My journey to open theism

I am going to document here my personal experience with a theological view contemporarily called "open theism."

My main motivation for writing this article is that a lot of people who know me make assumptions about how I came to be an open theist.

The usual assumption is that I read a pamphlet or a book promoting the theology and I swallowed it hook, line and sinker.

I was recently told that I should not be an open theist.

Why?

Because it is heresy.

Really?

Yes, really.

Being told that I believe something that is heresy, with no further explanation is pretty weak, to say the least. Telling me to go read some particular "systematic theology" does not fly either. I have read numerous systematic theologies; but I have not read all of the systematic theologies. I don't have time in my life for such a silly task. There are more systematic theologies out there than you can shake a stick at.

So, no. I did not become an open theist by reading a book or a pamphlet. Actually, I got there by reading the Bible. I will explain what I mean. After all, there are also more people than you can shake a stick at who came to extremely divergent theologies by, as they say (and I question), reading the Bible.

My journey began way back in 1982 or 1983. I was having a theological conversation with my brother. I mentioned some event. I cannot remember what it was. I commented on it using standard non-Calvinist language. "God knew that particular thing would happen but he did not cause it to happen."

Said my brother, "You know that does not make logical sense, don't you?"

"It makes perfect sense," I said. "God can know with certainty that something is going to happen but not cause it." That little exchange was the beginning of an hours-long conversation. He had come to the conclusion that divine providence and absolute foreknowledge were mutually exclusive. We did not agree; but we were not properly debating either. I am the one that brought up John 7:6 which I had considered interesting in light of my theological assumptions (that God foreknows but doesn't cause).

So Jesus said to them, "My time is not yet here, but your time is always opportune." (NASB)

I will not report the details of the conversation. I don't have room. Suffice it to say, it is true that it is true that God cannot be actively involved in the world, especially with respect to answering prayer, if everything is already foreknown. It really is a logical contradiction.

My conversation with my brother was not enough to change my mind at the time; but over the course of several months I did change my mind. As I read the Bible, it began to make more sense to me in light of God's actions in the world.

The Bible demonstrates that prayer changes the future because prayer motivates God to act in ways that he otherwise would not act.

1 Then Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart. 2 He said, "In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people. 3 In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him and saying, "Grant me justice against my opponent.' 4 For a while he refused; but later he said to himself, "Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, 5 yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.' " 6 And the Lord said, "Listen to what the unjust judge says. 7 And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? 8 I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them. And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?" (Luke 18:1-8)

Absolute divine foreknowledge also contradicts the biblical view that it is possible for people to lose their salvation (something Calvinists have noticed and therefore hold to the view that it is not possible to loose one's salvation).

Now, I have to confess that I did not know what to make of this kind of thinking. It turns out that, at the time, such thinking was quite unusual. I never had a need to defend it. Maybe I interpreted some scriptures in ways that some people thought strange but they didn't tell me they thought it was strange.

I want to draw a circle around a historical fact. Right now is a great time to make note of it.

I came to the view that divine providence is true and personal responsibility is also true; but those truths contradict absolute divine foreknowledge. I came to that view all by myself with a little push from my brother. I came to that theological understanding no later than 1983. Now the term "open theism" was coined sometime after 1980 when Richard Rice's book The Openness of God was published. I had never heard of Rice's book nor had I heard of the term "open theism."

One day in 2007, a colleague at work challenged me on my theology. He was going to try to convince me to be a Calvinist. I decided to go ahead and debate him on the subject. He was a cool person and quite likable. I figured we may both grow spiritually from the exercise. Now, this colleague assumed I was an Arminian (which is the usual form of non-Calvinism). I also figured I must be an Arminian. I went out an read some books that promoted the usual approaches against Calvinism. I found them to be extremely frustrating because I found myself strongly disagreeing with them. I know I was not a Calvinist; but apparently I was not an Arminian either. What was I?

I also read F. LaGard Smith's Troubling Questions for Calvinists ...And All the Rest of Us. In LaGard Smith's interesting book, he took to task the theology that I actually believed. I did not find his arguments persuasive; but that's not my point. I discovered the name for my theology: open theism. I also learned the names of some of the proponents of open theism. I tracked down some of their books and read them. I did find may of their arguments persuasive and valid.

So really, I did not hear about open theism and then decide to be one. The story is, I drew theological conclusions from the Bible. Decades later learned that what I believed had a name: open theism.

That's my story.