A Conservative Christian View of the Environment

The Belgic Confession - 1561A.D.

ARTICLE 2By What Means God Is Made Known Unto Us

We know Him by two means: First, by the creation, preservation, and government of the universe; which is before our eyes as a most elegant book, wherein all creatures, great and small, are as so many characters leading us to see clearly the invisible things of God, even his everlasting power and divinity, as the apostle Paul says (Romans 1:20). All which things are sufficient to convince men and leave them without excuse. Second, He makes Himself more clearly and fully known to us by His holy and divine Word, that is to say, as far as is necessary for us to know in this life, to His glory and our salvation.

“It is not a mere external revelation of which the apostle is speaking, but of the evidence of the being and perfections of God which every man has in the constitution of his own nature, and in virtue of which he is competent to apprehend the manifestations of God in his works. . . This knowledge is a revelation; it is the manifestation of God in his works, and in the constitution of our nature.” Charles Hodge, Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans, 36.

Romans 1:32 who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do the same but also approve of those who practice them. “This realization of God’s righteous decrees was not learned but was implanted in the human soul by God”Bruce A. Demarest, General Revelation: Historical Views and Contemporary Issues, 231

Romans 2:14-15 for when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do the things in the law, these, although not having the law, are a law to themselves, who show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and between themselves their thoughts accusing or else excusing them)

“There never was a nation so barbarous or inhuman that it did not regulate life by some form of law. . . . We see clearly from that that there are certain original conceptions of right and wrong which are imprinted on the hearts of men by nature.” John Calvin, Institutes, I.iii.1.

In addition to an a priori knowledge of God, Paul focuses on knowledge that man acquires by rational reflection on the created order.

Romans 1:19-21 because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened.

“The knowledge of God must in this context be the knowledge derived from the manifestation given in the visible creation. It is of this manifestation the apostle is speaking and it is the manifestation that is stated in verse 20 to leave men without excuse. Therefore the cognitive perception elicited from the manifestation of God’s glory in the visible creation is spoken of as ‘knowing God.’ The inexcusableness resides in the fact that being in possession of this knowledge they did not render to God the glory and thanks which the knowledge they possessed ought to have constrained.” John Murray, The Epistle to the Romans, 41

“But just what does Paul mean when he claims that human beings ‘see’ and ‘understand’ from the creation and history that a powerful God exists? Some think that Paul is asserting only that people have around them the evidence of God’s existence and basic qualities; whether people actually perceive it or become personally conscious of it is not clear. But Paul’s wording suggests more than this. He asserts that people actually come to ‘understand’ something about God’s existence and nature.”

“How universal is this perception? The flow of Paul’s argument makes any limitation impossible. Those who perceive the attributes of God in creation must be the same as those who suppress the truth in unrighteousness and are therefore liable to the wrath of God. Paul make clear that this includes all people.” Douglas J.Moo, The Epistle to the Romans, 105

But this glory they invested stocks and stones with. As then he which is entrusted with the goods of the king, and is ordered to spend them upon the king’s glory, if he waste these upon robbers, and harlots, and witches, and make these splendid out of the king’s stores, he is punished as having done the kingdom the greatest wrong. Thus they also who after having received the knowledge of God and of His glory, invested idols therewith, “held the truth in unrighteousness,” and, at least as far as was in their power, dealt unrighteously by the knowledge, by not using it upon fitting objects. The knowledge of Himself God placed in men from the beginning. But this knowledge they invested stocks and stones with, and so dealt unrighteously to the truth, as far at least as they might. For it abideth unchanged, having its own glory immutable. Whence was it plain then? did He send them a voice from above? By no means. But what was able to draw them to Him more than a voice, that He did, by putting before them the Creation, so that both wise, and unlearned, and Scythian, and barbarian, having through sight learned the beauty of the things which were seen, might mount up to God. Wherefore he says,

Ver. 20. “For the invisible things of Him from the Creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things which are made.”

John Chrysostom, Saint Chrysostom: Homilies on the Acts of the Apostles and the Epistle to the Romans, 351–352.

And he said, in them rather than to them, for the sake of greater emphasis: for though the Apostle adopts everywhere Hebrew phrases, and ב, beth, is often redundant in that language, yet he seems here to have intended to indicate a manifestation, by which they might be so closely pressed, that they could not evade; for every one of us undoubtedly finds it to be engraven on his own heart. By saying, that God has made it manifest, he means, that man was created to be a spectator of this formed world, and that eyes were given him, that he might, by looking on so beautiful a picture, be led up to the Author himself.

John Calvin, Commentary on the Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Romans , 69–70.

