After plumbing the depths of theology, the gospel remains the same. The real theological work is to persuade the natural man that the content of Christianity coheres with the world we see around us.
This is a great project, Joel. And I like the natural theologian stance. I am wondering, not really concerned, just wondering, whether you need to distinguish it from Natural Theology as a school of thought? Am I right that you are doing something a bit broader??? Maybe clarify this early on? Not sure this is a problem any more, as Natural Theology per se is so out of vogue. Just pondering...
Thanks, Cleo! I would still defend much of traditional natural theology, but I do want to suggest that natural theology is a broader kind of inquiry. Not only deductive proofs, it can include observation, study, and reflection that leads to a religious end without assuming that as a starting point.
If we are to take our idea of God from nature, a place to start would seem to be clear about what nature is.
Reality at every scale consists overwhelmingly of space. That's what nature mostly is, space.
Does space exist? Space doesn't meet our usual definition of existence as having weight and mass, shape and form. But space is clearly real, or all of reality would still be a single thing, as we're told it was before the Big Bang.
Perhaps the question "does God exist" has been a bad question all along, and that's why the debate remains eternally unresolved?
What if God does not exist, but is real, much as space, math, and the laws of physics don't exist, but are real?
This is a question which might arise by looking for God through the lens of the natural world.
My conversion to Christianity came at the end of a season of my life that was, in any metric, an utter disaster. Married at 17 to a pregnant girlfriend, with the child passing away at three months old on my watch. The marriage lasted a couple of years beyond that as we both descended into the popular lifestyle of being hippies. Drug use and alcohol were in abundance, as was the adultery (on my part) of the “free love” worldview. Ultimately, at the explosive end of that, I spend a year as a homeless man, steeping in the tea of my guilt over all this.
You said, "For any non-Christian to hear and respond to this gospel, he had to be already acquainted with several things: The existence of God, the law of God, the moral responsibility of man, the inevitability of death, and human sin and misery. “ It occurs to me that when I stood at the front of a church after an altar call, I stood there with all those ideas intact, or, at least, in one great and desperate hope that they are. Frankly, having lost any connection to hope for redemption of my load of guilt in the death of my son and for the rest of my very poor choices along the way, If this promised Jesus was not real, I was utterly done. So, in many ways, I stood there with a Christian worldview (though not an intentionally biblical one) It could be said I had a natural theology, having been brought to me outside of the pages of scripture but a clear divine revelation, nonetheless.
Moving the story ahead from that October day in 1975, it took me 20 years (I confess with some embarrassment) to come to a place that was some distance from the “biblicalism” that you mentioned above. Biblicalism was just not doing it for me anymore, as I observed the repeated appeal from the pulpit for the building of some emotional response to Jesus. I finally came to the conclusion that God was a rational Being, and we should have more of that approach. All objective Truth is God’s Truth, and we should try to seek out God with a more rational faith. I committed myself to the pursuit of real Truth, regardless of where it would take me. Christianity cannot be true because it is Christianity but because it is true.
That led me to the study of apologetics. Let’s first dispel the faulty ideas about apologetics The study of apologetics is not a pathway for Christians to win a debate and crush the worldviews of our opponents. You mentioned Aquinas and his “preambles of faith.” Apologetic pursuits are the quest for tools to provide these preambles of faith. I use the term “pre-evangelism.” That is possibly because I am less of an academic, having spent my career as a God-serving construction tradesman, and may be short on the lexicon of academia.
I have said all that wordiness to say I am with you as a natural theologian. I continue to be amazed at the complexity of our natural world. Observing the systems of systems functioning all around us is not, as some would say, an exercise in pareidolia, seeing patterns in the chaos which are not there. Denying that hand of a rational Creator requires a constant invocation of deeply committed a priori mental gymnastics. Though I may not be formally educated, I have spent almost 50 years in the “School of the Holy Spirit” and can tell you the information-cum-knowledge is the same stuff. God truly is good!
Ian, thanks so much for sharing! This is a perfect example of what I was talking about. "Pre-evangelism" is not an unsophisticated way to express - it's what I've come around to after three university degrees and now in the midst of a fourth. Francis Schaeffer was right all along (on that point).
The person on the brink of conversion who must choose whether to follow Christ *already has* a Christian worldview; the believe that the right things are true. The question that remains is one of the will; will you submit to the yoke of Christ? "For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."
I was thinking about this very topic last summer. I remember thinking that, when I stood there, I believed that God must exist, that He was able to save me, and that He wanted to save me. These are those right things. I was very aware, also, that, if any of those things were not right, I was finished as a human being, whatever that thought may entail. Thankfully I didn’t have to find out because He is all that and more!
