Simplicity, Attributes and Divine Wrath
To say wrath is not a divine perfection because there are no objects of wrath toward which wrath may be expressed within the self-existing ontological Trinity proves too much. Such a criterion would undermine other divine perfections such as holiness, mercy, creativity, patience etc.
God is a simple being or he is not. If God is not a simple being, then he is a composite of parts, in which case God’s attributes would be what he has rather than is, making his attributes abstract properties that self-exist without ultimate reference to God. God would be subject to change and evaluation against platonistic forms without origin. Yet if God alone self-exists, then God is a simple being. As such, God is identical to what is in God.
There are at least four traps or ditches we must avoid when considering divine simplicity. One is to say that each attribute is identical to each other because God is his attributes. Another trap to avoid is the denial of divine simplicity on the basis that “God is love” obviously means something different than “God is holy.” A third trap to avoid is trying to resolve the conundrum presented by the first two ditches by positing a kind of penetration or infusion of attributes using propositions like, God’s holiness is loving holiness. Although helpful and in a sense unavoidable to a point, the infusion of attributes eventually breaks down when we consider, for instance, omniscience and spirituality, or more strikingly love and wrath. Attempts to qualify attributes with other attributes do not save divine simplicity but instead, if taken too far, end in its denial. And finally, a fourth trap to avoid, which is an advancement of the first, is that of saying x-attribute is identical to y-attribute in God’s mind even though the transitivity of attributes is unintelligible to human minds. That particular mystery card reduces each attribute to meaningless predicates when played. Attributes become vacuous terms. The law of identity was never intended for such abuse.
Like creation ex nihilo divine simplicity is derived negatively, not positively. (Creation ex nihilo is deduced by the negation of eternal matter and pantheism.) Given that divine simplicity is entailed by God’s sole eternality, God is not comprised of parts. Accordingly, God’s revelation of his particular attributes is an accommodation to our creatureliness. It’s ectypal and analogical, not archetypal and univocal.
When we consider God’s attributes we must be mindful that we are drawing theological distinctions that pertain to the one undivided divine essence that eternally exists in three modes of subsistence or persons.
Given our finitude we cannot help but draw such theological distinctions, but we should be mindful that such doctrinal nuance, although proper, does not belong to any division in God.
As a simple being, God has one divine and univocal attribute, which is his essence. Notwithstanding, the God who is not composite we only know analogically, discretely and in part, but that is because God’s simplicity is too complex to take in all at once due to the creator-creature distinction. God is knowable and incomprehensible.
With that as a backdrop, we may consider that many of God’s revealed attributes are further distinguished by their relation to creation, which are sometimes called relative attributes (or secondary attributes, which is not the happiest of terms). Although all God’s attributes are eternal and ultimately one, at least some of God’s revealed perfections are inconceivable to us apart from considering them in relation to something other than God. For instance, God is long-suffering, but what is it to be pure patience in timeless eternity without objects of pity? That an attribute such as long-suffering is revealed in the context of created-time and patience toward pitiful creatures does not imply that God is not eternally long-suffering in his being. The same can be said of God’s holiness, for what is holiness without created things? God cannot be separate from himself; yet God is eternally holy. That is to say, God does not become holy through creation, or long-suffering through the occasion of sin and redemption. Is omnipresence a spatial consideration dependent upon creation or is it an eternal reality that is expressed or not expressed apart from creation?
We are limited in our creaturely understanding, but we can be certain God’s Trinitarian self-love includes love of his relative attributes, such as his patience towards sinners he’d instantiate, and his creativity apart from having yet created. God loves himself for who he is, not what he does (or what we might imagine he was eternally doing).
We understand this even by analogy. One reason I love my wife is because she is a self-sacrificing servant of God and his people. My love for her as a servant isn’t released by her actions of serving. I love her as the servant she is even when she is not serving or even being served. I love her for who she is, not what she does.
Wrath is an attribute no less than long-suffering and holiness. It’s a perfection of God without which God would not exist. If it is not, then what is it?
I’ll now try to address some common rejoinders:
1. To say wrath is not a divine perfection because there are no objects of wrath toward which wrath may be expressed within the self-existing ontological Trinity proves too much. Such a criterion would undermine other divine perfections such as holiness, mercy, creativity, patience etc.
It also confuses God as timeless pure act with a notion of God’s timeless doing. That there’s no potential with God does not mean God’s existence entails an eternal expression of his divine attributes – for our only conception of expression entails time-sequence, which in turn entails creation! So, that God does not “express” wrath in the ontological Trinity in a way that we can understand does not undermine wrath as a divine perfection, for neither can we begin to conceive how love is expressed in a timeless eternity! So, just as relative attributes are only understood in relation to things outside of God, what are classified as absolute attributes (e.g., Love) cannot be conceived other than analogically and relatively.
