Well, thanks to my brother Sam who got us off on a good footing. This looked lower from out there and now that I stand behind it, but anyway, you know what? I've I've preached in Dutch churches before and I've never gotten taller as a result. Um, it's okay. It's all right. The Lord gave me 5 foot eight and uh it makes for comfortable flying. So I'll I'll leave it at that. Uh as Sam mentioned, uh now we get into some of the the what of the confession and obviously not everything because uh first of all, the what is God. Uh and so he's infinite. In fact, our confession says in every way infinite. I want to I want to do one quick thing though, just to give you a heads up. I'm going to call an audible here. Uh hopefully it won't be too disorienting. I'm actually taking part of session two and putting it into session one and also taking part of session one and putting it into session two. So in this first session we will treat divine simplicity and infinity together. Uh on the one hand treating divine simplicity makes you think it's going to be an easy session and then divine infinity makes you think it might not be an easy session. But actually it's divine simplicity that makes it not an easy session. Uh and also divine affinity. I want to begin with a text of scripture. Romans chap 11 verse 36. I'm sure well known to you. And then we'll ask the Lord to help us uh in this time together. For of him and through him and to him are all things. to whom be glory forever. Amen. I want to follow that with an non-inspired text uh but one that we're considering the confession. If you look at page seven in your spiral uh bound handout on the far left column, you'll see chapter one of the second London confession. And I want to read that and then we'll ask uh the Lord's help. So page seven far left column article one. The Lord our God is but one only living and true God whose subsistence is in and of himself infinite in being in perfection whose essence cannot be comprehended by any but himself. A most pure spirit invisible without body parts or passions. Who only hath immortality dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto. who is immutable, immense, eternal, incomprehensible, almighty, every way infinite, most holy, most wise, most free, most absolute, working all things according to the counsel of his own, immutable and most righteous will for his own glory, most loving, gracious, merciful, long-suffering, abundant in goodness and truth, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, rewarder of all them that diligently seek him, and with all most just and terrible in his judgments, hating all sin, and who will by no means clear the guilty. Let's pray. God, you are good and you do good. And you have not hidden yourself from us, but you have revealed yourself to us in truth, Lord, that we might know you that we might commune with you, that we might tremble before you, but that we also might draw near to you with hearts full of gratitude. For you do forgive sins and iniquity, and you are a God full of compassion and mercy, indeed most loving. Lord, as we consider your simplicity and your infinity, these two grand and great mysterious truths of our faith, we pray, God, that you would give us wisdom and insight taught from above, that your spirit would illumin our hearts to to see uh these glorious truths that we might even honor you and glorify you in our hearts. Lord, we pray that you would enlarge our hearts to be lifted up to you now in praise and gratitude and wonder. Give us the thing that we seek, which is the knowledge of you and greater love for you. We ask this in Christ's name. Amen. Amen. Only a simple God and an infinite God could possibly be the creator of the universe. When Paul says in Romans 11:36, "For from him and through him and to him are all things," this rules out the possibility that God is in any way complex. Now, I know this sounds counterintuitive. I anticipated that. Uh but consider with me. It's only because he is a simple god. That is to say, as our confession phrases it, not composed of parts, the way uh that the Belgic confesses it, we believe in our hearts and confess with our mouths that there is a single and simple spiritual being whom we call God. Uh this is a very common uh confession both among the reformed churches and in the medieval and early uh churches as well. Only if God is simple is he absolut absolutely irreducible in being. and thus the most fundamental reality upon which all else depends. That's a major premise. I'm going to repeat it. Only if God is simple is he absolutely irreducible in being and therefore the most fundamental being upon which everything else depends. If God were not absolutely simple, he would not be the God of Romans 11:36. It's a it's a very important uh thing that we confess in saying this. A composite spiritual deity by contrast or or being even uh would in fact not be sufficient to make the world or sustain it and therefore completely unqualified for our worship. These would be at worst one of the gods of the nations, impostor gods that are in fact composed of parts. We'll get into more a little bit about what that is. um or at best not one of the false gods of the nations but perhaps a holy angel who is I will grant relatively simple not being composed of a body uh and a soul the way that we are and so there is a kind of simplicity in angels but angels are not entirely without parts even if not physical ones uh even the angels must be ruled out what we don't worship is a composite spiritual immaterial being with great power. A composite spiritual immaterial being with great power. We have names for those kinds of beings. Michael, Gabriel, if you've been reading your toe lately, Raphael. I mean, it's not canonical, but I'm I lay odds there's a Raphael. Anyway, we can talk about that on the break. Uh, don't worship him. They're powerful. They can do extraordinary things. Things that compared to us even appear supernatural, the angels, but they're not to be worshiped because they're composed of parts. At some fundamental level, they are dependent entities. Closely allied with the confession of divine simplicity is that God is in every way infinite. Even though confession 21 begins with divine infinity and then goes to simplicity and then goes back to infinity sort of in the order of knowing I want to begin with the consideration of simplicity and then move from there to infinity. Uh for one reason being that many historically and I think rightly have understood infinity to be an implication that follows from simplicity. If God is simple that is not composed of parts, then we have the conditions for for infinitude. If God were composed of parts, we would have the condition for finitude. Uh so composition of parts is the structure of finitude. If God doesn't have that structure of finitude, then infinity seems to follow of necessity. But we'll step toward