Q.
1. “From a study of the term goodness in Scripture, we see that goodness is closely related to
other attributes of God such as grace, mercy, love, longsuffering, goodness,
and the like. These ethical virtues of God stand related to each other.
Therefore, because all men are the objects of God’s goodness, all men are also
the objects of God’s grace, love, mercy, goodness, etc.”
The
argument is, of course, correct formally. Because God’s attributes are one in
Him, they are to be treated together. God’s grace is surely inseparably connected
to and a part of His love, kindness, goodness, mercy, longsuffering, etc. If
anyone of them is common to all men, they are all common. If one is particular,
however, they all are particular.
…
[However, when you survey the Scriptures for these terms,] in every case they
are attributes which are shown only to the elect. There is a prima facie case to be made for the
truth that always God is particular in His grace and mercy, His love and favor.
The argument consists of two lines of thought.
The
first is this. If all these attributes are indeed inseparably related to grace,
and if grace in Scripture is something shown only to the elect, then it follows
that these other attributes as well are shown only to those chosen in Christ
from eternity.
The
second line of thought goes like this. God’s attributes are never mere
characteristics of God. They are living, powerful, working attributes. They are
the virtues of the living God who does all things. If, e.g., grace is itself
the power whereby we are saved, so also is this true of love and goodness. We
love God because He first loved us. We are good because God is good to us. We
are called to be kind towards one another because God is kind to us. God’s
attitude is never merely attitude, powerless to accomplish what it is in Him.
When God is gracious to a man, that grace permeates man’s being and makes him
gracious. God’s mercy is more than an attitude of pity and longing to deliver.
It is a mighty power that rescues us from our own hell and makes us blessed. It
is a serious injustice to God to make His attributes mere attitudes such as our
attributes are. (Prof. Herman C. Hanko, “Protestant
Reformed Theological Journal,” April 1993)
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Q. 2. “Is God to be thought of as ‘necessary’ or
‘free’ in the exercise of His attributes?”
God is not essence and attributes, as though His attributes were something outside of
His real self that could be freely controlled. Rather God is essence in attributes (hence the teaching of I
John 4:8, 16). God, then, is to be thought of as necessary rather than free in
the exercise of His attributes, and a change in the exercise of a particular
attribute implies therefore a corresponding change in God Himself. It is
therefore not valid to say that, because God is sovereign, He can begin to love
whom He wants, when He wants, and for how long He wants. This makes God guilty
of purely arbitrary indifference rather than rational self-determination. Also,
it should be noted that the doctrine of the immutability of God regards not
only His eternal Being (and therefore His attributes) but also the purposeful
exercise of His Being in the world of space and time. (British Reformed Journal, Issue 9 [Jan – Mar 1995], p. 22.)
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Q. 3. “What is the main objection to the idea that
God loves all men?”
Negatively, the theory that God loves all men is,
of course, in plain contradiction to the teaching of the Scripture (e.g., Ps.
5:5; 11:5; Mal. 1:3; Rom. 9:13). Positively, the Scriptures confirm that God
loves only His people. An example of this can be seen in the doctrine of
election. Why are some chosen to life and some not? Simply because God only
loved some, and thus only chose some. Thus “foreknowledge” in Romans 8:29 is
equivalent to “forelove” and is the ground of our predestination to
glorification. This loving choice of God involves two elements—aetiology (the study of original
causes) and teleology (the study of purposeful ends). The cause of our election
and salvation is found in the love of God to us. But this electing love also
shapes our final destiny and end both as far as this life is concerned (Eph.
2:10) and ultimately in that which is to come (Rom. 8:29). (British Reformed Journal, Issue 9 [Jan – Mar 1995], p. 22.)
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Q. 4. “If God’s attitude never
changes, and that He either eternally loves or hates somebody, then this must
be true also in the case of angels. But, what about the reprobate angels? Was
there not a time in their existence when they were holy? Did God hate them even
at that time? If yes, how it is possible for God to hate somebody who did not
commit any sin?
