands and his eyes and his arm and his ears and several other body parts. However, when we read those, we know that those are not literal descriptions. God is not physical as is shown all throughout Scripture due to him being spirit.

However, he is described in this way because this is the way we understand things. When we hear about the eyes of the Lord going throughout the land, we understand it to mean that God is searching. When we hear about the arm of the Lord, we understand it to mean his power. We understand visions are meant to capture his glory. He does not have a body as described in visions, but that body is meant to show his grandeur for us.

I take the descriptions of God changing his mind to be the same way. God does not literally change his mind, but he describes it in that way so we can understand him. We know what it’s like to grieve over something. I do not believe God is literally doing this, but he is acting like one who is grieved.

Jwarrend also gave an analogy to use of his changing his relation to God. I thought this was an excellent one and I’ll just put it here.

“My solution to this question is to posit that God, rather than being atemporal, is in fact omni-temporal — He is dynamically involved in all moments of time simultaneously. So when God says, in year X, “I will not bless Jeff with my favor, because He is not a believer”, that can be true, and when He says in year Y (Y>X) “Jeff WILL receive my favor because now he IS a believer”, that’s also true, and there’s no incompatibility. Because my status changed in God’s eyes, God’s will towards me changed as well. But God’s goodness — His desire that I become a believer, His arrangement of circumstances in my life to bring about my belief, His offer of salvation extended to me as a free gift — were always constant, because His nature is constant.”

I find this to be an excellent description. God does not change in relation to us. We change in relation to him. The same fire that melts wax also hardens clay. This has also been a view of the after-death. The love of God that believers experience as joyful and bliss are, to those who want nothing to do with God, experienced as wrath and judgment.

Thus, I do agree. God’s will never did change. It is we who are changing in relation to the changeless God.

So thanks for the question and dear readers, if you support what is going on here, remember that I look for help from people like you. I welcome your donations but if you cannot do that, I appreciate your prayers.

We shall continue tomorrow.

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters where we are diving into the ocean of truth. We’ve been going through the doctrine of God right now and the Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas has been our guide. This can be read for free at NewAdvent.org. We’re studying right now the doctrine of the Will of God. We’re on the eighth question tonight in this topic and asking if the will of God imposes a necessity on things. Let us go to the question.

This has a lot to do with human freedom and in fact the reason Aquinas states that God’s will does not impose necessity is because human beings do have free-will. However, he will not defend that here as Aquinas later on does defend that when he gets to the doctrine of man. For obvious reasons, he wishes to start with the doctrine of God first.

Aquinas is of the position that God’s will does not impose necessity, but whatever it is that you and I do, God willed that we would freely choose to do something. No parallel could be exact, but we in America can consider that we have freedom of religion, the press, etc. Thus, we can freely choose to do or believe what it is we do or believe, but we can only do those freely because our founders intended us to have that freedom. None of the founding fathers were Muslims, but their freedom does allow for someone to be a Muslim.

So why is it that it seems that many things he would desire does not happen? It is not because of a deficiency in God. That is impossible. Instead, it is then because of a deficiency in the object. It is God’s will that I be sanctified, but I can assure any readers that I realize I am a long way from that goal. I do believe that if I submitted to the Holy Spirit, I could avoid sin. However, I still sin every day. It is not because the Holy Spirit is weak that this happens, but it is because I am weak.

Now I have no reason to believe that God’s ultimate will is ever thwarted, with events such as the return of Christ. At the same time, I believe God is sovereign and nothing happens outside of his allowing it. How do those two work together? I would not dare say that I have a clear answer yet. I am willing to accept the freedom of man and the sovereignty of God and say that while it is fun to ponder, I see no place for dogmatism without conclusive arguments.

So in closing, I will simply say that whatever it is that you do, God willed that you would be able to freely do it. For the debates on secondary issues, I once again remind readers that I do not wish this blog to be about secondary issues. I am interested in helping Christians defend the issues that we all agree on regardless of how strongly I might hold to some secondary positions.

Finally readers, please keep in mind that this work that I do is in part supported by people like you and while there are many in hard times financially as I realize, I am as well. If you like what you see here and wish to support it, you may do so by going to the donate button. If you do, I thank you for your gift.

We shall continue tomorrow.

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters. I hope you’re enjoying our blog series. If you are someone who regularly enjoys, I hope you will also be willing to make a donation. Right now, I am in a tighter financial spot than I’d like to be in and any help would be appreciated. If not that, your prayers are greatly desired. For our study now, we’re going through the doctrine of God in Christian thought and our guide for this has been the Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas. This can be read for free at newadvent.org. We’re on the topic of the will of God and we’re asking if the will of God is changeable. Let’s go to the text.

There is truly nothing new under the sun. In debates on open theism today, the verses that are used are two of the verses that Thomas Aquinas replies to. We have the account of the flood in Genesis where God repented of making man and then that of Jeremiah where is told that if he wants to destroy a nation and the nation repents, he won’t, and if he wants to bless a nation and the nation strays, he won’t.