that. Undoubtedly, this claim will strike many as odd. If I say God is simple to the modern Christian, that might almost sound like an insult. Um, if I say my friend Cam, he's a he's a simple guy. There are a couple of ways in which you could understand that. Um, it could mean uh that he doesn't clutter his life with a whole bunch of unnecessary things and he keeps the main thing the main thing. When I say he's a simple guy, what I really mean is he has a very well-ordered life. That would be the very positive way of putting it. But then there's that other way of saying he's a simple guy. And you all know the implications of that. something like simplistic or a simple tongue uh tends not to be a compliment. And when we say that God is simple, it can almost sound to the modern ears, especially in English, as some kind of insult uh that we're hurling uh toward God. I think there's another reason why this might sound wrong to us, and it's because we tend to associate uh perhaps power and production with complexity. In the world of modern physics, we understand uh that machines composed of many parts are thereby enabled to do perhaps extraordinary things in the world of production. Maybe if you're like me, you remember seventh grade science class in which you had a culminating science fair project. My science fair project in seventh grade was um soil permeability. Uh my dad was a farmer. I grew up on a farm in Northern California and so we just went around to different parts of the farm and we just dug up the soil, put them in glass jars uh and tested soil permeability for the lom and the sandy loom and the clay. And then what you do is you bring your four jars to the science fair with your trifold board telling you all about soil permeability. and uh and uh nobody lines up to look at your jars, jars of dirt in which water had been poured and observed. Uh it's it's always the uh the robotics and the lever pulley systems uh you know that you can actually interact with that people are excited about. Uh, and the one that stands out to me is the lever pulley system where if you add enough fulcrums uh into the mix, if you distribute the work across more parts with relatively little effort, you can do extraordinarily difficult tasks. With your pinky, you can lift a 12PB bowling ball. If you distribute the work across a number of fulcrums and pulleys and levers, levers, in fact, are force multipliers. And the more parts you put in, uh, the more force multiplication you get and then the more extraordinary productions can be brought off. Well, that's I think that's true. I flew up yesterday from Dallas on a 737. I once read that a Boeing 747 has 6 million parts. I read that on Wikipedia, so probably somebody in his basement. But you know what? That's probably about right because I've seen Boeing 747s and that's about I size it up for about six million parts. Um, give or take a few. Uh, and the six million parts do amazing things. In fact, they're getting they're getting better at it. And in the spring, earlier spring, I flew from Los Angeles uh to back home to Philadelphia. And the flight from Los Angeles to Philadelphia. It's the first time I've ever done that flight in under four hours. The flight coast to coast under four hours. um with amazing tailwinds, an average ground speed of we were at 38,000 ft, no 55 or 58,000 ft. That's way up there in a regular jet. Uh and we were averaging 705 miles an hour. I didn't notice because I I did some Bible reading. I listened to a little bit of music and then I took a nap and I felt the plane descending and I woke up and I asked my wife if there was like an emergency. Were we landing in Cleveland or something? And she said, "No, we're we're coming into Philadelphia." Hundreds of people moved across the entire continent with relative ease. A personal little air conditioning thing, a reading lamp, uh ginger ale, coffee, cream, chilled. That that that's a lot of things going on at once. And I had this and I think you agree with me on this. We haven't talked, but I think we probably agree on this. I think the six million parts have something to do with it all. Meaning, um, coffee, bathrooms, air conditioning, personal reading lamps, your own seat with armrests. I mean, the whole the six million parts all contribute to this great production of moving hundreds of people in relative ease and comfort across the entire continent at blinding speeds. Okay? And so I think what we tend to do is probably we move from something like that an extraordinarily powerful event that we now become have come to take for granted I suppose and we tend to think that power lies in complexity and if you're talking about machines or a lever pulley system there's a lot to that. If we're talking physics, parts amplify power. More parts, more false force multiplication, bigger productions. You got that? Now, step, take one step back from that and think about the biggest production ever. The biggest production ever. And God said, "Let there be." And there was. Uh, so I like to say the biggest production ever is the world. The world. Well, now you can see how the little wheels get turning in people's minds and think, well, if it's six million parts to get people across a continent, how many parts, how complex must God be to make a world? But that's because they're thinking about God as if he is a kind of physical machine so that his power works the way that like say the power of a material force would work. Uh, and that would be exactly wrong. Let me now stay with me for a moment. Um, if a Boeing 747 has six million parts, not a single one of those parts is a Boeing 747. Not a single part of a Boeing 747 is a Boeing 747. Not a single one of those parts could hope to get you anywhere, much less across the country in relative ease and comfort quickly. Um, so six million things not a Boeing 747 all come together are composed to produce a Boeing 747. And we could say, and this is a buyin. I need you to agree with me on this or we're not going to get much farther in our talk this afternoon. Um, that in some respects that plane depends upon those parts to be the plane it is and produce the production it does. Did I say that to you? It depends on the parts to do the stuff it does. That's the other way of saying it. Uh so in how many ways is a Boeing 747 a dependent entity? Uh 6 million plus because it also requires I've not been there. I've not down to Seaac to the Boeing assembly line there. Uh, but I have I've heard about uh this that there are actually people there who put it together. They don't just like get the parts all laid out and then all right, let's check back in the morning and see how the parts are doing. They show up like, "Oh, good. They came together." Um, it's actually six million parts plus whatever puts them together. So that that plane which produces remarkable effects like moving people the way it does um is also a