The Christ Centred Cosmic Civilisation
Rod Dreher wrote “to order the world rightly as Christians requires regarding all things as pointing to Christ”
Christ is the One in Whom in all things consist and humanity is not the measure of all things. If a defining characteristic of the modern world is disorder then the most fundamental act of resistance is to discover and life according to the deep, divine order of the heavens and the earth.
In this series we want to look at the big model of the universe that the Bible and Christian history provides.
It is a mind and heart expanding vision of reality.
It is not confined to the limits of our bodily senses - but tries to embrace levels fo reality that are not normally accessible or tangible to our exiled life on earth.
We live on this side of the cosmic curtain - and therefore the highest and greatest dimensions of reality are hidden to us… yet these dimensions exist and are the most fundamental framework for the whole of the heavens and the earth.
Throughout this series we want to pick away at all the threads of reality to see how they all join together - how they all find common meaning and reason in the great divine logic - the One who is the Logos, the LORD Jesus Christ - the greatest that both heaven and earth has to offer.
Colossians 1:15-23
The Christ Centred Cosmic Civilisation
Episode 119 - The Unchanging God: Philosophical Speculations vs Biblical Revelation
The unchanging nature of God stands as one of Christianity's most fundamental doctrines, yet how we understand divine immutability profoundly shapes our entire theological framework. This episode delves into the fascinating tension between philosophical conceptions of God's timelessness and the Bible's rich portrayal of divine relationship.
We begin by examining what Scripture actually means when it declares "the Lord does not change." Rather than abstract metaphysics, biblical immutability primarily concerns God's faithfulness, dependability, and consistent character. However, philosophical traditions—beginning with Neoplatonism and continuing through Christian history—have developed a far more radical concept: that God exists in a single "eternal moment" with absolutely no sequence of events, no before or after, no conversation or interaction even within the Trinity itself.
This provocative concept suggests everything God has done or will do occurs simultaneously in one eternal act. There is no potential, only pure actuality. God doesn't think one thought after another or engage in sequential activities—everything is maximally realized in this timeless moment. While intellectually sophisticated, this view creates significant tensions with Scripture's portrayal of God.
The Bible consistently depicts the Father, Son, and Spirit engaging in genuine conversation and relationship. In passages like Psalm 2, Hebrews 1-2, and Psalm 110, we witness the Father speaking to the Son about future events, the Son responding to the Father, and clear evidence of sequential divine dialogue. These biblical passages suggest real communication between Trinity members—not merely anthropomorphic language, but genuine relational dynamics within God's nature.
This exploration challenges us to reconsider whether philosophical abstractions, however intellectually compelling, should supersede the Bible's clear revelation of a God who remembers the past, acts in the present, and anticipates the future. Can the Trinity transcend time's limitations while still experiencing genuine relationship and sequence? Join us as we navigate this profound theological terrain where Scripture and philosophy collide.
The theme music is "Wager with Angels" by Nathan Moore
Well, welcome to the Christ-centered cosmic civilization. As we continue to examine the way in which God is immutable, or what does the Bible mean when it says the Lord does not change we have thought about the Bible's straightforward teaching about the faithfulness of God. His word is completely dependable, trustworthy. Then we thought about the way in which there's something structurally time changeless about the. You know that the Father always begets, the Son always breathes out the spirit, and that the father, uh, that the living god, is always father, son and spirit, um, and that there's no sense in which any member of the trinity came to be at some point or anything like that. Nor is there a way in which the Trinity is evolving into something else or anything like that. So then we thought about that. But now we're examining this other idea, the philosophical speculations that try to connect the idea that God does not change or ground it in some other idea, and the first one is the idea that God is timeless, and we've already examined ways in which the Bible speaks about how the Father, son and Spirit relate to time and history, and we've seen that there is no sense in which they have negative impacts of time. Time is not running out for them. They have, you know, infinite amount of time. Time is not running out for them. They have, you know, infinite amount of time and they do not decay. And so the living God doesn't age, decay or diminish through the passage of time or anything like that, doesn't suffer from forgetfulness because of aging or anything like that. All of that's ridiculous, and that we've seen that the members of, as if they are subject to the universe, rather even the highest heaven, cannot contain the lord god. So we've something that kind of rules over us because we are creatures within the universe and are subject to the conditions of the universe, so that, like when we think about Genesis 3 or Romans 8, and it says that the whole creation has been subject to a bondage of decay. Therefore, because we are part of that universe, we are also subject to vanity and decay and all that goes with that. But that is not true of the living God. But that is not true of the living God. But we've seen that the living God does experience, can experience time very intricately, or see it as passing quickly, and so on. There's that very different perspective.