Since time is created, and eternal expressions of love in the ontological Trinity are human contemplations of the eternal in temporal terms, it’s special pleading to dismiss wrath as an eternal perfection while simultaneously affirming love as an eternal perfection. To do so on the basis of analogical contemplations of time-function intra-Trinitarian expressions of non-temporal Trinitarian existence is philosophically arbitrary and inconsistent. It ends in Social Trinitarianism by introducing time into the eternal life of God.
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How to Raise a Worthless Child
He honored his sons above God by refusing to restrain them from their blasphemous life described above (1 Sam 2:29; 3:13). In fact, he joined their sins by fattening himself with the meat that his sons so wrongfully took (1 Sam 2:29). Hophni and Phinehas would answer for their own sins, but Eli would answer for letting them live unrestrained.
The book of 1 Samuel begins with a contrast between Samuel and the sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas. Whereas Samuel would grow to be a godly boy and young man (cf. 1 Sam 1:28; 2:11, 18–21, 26; 3:19–4:1), Hophni and Phinehas were very sinful.
Notice the sins of these sons. They were generally “worthless men” and “did not know the Lord” (1 Sam 2:17). They showed themselves irreverent bullies and gluttons by eating sacrificial meat with its fat and taking it by force (1 Sam 2:13–16; cf. 2:29; Lev 3:17; 7:22–27). They slept with the women who helped at the tabernacle (1 Sam 2:22). They refused to listen to rebuke (1 Sam 2:25). As it was still Israel’s era of rule by judges, perhaps the lawless spirit of the day encouraged their sins as well (cf. Judg 21:25). It is no surprise, then, to find their sin described as “very great in the sight of the Lord” and that “it was the will of the Lord to put them to death” (1 Sam 2:25). As promised, they died on the same day, and God exterminated Eli’s descendants from the priesthood altogether (1 Sam 4:1–22; cf. 2:27–36; 1 Kgs 2:26–27, 35).
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Are We Performing or Are We Participating?
It would be far better to sing without instruments than to have the church stay silent with them. It would be far better to turn off all instrumentation than to tune out all the voices. Serve the people as they sing, I say—serve the people as they sing of the gospel, sing for one another, and sing to the Lord—just as He commands.
With due respect to my Reformed Presbyterian friends, I think it’s difficult to make the argument that singing in the local church must not be accompanied by instrumentation. But with due respect to everyone else, I think it’s equally difficult to make the argument that singing in the local church must be accompanied by instrumentation. It seems to me that we have a lot of freedom here—freedom to sing in a way that matches our convictions and freedom to sing in a way we judge appropriate to our setting.
I tend to think the most difficult position to justify from the Bible is the one that seems to be in effect in a great many evangelical churches today—that music is at its best when there is a full band of skilled singers and musicians who play so loudly as to drown out the voices of the congregation. Where instrumentation was traditionally used to enhance the beauty of the music and help direct the singing of the congregation, today it often seems to dominate so that instead of using a band to complement and accompany the congregation, the congregation now merely does their best to sing along to a band.
A friend recently distinguished between two helpful categories: worship services that are performative and worship services that are participatory. A performative worship service is one that could merrily go on even if there was no one there but the people at the front of the room—the pastor(s) and the band. A participatory worship service is one that would have no meaning unless the congregation was present and doing their part. And while the congregation can and should participate in more than the singing (e.g. prayers, ordinances, responsive readings), they should certainly not participate in less than the singing. Yet this is the reality in so many churches today—singing is performative far more than participatory. In fact, the less we can hear the voices of the unskilled singers in the pews, the better the music is judged to be. Singing has gone from being the domain of the many amateurs to the domain of the few professionals.
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“Christian Nationalism”: Dump the Term While We Still Can
The term Christian Nationalist sends the wrong message to both those outside the church and those inside the church. Therefore, I simply do not use the term. I prefer the term Christendom. When I speak of Christendom, surprisingly most people in the church today have never heard of it. I find this ironic because America (with all her warts) at various times in history could be judged as an example of Christendom. We have been living off that borrowed capital for years, but it is hastily running out.
America is at war—not literally as in the shedding of blood. At least, not yet. However, we have not been this divided since the advent of the Civil War. History does tend to repeat itself. It appears to me that total anarchy is on the horizon, and the 2024 presidential election could easily trigger this event.
On the one hand, we have a political party (with a president in the White House) that is pro-abortion up to the point of birth, a proponent of homosexual marriage, and an advocate of the mutilation of children in the name of transgenderism. With this party in power, we are now a nation that is known for Drag Queens teaching children at public libraries, open United States borders, and monetary inflation that steals purchasing power from every household.
On the other hand, we have a second political party in this country that is pushing back on some of these issues, although not all of them. For Bible-believing Christians the present political and social disorder is very appalling. Most biblical Christians have lost hope in both political parties.
