Having discussed the source from which God’s love flows—that is God’s essential attribute of love as it is and has been expressed perpetually and eternally, apart from and independent of the created order, within His intratrinitarian Persons (See my first installment to this series)—we can now consider the expressions of the outworking of God’s other-orientation in His self-giving. The first aspect of God’s self-giving love, to which we will now devote our attention, is the providential love of God for all creation.
God “did not, on making the world, leave it to itself, or commit it into other hands; but it is an object of His constant care, and His hand is concerned in all its movements.”[i] God is not deistic; He is, in fact, interested and concerned with what He has created. Creation is not worthless; it is, on the contrary, of special significance to God.
God takes great pleasure in His creation. The first chapter of the book of Genesis reveals God’s response to His creation. God reacted six times to what He created, each time pronouncing what He had created to be “good” (Gen 1:4, 10, 12, 18, 21, 25). After God was finished creating, and man and woman were made in His own image, Scripture says, “God saw everything that He had made, and behold, it was very good” (Gen 1:31). God loves what He has created.
There are a number of other reasons why God loves and rejoices in His creation, and thus, provides lovingly for it. First, God delights in His creation because it is an expression of His glory. Creation was a Trinitarian work. God the Father played the primary role as the source, by speaking the universe into existence (Gen 1:1; Acts 4: 24; 1 Cor 8:6; Eph 3:9; Heb 1:2; Rev 4: 11). God the Son, the eternal Word of God, was the efficient instrumental creating agent in carrying out the Father’s decretive will (John 1:3; Col 1:16; Ps 33:6, 9; 1 Cor 8:6; Heb 1:2). Also, God the Holy Spirit was actively involved with this creating process in demonstrating His transforming power (Gen 1:2; Job 26:13, 33:4; Ps 33:6, 104:30, 139:7).[ii] Altogether, God’s creation “declares the glory of God” (Ps 19:1). Each member of the Trinity participated in this creation process, and thus, creation is an overflow of the gladness that they have in one another as they share in their glory.
Second, God rejoices in the works of His creation because they praise Him. The psalmist calls on creation to praise God (Ps 103:22; 148:3-7). Even the parts of creation that the eyes of man have never seen, and will never see, praise God. This is the significance of Psalm 148:7, which calls on the “sea monsters” to praise God. Because most of creation, including the far reaches of space and the depths of the oceans, is beyond the awareness of man, God’s creative purposes were not merely directed toward the service of mankind. Everything was created for the delight of God.
Third, God delights in the works of His creation because they reveal His unparalleled wisdom. The psalmist says, “O Lord, how manifold are Your works! In wisdom You have made them all” (Ps 104:24). The earth is certainly a masterpiece of great wisdom and order.
Fourth, God loves His creation because it reveals His incomparable power. Isaiah, in Isaiah 40:26, marvels at the greatness of the stars that fill the sky and worships God as he says, “Lift up your eyes on high and see who has created these stars, the One who leads forth their host by number, He calls them all by name; because of the greatness of His might and the strength of His power, not one of them is missing.”
Fifth, God rejoices in the works of His creation as they function as a conduit to His praise, pointing beyond themselves to God Himself. Every man must look past God’s created order and see the One who created it and give Him the worship and praise that is due Him (Ps 104:31-34).[iii]
Because God loves His creation, it is reasonable that He would desire to care and provide for it. In God’s providence, He actively keeps created things in existence and maintains their properties with which He created them. He cooperates with them in their every action, causing them to do the things they do by directing their distinct properties, and He does all this to fulfill His special purposes. On this basis, there are at least three categories that can be used to describe God’s providential care for His creation: preservation, concurrence, and government.[iv]
God actively preserves and maintains the existence of His creation. Christ upholds or carries the universe by His word of power (Heb 1:3). This does not mean that He simply sustains the world; instead, He has a purposeful control over the thing being carried. Again, Christ is responsible for causing things to endure (Col 1:16, 17). If it were not for this sustaining work of Christ, everything apart from the Godhead would cease to exist. The very breath that men breathe is controlled by the hand of God (Job 34:14, 15; Ps 104:29). God also maintains the properties that belong to His creation. Water is only drinkable because God preserves the chemical composition that makes H2O water. Air only is breathable because God keeps air being air. These things will continue to be constant so long as God preserves the created order that He has made. This preservation provides a basis for science; as long as God maintains the universe, it will act in predictable ways.[v] The world came into existence by God’s will, and it continues to exist because of His will.[vi]
God causes His creation to act in the way it does through the directed cooperation of His creatures. God causes and controls fire, hail, snow, and stormy winds to impact the world (Job 37:6-13; 38:22-30). God makes the grass grow (Ps 104:14), controls the constellations (Job 38:32), and causes the sun to rise and the rains to fall (Matt 5:45). God loves the animals and provides for their needs (Ps 104:27-29; Job 38:39-41). He even feeds the birds of the air (Matt 6:26) and does not allow their death apart from His will (Matt 10:29). There is no such thing as chance or random luck. God controls even the rolling of dice and the casting of lots (Prov 16:33). There are natural explanations for each of these providential acts; however, one must not assume that because he can observe and study the laws of nature that God does not directly cause such things to occur. Instead, one should conclude that God uses these laws in cooperation with His will to perform His desires. God controls the affairs of the nations, causing them to rise and to fall (Job 12:23; Ps 22:28; Dan 4:34, 35; Acts 17:26; 14:16). All of mankind relies on God’s love and care for their continued existence. God plans man’s days before their creation (Ps 139:16). The very number of man’s days has been determined in advance (Job 14:5). All of man’s actions are under God’s control, for “in Him we live and move” (Acts 17:28). Every step that man takes has been “ordered by the Lord” (Prov 20:24). Man’s talents and abilities are designed by and given from the Lord (1 Cor 4:7). God influences people’s decisions (Prov 21:1). In the end, man’s words, steps, movements, personalities, and abilities are all given and controlled by God. This understanding of God as the primary cause behind each and every detail of existence should not lead one to conclude that man is not responsible for his actions.[vii] There is a real sense in which God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility are compatible. God is able to freely regulate the choices of men without destroying their volition.[viii]
God governs and directs all things providentially in order to accomplish the wise purposes of His will. God’s kingdom is said to rule over all (Ps 103:19). God does what He pleases and no man can “stay His hand or say to Him, ‘What are You doing?’” (Dan 4:35). God “puts all things in subjection under His feet,” (1 Cor 15:27) and “accomplishes all things according to the counsel of His will” (Eph 1:11). Finally, “God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose” (Rom 8:28).[ix] God certainly has a plan, and He will carry it out for His own name’s sake.
