THEOLOGY NIGHT: GENERAL REVELATION/COMMON GRACE

“Accurate theology must always issue in transcendent doxology” (Biblical Doctrine, 565).

In my judgment, one of the crying needs of the hour is for Christians to know in their
bones that our view of men and women and marriage and sexuality is not simply the
product of Bible verses, but is itself natural, normative, and universally binding on all
people because we live in the world God made.” Our social context—what we often call
the World—can easily deceive us here. Because the World is moving in one direction, we
begin to feel that we are the weird ones. We are the outliers. We begin to believe the
propaganda that we are the last holdouts on the wrong side of history. But we’re not the
weird ones. Not just God in his Word, but all of heaven and earth testifies to God’s
design for men and women and marriage and sexuality.

There is a kind of humble and settled confidence that comes from knowing that, when
you embrace the biblical teaching on any subject (and especially sexuality), you are
cutting with the grain of created reality, not against it. As we continue to commend to
the world a vision of biblical anthropology, we must do so, knowing deep down, that
Scripture and nature speak with one voice, the voice of the living God, the Almighty
Maker of Heaven and Earth.
-Joe Rigney

Theology: Theos (God); logos (saying/word/speech) What we can say/know about God.
Theology concerns the knowledge of, or the study of, God.
Doxology: Doxa (glory); logos (saying/word/speech) What we can say/know about God’s glory.
A doxology is a praise saying. Our doxology concerns our life of praise offered to God.

Accurate biblical knowledge of God must always result in praise and glory to God.

The primary purpose of Theology Nights is to help us better glorify God in our everyday
relationships with Him and others. We want to help you grow in your ability to please God in
everything by applying a biblical understanding of God and His ways to everything. We want to
help you love the Lord and your neighbors well.
You cannot do any of that, or do it well, apart from knowing God and growing to know God
better and better.

Some additional pastoral goals for these studies: We want to help you practice thinking,
speaking, and living biblically, so that you have a natural, humble confidence about what you
believe and why you believe it. This is a safe and healthy place for you to practice. “People
cannot defend what they cannot define” (George Will).

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With that in mind, we will jump right into our theology topic for this evening: General
revelation with a theological twist: as it informs our anthropology - how God sees man and how
man responds to God.

“The work of theology is to understand what God thinks about any topic” (Heath Lambert, 13).

General revelation concerns what God thinks/says about man’s ability to interpret himself,
interpret his world, and interpret himself in his world? Your view of God’s world determines
how you operate in it. How do non-Christians view God’s world and their place in it?

I. What is General Revelation?

* “General revelation is the self-disclosure of God to all rational beings, a revelation
[revealing] that comes through the natural creation and through the make-up of the
human creature.” How God makes Himself known to everyone, everywhere at all times.
There has never been a time when God left Himself without demonstration of Himself.

“In my judgment, one of the crying needs of the hour is for Christians to know in their bones
that our view of men and women and marriage and sexuality is not simply the product of Bible
verses, but is itself natural, normative, and universally binding on all people because we live in
the world God made.” Our social context—what we often call the World—can easily deceive us
here. Because the World is moving in one direction, we begin to feel that we are the weird
ones. We are the outliers. We begin to believe the propaganda that we are the last holdouts on
the wrong side of history. But we’re not the weird ones. Not just God in his Word, but all of
heaven and earth testifies to God’s design for men and women and marriage and sexuality.
There is a kind of humble and settled confidence that comes from knowing that, when you
embrace the biblical teaching on any subject (and especially sexuality), you are cutting with the
grain of created reality, not against it. As we continue to commend to the world a vision of
biblical anthropology, we must do so, knowing deep down, that Scripture and nature speak
with one voice, the voice of the living God, the Almighty Maker of Heaven and Earth. Joe
Rigney.

II. Why begin with this area of Theology and doctrine? Because it has everything to do with
how you interpret your world and with what you encounter in others multiple times a day in
multiple ways. In General revelation, God makes Himself known:
* Through God’s Creation: Psalm 19:1-4a; 50:6
* Through God’s Creature: Rom. 2:14-15
- People are mind-motivated (reason - unlike animals - believe then behave)
- People are innately moral (know right from wrong - inner moral code/compass)
- People are meaning-makers (always interpreting their world)

III. Where does our reason, morality, and meaning come from?
* From being made in the Image of God: Gen. 1:27
* Is this image still there after the fall? Gen. 9:6; James 3:9

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 * Ability to know and reason: John 1:9 - Through common grace (1 Tim. 4:10), Jesus
gives knowledge “light” to everyone so that they can use their minds.
* Rom. 2:14-15 (Conscience - a gift of God’s common grace)

IV. Does every rational person know that God exists? Yes! Does every rational person know
that God is wise, powerful, and the authority over all He has made? Yes! This is the testimony of
General revelation through what God has made and through human conscience.