Speaker 1:Were coming to this idea, though, that some would argue that not only is the living God not part of the history of the universe, but the Father, son and Spirit do not have any sequence of events at all, so that for the Trinity there is only a single moment, one single moment in time that has no past, no future, just a kind of eternal present moment in which there is no sequence of occurrences, there is no before or after Now again, when I try to explain this to people they particularly if they're just interested in the Bible they're a a bizarre idea, because the Bible just doesn't seem to get into anything like that or imagine such a thing, and so it takes sometimes a bit of time to try to explain how a person gets to that, and we may be able to do that over these coming episodes. So the idea here is that time is intrinsically a created thing that is part of the universe, and time there is taken to mean any sequence of events and the relation between occurrences. So if that is true, if that's what time is is something that is intrinsically tied to created existence within the universe, existence within the universe. Therefore, if that's what time is something that is intrinsically tied to creative existence, then the living God doesn't have it, because the living God is not a creature. And then if time is also taken to mean a sequence of events, one thing happening after another, then that means that the Trinity has no events occurring within the life of god. So if there's no events, if there's no before or after events within the life of god, why would a person think that will be cut? And then they'll.
Speaker 1:That leads to this idea that the kind of and try and try and stick with this the idea is that the Lord God just does one single event, one single action, and that single action that happens in this eternal moment is all, the, all actions that the living God ever does are done as this single action. It's like a single act of will and decision. So we experience the actions as if God has done lots of different actions sequentially, one after the other, spread along the timeline, kind of thing. But those that take this view say no, actually the law, lord God, has no history at all past, present, future, and so, from the perspective of this eternal moment of God, god just does this one single action, and that one single action is everything that God ever does Creation, redemption, everything is all in this single moment, with no sequences. So if this is true.
Speaker 1:The claim is, then, that the Trinity does not have actions or events or speeches that are sequential, no thoughts that go one after the other, no conversations, there's no chronology or history for the father, son or spirit. Um, and so obviously, if that is true, that does kind of mean there is no change in a very, very absolute sense. There's no change for the father, son and Spirit, because there's no, not even any activity in what, or you could say, there is only activity. There's this pure single action of this, a single moment, so that every God is like this single action, that is total action. Total action and all activities that the living God, ever that we perceive as happening sequentially are all included in this single one act, so that there is no sequence of actions.
Speaker 1:So, in that sense, there's no events or happenings one after another and therefore, yeah, no variations, even in the thoughts within the Trinity. Other no, and therefore, yeah, no variations even in the thoughts within the trinity. So we would think, one thought comes after another and leads to other thoughts, and then you can have conversations where one person says that, one thing, person, but none of that. All of that would be ruled out, because the idea is all thought is also everything that god has ever thought. It all happens in this single eternal moment where there is one action, one thought, one will. That contains all that, god, ever that we might see or experience or as sequences of things. But in truth, truth, the idea is from God's perspective, everything is done in this single thought, single action, single will. Okay, yeah, so that's what's the proposal. So that does mean there is no variation within the Trinity, no sequence of actions, no variation of emotion in the Father, son and Spirit. Everything is just maximally what it is in this eternal moment, with no possible variation.
Speaker 1:Now, if you can grasp that, that's good. Well, I don't know if it's a good thing, but it's not an easy thing to grasp. I think we can all agree from the outset that that is not ever explicitly taught in the Bible, that that is not ever explicitly taught in the Bible. It's certainly not explicitly taught anything like that in the Bible. That, whatever there is the status of this claim that God has such an existence, it is obviously not an explicit biblical teaching. Some would argue it's compatible with what the Bible says. Some would argue it's compatible with what the Bible says. I'm not sure about that. But many do think it is compatible with what the Bible says and we'll leave that for a moment, that possibility.
