Trinity and Creation

A Scriptural and Confessional Account

Richard C. Barcellos

• Publisher: Resource Publications
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781725280403
• Topic: Teologia e religione
• Subtopic: Teologia cristiana

Trinity and Creation explores Scripture and the Reformed confession on the doctrine of creation as they relate to the triune God. When considering an act of God, it is important to understand the agent of the act in order to account properly for the act of the agent. Any faithful account of divine creation must ground its argument first in the God who creates. This method of treating the doctrine of creation is displayed in this book. It will become clear to readers that understanding the nature of God is essential in order to account for what God does. It will also become clear that this is not a novel method of accounting for creation. This book argues that not prioritizing theology proper in our accounting for creation is a recipe for theological novelty and, if unchecked, heresy. Trinity and Creation is offered to account for creatures given who God is, to display that its argument is firmly rooted in the Christian theological tradition, to address the views of some who (it will be argued) apply a faulty method when accounting for creatures, and to enhance readers' knowledge and worship of our triune God--Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

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Introduction

It may be helpful to explain the title and sub-title of this book. By “Trinity and Creation” is meant the triune God and everything not God. Another way of putting it is “God plus the world.” As will be argued below, older theologians understood “the world” in the context of discussing God and creation to mean everything created, or creatures. The words “A Scriptural and Confessional Account” encapsulate the fact that the arguments will be grounded in the Scriptures, utilizing the doctrinal formulations of the Westminster Confession of Faith 1646 (WCF), the Savoy Declaration 1658 (SD), and the Second London Confession of Faith 1677/89 (2LCF), which declare the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as co-equal, divine agents of creation. The confession will be used to provide an outline for the study.1 The book not only states the confessional doctrine of trinitarian creation but seeks to account for its formulation. The word “confessional” refers to the three seventeenth-century documents mentioned above, though other creedal documents will be consulted at various points. Accounting for the confessional formulation of trinitarian creation will bring us into a discussion of hermeneutics and theological method. It is one thing to state and explain a confessional formulation; it is another to account for it. Though hermeneutics and theological method, when it comes to accounting for the confession’s statement on creation, are a large part of this book, it will adhere closely to the doctrine of the Trinity as well. This will be largely assumed throughout the discussion. The reason for this is due to the fact that chapter 4 of the confession, “Of Creation” assumes chapters 1–3 (i.e., “Of the Holy Scriptures,” “Of God and of the Holy Trinity,” and “Of God’s Decree”).

This book attempts to present a method of accounting for the confessional formulation of the doctrine of creation by our triune God. Formulating Christian doctrine, especially as it relates to the doctrine of the Trinity, is not as simple as counting texts which use the same words; nor is it as simple as rehearsing redemptive history. Counting texts that use the same or synonymous words is deficient in establishing Christian doctrine. This is because biblical texts ought to be weighed, not merely counted, to determine their importance. This will be illustrated in various parts of the book. Weighing texts is especially important when considering creation in relation to the Creator. If only one text of Holy Scripture informs us about a crucial element of the divine act of creation, that text is of great importance. One of the reasons this is the case is because creation involves everything in relation to God. The doctrine of creation, as with the doctrine of the Trinity, is a distributed doctrine. John Webster’s words capture what is meant by creation and the doctrine of the Trinity as distributed doctrines. He says:

. . . the doctrine of creation is one of the two distributed doctrines in the corpus of Christian dogmatics. The first (both in sequence and in material primacy) distributed doctrine is the doctrine of the Trinity, of which all other articles of Christian teaching are an amplification or application, and which therefore permeates theological affirmations about every matter; theology talks about everything by talking about God. The doctrine of creation is the second distributed doctrine, although, because its scope is restricted to the opera Dei ad extra [i.e., the external works of God], its distribution is less comprehensive than that of the doctrine of the Trinity. Within this limit, the doctrine of creation is ubiquitous. It is not restricted to one particular point in the sequence of Christian doctrine, but provides orientation and a measure of governance to all that theology has to say about all things in relation to God.2

Because both God the Trinity and creation are distributed doctrines, it is of the utmost importance that we allow the Bible to speak on these issues, even if it does not speak as often as it does on other issues. We do not need a plethora of biblical texts indicating the work of the Spirit in creation, for example. One text would suffice, and its truth would extend to the entirety of Christian thinking on creation, conservation, re-creation, and consummation. Scriptural texts must be weighed not merely counted, especially as they relate to telling us something about God and his works.

Formulating Christian doctrine is also more involved than a rehearsal of redemptive history. Though the study of redemptive history (i.e., biblical theology) is a vital aspect of the theological encyclopedia, it concerns itself with the revelatory process presented to us in Holy Scripture. Its method is not designed to conclude its work by presenting full statements on the various loci (i.e., places) of systematic theology. Unlike biblical theology, systematic theology is designed to collate various aspects of revelation under pre-determined headings (e.g., Scripture, God, creation, providence, etc.).3 When systematic theology does its work properly, each topic’s statements are formulated by a canonical consultation, a consultation of Scripture as a finished product of divine revelation, and in conversation with historical theology. Systematic theology reduces all the truths of Holy Scripture concerning given topics to propositional form. Similarly, confessional formulations seek to reduce large swaths of biblical truth into brief compass. In order to do this successfully, these formulations must weigh texts in order to ensure the formulations are brief, though comprehensive, enough to accurately convey the major emphases of Holy Scripture. These points will be illustrated in the discussion below.

OVERVIEW OF THE BOOK

After the Introduction, chapter 2 seeks to put confession 4.1, mentioned above, in context. Once this is done, a discussion on hermeneutics and theological method, in light of the confession, will be conducted.

The third chapter covers most of the relevant issues of confession 4.1. Some issues are covered in more depth than others. The reason for this is due to the scope of this book.

Chapter 4 seeks to define creation. After providing a working definition of creation, a brief survey of seventeenth-century theologians on creation will be conducted. This sets up the fifth chapter.

Chapter 5 is a contemporary excursus. It analyzes some of John M. Frame’s and K. Scott Oliphint’s published material on God and creation which, it will be argued, is not in-step with how older theologians stated themselves on these issues. Both Frame and Oliphint state clearly that they are uncomfortable with various aspects of older ways of accounting for the acts of God given creation. The views of these men were chosen due to their relation to the WCF and their influence through their published materials.4

Chapter 6 takes readers back to the doctrine of the Trinity and creation, focusing specifically on the doctrine of appropriations in John Owen’s “Peculiar Works of the Holy Spirit in the First or Old Creation.” Owen’s work illustrates many of the points made in previous discussion about hermeneutics, theological method, and accounting for trinitarian creation.

The Conclusion is a brief recapitulation of the book with some suggestions on how its contents might help pastors and theological students.

THE TEXT OF CONFESSION 4.1

Confession 4.1 will be analyzed using the 2LCF as the basis, though other creedal documents will be cited. Since 2LCF is slightly different in form from the WCF and SD, the text of the WCF and 2LCF are provided below. The reason why the text of the SD is not includ...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Preface
• Chapter 1: Introduction
• Chapter 2: Trinity and Creation
• Chapter 3: Relevant Issues
• Chapter 4: What is Creation?
• Chapter 5: Change in God Given Creation?
• Chapter 6: Confessing Trinitarian Creation
• Chapter 7: Conclusion
• Appendix
• Bibliography