Purpose Driven Life 2
Chapter 2 presents the paradox of predestination and free will but does not give a satisfactory answer. I can faintly grasp an answer to this paradox.
People are beings in time. We are consciously acting in the present, can sense the memory of the past and have hopes and fears about the future. But that is not the case with God. We have the marvelous statement “Before Abraham was, I am.” In that statement Jesus uses incorrect grammar. But our grammar is designed to express our experience. Something that is “before” something that “was” also “was”. But Jesus was giving the closest approximation of his experience. He sat teaching in the Temple and was actively creating the universe in the same conscious instant. We live in time while he encompasses time the way we would see a landscape.
A simple analogy would be a dust mite standing on a violin string. He may describe the vibration as starting at the bow and then moving out past him toward some unknown end. But the musician controls both the bow and the finger on the string at the same time. The musician knows the end from the beginning, yet she does not control the random vibrations between.
But the violin string is inanimate. It does not make any changes along the way or the violinist changes the string. But that is why being aware and active across time is part of God’s character. As we move through time we make decisions, but outside of time God responds in the past and future as well as the present.
From our standpoint God shows foreknowledge. From his standpoint he is seeing it all at the same time. It is a single broad tapestry. Each of our lives is a single thread. Few of us are the red highlight in the horse’s eye or the silver sliver on a shimmering stream, but each thread is needed for the completed work.
People are beings in time. We are consciously acting in the present, can sense the memory of the past and have hopes and fears about the future. But that is not the case with God. We have the marvelous statement “Before Abraham was, I am.” In that statement Jesus uses incorrect grammar. But our grammar is designed to express our experience. Something that is “before” something that “was” also “was”. But Jesus was giving the closest approximation of his experience. He sat teaching in the Temple and was actively creating the universe in the same conscious instant. We live in time while he encompasses time the way we would see a landscape.
A simple analogy would be a dust mite standing on a violin string. He may describe the vibration as starting at the bow and then moving out past him toward some unknown end. But the musician controls both the bow and the finger on the string at the same time. The musician knows the end from the beginning, yet she does not control the random vibrations between.
But the violin string is inanimate. It does not make any changes along the way or the violinist changes the string. But that is why being aware and active across time is part of God’s character. As we move through time we make decisions, but outside of time God responds in the past and future as well as the present.
From our standpoint God shows foreknowledge. From his standpoint he is seeing it all at the same time. It is a single broad tapestry. Each of our lives is a single thread. Few of us are the red highlight in the horse’s eye or the silver sliver on a shimmering stream, but each thread is needed for the completed work.
posted by Mark at 21:22
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