profoundly dependent entity and it is nothing there's no way you would call that the first cause. It has six million causes intrinsic to it and then it has a whole bunch of exttrinsic causes namely the designers and the assemblers who are actually imposing unity onto the six million intrinsic parts. That is not the first cause of being. That is not the one from which all things are. That is itself a thing that is from more than six million other things not itself. And that would be blasphemy. Blasphemy to attribute to God. Now when people call God complex, I don't actually think that they necessarily intend to fall to the question of heresy. That is a material heresy, not a formal one. I appreciate that distinction, by the way. Um in which case I would really be careful not not to say, "Brother, you're a heretic." that just maybe but let's wait a while on that. Maybe what I want to say is um brother I understand why you're saying this because what you're saying is God is really powerful and you associate power with complexity but let me propose to you that complexity might be the wrong way to go about this uh because complexity will not allow God to be the one from whom are all things and uh like give give people a chance to finesse their language. Now, thankfully, the confession helps you fasttrack that because the confession confession's already finessed the language for you. Um, I also have this idea that this isn't about my ideas, but just while I'm on this for a moment, we're going to put it into overdrive in a second, so this is all on-ramp. Uh, I do actually think that most true Bible believing Christians are already in some inarticulate way committed to the doctrine of divine simplicity. And here's here's what I mean by that. I I think I want to be very careful not to propose that we ourselves have gone and discovered something in the past in the confession and now we're saying it to scandalize all the contemporary evangelicals around us who don't talk like that. I I here's what I mean. Um, if I ask the average Christian in a church that isn't confessional or even very theologically well educated, um, do you think that God depends on what is not God to be God or do what he does? Just imagine that in your own head right now, asking a Christian you know who might not be from a confessional tradition or have had Sunday school classes going through all all 32 chapters. And if you just said, "Does God depend on what is not God to be God or do God stuff?" That's how I ask it to my undergraduate students. Um I'm very relieved to hear most of them say that's kind of a weird sounding question, but no. No. Uh then what I want to say is uh good then you're already on board. Simplicity is already your doctrine. You're already committed to it. Simplicity is really just a scheme, a good scheme, a scheme I like that helps protect and guard that fundamental condition, that fundamental conviction that God does not depend on what is not himself to be himself. But things composed of parts do. Namely, parts which aren't holes that actually fund the being of holes or support the being of holes are those upon which the holes depend. I'm a human. You see that for yourself? I think uh I depend upon some major parts like soul and body. I am not my soul. Plain and simple. My body is an essential constituent of mine. I'm also not merely a body. My soul is an essential constituent of mine. Uh I'm not suggesting that there isn't a hierarchical relation between those two. I actually think that there is. But nevertheless, they are irreducibly distinct. My body and soul just are not. They are both in me. They're both intrinsic. I need both of them to be a living human. And they're not the same thing. Neither one of them is properly speaking a human. Each one of them is a major essential part of a human. I depend upon both of them. And I also depend upon their togetherness to be in an actual natural human state. Okay? So I depend on what is not a human to be a human namely a soul and a body. Does that make sense? This is this is one way we can begin to uh realize that even even uni even natural substantial units like humans or or angels um depend upon intrinsic parts and a unity of those parts with which they are not identical. So that they are actually dependent on what is not themselves to be themselves, namely their parts. Unfortunately, uh this is a doctrine that's been very eclipsed uh lost sight of if not just downright objected to uh in the last couple of hundred years. Lewis Burkoff in writing in the 19 early 1930s said in recent works on theology, the simplicity of God is seldom mentioned. Many theologians positively deny it either because it is regarded as a purely metaphysical abstraction or because in their estimation it conflicts with the doctrine of the Trinity. I leave that to the side. My brother has the heavier task even going into tomorrow of touching questions of of trinity. Uh but some will say well there are three parts of God the father, son and holy spirit. Let me just anticipate you a little bit. Historically we have never thought of the persons as parts. Namely constituents less than the whole that collectively make up the whole. Um and then also uh some find it overly metaphysical. They just metaphysics is yucky. They don't have a taste for it. They don't want to talk about being in technical terms. And so the doctrine has just kind of slipped away into the mist. Um Frank Sheed uh not a Protestant, a Catholic, uh giving a lecture in 1930 at Cambridge in a summer school of theology, uh said these words later written down, "A study of what is happening to theology and its higher reaches would almost certainly take as its starting point the attribute of simplicity and show how and show that every current heresy begins by being wrong on that." I read these words. I think I read that in 2008 and I just remember thinking this has got to be hyperbole. This is just take simplicity and every major heresy begins by being wrong on simplicity. I've decided in the intervening years um that he's almost right. Exact like if it's hyperbolic it's barely barely hyperbolic. Um now sheeted is writing in 1930 when the raging philosophies in the in higher academia at the time were process theism this doesn't matter to you but enri down in France um Alfred North Whitehead uh in England these are the pioneers of a process theology for Berson the vitalon that living means becoming that living means changing vitality means alteration vitality means time passion movement ment the process theism of Alfred North Whitehead later in America via Charles Hartshorn made the argument basically effectively the same thing that God is actually in a process toward his own future and he's interacting with the world in such a way that he affects the world and the world also then returns the favor and affects God and God is in this kind of symbiotic mutualistic relationship