Tag Archives: Promise

Emil Brunner’s Simple Faith (6)

Theology, , , ,

God’s Will for Humankind

In his reflection on the nature of human being, Emil Brunner suggests that the ‘image of God’ is a dynamic becoming:

He created man as a personal being, that is as a being that does not simply develop of itself into that for which God created it, but rather as a being who achieves his destiny only by saying his ‘yes’ to it (51).

Persons achieve or realise their ‘true’ humanity as they hear and receive the Word of God addressed to them. In chapters 10-13 of his little book Our Faith he explores the nature and contours of this Word, beginning with the Law.

Brunner begins with human experience of ‘law’ in general: our experience of cultural and social laws, of the laws of physics, of the human freedom and sense of autonomy that tempts us to think that we might be a ‘law unto oneself.’ Perhaps we can be even our own god! Yet, says Brunner, we find our autonomy limited and ultimately doomed. We find ourselves in environments we are unable to change or to bend to our will. We are confronted, finally, by the inevitability of death and with it all our God-pretensions. Brunner thus argues from a learned sense of law to establish an understanding of that which stands over against us and for which we are responsible: the Law of God.

The divine law is God’s will for humankind. “Every man, Jew or Christian, believer or atheist, cultured or uncultured, has some knowledge of this law. Every man has the consciousness of ‘responsibility’” via the faculty of conscience (46). This law is a reflection of the Creator’s good will for human life and it is just as inviolable as the laws of nature (47). Further, God has supplemented conscience by giving his people a written Law which is really a reiteration of “the natural laws of true human life” (46).

God’s law reveals that God wants something of us and that we are accountable for it. What is it that God desires? Brunner’s answer is threefold: something new every moment (!), only a few things—the Ten Commandments, and indeed, only one thing—the first commandment, for “he who keeps the first commandment keeps all the rest” (49). To have God alone as our God is to have a Master and thereby to forsake all alternatives, including especially the desire to be our own master. “God wants only that we should be that for which He created us. He created us ‘in His image’” (49). In binding us to himself God binds us also to others for the command to love God includes within itself the command to love our neighbour.

The Commandment of God is what God wants of us. But if we understand the words concerning the image of God, we also know what God wants for us. That God first loved us, before He demanded anything of us, and that He demands nothing more than that we should accept His love, that is, react to love with love, is simply what we call faith. … God’s incomprehensible, undeserved Love; and whosoever does that fulfils the will of God (49-50, original emphasis).

Of course, humanity has failed to keep God’s commandments and his law. We have supplanted God’s rule in the attempt to be our own master, seeking to live without and apart from God. We misuse our freedom of choice to do that which God does not will.

But God in His creative goodness, having given man freedom to choose for himself, gave him something more in that when he sinned he might not wholly corrupt his life and the life of others, might not wholly deviate from God’s way. This gift is the Ordinances of God (52).

The ordinances of God are those regularities of the natural ‘order’ in which human life is set. More particularly, they are limits and realities implanted in our very nature by God, which we can know intuitively, and which we can but ought not to transgress.

The most important of these ordinances is the fact that God has so organized human life that no man can live for himself. He cannot live without the other. Man needs woman, woman needs man. … Human life is so ordered by God because God has created man for love (53).

The ordinances of God can be endangered by human wilfulness, and, says Brunner, this has never been more apparent in world history than ‘today’ (53). The individual’s will for mastery, for autonomy, for independence tears at the very fabric of relationship and society.

The man who recognizes nothing higher than reason becomes ‘independent’—he no longer needs others, he is his own master—even his own God. And then human fellowship is dissipated like a string of pearls when the cord is cut. What binds us together is the Ordinances of God, behind which stands God’s love. He alone who is bound to God, and through God to his neighbour, can really become a man (54).

God’s address to humanity takes not only the form of law but also promise. Indeed, “God is not primarily the lawgiver, but the lifegiver” (55). The law functions to make us aware of our failure to do what God wills. But in itself it is a gift of divine love given to us for our good. Brunner acknowledges that the commandments do not begin with Thou shalt Not but with I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. All humanity have some inkling of the divine demand but the knowledge of the promise is strictly the message of the Bible.

That is the biblical message, not what God wants of us, but what He desires for us; no what we should do, but what God does and gives. The Law of God is everywhere, the Promise of God is only in the Bible—the promise, namely, that God comes to His sick, rebellious people, to heal them, the message of the ‘Saviour,’ the healing, saving, forgiving, and redeeming God. This promise is really the Word of God. … God desires nothing of us save that we allow Him to bestow life upon us (57, original emphasis).

