Thomas Magers is the pastor of Tiplersville Baptist Church in Tiplersville, MS and is a student at NOBTS.
Physics is the study of the physical world. In studying the physical sciences, a student learns about the law of conservation. The law of conservation applies to many different areas. Some of the areas are energy, momentum, mass, and electrical charge. The law about conservation of mass posits that matter cannot be created or destroyed.[1] For instance, burned wood is not destroyed completely; it has gone through a process of change resulting in ash and gasses.
Another such law is conservation of energy. Again, the basic premise is that energy cannot be created nor destroyed. It can change forms, for example, from chemical to electrical or kinetic to chemical. For instance, the flow of water, kinetic energy, turns turbines that produce electrical energy by use of magnetic fields. The energy is not created; it has been changed from one form to another.
How then does this apply to Christians? Why is this topic given here on a website that addresses Christian thought?
The idea of conservation is something that many Christians believe but do not realize. Augustine, the famed theologian of years gone by, wrote, “Let every good and true Christian understand that wherever truth may be found, it belongs to his Master.”[2] From this phrase, the colloquial phrase, “all truth is God’s truth” originates. Ultimately, we, as Augustine noted, believe in the conservation of certain attributes. In this case, it is truth. If someone says a true and trustworthy statement, we realize that the particular truth originated with God for He is Creator.
Another area in which a Christian holds to the idea of conservation law is love. The Bible affirms clearly, “God is love” (1 John 4:8). This means that all love is God’s love. A person cannot know love truly, unless they know God. Some may think they know love without God, but it is a skewed image of the real thing. I realize now that I cannot love my wife or children fully unless I know the love of God.
The theological astute among us realize that this discussion is about the communicable attributes of God. The terms communicable and incommunicable refer to God’s attributes that He shares (communicable) and the attributes He does not share (incommunicable). These terms are widely used, however, some theologians do not use these terms. For instance, Millard Erickson prefers “Attributes of Greatness” and “Attributes of Goodness.”[3] The lists of communicable attributes vary greatly according to the theologian you read. Two outstanding theologians in Baptist life are Millard Erickson and Wayne Grudem. Erickson lists 10 attributes that God shares with people. While, Grudem lists 20 attributes of God that He shares with people to some extent.[4]
For this pastor and student, I find it interesting to study God’s communicable attributes in Scripture. In the book of Ruth, the faithful love of God is front and center. The faithful love of God, known in the Old Testament as chesed, is seen from the beginning of the book to the end. In the first chapter, Ruth shows Naomi chesed by abandoning her own people and land to follow Naomi. In Chapter four, God’s chesed is displayed through the genealogy of David. Ultimately, faithful love is shown throughout the whole book. Ruth was faithful to Naomi. Boaz was faithful to Elimelech (even though he was dead) and his family. Naomi was faithful to Ruth. Ruth was faithful to Naomi. Boaz was faithful to Ruth. Ultimately, God’s faithfulness is seen. He is the originator of faithful love (chesed), the people of Ruth or the medium of that faithful love, and it continued through David ultimately to Jesus.
How does the narrative of Ruth, communicable attributes, and conservation law apply to us? In my opinion, we are the “hands and feet” of Christ in our world. “We love because He (God) first loved us” (1 John 4:19). We are faithful because He was, and is, faithful. Therefore, we, by the power of the Holy Spirit, stay in step with the Holy Spirit and allow ourselves to be the medium for God’s glory to shine.
[1]Obviously, this does not apply to the sovereign God. He created from nothing (Gen. 1:1; 21; 27).
[2]Augustine, On Christian Doctrine II.18.28, Georgetown University Online, http://www9.georgetown.edu/faculty/jod/augustine/ddc2.html (accessed March 19, 2014).
[3]Millard J. Erickson, Christian Theology, 3d. (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2013), 238.
[4]Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine, (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1994), 186.
