Divine Sovereignty and Human Responsibility # 2

Divine Sovereignty and Human Responsibility # 2

2. Divine Sovereignty and Human Responsibility

Our aim in the present study is to think out the nature of the Christian's evangelistic task in the light of this agreed presupposition that God is sovereign in salvation. Now, we need to recognize right at the outset that this is no easy assignment.

All theological topics contain pitfalls for the unwary, for God's truth is never quite what man would have expected; and our present subject is more treacherous than most. This is because in thinking it through we have to deal with an antinomy in the biblical revelation, and in such circumstances our finite,fallen minds are more than ordinarily apt to go astray.

An "Antinomy" Defined

What is an "antonomy"? The Oxford Dictionary defines it as "a contradiction between conclusions which seem equally logical, reasonable, or necessary."

For our purposes, however, this definition is not quite accurate; the opening words should read "an appearance of contradiction." For the whole point of an antinomy - in theology, at any rate - is that it is not a real contradiction, though it looks like one. It is an apparent incompatibility between two apparent truths. An antinomy exists when a pair of principles stand side by side, seemingly irreconcilable, yet both undeniable. There are cogent reasons for believing each of them; each rests on clear and solid evidence; but it is a mystery to you how they can be squared with each other. You see that each must be rue on its own, but you do not see how they can both be true together.

Not a Paradox

It appears, therefore, that an antinomy is not the same thing as a paradox. A paradox is a figure of speech, a play on words. It is a form of statement that seems to unite two opposite ideas, or to deny something by the very terms in which it is asserted. Many truths about the Christian life an be expressed as paradoxes. Paul states various paradoxes of his own Christian experience: "sorrowful - yet always rejoicing... having nothing - yet possessing all things" (2 Cor. 6:10). "When I am weak - then am I strong" (2 Cor. 12:10).

The point of a paradox, however is that what creates the appearance of contradiction is not the facts, but the words. The contradiction is verbal, but not real. A little thought shows how it can be eliminated and the same idea expressed in non-paradoxical form. In other words, a paradox is always dispensable. Paul might have said that sorrow at circumstances, and joy in God or that he owns no property, there is a sense in which everything belongs to him, because he is Christ's and Christ is Lord of all.

By contrast, however, an antinomy is neither dispensable nor comprehensible. It is not a figure of speech, but an observed relation between two statements of fact. It is unavoidable, and it is insoluble. We do not invent it, and we cannot explain it. Nor is there any way to get rid of it - save by falsifying the very facts that led us to it.

Responding to an Antinomy

What should one do, then, with an antinomy? Please note the following.

Accept it for what it is, and learn to live with it. Refuse to regard the apparent inconsistency as real. Put down the semblance of contradiction to the deficiency of your own understanding. Think of the two principles as, not rival alternatives, but, in some way that at present you do not grasp, complementary to each other.

Be careful, therefore, not to set them at loggerheads, nor to make deductions from either that would cut across the other. Note what connections exist between the two truths and their two frames of reference, and teach yourself to think of reality in a way that provides for their peaceful coexistence, remembering that reality itself has proved actually to contain them both. This is how antinomies must be handled, and this is how Christians have to deal with the antinomies of biblical teaching.

Antinomy: God as King and as Judge

Scripture teaches that, as King, He orders and controls all things. Scripture also teaches that, as Judge, He holds every man responsible for the choices he makes and the courses of action he pursues. Thus, hearers of the gospel are responsible for their reaction; if they reject the good news, they are guilty of unbelief. Paul, entrusted with the gospel, is responsible for preaching it; if he neglects his commission, he is penalized for unfaithfulness. God's sovereignty and man's responsibility are taught side by side, and sometimes in the same text. Both are thus guaranteed to us in the same divine authority; both, therefore, are true.

1. A Man is a responsible moral agent; though he is also divinely controlled.

2. Man is divinely controlled, though he is also a responsible moral agent.

God's sovereignty is a reality, and man's responsibility is a reality too. To our finite minds, of course, the thing is inexplicable. It sounds like a contradiction. Paul notices this complaint in Romans 9, and replies. He does does not attempt to demonstrate the propriety of God's action; instead, he rebukes the spirit of the question. "Nay but, O man, who are you that replies against God?" (Romans 9:20). 

The Creator is incomprehensible to His creatures. We ought not in any case to be surprised when we find mysteries of this sort in God's Word for the Creator is incomprehensible to His creatures. A God whom we could understand exhaustively, and whose revelation of Himself confronted us with no mysteries whatever - would be a God in man's image, and therefore an imaginary God, not the God of the Bible at all! "My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither your ways my ways...As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts" (Isaiah 55:8).

It is necessary to take the thought of human responsibility very seriously indeed. But we must NOT let it drive the thought of divine sovereignty out of our minds. Let us not for a moment forget that God's sovereignty and man's responsibility are both true.

~J. I. Packer~

(The End)