Everyone naturally has a general idea that there is a God [...] But someone may object: "If all people know God, why does Paul say that before the proclamation of the gospel the Galatians did not know God?" I reply that there is a twofold knowledge of God [duplex est cognitio Dei], general and particular. All people have the general knowledge, namely that God exists, that he has created heaven and earth, that he is righteous, that he punishes the wicked, etc. But people do not know what God proposes concerning us, what he wants to give and to do, so that he might deliver us from sin and death, and to save us - which is the proper and true knowledge of God [propria et vera est cognitio Dei]. Thus it can happen that someone's face may be familiar to me but I do not really know him, because I do not know his intentions.Martin Luther

http://www.ccel.org/ccel/luther/galatians.vii.html Gal 4:8(from 1535 Lectures on Galatians, in p.99, The Christian Theology Reader ed by A McGrath)

Truly, if such are the good things of time, what will be those of eternity? If such is the beauty of visible things, what shall we think of invisible things? If the grandeur of heaven exceeds the measure of human intelligence, what mind shall be able to trace the nature of the everlasting? If the sun, subject to corruption, is so beautiful, so grand, so rapid in its movement, so invariable in its course; if its grandeur is in such perfect harmony with and due proportion to the universe: if, by the beauty of its nature, it shines like a brilliant eye in the middle of creation; if finally, one cannot tire of contemplating it, what will be the beauty of the Sun of Righteousness? If the blind man suffers from not seeing the material sun, what a deprivation is it for the sinner not to enjoy the true light! – Basilhttp://www.newadvent.org/fathers/32016.htm

But in addition to what has been said, follow me whilst I enumerate the meadows, the gardens, the various tribes of flowers; all sorts of herbs, and their uses; their odours, forms, disposition, yea, but their very names; the trees which are fruitful, and which are barren; the nature of metals,—and of animals,—in the sea, or on the land; of those that swim, and those that traverse the air; the mountains, the forests, the groves; the meadow below, and the meadow above; for there is a meadow on the earth, and a meadow too in the sky; the various flowers of the stars; the rose below, and the rainbow above! Would you have me point out also the meadow of birds? Consider the variegated body of the peacock, surpassing every dye, and the fowls of purple plumage.

Contemplate with me the beauty of the sky; how it has been preserved so long without being dimmed; and remains as bright and clear as if it had been only fabricated to-day; moreover, the power of the earth, how its womb has not become effete by bringing forth during so long a time! Contemplate with me the fountains; how they burst forth and fail not, since the time they were begotten, to flow forth continually throughout the day and night! Contemplate with me the sea, receiving so many rivers, yet never exceeding its measure! But how long shall we pursue things unattainable! It is fit, indeed, that over every one of these which has been spoken of, we should say, “O Lord, how hast Thou magnified Thy works; in wisdom hast Thou made them all.” – Chrysostom

http://www.tertullian.org/fathers2/NPNF1-09/npnf1-09-60.htm

The Great Master Author has sent forth several volumes; among the rest is one called the “Book of Revelation,” and another styled the “Volume of Creation.” We have been reading the Word-volume and expounding it for years, we are now perusing the Work-volume, and are engrossed in some of its most glowing pages. Our love for the sacred book of letters and words has not diminished but increased our admiration for the hieroglyphics of the flood and field. That man perversely mistakes folly for wisdom who persists in undervaluing one glorious poem by a famous author, in order to show his zeal for a second epic from the same fertile pen. It is the mark of a feeble mind to despise the wonders of nature because we prize the treasures of salvation. He who built the lofty skies is as much our Father as he who hath spoken to us by his own Son, and we should reverently adore HIM who in creation decketh himself with majesty and excellency, even as in revelation HE arrayeth himself in glory and beauty….

Modern fanatics who profess to be so absorbed in heavenly things that they are blind to the most marvelous of Jehovah’s handiwork, should go to school, with David as the schoolmaster, and learn to “consider the heavens,” and should sit with Job upon the dunghill of their pride, while the Lord rehearses the thundering stanzas of creation’s greatness, until they cry with the patriarch, “I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth thee; wherefore, I abhor myself and repent in dust and ashes.” For our part, we feel that what was worth the Lord’s making, richly deserves the attention of the most cultivated and purified intellect; and we think it blasphemy against God himself to speak slightingly of his universe, as if, forsooth, we poor puny mortals were too spiritual to be interested in that matchless architecture which made the morning stars sing together and caused the sons of God to shout for joy.- Charles Haddon Spurgeonhttp://www.spurgeon.org/s_and_t/engl2itl.htm

Dover BeachBY MATTHEW ARNOLDThe sea is calm tonight.The tide is full, the moon lies fairUpon the straits; on the French coast the lightGleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!Only, from the long line of sprayWhere the sea meets the moon-blanched land,Listen! you hear the grating roarOf pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,At their return, up the high strand,Begin, and cease, and then again begin,With tremulous cadence slow, and bringThe eternal note of sadness in.