with the world in which God himself is moving toward his own future and the world's helping him get there. If that's offensive to you, you're on the right track. Um and Beric son's point or Sheed's point writing as a lay Catholic uh is basically saying uh by the way Catholics are on board with this. They have to be because in 1215 at the fourth council Lateran council they made this official Roman Catholic dogma. And then when you get to the Protestant Reformation every single major Protestant confession put this in their very right up front in their doctrine of God. And so on this point the Catholics whether they know about this or not they're on the hook. I mean they should be good on this. Uh she was actually good on it and I think he gets it that if God were not composed of parts then there wouldn't be a distinction between God's actuality and his passive potentiality and if he doesn't have a distinct principle of passive potentiality that's distinct him from actuality then that all this process theism and God becoming and God developing toward his own future would be a complete non-starter. No Catholic or any classic Protestant would have any business entertaining that kind of theology as a remote possibility. By abandoning simplicity, it opens the doors for things like process theism to actually begin to make sense in people's minds. I think she'd had I think she'd put his finger on probably one of the the sore spot in terms of where the trouble uh may have lay. Well, let's talk then briefly about the basic claims of the doctrine. As our confession says, God is without parts. The chief claim of the doctrine is that he's without parts. But in order for this to make sense, we need to understand what a part is. If God doesn't have them, then what are they that he doesn't have? So that the confession is meaningful. And so I propose this as a very broad definition for you of what a part is. A part is anything in an entity that is less than the whole and without which the whole would be somehow different than it is. I could also add and upon which the whole somehow depends. But that's implicit. So a part is anything in a whole that is less than the whole without which the whole would be somehow different than it is and therefore upon which the whole somehow depends. I know I changed the second definition a little bit, but that's that's got it. That's covered it. Um, anything in a hole that is less than the whole without which the whole would be somehow different. That's a part and I want to propose that that version of a part um actually applies to any composition of parts. Anything that we call a part. Now here's here's the reason I am giving you this definition up front because when the confession says that God is without body parts or passions, I think it's very tempting for us in a in a in a kind of um post-enlightenment context to read that as if it's saying that God is without body parts. But if you look at the confession, that comma uh is actually there in the original uh which we now have reproductions of the original uh available. And so if you want to check me on this, um as I recall, I think if you went back in the time machine and went to the street and looked at the actual original uh sheets, uh you would find there's a comma between body and parts. So that it doesn't say God's without body parts. Well, it doesn't not say that. It is of course saying that, but it's actually envisioning something more than that. It's not just that God doesn't have body parts. That's true. But that he also doesn't have any other kinds of parts. That is to say, um it's not just ruling out physical parts. Our confession is ruling out what we might call metaphysical parts. Any composition, physical or metaphysical, is being ruled out. This is important, especially if you believe that angels are spirits. Because if you just said he's without body parts, I could say that about Raphael, the apocryphal angel, and I would be right. And that doesn't make him God. Does this make sense? But if I say without body, that covers God and Raphael. But if I say without parts at all, then Raphael doesn't make the great. Does this make sense? This is this is important for actually distinguishing God from the angels. that comma that comma is vital to actually making that distinction. Um basic claims then first the meaning of a part second then the recognition that anything composed of parts is doubly dependent first upon the parts themselves like the Boeing 747 or like I depend upon a soul and a body. Um holes depend upon their parts. Some of the parts are essential major constituents without which the whole would would dissolve and no longer be the whole. So like if my body separates from my soul, then there's no longer going to be a human in front of you, there will be an incomplete state of my soul that persists my death in the intermediate state, which is not a complete and human natural state in which I would be longing for the resurrection of my body. And you would too. I'm sure there's that. We're early enough in the day, I think, for that. Um, we can we can say it that way. Um, I don't know about after dinner. That's going to be the rough one this evening. what kinds of things you can say with all the digestion. Um, that's a major constituent part in which a human goes. But if if all you if all I do is clip my left pinky finger nail, which I do sometimes. I did it a few days ago actually. It was just time. Uh, and I clipped it, a part of me was missing in which I was no longer James with the pinky nail of such a length. That was no more. I lost it. It went in the garbage. Um, but like I survived it. This is not the intermediate state. I'm still here. I made it. In which case then I can remove some parts and make it. And if I remove other parts, I'm gone. I have shoved off the mortal co mortal coil as they say. Um, and so my point is this, but all parts are less than the whole and without which the whole would be somehow different than it is. Without my fingernail, I lose fingernail quantity. which is okay. Uh without my soul, I lose the very form of my body making it human and it thereby becomes a corpse and you can fill it full of formaldahhide, dress it up, look at it, bury it in the ground, say we miss him. Uh and you could not do that to me if that's an actual human. Something's changed. Something's changed. The disintegration has actually led to the loss of the thing itself in that case. The point though, uh I'm dependent upon my parts. Some of them are not essential for my being. Some of them are essential for my being. But I'm dependent upon all of them for some aspect of my being. That this is important. Every whole depends upon its parts for some aspect of its being. And then secondly, they also depend upon whatever accounts for the togetherness or whatever unifies them. So the unity of the Boeing 747 depends uh upon the unity of the