Don't Put God in a Box

http://str.typepad.com/weblog/2006/06/dont_put_god_in.html

"Don't Put God in a Box."
Can we all agree to never use this sentence again? It's an unproductive ad hominem thrown into a potentially productive conversation about understanding God.

I've heard it as the answer to a creationist who thinks God could not have designed using the random mechanism of evolution. I've heard this phrase tossed out after a long Biblical rationale for why God doesn't give personal, specific direction as in "God speaks to me." I've heard it as the only rejoinder when someone explains why they don't believe in charismatic gifts today. I've heard it as the only response after an explanation for why Calvinism is the best systematic understanding of the Bible. I've heard it from Christians as the alternative to the Bible is our sole source of religious authority.

"Don't put God in a box."

What I think that line really means is, "I don't agree with your explanation but I don't have an argument in response." It's a way of dismissing someone's reasons without saying why they're wrong.

And it's actually kind of rude because it implies that we're doing something illegitimate with God. But you know what? We all put God in a box - the box being how we best understand God's revelation of Himself in Scripture. The box is one of God's own nature we're all just trying to figure out what the box looks like.

God should be in a box. What's the alternative? God has no limitations on what He can be like or act like? That is frightening. God Himself is limited by His own nature. He can't lie. He can't sin. He's can't go out of existence. God's box - the definition of what He is like - is what makes Him God and a Person we can love and trust and glorify. If God isn't in some kind of a box, He would be arbitrary.

God's box is the biggest and greatest box there is. He's omniscient - He knows and believes all true things; but He cannot believe false things. He's omnipotent - God can do whatever power can do. His potentialities are at the greatest limit of the attributes He possesses. But those very attributes define Him, they describe His box. Our goal is to get the best idea of what that box looks like.