Does God change his thoughts?

Professor Richard Hays’ e-book, The Moral Vision of the New Testament, has lengthy been extremely considered a particularly useful introduction to New Testament ethics.

One of the chapters in his e-book makes use of the problems of homosexuality as a take a look at case for studying and making use of the New Testament in relation to a selected moral subject. In this chapter he writes that:

‘….the New Testament gives no loophole or exception clauses that may permit for the acceptance of gay apply underneath some circumstances. Despite the efforts of current interpreters to elucidate away the proof, the New Testament stays unambiguous and unequivocal in its condemnation of gay conduct.’

This being the case, he goes on to put in writing that:

‘It isn’t any extra acceptable for gay Christians to persist in gay exercise than it will be for heterosexual Christians to persist in fornication or adultery … Unless they can change their orientation and enter a heterosexual relationship, gay Christians ought to search to dwell lives of disciplined sexual abstinence.’

However, since The Moral Vision of the New Testament was revealed again in 1996, Hays has altered his place. He has co-authored along with his son Christopher a e-book known as The Widening of God’s Mercy, which has simply been revealed by Yale University Press and which argues for ‘the total inclusion of LGBT+ individuals in Christian communities.’

The argument put ahead on this e-book is just not that the New Testament accepts or approves of same-sex sexual exercise. Richard Hays nonetheless holds that these biblical texts that point out gay exercise are unequivocal of their condemnation of it. The argument on this e-book is slightly that ‘God repeatedly adjustments his thoughts in ways in which increase the sphere of his love’ and this precept can be utilized to argue that God now approves of gay conduct, though the Bible says he doesn’t. God has supposedly modified his thoughts on the matter.

In this text I’m not going to discover the small print of the argument put ahead by Richard and Christopher Hays of their e-book. Instead, I shall have a look at the massive subject that the e-book raises, particularly ‘Does God change his thoughts?’

I wish to counsel that there are three explanation why we should always say that the reply to this query is ‘No.’

The first motive is that there’s a complete collection of Biblical passages which explicitly state that God doesn’t change his thoughts. The following six quotations illustrate this level:

‘God is just not man, that he ought to lie,
or a son of man, that he ought to repent.
Has he stated, and can he not do it?
Or has he spoken, and can he not fulfil it?’ (Numbers 23:19)

‘And additionally the Glory of Israel won’t lie or repent; for he’s not a person,

that he ought to repent’ (1 Samuel 15:29).

‘I the Lord have spoken; it shall come to move, I’ll do it; I cannot return, I cannot spare, I cannot repent; based on your methods and your doings I’ll judge you, says the Lord God (Ezekiel 24:14).

‘For I the Lord don’t change; subsequently you O Sons of Jacob should not consumed’ (Malachi 3:6).

‘Those who previously grew to become clergymen took their workplace with out an oath, however this one was addressed with an oath, “The Lord has sworn and won’t change his thoughts, “Thou artwork a priest for ever”‘ (Hebrews 7:21, citing Psalm 110:4).

‘Every good endowment and each excellent reward is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no such thing as a variation or shadow as a result of change’ (James 1:17).

What we study from these passages, and from different comparable passages within the Bible, is that God doesn’t change or repent, and that is one thing to be each celebrated, as a result of it implies that God will hold his guarantees to his individuals and to be feared, as a result of it implies that God will enact the judgements that he has pronounced.

The second motive is that for God to alter or repent could be to go in opposition to his very nature. This is a degree that’s made very clearly by the seventeenth century English Puritan theologian Stephen Charnock in his 1682 work The Existence and Attributes of God.

According to Charnock: ‘There may be no motive for any change within the will of God.’ Human beings change their minds both due to a must adapt to unexpected circumstances or due to ‘a pure instability with none good trigger.’ Neither of those causes, argues Charnock, may be true of God.

First, lack of foresight can’t be attributed to God:

‘What may be eager to an infinite understanding? How can any unknown occasion defeat his objective, since nothing occurs on the earth however what he wills to impact, or wills to allow; and subsequently all future occasions are current with him? Besides, it doth not consist with God’s knowledge to resolve something, however upon the very best motive; and what’s the highest and infinite motive, can not however be unalterable in itself; for these may be no motive and knowledge greater than the very best.’

Secondly, there can’t be in God ‘…a pure instability of his will, or an easiness to be drawn into that which is unrighteous’.

‘If his will shouldn’t observe his counsel, it’s as a result of it’s not match to be adopted, or as a result of it won’t observe it; if not match to be adopted, it’s a reflection upon his knowledge; if or not it’s established, and he won’t observe it, there’s a contrariety in God, as there’s in a fallen creature, will in opposition to knowledge.’