Boeing 747 depends upon whatever put the parts together. So it depends upon the parts for its function and operation and for being what it is. But then it also depends upon whatever accounts or funds the unity of the parts or the guy who put it uh together. And even if it were very improbable, but let's just imagine you're down there in SeaTac and one night they have all six million parts laid out like, "All right, tomorrow morning we're going to assemble it." And they showed up the next morning after a humongous windstorm. And they showed up and lo and behold after this gigant the windstorm to beat all windstorms uh like tornadoes all over the place and they showed up in the morning and lo and behold the tornado had just torn down the whole the whole assembly shed and and instead in its place was a fully assembled Boeing 747 fueled and ready to fly. The probability that a windstorm could be what imposed unity upon those parts. Is that impossible? Mathematically impossible? It is not. Is it improbable? Are the numbers of zeros before the one after the period on the probability factor so immense that it just feels impossible? Yes, I'll grant that. But what you would but it's in other words it's not comp strictly impossible physically speaking. What would be impossible though, watch this, if you you showed up there the next so somebody said, "Wow, look, the windstorm put the plane together." Highly improbable, highly unlikely. I wouldn't hold my breath on that. But if you showed up the next morning and this plane were together, that is to say, all the parts have been, all the parts were now integrated, and somebody said, "Boy, I wonder what put this plane together and somebody said nothing." That wouldn't just be improbable. That would be actually impossible. That is to say, something has to be the reason why there's a togetherness of the parts. All right, now we're back to it. If God were composed of parts, God would be dependent upon the parts, which would not be identical with himself, the whole. And he would be dependent upon whatever funded or whatever power accounted for the unity of those parts. And he would not be the one from whom and through whom and to whom are all things. He himself would be from, that is to say, from whatever assembled the parts or accounted for their assembly. and he would be through the assembly of the parts themselves. None of which is actually God because parts aren't holes. Are you are you following the rational? This is now I step back from it all. This is why Christians historically have recognized God to be absolutely simple, not composed. The medieval uh theologian Thomas Aquinus says, "Every composite is posterior to its components." That is to say, it follows after. Since the simpler exists in itself before anything is added for the composition of a third, but nothing is prior to the first. Therefore, since God is the first principle or cause is what he means, he is not composite. Composits depend upon unities of being more fundamental than themselves, namely the parts. But if God is the first cause of all things, and how do you know he's the first cause of all things? There are multiple ways of knowing this. The easiest one, Genesis 1:1, and then a whole bunch of other verses like Romans 11:36. In other words, there are lots of biblical reasons to believe that God is the absolute first cause of all things. If he's the absolute first cause of all things, he cannot be composed of parts since things composed of parts follow from or are ontologically secondary to the things that com that comprise them. Does that make sense? Okay. Um, a number of implications follow from this. I won't tease these out. This is usually where the the sort of the difficulty gets in. Um, but I'll say just a few things uh in this connection. Um first most fundamentally this means that God is not composed of existence and essence. Existence and essence. What do I mean by that? There is in God no distinction between his is and his what and there is in in us a distinction that way. For instance, if I asked you and it's just a simple kind of thought experiment with you, but you can even see this in the way we ask questions. the the difference between that and what. If I say um if I say um what is Cam Porter? I just pick the people a few people I know. What is Cam Porter? And you say um yeah, Cam exists. You haven't told me that Cam Porter isn't the name of my goldfish. If I say, "What is Cam Porter?" And you say, "Yeah, he exists." I didn't say is he. I said, "What is he?" And we recognize that you just giving me an is answer to a what question. Or if I can put a little more technically, you give me an existential answer to an essential question. Doesn't quite answer my question. I asked, "What?" Now, flip it around the other way. Um, if I asked, "Does Cam Porter exist?" You said, "Cam Porter, what a wonderful rational animal." Well, that's what Aristotle would say his nature is. Uh, but does he exist? I always think of the I I always like to pick an extinct animal to illustrate this point. If I asked you, um, are there any dodo birds? Are there any? And you said, well, let me see. And you pulled off digest a little here, but you pulled off your like an an 1840 I think they were still around in 1840. You pulled off an 1840 ornithological def desk reference antiquarian dictionary that I'm sure you have on your desk. That's a that's a bird dictionary from 1840. And you open to the Latin entry for do I always say dotus berdanis. That's not it. Don't quote that. But you open the dotus berdanis and you start reading. You say the dotas berdanis is a bird of such and such a you know mature state. The male weighs this and the female weighs this and this is its molting patterns and here is its diet and it lives on Madagascar in parts of southeastern Africa. And um here are its mating patterns and the thickness of its eggshells is roughly this. And this is when it lays its eggs and this is how many eggs a female might lay in her lifetime. And this is and you just read me this full exhaustive ornithological 1840 dictionary entrance of a dodo bird. I mean like let's just say that this thing is exactly scientifically correct. But my question now I let you do your whole thing. Uh but then at the end I tell you that wasn't my question. My question was not what is a dodo bird. My question is are there any? That is to say I'm asking is the dodo bird in existence. You're telling me what it would be if it were. But simply telling me what does not tell me that. Does that distinction make sense? Um, and in us there's actually a distinction between our humanity, what we are, and our existence. That is to say, that act by which our humanity is placed outside of nothingness. I have to say it this way. An undergraduate once asked me twothirds of the way through the semester, "What do you mean by existence?" That seems like a big deal to know. Um, I