It may be objected, “How can God hate a being that
is at that time upright and perfect?” To which we reply, “How can God love a
sinner who is at that time a sinner?” Or alternatively, “How can God love a
being whom He knows (and has in fact decreed and purposed) will become the
devil?”
The answer is as follows: First, God’s love and
hatred are sovereignly determined within Himself and not dependent on anything
in the creature (Rom. 9:11-13). Second, God is not bound by time, and therefore
“sees” the devil, even in his original upright state, according to what the
devil in God’s decree of predestination would become, even as He sees the elect
not only as in Christ by election, but as what we become in time—righteous by
the imputation of Christ’s righteousness. (Dr.
Manuel Kuhs, British Reformed Journal, Issue 59)
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Q.
5. “If
they who are the objects of God’s redeeming love can also in some sense of the
word be regarded as the objects of His wrath, why should it be impossible that
they who are the objects of His wrath should also in some sense share His
divine favour?”
[The] wrath and curse
which God has declared against the reprobate [is sometimes equted] with that of
His fatherly displeasure under which the elect may fall by their sins, having
made this equation, they then assume that because God loves the elect and exercises
His fatherly displeasure concerning them when they fall into sin, that He must
also love the reprobate. In other words, if God can be said to exercise both
love and wrath toward the elect, He must also have a love for the reprobate.
… Let us now investigate
the fallacy of this reasoning.
In the first place it must
be stated that there are not two kinds of wrath in God concerning sin, one for
the elect, and one for the reprobate. The text of Romans 1:18, “For the wrath
of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of
men,” is true both of the elect and reprobate. There is nevertheless a total
difference between God’s disposition towards the elect and reprobate. While
God’s anger is perfect, and this emotion is expressed in God’s disposition
toward elect and reprobate, that disposition is conditioned absolutely by the
factors of God’s electing, predestinating love and Christ’s death.
On the death of Christ
rests the judicial removal of the wrath of God against the elect for their
sins. Since the atonement has reference to particular sins and not sins in
general, it is not a reservoir or storehouse of forgiveness. It therefore
creates no difficulty to hold that God has expressed His displeasure against
His people for their sins. This is clearly the position of Scripture as seen in
the following quotation from Calvin’s Institutes,
book 3, chapter 4, section 32:
David says,
“O Lord, rebuke me not in thine anger, neither chasten me in thine hot
displeasure” (Ps. 6:1). There is nothing inconsistent with this in its being
repeatedly said, that the Lord is angry with His saints when He chastens them
for their sins (Ps. 38:7). In like manner, in Isaiah: “In that day thou shalt
say, O Lord, I will praise thee though thou wast angry with me, thine anger is
turned away, and thou comfortest me” (Isa. 12:1). Likewise in Habakkuk, “In
wrath remember mercy” (Hab. 3:2), and Micah, “I will bear the indignation of
the Lord because I have sinned against him” (Mic. 7:9).
Two things determine the
disposition of God toward the elect. Firstly, He has chosen and loved them out
of His mere good pleasure from all eternity, and secondly, He has sent His only
Son into the world that He, through His own perfect righteousness and death, would
reconcile them unto Himself.
Two things determine God’s
disposition toward the reprobate. One: the fact of His wrath against all
unrighteousness and ungodliness of men; and two: the fact that He has by an act
of His will ordained them to be the objects of His everlasting displeasure and
wrath. Though they may taste of the temporal blessings which God bestows upon
them in their earthly life, they are, as the Scripture teaches, given the
Gospel for the reason as Calvin comments on Isaiah 6:9-10. “He directs his
voice to them, but it is that they may turn a deaf ear; he kindles a light, but
it is that they may become more stupid; he employs a remedy, but it is that
they may not be cured.” From this it should be clear that God’s disposition
toward the reprobate is such that they have no part whatever in the purposes of
God in the free offer of the Gospel except for the greater hardening of their
hearts.