For Aquinas, the first is to be understood metaphorically. God does not literally repent but his actions seem to be that of a man who repents. This is the same thing that is said about emotions like angry. God is not literally angry but he is acting like a man who is angry.

For the second, God is not changing his will but different things are falling under his will in different ways. If one does good, it is God’s will to bless that one generally. If one does evil, it is God’s will to punish that one. Aquinas wants us to know that because God wills a change in a thing, that does not mean the thing has somehow brought about a change in the will of God.

The will of God could only change if something in God changed. That would be his disposition would have to change or his knowledge would have to change. His disposition would refer to his goodness and his goodness cannot change. His knowledge cannot change either and both of these have been established in past blogs. Thus, since the source of the will does not change, his goodness, then his will cannot change in that way. He cannot get new knowledge so he decides to will something other than what he had willed before, so his will cannot change in that way. In either case, God’s will cannot change.

This again is the fascinating aspect of the medieval philosophers. They took these questions seriously. I believe that, for instance, Thomas Aquinas refuted the Mormon doctrine of God long before Mormonism ever came along. The apologists of the past were prepared in advance for the heresies that were coming by having a thorough knowledge of God. May we learn to be prepared in advance for the challenges coming our way today so we are not merely responsive but are proactively making a difference.

We shall continue tomorrow.

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters where we are diving into the ocean of truth. Right now, we’re going through the doctrine of God in Christian thought and the guide that has been chosen for this is the Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas which can be read for free at newadvent.org. As I remarked to a friend this morning, the more we understand the doctrine of God, the more we can enjoy our relationship and appreciate him for who He is for greater knowledge of something increases our enjoyment of it. We’re studying right now the will of God and we’re asking tonight if God’s will is always fulfilled.

This is a more controversial one and as you read over the section, you will notice that many of the questions we ask today are still relevant. For instance, we have the passage of saying that God wills all men to be saved. Anyone who has been in the Calvinist and Arminian debate knows about this verse.

And lo and behold, they knew about it also. Augustine had already said that God wills all men to be saved who are to be saved as Aquinas points out. It is not because there is someone who he does not wish to be saved but no one who is saved whose salvation God does not will.

There is also the possibility that this text refers to every class of men as if to say that God wants all kinds of people to be saved. There is indeed nothing new under the sun. These same debates have been going on in Christian history for centuries and will no doubt continue until the return of Christ.

And of course, there is the view that God does want all people to be saved beforehand, but knows that this will not happen. Aquinas uses an analogy of a judge who would will that all men be allowed to live, but at the same time will will the hanging of a murderer.

In this case, somehow everything does return to the will of God. If you fall out of the will at this point, you will fall in under another point. If you are not saved, you will submit to the will of God in judgment over your soul for instance. Whatever happens to you, you can be sure that God is aware of it.

Aquinas says that all must come under the will of God in some way and come about that way because ultimately, nothing can thwart the will of God. All causes that are secondary will trace back to the cause that is primary and through that cause all things come about. There is nothing that can override that. Now how this works with free-will and such, that is an in-house debate and like all in-house debates, I choose to not comment.

For Christians tonight, consider this. Whatever happens in your life has not escaped the notice of God and he has allowed it. We can often worry about so many things and when we do, it is because we have forgotten that God is in control of the world we live in. Trust him today. His will be accomplished and since we are told that will includes your Christlikeness in passages like Romans 8, that will happen as well.

We shall continue tomorrow.

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters where we are diving into the Ocean of Truth. We’re going through the doctrine of God in Christian Theology and our guide for this has been the Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas. You can read this online at newadvent.org. We’re studying the topic of the will of God right now and we’re asking if any cause can be assigned to the divine will. Let’s go to the question.

This is along the lines of the question of “If God created everything who created God?” If the will of God is the cause of all things, what caused the will of God? However, this can continue to an infinite regress. If there is a cause of that, we can ask what caused that. Can we rest in the conclusion that nothing causes the will of God?

Suppose you want to do something. For instance, I just mailed a letter out at a local mailbox. It’s a distance away, but not too far away, so I chose to walk. My end of course was getting the letter in the mail and I figured a walk would grant me some more reading time. However, I could have just as easily got in my car and drove over to the mailbox or I could have even just left it for the mail carrier to pick up here in the morning.

However, once I will the ends, I also will the means I want to go through to get to that end, but those are two different activities. I had the end in mind already that I wanted, but there were a number of ways that I could use in order to get to that end and willing the means was something separate.

It is the same with knowing a conclusion based on a principle. In seeing the conclusion, one can look at the principles then and understand how one got to that conclusion. Think back to being in a math class and being given a problem and seeing the answer and wondering how that answer was reached. Then, your teacher, if they were a good one, went through a process and showed you. You knew the conclusion, but in a separate act, you knew the way by which that conclusion was reached.