just said whatever it is that places you outside of nothing. The Latin to be, if you will. Um, and that was that. Oh, okay. So, that's what I mean. Um, that which places you the dodo bird nest itself does not place it outside of existence. The dodo bird nest when it was existing was placed outside of or outside of nothing was placed outside of nothing by some act of being called existence. But the existence was not identical with the essence because at some point the ex essence and ex existence were separated when the last dodo bird died. That was a moment of silence for the last dodo bird that just it was gone. It's it's not here anymore. But if I asked of God, what is God? And you said to me, you you quoted the Septuagent translation of Exodus 3:14. Ha, he is or the way that Durham renders it in his commentary, he is the ising one. And I asked you what, and you told me is. And if I flipped around and says and said, um um does God exist? Um, and you told me his nature is to be. I ask you a what question? I ask you an essential question. You give me an existential answer. And in the case of God, it's the right answer. God is his own. This is the this is the most fundamental thing about divine simplicity. God is his own is. Thomas Aquinus once said that God is not a hobbins essay. Some of you came here wanting that question answered. There you have it. He's not a Hobbins essay which is which is a funny thing funny way of saying he's not a have of is that's what Hobins to have uh essay to be. He doesn't have to be rather he is to be his words Ipsum essay subsistence that God is his own being subsisting God doesn't God doesn't strictly possess what he is or that he is he is that he is his name is I am that I am I think Durham is right he is the ising one and that he is his own is God doesn't have existence he's the very act by which he is existent. What he is and that he is in him are identical. They're not distinct principles of being. He's not reducible to an existential principle that is somehow distinct from a quiditative or essential principle. That I want to propose is the creator creature distinction. That's the thing that you can say about God that you cannot even say about the archangel Michael. Because Michael, Michael's a hobb essay. He has existence. He has his to be. God is his own to be. That is most fundamental. Um this is that there's nothing in God not God upon which God depends to be God. But there is something in Michael not Michael upon which Michael depends to be Michael which is his own act of existence which is a gift given to him by God. God's existence is not a gift. It's himself. Your existence is a gift. He gave it. Simplicity puts a fine point on that distinction. Maybe in addition to this one other point um that it also means that there's not a substance attribute distinction in God uh like there is in me. So for instance I am a human substance. You see that I suppose um but then there are also things I am over and above being a human substance. So you could say like James is human but then you could also say James is talking. That's an accidental accidental state of action. Um and how do I know that James is that my talking and my human aren't the same thing? Like, how do I know those are really distinct parts of me? First of all, they're both real in me. I really am human and I really am talking. And those really aren't the same thing. And they're both real in me. And how do I know? Because sometimes, and this does happen, but I am paid to talk. But sometimes I'm human and for a little while I'm quiet. In which I conclude to be James and to be speaking can't be the same thing because what's up with the fact that I'm not speaking and I'm still me? And some of you don't your life goes by much more easily than mine. I do wonder about those questions. And um I conclude you can say the same thing about standing. Standing is a state of position or a state of uh posture um or position. Um but being human which is what I am and being and standing are not the same thing. And I know this also because I don't stand up when I sleep but I count on still being human when I sleep. In which case then whatever it is in me that makes me human and whatever is in me that accounts for my being standing or upright can't be the same thing because then what's up with the fact that sometimes I'm not standing but still human. Okay, you get the point. I have all sorts of attributes that are over and above my nature. My humanity is not what accounts for my for my standing. I I could have been born a parapolgic without legs and never have stood and been fully human even if in some kind of diminished way physically be fully human in which case then I have to conclude that there are all sorts of attributes or truths about me that are real in me but they're not necessarily identical with my substance and so I'm composed of substantial principles and then also principles of being over and above my substance that are somehow distinct from it. Does this does this make sense? And God, if God is not composed of parts, then there can't be that in him which is his godness and then something else real in him accounting for his being somehow that isn't his godness. Because then God would depend on what is not his godness to be his godness. Like I depend on what is not humanity to be talking and to be speaking. These are states of being over and above the state of being human. God does not depend then upon qualities really distinct from his divine essence in order to be as he is. Some have also proposed that this means uh that God is not composed uh that his attributes are in him all identical. And I don't want to go into this too much but only to quote this from John Owen. The attributes of God which alone seem to be distinct things in the essence of God are all of them essentially the same with one another and everyone the same with the essence of God itself. In other words, in God to be wise is to be good is to be powerful is to be just is to be loving is to be eternal. There are reasons why I can't conceive all of those together. The way God reveals those that reality to me is bit by bit. He reveals his eternity one way, his power another way, his love another way, his wrath and his justice another way. Uh in other words, the way in which he discloses his fullness of being to me is multi-arted. The revelation of God is not simple. God is. The language about God is not simple. God is. The statement God is simple isn't simple. It's a three-parted statement with a predicate, a subject, and a copula. It's a three-parted statement declaring non-partedness in God. I can say the same thing about infinity. I've never had an infinite thought of God. I've only had finite thoughts of the infinite. There's a kind of non symmetry in my familiarity with complexity and multiartiveness that in some ways will always mean that there's a kind of non symmetry