It is easy to see God’s love in His good acts of providential care for His creation. However, some have difficulty reconciling God’s love with His meticulous sovereignty and the presence of evil that exists in the world. The reality of evil is not easy to comprehend, but it does no good to explain it away like Open Theists such as Gregory Boyd who says, “Divine goodness does not completely control or in any sense will evil; rather, good and evil are at war with one another. This assumption obviously entails that God is not now exercising exhaustive, meticulous control over the world.”[x] John Sanders, another Open Theist, explains that “God has chosen to rely on us” and that “the future is not wholly fixed or determined.”[xi] God apparently did not want moral evil to arise, since it was not part of His original plan. All evil, then, must be considered pointless and gratuitous, without the potential of attaining a greater good, since God in no way has any plan for evil.[xii] But this view of God’s relation to evil overlooks and misses the Scriptural witness regarding the issue.
Scripture is clear that God ordains natural evil including life and death (Job 1:22; Deut 32:39; 1 Sam 2:6-7; 2 Sam 12:15; James 4:14-15), disease (Ex 4:11), natural disasters (Ps 104:4; 105:16; 135:7; 147:18; 148:8; Mark 4:39, 41), destructive animals (2 Kings 2:23, 24; 17:25; Dan 6:22), and many other various kinds of calamities (Isa 45:7; Amos 3:6; Job 42:2; Dan 4:35). God also controls moral evil including the selling of Joseph into slavery (Genesis 50:20) and the sinful acts of Herod, Pilate, the Gentiles, and the Jews in the murder of Jesus ( Acts 4:27-28; Isa 53:10).[xiii] Ultimately, one must conclude that God is not the author of sin. His relation to sin must be indirect, “never expressive of His nature,” and permissive, “produced altogether by portions of His sinful creation and never in respect immediately by Him yet regulated in every instance so to allow or disallow any and every instance of evil that occurs, as His wisdom, authority, and power direct.”[xiv] Though He is willing to order things so that evil should come to pass, He allows this, in His infinite loving wisdom, for the sake of the contrary good.[xv] God’s love is ultimately demonstrated in every situation, no matter how difficult it might be for finite human beings to understand. In the end, God must be trusted for His loving wisdom and the hope that all things do, in fact, “work together for good” (Rom 8:28) and that He is in complete and total control.[xvi]
Here we have explored one expression of God’s other-orientation and self-giving love. God loves His creation and so should we. As creatures who have been given the right and command to practice dominion over all creation (Gen 1:26), we as humans must be responsible stewards. Creation has suffered as a result of the Fall and cries out for restoration (Rom 8:19-22). Part of our mission as Christians, therefore, is to take part in the redemption process of creation. Though being “green” or “ecologically friendly” is usually associated with liberalism, we must not neglect our call to be responsible stewards who properly practice godly dominion over our world. Upcoming posts will address other aspects of God’s love, namely His general love for the human and His special love for His elect.
[i] J.L. Dagg, A Manual of Theology (Harrisonburg, VA: Gano Books, 1990), 115.
[ii] James P. Boyce, Abstract of Systematic Theology (Cape Coral, FL: Founders Press, 2006), 157-59.
[iii] John Piper, The Pleasures of God: Meditations on God’s Delight in Being God (Colorado Spring, CO: Multnomah, 2000), 86-95.
[iv] Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine (Leicester, England: Inter-Varsity, 1994), 315.
[v] Ibid., 316-17.
[vi] Dagg, Manual of Theology, 117.
[vii] Grudem, Systematic Theology, 317-22.
[viii] For a more thorough understanding of divine-human concurrence and a compatibilistic understanding of the relationship of God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility, see Bruce A. Ware, God’s Greater Glory: The Exalted God of Scripture and the Christian Faith (Wheaton: Crossway, 2004), 97-130.
[ix] Grudem, Systematic Theology, 331-32.
[x] Gregory A. Boyd, God at War: The Bible and Spiritual Conflict (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1997), 20.
[xi] John Sanders, “Divine Providence and the Openness of God,” in Perspectives on the Doctrine of God, ed. Bruce A. Ware (Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 2008), 202.
[xii] Ibid., 212-13.
[xiii] John Piper, “Is God Less Glorious Because He Ordained that Evil Be?: Jonathan Edwards on the Decrees of God” accessed 23 January 2009, http://www.desiringgod.org; Internet.
[xiv] Bruce A. Ware, “A Modified Calvinist Doctrine of God,” in Perspectives on the Doctrine of God, ed. Bruce A. Ware (Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 2008), 117.
[xv] Piper, “Is God Less Glorious Because He Ordained that Evil Be?”
[xvi] This certainly does not exhaust the discussion on the problem of evil, but then, this is not the overall theme or purpose of this discourse. The intent for its discussion is only to acknowledge the tension that exists between God’s love and His meticulous providence over evil.