This is a great project, Joel. And I like the natural theologian stance. I am wondering, not really concerned, just wondering, whether you need to distinguish it from Natural Theology as a school of thought? Am I right that you are doing something a bit broader??? Maybe clarify this early on? Not sure this is a problem any more, as Natural Theology per se is so out of vogue. Just pondering...
Thanks, Cleo! I would still defend much of traditional natural theology, but I do want to suggest that natural theology is a broader kind of inquiry. Not only deductive proofs, it can include observation, study, and reflection that leads to a religious end without assuming that as a starting point.
The concept of a natural theologian is quite appealing, great concept for a Substack. A quick try to join in...
https://joelcarini.substack.com/p/on-being-a-natural-theologian
If we are to take our idea of God from nature, a place to start would seem to be clear about what nature is.
Reality at every scale consists overwhelmingly of space. That's what nature mostly is, space.
Does space exist? Space doesn't meet our usual definition of existence as having weight and mass, shape and form. But space is clearly real, or all of reality would still be a single thing, as we're told it was before the Big Bang.
Perhaps the question "does God exist" has been a bad question all along, and that's why the debate remains eternally unresolved?
What if God does not exist, but is real, much as space, math, and the laws of physics don't exist, but are real?
This is a question which might arise by looking for God through the lens of the natural world.
My conversion to Christianity came at the end of a season of my life that was, in any metric, an utter disaster. Married at 17 to a pregnant girlfriend, with the child passing away at three months old on my watch. The marriage lasted a couple of years beyond that as we both descended into the popular lifestyle of being hippies. Drug use and alcohol were in abundance, as was the adultery (on my part) of the “free love” worldview. Ultimately, at the explosive end of that, I spend a year as a homeless man, steeping in the tea of my guilt over all this.
You said, "For any non-Christian to hear and respond to this gospel, he had to be already acquainted with several things: The existence of God, the law of God, the moral responsibility of man, the inevitability of death, and human sin and misery. “ It occurs to me that when I stood at the front of a church after an altar call, I stood there with all those ideas intact, or, at least, in one great and desperate hope that they are. Frankly, having lost any connection to hope for redemption of my load of guilt in the death of my son and for the rest of my very poor choices along the way, If this promised Jesus was not real, I was utterly done. So, in many ways, I stood there with a Christian worldview (though not an intentionally biblical one) It could be said I had a natural theology, having been brought to me outside of the pages of scripture but a clear divine revelation, nonetheless.
Moving the story ahead from that October day in 1975, it took me 20 years (I confess with some embarrassment) to come to a place that was some distance from the “biblicalism” that you mentioned above. Biblicalism was just not doing it for me anymore, as I observed the repeated appeal from the pulpit for the building of some emotional response to Jesus. I finally came to the conclusion that God was a rational Being, and we should have more of that approach. All objective Truth is God’s Truth, and we should try to seek out God with a more rational faith. I committed myself to the pursuit of real Truth, regardless of where it would take me. Christianity cannot be true because it is Christianity but because it is true.
That led me to the study of apologetics. Let’s first dispel the faulty ideas about apologetics The study of apologetics is not a pathway for Christians to win a debate and crush the worldviews of our opponents. You mentioned Aquinas and his “preambles of faith.” Apologetic pursuits are the quest for tools to provide these preambles of faith. I use the term “pre-evangelism.” That is possibly because I am less of an academic, having spent my career as a God-serving construction tradesman, and may be short on the lexicon of academia.
I have said all that wordiness to say I am with you as a natural theologian. I continue to be amazed at the complexity of our natural world. Observing the systems of systems functioning all around us is not, as some would say, an exercise in pareidolia, seeing patterns in the chaos which are not there. Denying that hand of a rational Creator requires a constant invocation of deeply committed a priori mental gymnastics. Though I may not be formally educated, I have spent almost 50 years in the “School of the Holy Spirit” and can tell you the information-cum-knowledge is the same stuff. God truly is good!
Ian, thanks so much for sharing! This is a perfect example of what I was talking about. "Pre-evangelism" is not an unsophisticated way to express - it's what I've come around to after three university degrees and now in the midst of a fourth. Francis Schaeffer was right all along (on that point).
The person on the brink of conversion who must choose whether to follow Christ *already has* a Christian worldview; the believe that the right things are true. The question that remains is one of the will; will you submit to the yoke of Christ? "For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."
I was thinking about this very topic last summer. I remember thinking that, when I stood there, I believed that God must exist, that He was able to save me, and that He wanted to save me. These are those right things. I was very aware, also, that, if any of those things were not right, I was finished as a human being, whatever that thought may entail. Thankfully I didn’t have to find out because He is all that and more!
"Will you join me?"
Yes I will.