Speaker 1:But it's a quite unusual, let's just say that way of thinking because it means that everything that's in the bible that seems to suggest a secret, that the father does one thing, then another thing, or the son, and, and that there's a sense of looking forward to things or remembering things, that the members of the trinity might be described in such terms. All of that has to be said to be not literally true, but all of that is not what God is really like, but that's how we are to perceive the members of the Trinity, but beyond that. So the idea is, if we, a person who can attain this way of thinking of the Father, son and Spirit as existing in this eternal single moment, they are able to see that the language of the Bible, where the members of the Trinity seem to have acts sequentially, with varieties of events and emotions and words and actions, they can see through that and see a higher picture or deeper understanding of God. Where there is no such things, ok. So if there are no events or happenings, then yet no variation, no change of any kind in this absolute sense. Again, I just have to flag up that we're in now a world of thinking that is extremely distant from the biblical language, where it says the Lord does not change. Therefore we trust his words, therefore he's faithful, therefore he's reliable, therefore, as he's hated evil in the past, he still hates evil now. That kind of level of language is so distant now because we're talking now a kind of very, very abstract way in which God does not change, in a kind of very metaphysically abstract sense.
Speaker 1:So the point then, from this perspective, is that everything that the Trinity could be, or could do, or could think, or could say, all of that is fully realized in a timeless, eternal moment, and so that there is no potential for the father, son or spirit, and that means no possibility of variation in absolutely any way, absolutely, anyway, this idea of potential, because if, if it's the case that the father could do something but has not yet done, it has the potential to do something but has not yet done it, then once the father does, does do that thing, then that change has happened. Or, from another perspective, we might say now there's a sequence of events before the action was done, during the action, after the action. So now there'll be a sequence and in that sequence there's a change from before to after. So those that take this view have this idea that there is no potential, that everything that God could do, say, think, feel, all of it is maximally done in this eternal moment, so that there is no potential. Everything that God could do is done in this timeless moment. So there's no capacity to do something, everything is done. I know it sounds odd to describe it, but there is a kind of internal logic to this way of thinking. So there it is. If the Father, son and Spirit have no experience of one thing happening after another, therefore, just that one starting point would lead to. Therefore, if they only have a single moment, an eternal moment, in that single moment everything is done, everything is thought, everything is said, everything is no potential, there is only actuality, there's only action, pure act, everything is done, everything is in this single moment, with no sequence, no, looking forward, no, remembering nothing like that. Now, yeah, it can see. And again, the goal of this, in a way, is to achieve the idea that God does not change in any sense. So you do end up here with a God who doesn't change, because there is no sequence, there's no variation, there's nothing but the question. Well, we'll leave that for a second, let's just keep exploring it.
Speaker 1:So it may seem hard to comprehend, but there is actually quite a long philosophical tradition of trying to explore this idea of a kind of it's like a timeless divinity, but it's not like timeless in the sense of no, no sequence. No, no sequence of before or after. Uh, so the there's a quite a long philosophical tradition of trying to conceive of a, of a concept of divinity, or the absolute, or the one, the one absolute, that has no sequence, no potentiality, no before and after. And then what is done? It's not only Christians, it was originally pagans who did this Neoplatonism, but Christians felt, ah, that is a very powerful concept of divinity, and we, some Christians, felt that was compatible with the Bible. And there's been a long and, I would say, quite impressive tradition of trying to integrate that concept of divinity with the scriptures, and it's led to intellectually impressive and sometimes even devotionally powerful meditations on God and works that have been written about God from that perspective, whether, yeah, I won't criticize it yet, I'll just want to acknowledge what it is. So the idea, then, is let's just get it clear again If the divine or the supreme being or the absolute one, or we might even wish to call that the Trinity, has no before or after, then there cannot be any sequence of actions, no conversations in the sense of one person saying something, someone else responding to that, for this divine being, for the Trinity, and therefore no change of any kind for God.
