The Fall was a Good Thing

The Fall was a good thing. Such is the demonstrable conclusion based on two facts that any Christian should accept, viz., 

1. God is sovereign. 

2. It's that wonderful (yet most insensitively quoted) verse in all of scripture, Romans 8:28.

Congregant: The tornado destroyed my home, my car, my begonias, and Aunt Ethyl appears not to be in Kansas anymore.

 

Pastor: Very sorry that happened, but don’t forget: All things work together for good to those who love God…

The Sovereignty of God finds a good expression in the great Protestant confessions, e.g.  

God from all eternity did, by the most wise and holy counsel of his own will, freely and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass yet so as thereby neither is God the author of sin nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures, nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established. (WCF 3.1)

Some (like one out of the five who read this blog) may be surprised to see me quote a capital C Confession, but in truth I love them. I am just appaled when people forget they are fallible. Or when they outrageously extrapolate from them, as in claiming that the confession’s statement that God is without “passions” (which nobody would dispute) implies anything remotely like the modern monstrosity that is taught involving extreme views on Impassibility, Immutability, Impeccability, and Simplicity. Views that render God as a Star-Trek-like impersonal and stoic universal life force, and bestows upon the Holy Spirit, for the gazillion times he inspired writings attributing emotions to God, the title of  “incompetent inspirer of the Word.”

 

But I digress.

 

WCF 3.1 is one of the (in my opinion) minority paragraphs in the confession where the proof texts are actually satisfying. But you can judge for yourself. It tells us of course that nothing happens outside of God’s purview; at a bare minimum he at least permits everything that happens to happen, even if (as is often the case) he doesn’t condone or endorse it. He certainly allows us to sin, but the sin is on us. There is a tension here, a tension not free of mystery. If you take ordain to be a precise synonym of decree, then it becomes difficult to attribute moral culpability. “Ordain” is something slightly weaker and more nuanced than “And God Said…” decrees, something allowing for moral free agency and yet not so weak that there is a possibility that any of God’s plans or promises could be thwarted.

God is not a puppet master, and yet what he ordains happens. It is actually quite awesome.

 

I once heard RC Sproul talk about the four permutations (with repeats) of Good and Bad as it relates to evil. From highly fallible memory:

1. Good-Good
2. Bad-Good
3. Bad-Bad
4. Good-Bad

Good-Good is unavailable to fallen humans. It is untainted good done for a good purpose. It is the domain of God.

 

Bad Good is possible for humans. Humans can do good, but the motives are always tainted by our selfishness and self-aggrandizement.

 

Bad-Bad is what it sounds like. Evil stuff done for evil purposes. This is something that we can do but God can’t, but of course nobody should take any comfort in that.

 

Good-Bad is, somewhat surprising, also in God’s hands. The classic example is that of Joseph and his brothers. But the Fall is also an example. The sin precipitating the Fall was bad, but God used it for good. How else could God use it?

The Fall was good. QED.

 

If the Fall was good, can we conclude it was necessary? Probably. 

 

And if it was necessary, why was it necessary?

 

Nobody can answer that, at least on this side of glory. And if they do, make sure you get them to admit that are engaging in speculation—which is fine as long as it is acknowledged as such.