[Moderator: This is the final post this month by guest blogger, Ms. Kathrin Halder. Ms. Halder is a member of the Society. She works at IGNIS in Germany.]

We have seen that we are fearfully and wonderfully made by God. And yet we depend, totally, on His continuous speaking of life and love to us—something He chooses to continue even to fallen creation. But now, I’d like to explore the consequences of the fall even though God continues to speak to us.

Of course our breaking off with God, our refusal to answer Him did have massive consequences. Thus a paradox becomes apparent. While humanness reflects the original glory of creation, it also, at the same time, reflects the horror of separation of God. As Stanley Grenz puts it:

Throughout history thinkers have noted that humans are a strange paradox. We are a mixture of good and evil, of godly beauty and of demonic hideousness, of unlimited potential and of tragic failure. In theological terms, we are God’s good handiwork, but we have fallen into sin. [1]        

Therefore we should celebrate God’s beauty in us, but we should at the same time be shocked about the extent of evil being found in us. This ought to lead us to the cross where we can find redemption.

Some therefore divide sharply between Christians and Non-Christians, one mainly reflecting fallenness, the other mainly reflecting the restored beauty of creation. Without being able to address everything in this complicated issue, the main discussion in my classes comes to my mind, the question whether a Non-Christian, an unbeliever could or could not love.

Some (e.g., Augustine or Luther) see the good deeds of unbelievers as “splendida vitia,” or shining vices, things done to show one’s own goodness, but not out of genuine love. Others (e.g., those within the catholic tradition) see the unbeliever able to love due to the fact that there is remaining substance of the image of God in them.

My personal view is that there is love in the life of unbelievers, but not because there remains pure good them but because the relation to God is not totally disconnected (like I said in the last post).

You can take water out of a river (when the wellspring “decides” to allow water to flow into it), it is real good water, but in the end it doesn’t originate there, but in the wellspring. As stated I believe that God still speaks love into the life of fallen man, and they are able to pass on that love.

But of course the extent of love also has something to do with our response to God’s love, with the way the river “decides” to open itself more or less to the water out of the wellspring. And of course it will primarily be Christians who will be more receptive here. But I believe and know people who haven’t converted in a clear way yet, but still answer positively to some extent. And, it might be dangerous to say this, but I have met people outside the church that seemed to answer to love more strongly (and I believe they are on their way to find Christ) than some people inside church that on a real level seem to be more reluctant to open their hearts for Christ’s love and calling to pass on that love to a hurting world.

Source:

Grenz, Stanley J. (1994): Theology for the Community of God. Nashville: Broadman & Holman