This is as clear as it gets in describing how I approach a doctrine of creation; of course, it comes as a description of Karl Barth’s own understanding of creation within God’s economy of things. In case you weren’t aware Dutch Reformed theologian G.C. Berkouwer wrote a summary and critique (book length) of Barth’s theology, years ago, before Barth’s Church Dogmatics had been translated into English. I take this description of Barth’s doctrine of creation from Berkouwer’s description.

When Barth speaks of creation he does not have in mind an act of God which can in and by itself be a subject of theological reflection. The reason for this is that in his view creation is indissolubly related to the covenant of grace in Jesus Christ. It is not possible to speak of a natural theology with an independent cosmological interest in “God as Creator.” The witness of the Scriptures is differently oriented. It does not witness to an abstract highest being as prima causa of all things, but it witnesses to the Lord of history, the God of Israel. In the history of creation we are concerned with the history of salvation. It is not possible to say anything that is meaningful about creation outside of Jesus Christ. Only in Him can we understand creation. And when Barth says “only in Him” he does not mean the creation of all things through the second Person of the trinity, but through Jesus of Nazareth. In creation we are exclusively concerned with the relationship of creation to Jesus Christ. By Him and with a view to Him and to His grace the world was created so that it is never possible to regard or understand creation “as such.” The biblical message concerning creation does not present us with cosmological or ontological truths of which everyone who is not wholly blind can take note (through the  natural light of reason), but it witnesses to an act of God’s grace. It is not possible first to come to a knowledge of creation in itself, and then advance to a knowledge of redemption in Christ. Creation can be seen only in Jesus Christ and in connection with the incarnation of the Word.

Creation, it is true, is the external ground of the covenant but, conversely, the covenant between creation and covenant, between creation and Jesus of Nazareth, draws attention. In order to understand Barth properly here, it must be remembered that he is not concerned simply about a noetic problem (namely that knowledge of creation is possible only in terms of the revelation in Christ), but also about an ontic problem which touches the whole being of creation. This world has been created “through the child that was born at Bethlehem, through the man who died on the cross at Golgotha and rose again the third day. He is the creating Word through which all things became. From Him creation derives its meaning.”

Barth has called this conception “a remarkable turn-about in the whole of our thinking.” But such thinking is necessary. It alone can prevent us from abstracting creation from the gracious and reconciling work of God and from seeing the history of creation as a “pre-history” which has meaning in itself. When creation is seen as meaningful in itself it is forgotten that God’s action in creation is related to Jesus of Nazareth. All that happens in creation happens in Jesus Christ “who is the primordial image, the model or system, underlying and giving direction to all things.”[1]

I affirm all of the above. Maybe this helps clarify further why I am so averse to working from a natural theology approach, as so much of “classical” theology does.

[1] G.C. Berkouwer, The Triumph Of Grace In The Theology Of Karl Barth (Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1956), 54-5.