Scripture on Sunday – James 1:12 (#2)

Scripture, Theology, , , , ,

Saint_James_the_JustAs we noted in our previous discussion, this verse trades on the concept of God’s promise and its future fulfilment. Christian hope rests on the reality of this promise, and if it be anything less than a sure and steadfast divine commitment, Christian hope, endurance and faithfulness loses its sure foundation. In the face of trials and temptations, Christians cling to their hope on the basis of their trust in the divine promise. The concept of God’s promise is common in the New Testament. The author of Hebrews exhorts his audience to faithful endurance on the basis of God’s promise (6:10-15; 8:6; 10:23; 11:11). In Galatians 3 Paul refers to God’s promise nine times and traces it to the promise given to Abraham. In 2 Corinthians 1:20 Paul assures his readers that all the promises of God find their Yes in Jesus Christ. Behind this emphasis on the divine promise stands a firm conviction in the utter faithfulness of God who will fulfil the promises he has made. In one sense the fulfilment of the promise is wholly dependent upon this faithfulness, and so in hope and trust, we cling to the promise and wait expectantly for God’s act of fulfilment. In another sense, however, the promise is conditional, and it is this aspect that we find developed in James.

One of the aspects of James’ theology that becomes apparent in this verse is a sense of conditionality with respect to the believer’s reception of the divine promise. James does not so much pronounce the blessing as identify what the blessing is (the crown of life) and stipulate the grounds on which it is received (standing firm in trials, loving God). Although James does not use the language of “reward” in this text, the idea is present. Those who fulfil the conditions stipulated will receive the promised blessing. Some might find the idea of “reward” too close to the concept of merit, and so antithetical to genuine Christian faith and spirituality. Luther famously referred to James as less than apostolic, and to his letter as “an epistle of straw” as compared to those other New Testament works which set forth Christ and salvation more clearly (Luther’s Works, 35:362; cf. 395-397). Yet the New Testament often calls believers to consider the blessing which awaits them, and so be encouraged in faithful endurance.

For James, faith and salvation are not the fruit of a simple profession of faith which does not come to expression in the lived experience of the believer. Genuine faith is active and enduring. Faith, in this context at least, consists in faithfulness, and there is no possibility of a separation between faith and praxis, the two belonging together as two aspects of the one reality. This connection between fidelity and blessing was typical of early Christian thinking, according to Scot McKnight, who notes that “James 1:12 is more like Jesus and 2 John and Revelation than like Paul” (111), although Paul also can speak of “faith which works through love” (Galatians 5:6), and of the “work of faith” (1 Thessalonians 1:3). Nevertheless, Paul’s more consistent theme is to speak of faith as distinct from works (Romans 3:21-31), or even over against works (cf. Galatians 3:7-14). As a result, some commentators, pastors and Christians seek ways to bring James’ message into alignment with that of Paul. It is an error, however, to assimilate James too quickly to Paul, for such an approach limits and flattens the diverse New Testament witness. It is a far better approach to allow James’ distinctive contribution to stand in all its stern power. James and Paul sing from the same page but sound different notes, James’ harmony complementing Paul’s melody. A better musical analogy would suggest the two authors represent two songs on a single album, each distinct yet part of a larger whole, each contributing in their own voice and style to the overall project. Christian witness, spirituality and life require both voices to sound, both songs to be heard, both compositions to be accepted on their own terms. We will have occasion to discuss the relation between James and Paul at greater length in chapter two. Suffice it here to say that James’ intent is to insist upon the nature of faith as active and enduring, and to insist also that eschatological validation of one’s faith will be predicated upon the kind of life which demonstrated the genuine nature of that faith.

To say all this, however, is not to suggest that James’ spirituality is one of works undertaken in order to earn merit, achieve salvation, and so gain the promised reward. The final phrase of James’ exhortation is crucial: “which [God] has promised to those who love him.” Love for God is the motivation by which we stand firm under trial, refusing to buckle in the face of pressure, stress and affliction. Love for God undergirds the enduring faith which James has portrayed so steadfastly thus far. Those who persevere under trial and stand firm against temptation do so because they love him. By shifting his emphasis to the believer’s love for God, James clearly indicates that the work of faith over the course of one’s life is an expression of this deeper inner motive. Our faithfulness springs from this love which finds its root in his initiating love for us, grounded in the promise of this ever and always generous God, and the gift of salvation by which he has brought us forth (cf. vv. 5, 18). Our faithfulness toward God is but the echo of his greater, prior and all-encompassing faithfulness toward us. But faithfulness it must be.

What does it mean to love God? In broader biblical perspective we see that love for God involves keeping his commandments (John 14:15). It means to keep his word in our hearts (Deuteronomy 6:4-6). In this context, however, it might best be understood in terms of loyalty to God and to God’s will in the face of pressure to compromise and capitulate. It means to look to God, to hope in God, to approach God in prayer, and to trust in God. It means to rejoice in God and find our boasting, joy and life in him. The Christian life is neither a cynical quest for reward nor a fearful avoidance of hell. It is not simply a stoic endurance of affliction or a herculean withstanding of temptation. It is a life of joy rather than gritted teeth, of hope rather than fear, of faith rather than despair, of generosity rather than selfishness, and supremely, of love.