Thinking of the attributes of God, whether incommunicable or communicable, I reflect upon His exercise of them with reference to our salvation and service. In particular, it is a matter of joy to consider His goodness and faithfulness and how they work together to elicit our gratitude. The way in which He accomplishes this end result is both ironic and irenic. Consider what happened in my case in August of 1994. The first Sunday in that month, I preached on the subject of Gratitude and my text was I Th.5:18. Present that morning was our son and his girl friend. He was home for the weekend from the area of Chapel Hill where he finished his college degree, setting in his usual seat, the back row. At the conclusion of the service in which we sung two verses of an invitational hymn, I called for prayer. When I raised my head, I noticed that our son was no longer on the back row. He was gone, but his girl friend was still sitting there. We later found him over at the parsonage, weeping. To make a long story short, he said that if we had sung another verse of invitation, he would have rededicated his life. It really did not matter, because he did anyway. And then he began to talk to his mother about the fact that he felt called to preach (he would not talk with me due, in part, to a dislike he had had toward the minister based on the way he had seen me treated). In any case, on Dec. 11, 1994 I gave him his license to the Gospel ministry and performed his marriage on Dec.31. He went off on his honeymoon, came back a week or so later, and entered Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary.
It was ironic, enigmatic, mysterious, how that I chose to preach a sermon on gratitude and how that touched his heart. The whole affair was also irenic, pacifying to the soul, leading one to be submissive to the way God works, especially as we would see how it worked out nearly twenty years later. Our son is now our pastor; the girl friend is his wife, and they have a 13 year old daughter.
The reality of that ironic call and the irenic spirit involved was also a help, when that church fired me. The moderator said, “Well, we could find nothing wrong with you but we fired you anyway.” That was on Dec.29,1996. What was strange about the matter was that four-five years earlier he had shouted, when an elderly and well-respected gentleman in the community made a profession of faith. After the man’s baptism, we celebrated his 92nd birthday on that Sunday night though it was not until the following Friday. The brother who was baptized gave good evidence of his faith in the few years he had left to live. He had served on the U.S.S. Arkansas Battleship in 1918, and, being from Arkansas, I could appreciate the irony involved. The moderator was an amazement in his changes, shouting in one instance and in the other leading the movement to fire me and stooping to the use of some real political trickery and treachery to make sure the vote was 100% (it was not…due to the method used and the intention of at least one as we discovered within an hour after the meeting. I am reminded as to how God is concerned for another reality in such disappointments, He said of the Babylonian Captivity that He sent them “out of this pace into the land of the Chaldeans for (their) good.”(Jer.24:5). The “their” is in italics, meaning it is not in the original but was supplied by the translators to aid in understanding the text in our language. However, I wonder, if the aim might not have been, “for good,” meaning that the event served not merely their good, but the highest good, good for its own sake. So it is with such terrible events in our lives; I believe they serve good. Our son ends his Sunday morning services by saying as he walks to the foyer, “God is good.” His people then reply, “All the time.” Then he says, “All the time,” and they reply, “God is good.” The last words spoken are spoken by the people, “God is good.” And this is true, regardless of what happens.
Once I heard the Lord tell me why some terrible tragedies had happened to me in my life, and, perhaps, one of these days I will share some things about that experience.
Bro. Magers thanks got your article on your interest in the study of Our great God. He is intensely edifying and immaculately beautiful in his personhood. If more young ( and old ) preachers would get to know God better we would see more reviving rats of glory in our fellowships. Keep writing Sir. Shalom in Christ Alone.
The noun is rays NOT Rats.
Note: Mr. Miller Administrator Sir you missed that sp error again. I know… The Yankees are coming North soon and ISU plays again too. But let us give attention to our priorities.
Thanks for your personal episode of God’s goodness in your pilgrimage of faith. God certainly purposes all things for our good and his glory. Our small snapshots of providence are a narrow glimpse of His magnanimous portrait of glory and grace. I feel like I have worshipped by your side today sir. Blessed be the tie that binds us in spirit.