[Proponents
of common grace] have in effect adopted the so called ‘law of opposites,’ which
assumes that there is a love-hate relationship in God concerning the same
object. Their notion, that because God has in some sense expressed a wrath
against the elect, He must also love the reprobate because He loves the elect,
is entirely gratuitous. It is without warrant in any part of the Scripture and
constitutes an addition thereto. There is no equation in any sense whatever
between God’s disposition of wrath toward the reprobate and that of His
fatherly disposition toward the elect. Since the wrath of God in the case of
the latter is entirely conditioned by God’s eternal electing love and Christ's
death, it can never be said, in any sense, that any are loved outside of
Christ.
(Universalism and the
Reformed Churches: A Defense of Calvin’s Calvinism [EPCA])
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Q.
6. “A
seeming dilemma: Either deny that grace is an attribute of God, Or, deny that
‘saving’ grace is the only form of grace”
For an outline of this
argument, along with a response to it, see the following link:
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Q.
7. “Do the elect ever occur as sinners?”
My
brief answer would be that they do. Nevertheless, from eternity they occur as
sinners in Christ Jesus, as the objects of God’s free grace. (Rev. Herman Hoeksema, Protestant Reformed Theological
Journal, vol. 2, no. 1, Dec. 1968)
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Q. 8. “If God cannot love
sinners, because His love is holy, righteous and just, and He cannot even look
upon iniquity, then how does He love His chosen people, who themselves have
fallen into iniquity and misery in Adam?”
The answer is that the Most High loves
us in Christ alone. Only in Christ are we elected, redeemed, regenerated,
called, justified, adopted, sanctified, preserved and glorified. Only in Christ
can, and does, God love us with that perfect bond of divine love. In Christ we
even share (in a creaturely way) in the eternal and blessed love of the holy
Trinity! No wonder the apostle exclaims that nothing is “able to separate us from the love of God, which is in
Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 8:39)! This is the absolutely
indestructible and unbreakable love of the almighty and gracious God for His
covenant people, sealed in the blood of Jesus. (Rev. Angus Stewart, “God is Love”)
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Q. 9. “Surely we have no
right to say that God cannot both love and hate a man at one and the same time.
After all, God's mind is infinite, and therefore He is perfectly capable of
loving and hating the same person. Such a concept is simply one of the many
mysteries we must humbly accept.”
That is simply a
contradiction. Such a view is a denial of the attribute of God’s simplicity.
The doctrine of God’s simplicity means that God is one and undivided in His
Being. Although we speak of and distinguish individual attributes of God, it is
nevertheless true that His attributes are all one in Him. Hence, God’s
simplicity means God always acts consistently with His nature; God is always in
harmony with Himself; there is no tension in the Being of God. The very thought
is utter blasphemy. He is the one, perfectly blessed, incomparable God, unto
whom be glory forever. Even in human relationships do we not regard consistency
as a virtue? That we do is a reflection of the eternal and self-existent
Jehovah, who as the I AM THAT I AM simply is.
Jehovah God is never anything other than what He is. Hence, to will opposite
things … is impossible for God, as Job declares, “He is in one mind, and who
can turn him?” (Job 23:13). God’s will is
God and so His will is one and undivided; you obviously cannot say this about
one who wills both A and not A at the same time: God is not the great
schizophrenic! (Philip Rainey, “Calvinism
Cast Out: The Reformed Presbyterian Church of Ireland and the Free Offer of the
Gospel”)
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Q. 10. “Is there not a
natural propensity or disposition in God whereby He, in His infinite goodness,
is inclined to desire the happiness of all men, that they might be delivered
from misery, and be brought unto Himself?”
That God hath any natural
or necessary inclination, by his goodness, or any other property, to do good to
us, or any of his creatures, we do
deny. Everything that concerns us is an act of his free will and good
pleasure, and not a natural, necessary act of his Deity, as shall be declared.”
(John Owen, “Works,” vol. 10, p. 227)
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Q. 11. “Do we not see key
phrases in Scripture such as ‘Oh that …,’ ‘If only …,’ etc. (e.g. Deut. 5:29,
32:29, Ps. 81:13, and Isa. 48:18)? Does not this Divine employment of optatives
(phrases expressing a ‘wish/longing’) express a desire on the part of God for that which never comes to pass?”