V. What does each person do with this testimony of God through General revelation?
* Rom. 1:18ff. Here is a biblical example of this at work: Acts 14:15-17. Notice what is
happening in v.18. “Even with these words...” - this was truth about God!

Human autonomy is the highest goal of the sinful soul! We live in a fallen but ordered world,
and that order testifies to an Orderer. God’s system makes it possible for man to know true
facts about the working order of things in life. [GRAND CANYON illus.]. Non-Christians use
knowledge gained from General Revelation in truth-suppressing-rebellion against God’s
existence and authority. In sinful unbelief and rebellion, the only reflection I’m interested in is
my own.

J.C. Ryle quote from Powlison article:

“There are very few errors and false doctrines of which the beginning may not be traced up to
unsound views about the corruption of human nature. Wrong views of a disease will always
bring with them wrong views of a remedy. Wrong views of the corruption of human nature will
always carry with them wrong views of the grand antidote and cure of that corruption.”

Let’s pull together what we know so far about the point of General Revelation. It’s about God!
Every person lives Coram Deo - before the face of God. Everything a person thinks, believes,
and does is done either with-respect-to-God, or with-respect-to-self. No middle ground.
No other choice. Everything each person on earth says, believes, and does is done in God’s
world, in His presence, in the knowledge He exists, and under His rule over creation.
Everything!
God created every person to image Him - to reflect or mirror His character as we live in
communion with Him. God made us worshipers; that is an inherent God-reality about us as
human beings. God made us to worship Him. “The study of human experience is theological to
the core, since we are made like God to respond to Him” (Scripture and Counseling, 101).

That means that every person is always doing theology, always worshiping something - every
person is always acting on their knowledge of God. We either do bad theology without-respect-
to-God, or good theology with-respect-to-God, but we all live out of our beliefs about God.
Whenever unbelievers and secular thinkers make statements about how the world works, what
is most important in life, why they go to work, what they need most in life, how people should
parent their kids, what being married means, what gender means, etc. they are expressing their
theology - they are saying something about God and making interpretations about God’s design

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without-respect-to-God and His ways. They act on their theology in how they put their wrong
knowledge of God and His ways into practice in their daily lives.

VI. Where does bad theology (suppression of truth) lead?

* To a long life of fleeing from reality. To a death-perpetuating interpretation of being
human. Deny God and you deny reality. Truth is what corresponds to reality.
Here’s an example: According to God, what is the specific, fundamental issue that underlies
problems in living? Sin. According to the world, to secular thinking, human needs and desires
are fundamental - man and his needs are at the center of everything so that needs-fulfilment is
the aim of life and the defining factor in helping people live meaningfully. In the worldly view,
your needs are not fundamentally spiritual, and sin and rebellion are not your greatest
concerns.

When people live without-respect-to-God, they live from an offense-against-me frame of mind
because they are at the center of their universe. Everything centers in and on them. Wrongs are
chiefly understood as wrongs done to me. Unbelievers are always thinking and acting in terms
of serving the interests of their autonomy from God. They are constantly trying to shore-up
their crumbling views designed to factor God out of reality. But problems in life are first and
foremost problems stemming from this selfish autonomy against God. That’s the root!

VII. Can General revelation save people from sin? No! It only condemns us.
* We cannot overcome the effects of the fall on our own or even by knowing that God
exists. Recognizing and relating to the God of the Bible offers the only sensible way to
begin uncovering the true and unified meaning of things.
* Paul explained why this is true: Col. 1:16; 2:3; 3:10
* Ask yourself, “what does all of life pivot around?” Either God or idols! Idols are
counterfeits to the reality of God as our Creator. Life pivots around Him and not around
human wisdom, drives, needs, and desires.
* Heb. 1:1-3. Everything about life and the issues of life are explained, rightly
understood, and brought into a unified focus in Jesus Christ. Everything! The Christian
life is focused on Jesus Christ and on denying self to live more for God’s pleasure and
glory.
The Noetic Effects of Sin: 1 Cor.1:18; 2:12-14; 2 Cor. 4:4; Eph. 4:17-18

“We may ignore, but we can nowhere evade the presence of God. The world is crowded with
Him. He walks everywhere incognito.” (C.S. Lewis)

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