It is the same with the will of God. God wills all things by his goodness. However, once he has the end in mind, he does not will a means because of that end but in order to get to that end. It is by willing the means that he wills the end desired by that mean.

For my scientifically minded friends, Aquinas has some words for you also. By all means, seek out means by which processes come about. However, those are not primary causes. You can by all means consider why it is the arrow flies at the target, but do not neglect that there is an archer pulling the bow launching the arrow at that target. There is no need for Christians to fear secondary causes. These are instrumental causes God is using to bring about his goal.

We shall continue tomorrow.

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters where we are diving into the Ocean of Truth. I’ve had an odd day and I just ask everyone keep praying for me. I’m realizing more areas to work on and my tendency is unfortunately to focus on the negative. God’s making me a better man though with a great instrument to do that with. For now, let’s focus on our study of the doctrine of God. Thomas Aquinas’s Summa Theologica has been our guide and we’ll be continuing our study on the will of God. You can read the Summa for yourself online for free at newadvent.org. For now, let’s get to the question.

Tonight, we’re asking if the will of God is the cause of things. An important distinction needs to be made at the start. By things, Aquinas means substances I believe. I do not think Aquinas is saying that God is the cause of every action or event. Now he would believe that God allows every action or event, but God is not the cause of evil for instance, especially since evil isn’t a substance.

We have seen that God does not have to will anything outside of himself. He needs only will himself and he is complete in himself. However, his will flows out of his goodness and is an act of intellect. There must be an intellect before there is action as action seeks to reach an end.

This is also a challenge to our naturalistic way of thinking that tries to deny God. In this, there is no purpose. Things act, but ultimately, there is no reason why they act. The gazelle might seek to survive so it can reproduce, but there is no ultimate meaning for its reproducing. Even if it passes on fitter genes, so what? In the end, all dies in a cold death. There is no true progress for there is nothing for us to progress to.

God is also not determined by anything outside himself. He does not act out of necessity but out of the desire of his goodness and this is done through the will acting through the means of his intellect. Since the will is the one that acts through the intellect to produce things, then the will is the cause of those things.

Further, Aquinas tells us that results are produced insofar as they pre-exist in an agent. The classic example is that a painting is produced insofar as it pre-exists in the mind of the painter. In God, all things pre-exist in him. Since they pre-exist in the intellect, the way they come out is through the working of the will. If that is the case, then the will of God is the cause of things.

Thus, we conclude in agreement with Thomas that the will of God is the cause of things. How this relates to the problem of evil and the free-will of man will be discussed later on, but all substances that exist exist because it is the will of God that they exist.

We shall continue tomorrow.

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters where we are diving into the ocean of truth. We are going through the doctrine of God right now in Christian thought so we can learn all the more about the one who identified himself as “I AM”, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob who revealed himself best in Jesus Christ. Our guide for this has been the Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas. This can be read online at newadvent.org. We’re discussing the will of God and tonight, we’re going to discuss whether God wills what he wills necessarily.

There are some aspects to this that make it seem like it would be so. Mainly, isn’t God eternally doing all things and thus whatever he wills, he has been willing for all eternity? If that is the case, then he is willing necessarily. If he is eternally willing necessarily, then whatever he wills has been willed necessarily has it?

Not so fast.

Aquinas says that things can be said to be necessary absolutely or by supposition. Suppose you meet someone who is a bachelor. It is absolutely necessary that he be an unmarried male. If he is not an unmarried male, then he cannot be a bachelor. Suppose you want to draw a triangle. It is necessary that what you draw be an enclosed figure with three straight lines and three angels totaling 180 degrees.

The reason that these are necessary is that they are contained in the term itself. A bachelor is an unmarried male. A triangle is an enclosed figure with three straight lines and angles totaling up to 180 degrees. If you want to draw a figure that does not have those properties, it could be a figure indeed, but it is certainly not a triangle.

Thus, if you say “That bachelor is an unmarried male,” you are not saying anything about the bachelor that could not be known otherwise. If you say “That bachelor drives a Mercedes”, then you are saying something new. It is necessary to being a bachelor that one be an unmarried male. It is not necessary that one drives a Mercedes.

How about Socrates sitting? It is not necessary to the nature of Socrates that he be sitting. However, if Socrates is sitting, he necessarily sits. He cannot not be sitting if he is sitting. He can choose to stand up if he so desires, but he cannot stand up and be sitting at the same time.

God’s will is more that way. Whatever he wills, once he wills it, he wills it necessarily. However, it was not necessary to him that he will that. The only thing that he necessarily wills is his goodness. Aquinas says we can picture willing to go on a stroll. We do not have to will a horse to go on that scroll. We can go on a scroll without a horse, but riding a horse could be more pleasant.

God does not need to will anything else besides himself for his happiness. However, he can will other things in a way of diffusing his goodness that did not have to be. Once they are however, he wills them of necessity and cannot change that he wills something once he wills it.

We shall continue tomorrow.