Answering questions about our theology

This update is from Gary Deddo, who serves on GCI’s media team and as personal assistant to GCI president Joseph Tkach. In this article, Gary cautions about labeling ourselves as Incarnational Trinitarians and offers advice concerning answering those who question our theology. His insights help us understand more precisely the nature of our theological perspective.

1. The label, “Incarnational Trinitarian Theology” should be understood as descriptive rather than as prescriptive of our doctrinal statements. Our critics sometimes want to regard this label as being prescriptive, but that is not the case. Also, it is not the case that our theological perspective is Barthian or Torrancian or whatever. At best, such labels are only partially descriptive. Any similarities are definitely not prescriptive.
2. What is prescriptive for us is the reality of who God has revealed himself to be in Jesus Christ according to Scripture. Our theological formulations are derived from and meant to point faithfully to that reality, which exceeds what can be contained in our theological understandings.
3. When we quote any theologians positively, or even when the historic Christian Creeds are referenced, they are being used as illustrative of our own theological position, not as a source or final norm of it. They show that other members of the Body of Christ at other times and places grasped the biblical revelation in a way similar to how we have come to understand it. It demonstrates that we are concerned not to be esoteric or eccentric in our teaching and that we believe that other members of the Body of Christ can be helpful to us, saying at least as well, if not better than ourselves, how we also understand God’s Word.
4. Given what is noted above, the label “Incarnational Trinitarian Theology” is not meant to indicate that we hold to a special (or superior) form of Christianity. It indicates that the center and heart of our faith and worship corresponds to the center and heart of the revelation of the gospel itself—just as the whole of the historic, orthodox church has done down to this day. This label reminds us of the core reality of who God is and has revealed himself to be in and through Jesus Christ, according to Scripture. It also represents the nature of our renewal and restoration to true Christian faith which we have come to share with all the Christian church. If others have been pushed or pulled off-center we hold out to them these foundational truths, from which flow all other Christian doctrines, that they too might be renewed and restored in their faith and worship.
5. Some critics say we don’t make distinctions between believers and non-believers because of the way we speak of God having a oneness of mind, heart and purpose towards all. Though it is not true, they say we affirm universalism. Why do they come to this wrong conclusion? Because they make inferences from our statements about God to our views about his creatures. “If God regards all the same way, then all must regard God the same way.” But we do not come to our understanding through logical inferences made from one single affirmation about God. That would amount to both bad theology and bad logic. No simple logical inference is ever necessarily true, most especially when moving from God to talking about creatures.
6. It seems that their critique of our theology is a mirror-image of how their own theology works. Seeing a difference between believers and non-believers, they then imagine a corresponding difference in God. Again, they make a simple logical inference, but this time in the reverse direction: from a description of the differences among humans to what God then must prescribe for that difference among human persons. We do not reason in that way. Doing so would, in our view, constitute mythological projection, which is idolatry. Doing so would mean concluding something about what God prescribes from a description of individual creatures or a class of them. John Calvin made this mistake in reasoning in his polemical writings about predestination. Thankfully, he did not succumb to that faulty reasoning in most of his writings on theology (in his Institutes and elsewhere).
7. Typically, the difference between our viewpoint and that of those who criticize it, is that we start with God’s self-revelation as the criterion for our statements about God (“only God reveals God”). We do not start with our own, or even the Bible’s descriptions of how humans respond differently to God and then logically infer something about who God is and what God wants for his human creatures. Descriptions of human creatures and even of their potential eternal ends, either by means of our own observations or by reference to isolated biblical passages interpreted out of context, do not prescribe for us a definitive revelation of who God is and what he wants. Jesus Christ alone, according to divine revelation (Scripture) alone, prescribes for us our trust in and understanding of God’s heart, mind, purposes and character. On that basis, we conclude that God is a redeemer who has a redemptive nature and heart, does not want any to perish, but wants all to repent and receive eternal life. That is, God is identical in character to Jesus Christ who is Lord and Savior.
8. Some condemn or dismiss our theological stance, typically labeling it as Universalism, Aminianism or Calvinism. However, we have no need to be aligned with a particular school of theology. Though each school has understandings deserving our consideration, each also has significant weaknesses that obscure important, even crucial elements of the biblical revelation. Those weaknesses have not only been identified by us but have been brought to light in the ongoing discussions and debates down through the history of the church. While we share faith in the same realities as do all Christians, our theological understanding and articulation does not fall neatly along the lines drawn in the typical Universalist-Arminian-Calvinist debates.
9. Those who are satisfied with one of these primary theological traditions and insist that these are the only options, likely will not be able to properly hear our theological testimony or grasp its source and norm the way we do. Their critiques likely will assume that we have bought into the one or two theological options which they have rejected—ones that might include being “incarnational” or “Trinitarian.” While we can offer our reasons for why and how we understand the Christian faith the way we do, we don’t have to accept any labels nor defend the one we use. We are simply trying to be as faithful as we can in understanding and explaining the biblical revelation. We hold out our convictions first to our own members for their benefit and second to others in trust—hoping that others might be renewed and blessed as we have been as the Lord has corrected and restored us.
10. It was not a particular theology or theologian who transformed Grace Communion International. Rather it was Jesus Christ speaking through his Holy Word who revealed to us the true nature and character of God. Grace Communion International was grasped by the gospel of Jesus Christ, as our Lord placed himself at the center of our worship and faith. If the label, “Incarnational Trinitarian Theology” properly describes that transformation, then we accept it. However, we have no need to defend a label, for it prescribes nothing.