between the manner of God's being and the manner of my knowing or speaking of him. But nevertheless, we do have the resources to know that the manner of God's being exceeds even the manner of my speaking about his being. Because I do understand that if God depended upon parts, there'd be something in God, not God, making him be God. And he would not be the one that created all things. and he would not be the one upon whom all things depend because there'd be something not God upon which God himself depended. In other words, I may not be able to say simplicity simply. I can't uh even the word simple isn't simple. I can't say simplicity simply, but that's not the same thing as not knowing why it's true and believing it. That's just recognizing that there are limitations in the way that I have to express myself. Well, let's then consider um the doctrine of divine infinity as an implicate of divine simplicity. Our confession says if you look again that God is infinite in being and perfection. Infinite and being and perfection. Two words are used here being and perfection. Um I want to look just briefly uh at both. First the meaning of infinite when we say it of God. Historically, the Greeks until the Greek Plutinus, and I'll just leave Plutinus out here. He he's a major game changer. Um, the Greeks historically did not regard divine infinity as a perfection. They rather regarded infinity infinity as an imperfection. So, we tend to think of infinity as a perfection. They thought of infinity as an imperfection. To their minds, infinity denoted incompleteness or nonfullness. And you can actually you can appreciate why they would say this. You if you read an older book uh even a book in English, you sometimes get to the last page and in a modern English book, you might get to the last page and it says the end. In older books, they would sometimes sign the end in Latin. Finish. Finish. We have our word finish from this finish. The end, the limit. Uh and then that's when the thing was fulfilled. The fullness was when you got to the finish line. And anything that was in phenise was incomplete. It was open to development. It was still lacking. Do you get what I'm after? That's the the penultimate chapter would be non nonfinish or infin. You know what I mean? The chapter that leaves you hanging and you're looking for the resolution and you're just waiting for more. And so in their minds, infinity meant incompleteness, nonfullness of being, and therefore was an imperfection. So it's kind of strange when our confession says that God is infinite in being and perfection when in their mind infinity meant lack of being, lack of fullness, openness to further actuality. Obviously, Christian theologians do not mean to say that God is incomplete or lacking in the fullness of being when they attribute infinity to him. Rather, they insist that God is actually as distinct from potentially infinite. A potentially infinite thing is exactly not actually infinite. Potentially infinite means possibly more. Does this make sense? Could be or could become what it is not yet. Potential infinity is something that could be attributed to possibly with heavy qualification the human soul or the angelic mind in a very limited or narrow sense but that would be in the old imperfection sense. Actual infinity is s is saying that fullness of being without remainder without lack is in him. We say that God is actually infinite. Infinity does not deny actuality of God. Rather, it denies any end or limit to this actuality of being. What we're proposing is an actuality of being without limit. In the older Greek mind, that would be a potentiality of being, not an actuality of being. But by suggesting that God is actually infinite in being, that was infinite was precisely not being uh in the older Greek way of conceiving it. Edward Lee, an English Presbyterian of the 17th century, says, "Infinitess is such a property in God that he is not limited to any time, place, or this is so key, or particular nature or being." He's not saying there isn't a divine nature. What he's saying is that God's nature is not like a nature among others distinguished by what it lacks that belongs properly to the others. The way that you actually categorize finite natures is by discovering the things that are unique to them that are lacking in all others. And then the way you distinguish them from all others is by is by discovering how they lack what properly belongs to the being of others. That's a finite kind of being. That's a limited kind of being. Lee is saying that's not how God is. A particular nature or being or it is uh that whereby God is free alltogether from all limitation of place, time or degree. If we're going to say that God is infinite, and I do find actually that Christians are many Christians still confess that God is infinite. Well, I'll put it differently. I don't meet Christians that say, "Yeah, I believe in a finite God. I'm hoping in a finite God." Just not a it's not a thing Christians tend to say. What I have discovered, and this is true for me, uh, as well, um, that that doesn't necessarily mean they know wherein finitude consists. To say that God doesn't have it is one thing. To know what finitude consists of or what characterizes finitude. What is, if I can put it this way, what is the structure of finitude? If you knew what if you knew what made finitude finitude, then you would do a better job at not mistakenly putting God into that category. Does this make sense? Um, what I want to propose coming off the heels of what we just read is that the structure of finitude is complexity. That is to say, parts that are less than the whole and irreducibly distinct from each other outside of each other, thereby placing limits on each other in the intrinsic being of a thing. That's finitude. That's where you actually locate the intrinsic structure of limitation of being. I think the temptation for us is to think that finitude is purely accounted for by an exttrinsic cause because God made it and limited it. That would be an extrinsic finitizing power. I agree with that. I think that's not wrong. But then the question is, and is there something about the way a thing is intrinsically that also manifests its finitude? Or is it only finite because God as it were slaps some finitude on from the outside? What I want to propose is that when God made things composed of parts, he built them with an intrinsic finite structure as such. So it's not just an exttrinsic finitizing power. It's an intrinsic finite way of being. Multi multiplicity of parts does this. Francis Turin says the infinity of God follows from his simplicity. Essential and existential finitude in the creature is grounded in its compositess. My existence isn't my essence and my essence isn't my existence and therefore my essence and my existence have to be mutually delimiting principles inside of me and therefore I must be finite