Sophocles long agoHeard it on the Ægean, and it broughtInto his mind the turbid ebb and flowOf human misery; weFind also in the sound a thought,Hearing it by this distant northern sea.

The Sea of FaithWas once, too, at the full, and round earth’s shoreLay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.But now I only hearIts melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,Retreating, to the breathOf the night-wind, down the vast edges drearAnd naked shingles of the world.

Ah, love, let us be trueTo one another! for the world, which seemsTo lie before us like a land of dreams,So various, so beautiful, so new,Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;And we are here as on a darkling plainSwept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,Where ignorant armies clash by night.

‘Ignorant’ is the key to understanding the depth of Arnold’s horror at his discovery of the neutrality of a nature that cannot be invested with that long list of pastoral comforts. To describe the forces of nature as ‘ignorant’ is to admit that they do not possess an intrinsic drive towards the harmony of a heavenly plan. It is as though we are a species swept along in a struggle together with the ignorant armies of apes from which we derive. . . That the natural world can no longer be constructed as a ‘land of dreams’, but is in fact a bleak battle for survival without divine purpose.

Terry Gifford, Pastoral, 119-120

Changes in the perception of nature accompanied the changes in religion. Before 1859, religion and science-and art- were pretty much in harmony with one another. Conservative, liberal, and radical theologians took solace in the scientific picture of an orderly universe. For traditional believers, nature pointed to its Creator and to the moral truths that have their origin in His character.

Then cam Darwin. The Origen of the Species, published in 1859 laid the groundwork for a worldview that was completely antithetical both to the biblical cosmology of the Hudson River School and to the Romantic nature mysticism of the Transcendentalists. Contrary to Humboldt, Darwin argued that nature is not harmonious but filled with conflict. . . Darwin’s theory of evolution shattered Humboldt’s orderly cosmos, as Gould shows, and with it the religious view of nature.

Gene Edward Veith, Painters of Faith: The Spiritual Landscape in the Nineteenth-century America, 128-129

“If only the Geologists would let me alone, I could do very well, but those dreadful Hammers! I hear the clink of them at the end of every cadence of the Bible verses.” – John Ruskin

Nature never taught me that there exists a God of glory and of infinite majesty. I had to learn that in other ways. But nature gave the word glory a meaning for me. I still do not know where else I could have found one. I do not see how the “fear” of God could have ever meant to me anything but the lowest prudential efforts to be safe, if I had never seen certain ominous ravines and unapproachable crags.

C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves, 20

To say that we possess no visual image of God, however, is not to say that we are without images. When we open the Bible, we discover that God presents unseen realities to us through a dazzling array of images and word pictures. The Lord is pictured as a shepherd, a rock, a tower, a farmer, a mighty king, a jilted husband, a warrior, a shield, a dwelling place, a banner, a consuming fire, and (most significantly) as a father. Christ is depicted as a branch, a stone, a mother hen, a lamb, a lion, a road, a builder, a lawyer, a good shepherd. Sin is envisioned as missing the mark, leaving a path, and stepping across a boundary. Salvation is described as release from slavery, payment of a debt, adoption as an heir, a judge’s proclamation, a new birth, and a peace treaty. God is depicted in bodily terms as opening His hand, putting His feet on a stool, throwing His shoe, inclining His ear, writing with His finger, winning a victory with His arm, hiding His face, and opening His eyes. He rides on a cloud, casts a shadow, girds Himself, lays a foundation, changes His vesture, battles the monster Rahab, sings with joy, and walks on the wings of the wind. These images all open ways of envisioning realities that are otherwise invisible to us.

The categories by which we conceptualize God and eternity, heaven and hell, sin and redemption must be imagined in order to be understood. In a certain sense, our entire knowledge of God depends upon images that we encounter within experienced (immanent) reality. - Kevin Bauderhttp://www.centralseminary.edu/resources/nick-of-time/274-the-importance-of-imagination-part-five-imagining-the-transcendent

The message of this book … is called forth by a condition which has existed in the Church for some years and is steadily growing worse. I refer to the loss of the concept of majesty from the popular religious mind. The Church has surrendered her once lofty concept of God and has substituted for it one so low, so ignoble, as to be utterly unworthy of thinking, worshiping men. This she has done not deliberately, but little by little and without her knowledge; and her very unawareness only makes her situation all the more tragic.The low view of God entertained almost universally among Christians is the cause of a hundred lesser evils everywhere among us. A whole new philosophy of Christian life has resulted from this one basic error in our religious thinking.With our loss of the sense of majesty has come the further loss of religious awe and consciousness of the divine Presence. We have lost our spirit of worship and our ability to withdraw inwardly to meet God in adoring silence. Modern Christianity is simply not producing the kind of Christian who can appreciate or experience the life in the Spirit.

A.W. Tozer, Knowledge of the Holy