Speaker 1:Now, this then has quite urgent implications for the doctrine of the Trinity, I think for the kind of Neoplatonists who don't believe in the Trinity but believe in this single absolute one that is not really personal, that they had this idea of the absolute one that has no relationships of any kind and that was considered to be a virtue, not a vice, a virtue, not a vice. It was considered to be a feature of this, to be a good thing, that it had no relationships or no relations of any kind with any creature or anything, because any relationship or relation would be considered to be a diminishing, a lessening of the one, so that it was like a built-in feature to say the one has no relationships whatsoever. So that kind of you could understand how that worked. But when that kind of concept of divinity is, there's an attempt to integrate that with the doctrine of the Trinity or the biblical doctrine of God. There are some, then, quite urgent implications, because the Bible really does seem to describe conversations and personal interactions between the members of the Trinity, uh, actions of the trinity that are sequential and that are along a timeline such that the the father, for example, chose christ before the foundation of the world, then there came a point where he sent his son into the world, and so on. So it does seem that way, prima facie, that the Trinity and conversations within, even forgetting how the members of the Trinity might relate to the heavens and the earth or the historical timeline, even just thinking about the internal life of the Trinity, it does seem to be revealed to us. I have to say I can't get around this. It does seem to be revealed to us in such a way that they have conversations with each other, way that they have conversations with each other, that there's a kind of interactivity, of movement within the Trinity, a movement of relationship, a kind of vibrancy, an activity of the way they relate to one another, even just something. Let me give some examples of scripture. One another, even just something. Let me give some examples of scripture.
Speaker 1:Hebrews 1, verse 5,. This is the father speaking to the son. Hebrews 1, verse 5 says to which of the angels did God ever say you are my son, today I've become your father? Or again, I will be his father and he will be my son? So there it's like the father speaking to the son, like celebrating his begottenness, but in the other one it's him looking forward to doing that also. So this way in which there's an if the son is eternally begotten of the father, that the father can even look forward to this occurring, this begetting of the son, and that in some way there are events in the life of the son, maybe the incarnation, maybe the resurrection, maybe the ascension, maybe his baptism. On all these occasions, on all these occasions, the father says to the son today you are my son, today I've become your father. So it's something that happens multiple times. And the father says I will be his father, he will be my son, like that.
Speaker 1:Or the reference to Psalm 2 is important there, because that that's Hebrews 1 5 is quoting Psalm 2, because within Psalm 2, the father speaks to the son in order for the son to then speak to the father. So it's requiring a sequence of before and after conversation within the Trinity. And then the father describes the future work of the son. So Psalm 2, verses 7 to 9, says this I will proclaim the Lord's decree. He said to me you are my son today, I've become your father. Ask me and I will.
Speaker 1:Way the Bible handles that. The way the Bible exegetes Psalm 2, what we have is the father speaking to the son, him commanding the son to ask for an inheritance of all the nations. The son does in fact do that. In fact, the son prays many times to the father with tears and so on. That prayer is answered and then Jesus in the ascension has this kind of global kingdom and the church goes out to the whole world. Then that point about you will break them with a rod of vine, dash them to pieces like pottery. That is referenced in the book of Revelation as referring to what Jesus will do at the end of the world. He will do that at the end of the world.
Speaker 1:Now what's important there is that the father speaks to the son and is asking the son to speak to him, and the father is anticipating this sequence. Anticipating this sequence. So it does look as if there are conversations within the Trinity. Well, it doesn't look at it. There are in fact, according to scripture, conversations within the Trinity and reciprocal conversations, where one the father, says something to the son in order for the son to respond to the father, first the father speaking, and then the son, um, again, jesus and his apostles quote psalm 110, verse 1, in which the father speaks to the son and he speaks to the son about what the son should do and then what would happen. So Psalm 110, verse 1, the Lord says to my Lord sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet. And again that is understood as implying a kind of not, um, a sequence, uh, and, and there's a time, there's a, there is a kind of do this, do this, for until something happens, that there's a kind of uh, clear timeline there, um, scripture also claims that the son speaks to the father.