In abstract, declares Charnock:

‘The righteousness of God is sort of a nice mountain (Psalm 36:6). The rectitude of his nature is as immovable in itself, as all of the mountains on the earth are by the energy of man. ‘He is just not as a person, that he ought to repent or lie’ (Numbers 23:19); who typically adjustments, out of a perversity of will, in addition to need of knowledge to foresee, or need of potential to carry out. His everlasting objective have to be both righteous or unrighteous; if righteous and holy, he would turn out to be unholy by the change; if not righteous or holy, then he was unrighteous earlier than the change; which means soever it falls, it will mirror on the righteousness of God, which is a blasphemous creativeness. If God did change his objective, it have to be both for the higher – then the counsel of God was unhealthy earlier than; or for the more severe, – then he was not smart or good earlier than.’

The third motive why we should always not say that God can change his thoughts is due to the implications that will observe from saying this. It would imply that we can not depend on God to retain the connection with us that he has established. If we’re Christians, we’re these whom God has known as to be his kids. If he can change his thoughts, then the day would possibly conceivably come when he not desires us as his kids. He would possibly repent of getting made us such. Worst case situation, he might resolve to reject us on the closing judgement though he has stated that he won’t accomplish that.

It would additionally imply that we might by no means ensure of what it means to dwell in accordance with God’s will. If God adjustments his thoughts, then he would possibly will one thing tomorrow that’s totally different from what he wills at this time and what he willed yesterday, and this is able to imply that there is no such thing as a steady foundation for ethics.

A changeable God could be an unreliable God, a God who we couldn’t depend on by way of our salvation, or as the idea for our behaviour, and residing in a world with such a God could be a nightmare.

It would possibly, nonetheless, be argued, that the biblical proof signifies that we dwell in simply such a world. Quite a lot of biblical texts, it’s argued, inform us that God does change his thoughts. For instance, Genesis 6:6 -7 declares:

‘And the Lord was sorry that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his coronary heart. So the Lord stated, ‘I’ll blot out man whom I’ve created from the face of the bottom, man and beast and creeping issues and birds of the air, for I’m sorry that I’ve made them.’

Likewise, in 1 Samuel 15:11 God says to Samuel: ‘I repent that I’ve made Saul king; for he has turned again from following me, and has not carried out my commandments,’ and in 1 Samuel 15:35 the chapter re-iterates ‘the Lord repented that he made Saul king over Israel.’

Finally in Jonah 3:10-4:2 we learn regarding the individuals of Nineveh:

‘When God noticed what they did, how they turned from their evil means, God repented of the evil which he had stated he would do to them; and he didn’t do it.

‘But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was offended. And he prayed to the Lord and stated, “I pray thee, Lord, is just not this what I stated once I was but in my nation? That is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish; for I knew that thou artwork a gracious God and merciful, gradual to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and repentest of evil.’

All these passages and others like them, resembling Exodus 32:10-14, Isaiah 38:1-6 and Amos 7:1-3, do appear to point that God does change his thoughts. God does one thing, or says he’s going to do one thing, after which repents. Surely, it’s stated, which means God’s will is changeable.

The very first thing that must be famous in response is the purpose made by the good Medieval theologian Thomas Aquinas that each one language used of God is analogical. Because God is just not a creature, no phrases used of him are utilized in the identical means as when they’re utilized to creaturely realities. Thus, once we are informed that God is a rock, or a father, or a shepherd, all these phrases imply various things when utilized to God. God is just not a rock in the identical means {that a} piece of granite is. God is just not a father in the identical means I’m, and God is just not a shepherd in the identical means because the opponents in One Man and his Dog.

The identical is true of the language of repentance when utilized to God. It doesn’t imply the identical factor within the case of God because it does within the case of human beings. To quote Charnock as soon as extra:

‘God is claimed to repent when he modifies the disposition of affairs with out himself; as males, after they repent, alter the course of their actions, so God alters issues further to, or with out himself, however adjustments nothing of his personal objective inside himself. It slightly notes the motion he’s about to do, than something in his personal nature, or any change of his everlasting objective. God’s repenting of his kindness is nothing however an inflicting of punishment, which the creature by the change of his carriage has merited: as his repenting of the evil threatened is the withholding of the punishment denounced, when the creature hath humbly submitted to his authority, and acknowledged his crime.’

To put it merely, God’s thoughts and can are unchangeable, however they’ve totally different outcomes relying on human behaviour.

In abstract Richard and Christopher Hays base their argument for Christian acceptance of same-sex relationships on God having modified his thoughts. This means their argument is flawed from the beginning, as a result of that’s one factor that God by no means does.