Tumbling Faith

No, I'm not trying to say that our theological structure needs to be built only on provable things. Ultimately that would be impossible -- God himself has chosen, apparently, to hide from us things that would irrefutably prove his existence. So by necessity we must build our faith structure on just that ... faith.

What I was trying to get at was that the theological structure is held together by certain logical constructs. For instance, it should go without saying that if God does not exist, then whether Jesus was the messiah or not is entirely moot. Therefore, a necessary precondition for the Christian theological structure is a stipulation that God does in fact exist. If that matter is unsettled, then there's little reason to explore more minute details of the faith, such as whether Jesus really did feed the 5,000.

Similarly, I'd argue that the total sovereignty of God is another such precondition, though it's a less obvious precondition than the one I used in the previous paragraph. But if God is not entirely sovereign, then it's hard to hold the rest of the logical structure together. I suppose one could argue that he has sufficient authority, but not complete. But what a mess that creates if God has some authority but not complete sovereignty. Questions then boil to the surface: where does his authority start and end? What can he do and what can he not do? Etc., etc.

Note: that's precisely the position of "Open View Theism," which believes that God is not completely sovereign, and that he is learning as he goes along, making mistakes and trying to do better next time. I find the concept of that just silly. Why bother with a god that's little better than ourselves?

I'm more convinced of God's existence and sovereignty than ever before. I can't prove a lick of it, but to my mind and my heart, it makes no difference. I believe it.

But ... it sure is a fascinating mental exercise to map out the logical construct and see where the vulnerable spots are. "If X is not true, then Y occurs ... " Some might brand me a heretic for even considering such things, but that's precisely what theology is. The faith can only be made stronger by searching out such vulnerable spots and understanding the possible arguments that might be made.