Further stirring of the pot….

Last updated on: August 18, 2011 at 7:27 pm by Roger E. Olson

Further stirring of the pot…. 2011-08-18T19:27:59-05:00 Roger E. Olson

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For those of you wondering what view of God’s sovereignty Piper MIGHT be talking about in his youtube clip (that we’ve been discussing here), watch and listen to this youtube clip:

Letters Q&A – If God loved the world why did he let Satan control it?

I suspect the crucial word in Piper’s youtube clip (that some have mentioned but most have not) is “ultimately.” I do think he is saying in that youtube clip that a person who “ultimately” (finally, firmly) rejects God’s way of running the world (as Piper describes it– which I call meticulous providence or divine determinism) is likely to go on to reject God, then to reject the biblical testimony and finally to perish spiritually.

Many of you have wondered here whom he is talking about. Knowing Piper’s strong antipathy towards open theism, I suspect he is talking about open theists. I don’t take it that he is condeming them to hell. I think he is issuing a stern warning about where open theism (and anything very much like it) leads.

I don’t think it is right to interpret him as saying simply that someone who rejects GOD will perish. That hardly needs to be said, does it? His point obviously has to do with a person’s acceptance or rejection of God’s sovereignty. But what view of God’s sovereignty? Surely he wouldn’t bother to say that a person who rejects any and every view of God’s sovereignty will perish. Who rejects any and every view of God’s sovereignty? Even process theologians claim to believe in God’s sovereignty. Clearly, in his youtube clip, Piper is saying that a person who rejects the picture of God’s sovereignty he describes is in danger of perishing IF they go on to reject the biblical witness and God himself. But the point is, I think, that he sees a trajectory from rejection of his view of God’s sovereignty to rejection of the biblical witness to rejection of God himself. Whether that is an inexorable trajectory is the issue. He doesn’t say so. A hermeneutic of charity keeps me from thinking that is what he means. I certainly hope it isn’t.

Still, even if he doesn’t mean that, his warning is too harsh. I do not see any trajectory from open theism to rejecting the biblical witness to rejecting God. One could just as easily posit a trajectory from rejecting free will to rejecting the biblical witness to rejecting God. Wesley certainly posited just such a trajectory in Predestination Calmly Considered and other anti-Calvinist writings. But Wesley did not make it an inexorable trajectory. I hope Piper doesn’t mean his trajectory is. But I know some in the “young, restless, Reformed” movement do think that.

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