Notes and personal commentary on "The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God"(D.A.Carson)
Started 4/8/10- Completed 4/15/10
All "" are direct quotes. Notes are in summary/paraphrased form unless other wise noted. Chapter titles and underlines are directly quoted
Chp. 1
Why the Doctrine of the Love of God is judged difficult
1) The Majority of the people today believe God (it, she, he, fill in their own perfered word) is a loving God, and are not surprise by the "God loves you" phrase. But the definition of this love is vastly different than the Christian definition of love, or at least the definition that they come to has been set in a place outside of Christian theology
2) Other "complementary" truths about God are widely disbelieved such as sovereignty, holiness, God's wrath, providence etc...
"the love of God in our culture has been purged of anything the culture finds uncomfortable. The love of God has been sanitized, deomocratized and above all else sentimentalized"
"today most people seem to have little difficulty believing in the love of God; they have far more difficulty believing i the justice of God, the wrath of God, and the noncontridictory truthfulness of an ominicient God"
3) Our culture believes that all religions are the same, and a postmodern mindset has taken over. "the only hersey is that there is such a thing as heresy"
4) "Within Christian confessionalism the doctrine of the love of God poses its difficulties"
thinking through fundamental truths, to keep truths about God in balance
5) Love of God thought more easily understood than it is, overlooking distinctions
Some Different ways the bible speaks of the love of God
1) Love of the Father for the Son and Son for the Father
John 3:35, 5:20, 14:31
2) God's providental love over his creation
Gen. 1, Matt.6
3)God's "salvfic stance toward his fallen world"
John 3:16, 1 John 2:2, John 15:19
"inviting" "commanding all humans to repent"
Ezek. 33:11
4) God's particular effective selecting love toward his elect
Duet. 7:7-8; cf. 4:37, 10:14-15
" when Israel is contrasted witht he universe or other nations, the distinguishing feature has nothing of personal or national merit; it is nothing other than the love of God"
"the discriminationg feature of God's love surfaces frequently"
Mal. 1:2-3
Christ loves the Church
Eph. 5;25
5) "God's love is sometimes said to be directed toward his own people in a porvisional or conditional way- condtitoned, that is, on obedience"
Jude vs. 21
John 15:9-10
"to a thousand generations"
Ex. 20:6
Ps. 103:9-11, 13, 17-18
Three Preliminary observations on these distinctive ways of talking about the Love of God
1) The results of absoltizing and making exclusive one aspect of God's love over another, or making one the lense by which you see all the rest
Trinitarian model- between Jesus and followers; Father does not redeem Son nor vica versa
Providental love lense- God is a "mysterious force"- stance of pantheism
Inviting seeking love lense- semi-plageans, pelagians, arminians, + interested parties in God's emotional inner life
Election lense- God loves elect; hates reprobate; same assertion that has "engendered hyper calvinism"
Obediance love lense- bring people into merit theology instead of the cross
2) These views not "compartments" but complimentariasm -not "loves" but "love" God is love
All these truths are needed and needed to be held together
3) Do "certain evangelical cliches stand up"? aka "God's love is unconditional" "God loves everyone the same way"
What applies and what time is essential and important
"Christian faithfulness entails our responsibility to grow in our grasp ow what it means to confess that God is love"
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