and limited in the 19th century. Well, do I want to go to the 19th I'm looking at the clock infinity and the clock. How do you how do you manage those? Um, no. I'm gonna I'm gonna do do one better. I think Petrus Fenmast little book advertisement briefly his theoretical practical theology which is currently in the process of being uh published by reformation heritage books. This is a this is a worthy translation uh that we're getting of uh his work and in his second volume writes this about parts and infinity. He says, 'For to have parts and to be infinite is a most manifest inconsistency. If God had parts and were infinite, that would be impossible. He says, for these parts will be either infinite in their greatness or not infinite, that is finite. Do but do you get the silliness of infinite parts? Because if infinite parts were infinite, then how could they be inferior or less than the holes composed of them? That would be absurd. A mean is not allowed between these contradictory says master. Now if you would say these parts are infinite, you will say that from many infinite things one infinite thing comes together. If you should choose that they are finite, then you will have to say that from many finite things one infinite thing is put together. I'm going to interrupt a for a second. How many bits of finitude does it take to finally graduate to infinitude? It's it's impossible. All you would ever get is a really amazing great big still finite thing. Okay? In other words, you could have a great finite thing, but finitude only begets finitude. Which one of these is more absurd? He says, let them decide. Like if you want to say one infinite from many infinites, I I don't even what kind of mental calculus gets you there. How does that make sense? Or infinite from finite. Um, that also doesn't make sense. Infinite imperfection will conclude with this thought. Historically the meaning of perfection also was uh a somewhat difficult one. I remember reading in Francis Turin years ago and Turin said um God talking about perfection. He said God is perfect, as it were. Kind of troubled me. I'll confess. God is perfect as it were. Um, do I do this? Risking losing context. I'm gonna make a Okay, I'm take a shot at it. Uh, God is not literally perfect. Okay, don't walk out yet. Hold on. Uh, Teran knew this. Um, perfect literally means that which is thoroughly or completely made. Um our word facum fakare to make the fact in perfect actually comes from this word means made that's what perfect means. Um all variations of fickfac are versions of made. Like when we talk about just aification we're talking about being made just the thick is the make. Perfect is made and then the purr means uh made through or made to completion. The reason God can't be perfect is because he isn't fact. So putting the preposition purr on the front of it um still leaves it literally not quite right. God is not completely made because he's not made. He's the maker. So then why do we say that God is perfect? Why do our confessions why are they at ease with this language? Um because perfect al perfect also means uh that which is my my alarm tells me we're out of time. That which is perfect also means um that which is complete in itself and lacking in nothing. And in that customary sense of the term when we say that God is infinite in perfection this is another way of saying this is not the infinity of the Greeks potential openness incompleteness of being what we're actually saying is that he is his own is and that his is is an actual unbounded intensive dynamic state of being. and that this is our God. Few points to conclude with. Um, and I'll ask the so what. I'll ask the so what. I went more professorial on you, but I'll still ask it. Why does any of this matter? Um, I think most importantly, it matters uh in this respect. It's because God is absolutely simple and infinite that you can depend upon him and trust him utterly. And the reason is this because he doesn't depend upon anything else. Yesterday I was late getting out of the airport. Uh they said that um there was a maintenance issue with the plane I was on. Uh and so we were they were going to check the maintenance issue because the plane actually does depend upon its parts. And if the parts are not in working order, then the plane is going to maybe not be in working order. And I don't know if that means the plane goes down in flames or we just don't get hot coffee. I'm not sure what the pro the maintenance problem is. Uh but either way, uh when you trust God, you're not trusting a dependent entity. There's never halfhour delays for repair. You know what I'm after? There's no problem of disintegration with God because there's no integration with God. God doesn't fall apart on you because there are no parts to fall into. I mean, I you could depend on me. I hope you could depend upon me. And I could tell you tomorrow, you know, I'll do such and such for you. And you might say, "James is a dependable guy and you could depend upon me." And it could be that before tomorrow the said separation of soul and body, you know, finally takes place. And uh and then you say, "Well, where's Doulzel? Why didn't he show up and follow through?" And you say, "Well, Doulzel, you didn't you hear? He's gone." And then you think to yourself, "Well, all his sessions were yesterday, so maybe if you're cold and callous, you think that, but you know, he's gone." Um you know that lit literally I could disintegrate the integration of my body we call it death the integration of my body and soul could be no more my parts could come we could negate part and I could come a part God can't become a God can't fall apart on you because there are I don't like to put it this way there are no parts into which he might fall a being not composed of parts can't fall apart. A being not composed of parts who is himself infinite in being and perfection. He's the one. And when I say he's the one, I mean that in the maximal sense. From whom, through whom, and to whom are all things. He's the one you should pray to. He's the one you should worship. He's the one you should trust. And he's the one to whom you can give trust and dependence with absolute non-qualification. non-qualification because he is infinite being imperfection and without parts. Well, let's pray. God, you're good to us. You're kind. You've revealed yourself to us. You've reconciled us to us by your son. Lord, you've given us your word and you are dependable, perfectly because you are the I am that I am infinite and being in perfection. Lord, we bless you and we adore you and we praise you for this. And Lord, we do trust you. Strengthen our trust. Strengthen our faith. We pray in Christ's name. Amen. Okay, we'll take our break now and then be back at 4:00 p.m. for our session before dinner. And when you hear the piano playing, that's the time or the signal to come back into the sanctuary.
