God’s Initial Aim

The Bible constantly surprises and even at times shocks anyone who reads it with an open mind and a receptive heart. Among the biggest surprises is the number of times in the Hebrew Scriptures God negotiates with God’s people and even drastically changes the Divine Mind. Such a God does not fit well with beliefs in an omnipotent and omniscient deity. If God is all powerful and all knowing, then one would not expect such an engaging interaction between the Creator and ordinary human beings. When people try to understand what’s happening in these cases, they usually come to one of two conclusions: (1) either God actually negotiates with humans even to the point of changing events and “repents” of what was previously planned (if not ordained) or (2) what the Bible is actually trying to say is that we are the ones who change and become open to a truth or perspective we were not able or ready to accept in the past.

The first option of believing God dialogues with us and even changes the Divine Mind and intention is faithful to the biblical witness but presents problems for modern theology. The God presented in those passages seems to suggest that God grows in insight, love, compassion, forgiveness and character. A God who decides to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah but is willing to spare the city if Abraham can find even ten righteous people in the cities appears to be fickle and perhaps even less loving and patient than Abraham.

The second option maintains that God reveals the Divine Self to the extent we as humans are able and ready to receive a deeper and more mature truth about the Creator. This approach is often called progressive revelation. Take for example God’s command to the Hebrews to go into Canaan and kill every man, woman, and child. It’s rather difficult to square this with Jesus’ Abba who commands us to love our enemies because that is what God does. God makes the sun shine on the righteous and the unrighteous and sends rain on the good and the bad. I have  heard a lot of what I call pretzel arguments trying to reconcile contradictions like this. (A pretzel argument is when we twist our logic so much that no rational person can accept our premise or conclusion.) I remember the answer a little girl gave when she was asked how God could command so much killing and still be like Jesus. Her answer was, “O, that was before God became a Christian.” Too often our answers to the contradictions and radically different statements in the Bible are not much better than this little girl’s explanation. At other times we simply refuse to face the facts before us and hide behind a “The Bible says it, I believe it, and that settles it” mentality.

I would like to suggest a third option which transcends these two approaches. This third option may not explain every occurrence of change in the Divine Mind, but it could be helpful in many cases. And this option has the added value of being beneficial in our own dialogue and journey with God. What I am proposing reflects some of the insights of Process, Neo-Process, and Relational Theology.

This perspective assumes that God is present in every place, moment, life, and part of creation. God is our constant and eternal Companion and Partner. Therefore, God co-experiences everything that has happened and is happening. And at each stage—each moment—each instance God presents an option that is in accord with the Divine Nature as well as what is best for each and every part of creation, including human beings. Theologians call this an Initial Aim. Because God is love and respects our (and the universe’s) freedom, this Initial Aim is presented as a choice—an invitation. We can choose God’s way/suggestion, or we can reject it. If we reject what God proposes, God doesn’t destroy, reject, or give up on us. God simply takes the path we do choose (which was not the original Initial Aim), and seeks to present a new Initial Aim—one that is the best possible given what we have chosen in our freedom. If we reject that second Initial Aim, God works with our choice and presents another Initial Aim which is the best possible in the new situation made by our own response. This pattern continues over and over again with each of us (and perhaps with each part of creation). God never gives up.

What we choose may be a far cry from what God wants for us, and we may even convince ourselves that this choice is exactly what God wants. Many decisions in history made by Christians who believe their choices reflect the will of God prove in time not to be what God wants at all in our world. This leads to a lot of misunderstanding about the nature and will of God. There have been times in the past that Christians were absolutely certain that slavery, the domination of women, and the persecution of gays were God’s holy will. (And it’s obvious today that there are still those who hold such assumptions as being what God wants. Slavery, dominating women, and persecuting gays may take different forms in our day, but they are all still there and are defended by self-professed Christians who ought to know better.) God must grieve over many of the choices we make, but God does not despair. Each choice we make provides a new situation which God accepts, and the Creator offers a new choice which is the best possible at that time given where we are in our faith development.

With this option God is like a chess player. Every move God makes (through the Initial Aim) is countered by our move. God then responds to the new situation on the “chess board of life.” However, in this interplay, God’s goal is for all of us to “win.” That win allows us to come closer and closer to the kind of life that not only reflects God’s will and nature but also the kind of life that is worthy of our identities as children of God and which can best fulfill us and give us joy. If God is love, GOD CANNOT NOT LOVE. (Take some time to think through the implications of that one statement and how it might impact all we believe about and expect from God.) And, as love, God will not coerce. (Read I Corinthians 13:4-7 and substitute the word “God” for “love.” If what Paul describes and calls us to embrace in our living is “love” and if God is “love,” then I think we can appreciate how God is limited by God’s own Divine Nature.) God gives us a choice, but in every choice we make, God gets the Divine Hands “dirty,” takes the chance of being misunderstood, and comes to us as we are in all our stubborn and self-centered will. And in every instance God suggests a new Initial Aim which is certainly not all we need and all God wants for our healing and joy–but it is the best possible at that moment.

I suggest that unlike Greek philosophy, the Bible does not understand God as being so “perfect” as being unable to stoop to the human level. Greek gods (not the gods of the Iliad and the Odyssey but the god of the philosophers like Plato) were too perfect to deal with the imperfect human beings.  But the God of the Judeo-Christian tradition meets us where we are and provides opportunities for us to grow in knowledge, wisdom, love and joy. Of necessity our understanding of God will be inadequate at best and wrong-headed and wrong-hearted at worst. But God is willing to travel this difficult and long path with us as our ever-present Companion. We are never done growing in our faith and experience of God. And if we were done, I think we would find life boring! Part of what the Incarnation means to me is that God is present in every moment, place, and person as well as in every single part of creation. Such a dwelling on the part of God must be heartbreaking much of the time. The cross on Calvary is a flesh and blood window into the heart of God who endures and takes unto the Divine Self all our sin, pain, and tragic choices. But such love never gives up. And that gives all of us hope.   

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