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About the Author:
Ralph D. Winter is a senior mission thinker who has been actively involved from the beginning of the massive mission transition from simply thinking in terms of countries or individuals to thinking in terms of peoples. He is founder of the
U.S. Center for World Mission,
and is currently chancellor of
William Carey
International University. |
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The Instrumentalities of God
Ralph D. Winter
Forum, Tuesday, December 17, 2002
We all believe that the Holy Spirit guides and enables us to do things we would not on our own have done. We, in this sense are an instrumentality of God. There is nothing He cannot do without us, but He has apparently chosen us to do things for Him. It is not that He is in need. He apparently has chosen to create finite beings who can think, choose, learn, uphold or betray His goals.
The most spectacular single characteristic of this universe is that in even a single galaxy of a known 50 Billion, in even a single solar system within that vast galaxy we call the Milky Way (because its enormous swath so dominates our skies), on a single planet orbiting that sun, we find all kinds of creatures which to all appearances have a will of their own, and whose behavior therefore is not completely predictable.
Is freewill inherently contradictory to the purposes of God? May we assume safely that God may have had a good reason to create finite beings with freewill? I think we must.
In Iraq all kinds of bad things are going on. Most of them are attributed rightly to Saddam Hussein, even though he personally is not always involved. Oh, he can on occasion strangle an assistant in the sight of others in order to make a point, but it is likely that he usually employs others to do such things. Yet we say, ?Hussein did this and did that?, whenever it would appear to be his will in operation.
In the White House all kinds of good things are going on. But, again, Bush does not personally do everything. It would appear that Condoleezza Rice often does things and says things for him. But our newspapers say, ?Bush did this and did that...?
Does God work this way? When an Evangelical is elected to high office we may say ?God put an Evan- gelical in the White House,? or something like that, even though in fact the Holy Spirit may have moved the hearts of thousands of voters to elect that person. In the same way we may rightly attribute to God many things which in fact are done by unseen beings which are rather vaguely called ?messengers,? when in fact such beings may do far more than deliver messages.
Popular view of God has Him doing everything that happens. One pastor told me that the power with which a gnat bats its wings is the power of God. That may be true in some sense, but we must resist the perspective which gives so much direct credit to God that even Satan is unemployed.
We seem to be content to think that the vast panoply of life forms on earth were created by God in some mysterious direct manner, without the help of inter- mediate created beings.
In many mysterious situations today, where perhaps someone is lingering on death, we assume that God can may choose to heal a diseased spleen, erase a tumor,etc. without any thought at all about the possible involvement of intermediate created beings.
The reason I am pursuing this, incidentally, is because I am concerned that we not expect God to do things which either angels or men are supposed to do. It would be tragic if we are confused about what He will get done through His unseen instrumentalities and what He expects human beings to do
Let?s pause for a moment and take a close look at the Bible and its use of certain words for intermediate created beings that are neither divine nor human.
[Here introduce the distinction between words and terms, the latter being defined words. Use angels and adversaries as examples, and point out how the use of each changes throughout the Bible.] |
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