Speaker 1:So hebrews 2, 12 to 13 records the son speaking to the father about his future work in his incarnation. So this is what he said. He says and this is a quote from Psalm 22, verse 22, I will declare your name to my brothers and sisters In the assembly, I will sing your praises and then again quote from Isaiah 8, 17,. I will put my trust in him, the son there speaking about his future work and how, in his incarnation, he will put his trust in the father. And then again, isaiah 8, 18,. He says here am I and the children God the father has given me and the children God the Father has given me. So all that's kind of relevant.
Speaker 1:There seem to be clear conversations within Trinity where the Father will speak to the Son. The Son will respond affirming the Father's will rejoicing in it, affirming the father's will rejoicing in it, and that they speak about. They speak to one another about future thing, actions that the father says to the son look in the future, you will do this, and when you do this, I will do this. And the son's saying, yes, I am going you do this, I will do this. And the son's saying, yes, I am going to do this, and when I do that, I'm going to be happy about it, or then I'll sing your praises, or then, when I'm in this situation, I'm going to trust you, father. That's how it, that's what the scripture describes sequences of conversations that are in reference to future activities.
Speaker 1:Zechariah 1.12 is also relevant. The angel of the Lord said and the angel of the Lord is, of course, god the Son. Lord Almighty, how and this is the angel of the Lord God the Son speaking to the father, kind of praying to the father, lord Almighty, how long will you withhold mercy from Jerusalem and from the towns of Judah, which you have been angry with these 70 years? Now there's you know. Of course we might say that's quite complex, how the son is praying to the father about the ancient church and things like that. But even leaving that aside for a minute, what we'll do with that kind of a complexity? Just the idea that the the father is the age of the Lord says that the father has been angry with Jerusalem and the towns of Judah for a period of time 70 years and that he's angry. And then the idea is he's not always angry with them in the same way.
Speaker 1:Now, when I say this sort of thing, sometimes people say ah, you're reading the Bible very naively, you're taking it all literally or superficially. I've even been described as taking it superficially. I slightly resent that, but literally that's usually now, in the modern world, that's taken to be an insult. It usually means you're believing the Bible but you're believing it in a wrong way, in a simplistic way or you're understanding words in a way that they were never intended to be understood. Ok, I mean that that that would be a very serious accusation If that's true. That, but my kind of the reason that I because there's many times where people have pointed out to me that I've claimed I've said I've wrongly handled the Bible and they said, look, you think it means this, but look, look how the Bible handles that in other places. It can't mean what you think it means. And then I've changed many, many times, literally hundreds of times in my life because that has happened.
Speaker 1:But in this case I find the opposite is the truth that the more I look at the way the Bible itself handles those kind of verses and the way that Jesus and the apostles and the prophets speak about the members of the Trinity conversing with one another, looking forward to things, remembering things like they're, literally, it explicitly says that the Lord remembers things that happened in the past. So from the Lord's perspective, there is a past, there are things that are in the future. Now, it doesn't mean that he doesn't see the future. I can completely see that within the Bible, the future down to the smallest detail, even such that he could sort of see it as already accomplished. I and in all of that and it could even, we even contemplated the I, I think that I, I think that.
Speaker 1:But I, I remember we in an earlier we contemplated the possibility that the Trinity has their own experience of sequence and time, but that they can look at the entire history of the universe from start to finish and even enter time travel along that line, and that any member of the Trinity or the Father can send the Son to any point in the history of the universe, from start to finish, at any like, like time travelers, like a time lord, like a doctor, who sort of idea. I mean, yeah, I don't personally quite think that, but I, I can totally imagine a way that at least that would have a compatibility with the idea that, from the perspective of the Trinity, the Trinity has a before and after and so on. I could imagine that. But the idea that there is absolutely no before and after, no sequence, no sequencing at all, I really struggle to relate that to the language of the Bible. So maybe we'll leave it there, but I actually think we need to come back to this in the next episode.