Some Christians are looking for a rapture very soon. They believe they will escape what could be a coming calamity. Others, like myself, believe that this is simply the judgment of God on our nation, and this is something we all must face head on.
The issue before us is very simple. America has changed religions. From a nation where political laws were based on the Ten Commandments, our nation has been commandeered by those who despise God’s law. This new religion controls almost all landscapes of our country including the political, the educational, the military, the media, and even the arena of large business corporations. It is quickly infiltrating the church.
The Evangelical Church is a mess and unable to respond. Most pastors are silent from the pulpit in order to avoid conflict. Other pastors in the name of the separation of church and state (or the separation of two kingdoms) believe that only the church should be under the law of God, and it is alright if the state legalizes abortion, homosexuality, and the freedom to choose one’s sex. They promote the idea that the church is spiritual and the Bible has no authority over civil magistrates or unbelievers. Persecution is our calling and we should welcome it. It is the way of glory.
Thus, out of desperation and grief, there has arisen a new movement calling itself Christian Nationalism. It is a backlash against the current war against Christianity. It is partially a replacement movement for a silent church. Leaders include Marjorie Taylor Greene, a U.S. House Representative from Georgia, and Lauren Boebert, a U. S. House Representative from Colorado. Al Mohler, who has spoken against the use of the term in the past, now seems to be warming up to it.
For several reasons, I am opposed to adopting or using the term Christian Nationalism as a response to the present anti-Christian crusade. I believe the term will do more harm than good. My reasons are as follows.
First, no one has defined the term Christian Nationalism. There is no consensus on what it means. Cultural theologians, both liberal and conservative are attempting to give it meaning, seeking to be the first in line to claim that honor.
Secondly, it is all happening so fast that it makes my head swim. It may be time to just sit down and do more thinking about it rather than bellow the term in frustration. Proverbs 25:8 tells us to be cautious about arguing our case too quickly. This is wisdom that is needed in our day.
Thirdly, the term nationalism will be associated with the Nazi Nationalism of Germany before World War ll. Since the mainstream media is pushing this narrative too, and since they control much of public opinion, biblical Christians who are vocal will be called Nazis. In the case of our present President of the United States, he has already called people like me Semi-Facist. The FBI has become a political arm of the present regime, and many vocal Christians will likely come under considerable scrutiny (like the My Pillow Man).
Fourthly, no one that I know believes that the church should rule the state. In the Old Testament there was a separation of the realms of Moses and Aaron. In the New Testament the power of the sword belongs to the civil magistrate and not to the church. This idea of the church ruling the state is simply a false conflagration to scare the ignorant and to create a false phobia.
The separation of church and state is biblical. However, no one can separate religion and state. Every state will be dominated by some religion, whether it be Christianity, Islam, or (now in the case of America) Neo-Marxism (see my book Critical Race Theory and the Church – A Concise Analysis).
I have the same frustration as both Representatives Greene and Boebert, but I have a better name for what they want to see. It is called Christendom! It is a word that has been in use for hundreds of years. It does not have a pejorative connotation tied to it. It simply refers to a nation that, either by a consensus of the people (democracy) or by royal inheritance (Great Britain), is a culture governed by Christian principles and as such will be blessed with peace and prosperity.
In Christendom the church-state separation is respected. The ten commandments are the basis of a civil society. The laws of the state should reflect in principle the laws of God. No one is forced to go to church. After working six days, God gives us a day of rest. The dignity of life is to be protected, even those in the womb. Adultery is treason against the family because God created the family for security and protection. Opportunity is based on merit, and not on race or color.
The term Christian Nationalist sends the wrong message to both those outside the church and those inside the church. Therefore, I simply do not use the term. I prefer the term Christendom.
When I speak of Christendom, surprisingly most people in the church today have never heard of it. I find this ironic because America (with all her warts) at various times in history could be judged as an example of Christendom. We have been living off that borrowed capital for years, but it is hastily running out. The bank account is almost empty.
Only a full-orbed gospel can create a true and lasting Christendom. The hearts of the elect must first be changed through the power of the Holy Spirit. In Christendom, good Christian men will become leaders in all the domains of life. This is the only way to stop the present slide toward insanity and suicide. Remember, all who hate God love death (Prov. 8:36). Not all men in a Christian nation will be Christians, but in spite of their rebellious hearts, they will reap some of the blessings of God.
There is much that could be said about this topic. I cannot deal with it all here. I am not sure that I am capable. But I plead for my Christian brethren to dump the term Christian Nationalism and use the term Christendom. Then, let the real conversation begin.
Larry E. Ball is a retired minister in the Presbyterian Church in America and is now a CPA. He lives in Kingsport, Tenn.
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