[These] can only be
understood covenantally, as God speaking after the manner of men in order to
act in accord with the covenant relationship He bears to His people. Moreover,
according to the Scripture’s own testimony, these expressions of desire are not
made of no effect, but do come to pass in the elect, their proper point of
reference. (Rev. Matthew Winzer, “Murray
on the Free Offer,” in The Blue Banner, vol. 9, no. 10-12)
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Q. 12. “John Piper, as well as other neo-Calvinists, speak of the
“complexity” of God. What are your
thoughts on this?”
[When faced with the notion of the “complexity” of God … [the]
Reformed man … is immediately reminded of what the creeds teach about the simplicity of God: “We believe with the
heart, and confess with the mouth, that there is one only simple and spiritual
Being, which we call God ...” (Belgic Confession 1). God is “a most
pure spirit, invisible, without body, parts, or passions” (Westminster
Confession 2:1). We are complex because we are created and
fallen beings with a maelstrom of emotions. God is simple because He is the
perfect God of peace and harmony. God is never confused, agitated or disturbed
within His own Being. Created reality external to Himself never throws the
Almighty into turmoil—not even the many prayers God must answer … Because God
is simple, all of His attributes are equal with His Being and with one another.
Therefore, God’s mercy is never at odds with His justice. God is His mercy and God is His justice, and God’s mercy and
justice are one in Him. God’s mercy, then, is an infinite, unchangeable,
eternal, almighty, just and holy mercy! God only has one mercy, not two
mercies. He does not have one common mercy which—although unfeigned, genuine
and sincere—does not save, and another mercy which effectually saves His elect
church. Moreover, because God is one and simple, His will is simple. This is because God is His will. God’s will is not “part” of God, as if we could ever
separate God’s will from God Himself. God’s will is God’s willing, and God wills eternally and unchangeably and
efficaciously. God never wills—decrees and therefore desires—things which never
come to pass. God never wills contradictory things at the same time—such as to
will to save all men and to will to save only some men. This is not the
invention of Reformed scholastics but the teaching of Scripture … (Ps. 115:3;
Isa. 46:10; Dan. 4:35; etc.). About God, James writes that He is “the Father of
lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning” (1:17). (Rev. Martyn McGeown, British Reformed Journal,
issue 57)
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Q. 13. “What is meant in historic Reformed theology by the
so-called ‘threefold love of God’? Three terms are often used to differentiate
different aspects of God’s love towards His creatures: ‘Love of benevolence,’ ‘love
of beneficence,’ and ‘love of complacency.’ Is there scriptural support for
this idea? Is it a valid teaching? Does this idea of ‘threefoldness’ conflict
with the truth that God is one and His love is also one?”
You will find the answer to your question about the threefold
love of God in Turretin’s Institutes of
Elenctic Theology, volume 1, page 242. P&R is the publisher. Turretin
here gives the thinking of the Reformed tradition, not merely his own thinking.
The love of benevolence
is that “by which God willed good to the creature from eternity.”
The love of beneficence
is that “by which he does good to the creature in time according to his good
will.”
The love of complacency
is that “by which he delights himself in the creature on account of the rays of
his image seen in them.”
Immediately, Turretin applies all three aspects of the love of
God to “us,” his elect. In order, the three aspects of love refer to his love
by which “he loved us before we were,” by which “he loves us as we are;” and by
which “he loves us when we ‘are’ (viz.,
renewed after his image—DJE).” By the first, he elects us; by the second, he
redeems and sanctifies us; but by the third, he gratuitously rewards us as holy
and just. John 3:16 refers to the first; Ephesians 5:25 and Revelation 1:5 to
the second; Isaiah 62:3 and Hebrews 11:6 to the third.
I hardly need to call to your attention that Turretin applies
all three aspects of the love of God, and restricts them to, the elect.
The Reformed tradition, as well as Scripture and the creeds,
restrict the love of God to the elect. (David
J. Engelsma, 26/07/2017)
==================
In the following sermon, Rev. Angus Stewart preaches on the three distinctions in God’s love toward men:
http://www.cprc.co.uk/comattributes7.mp3
(Text: Romans 5:5, 8)
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