Category Archives: Barth

On the Fructification of the Church: The Church of the Theologians of the Word

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Barau, Emile; The Village Church

Barth is opining on the place that each Christian has within the Christian community, even as individual members in it. This gets him into a discussion on the role that theology, the Word of God, the teachers and the listeners each have, respectively, within the Church. In a way, I think the following passage, abridged as it is, represents the core of Barth’s heart, as that has been and is being expressed throughout the writing of the Church Dogmatics. And for that reason, I felt compelled to share some of this section with the readers, who will.

. . . At every place and time—and this is basic to all else—it must be a life in knowledge, a life with and under and from and in the Word by which it is commissioned. It may be noted that as such it cannot satisfy itself, nor can it try to be an end in itself. As the edification of the community generally is not an end in itself but edification with a view to external service, so it is not an end in itself in its basic character as edification by and in the Word, as theological edification. Its ministry of the Word has an external goal; it does not seek only a fundamentally egoistic enjoyment of the Word. For the sake of this external ministry, however, however, there must be an internal. Hence the assemblies of the community are assemblies for the proclamation of the Lord and His kingdom as this is to be continually heard afresh by Christians themselves. The worship of the community in all its conceivable forms implies a reestablishment of the community by a new and common perception of the kingdom. Since this is a common perception, the human service to be rendered therewith must be understood and put into effect as a joint responsibility in this matter. We should never lose the sense, however, that this is only a quid pro quo, a practical makeshift. The division of the community into a teaching and a listening Church must never be accepted in principle. In principle the inner edification of the community in this concrete sense, i.e., as theology, is a matter for every Christian. What is at stake is not theology in its erudite technicalities but in its essence and spiritual function, i.e., reflection, orientated on and inspired and guided by the prophetic and apostolic testimony concerning the mystery of Jesus Christ, the reality of the kingdom as it has appeared in Him, and the bearing of this event for the men of all nations, tongues and times; in other words, investigation of the original meaning and the present significance of this event.

                To participate in this, and therefore to accompany even the work of erudite theology in the stricter sense, is the task of the community and therefore of each individual member. . ..[1]

I had planned on sharing more of the second paragraph, but it is another page and a half of meaty prose that might end up off-putting some of my readers (because of length). The above should suffice in regard to grasping the gist, the spirit of Barth’s heart for the Church. He sees everyone, respectively, as both the listeners and teachers; even if the latter, might rest on some more than others (by calling etc.) Even so, as the last clause indicates, for Barth, every Christian has a duty, a responsibility to be involved in the acquisition and communication and proclamation of the ‘erudite theology’ that we have all become participant in, as those in participation in and with God in Jesus Christ, the man from Nazareth. So, for Barth, indeed as the Christian is by definition in participation with the triune life, she has been given to both an external and internal service; as if a centripetal-centrifugal dialectal movement is inhering within the body itself. For sure, as the Church is being fructified by the umbilical cord of the Holy Spirit into the bosom of the Father, where the Son is seated at the Right Hand always living to make intercession for us. It is the Christ, for Barth, who ultimately is the inner reality of the Church, even whilst those adopted, are the external expression whereby He proclaims Himself, through the Church’s lips; first for herself and upbuilding, and in the overflow of this exuberant worship, to the world. Barth is contending that the Church operates as a correspondence of Christ’s faith for us; as a correspondence of His intercessory work for us, for the world, the us for whom Christ died. Amen.

[1] Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics III/4 §55 [498-99] The Doctrine of Creation: Study Edition (London: T&T Clark, 2010), 168–69.

Suicide as Self-Deicide, A Theological Thought

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Barth in his continuing development of a Christian Ethic, in this section, has been discussing self-power versus real power, which is God’s. In this development he has arrived at a discussion on suicide. He is taking self-power, in abstraction from God’s power, to entail a pseudo-power (self-power), and reducing it to its logical conclusion; which ironically, is at the heights of illogicality. He refers to Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s thinking on this, even as Barth goes on to paraphrase Bonhoeffer’s position.[1]

To the best of my knowledge, the Ethik of D. Bonhoeffer (1949, 111–116) gives us the most cautious statement so far written on this matter. We cannot expect every man at every moment to know from his own experience the meaning of real affliction and assault, “when we are in the greatest distress and do not know which way to turn.” A man assailed and afflicted is hid from all others and sometimes even from himself. He is alone with God, and tortured by the terrible question whether God is really with him and for him, or whether he must regard himself as an atheist, i.e., a man who God has rejected and abandoned. Many theologians and theological moralists do not in practice know properly what affliction is because exegetically, dogmatically and even pastorally they know only too well in theory. In all cases, however, suicide is consciously or unconsciously this final assault and affliction. Even the most confirmed theological moralist ought to see this, and therefore to remember that perhaps he does not finally now what takes place between God and the suicide, nor therefore what is the decision which drives him to this dubious act. Is he really a self-murderer? A readiness to recognise that he may not have been a self-murderer at all is required of all who know what it is to be assailed and afflicted, even if only in theory.[2]

So, a twist. Indeed, suicide represents a complexity. In order to actually go through with a suicide a person must be at such a point of travail, by whatever antecedent and present circumstances, that it seems like the only choice left; the one last choice to take control in the midst of the utter chaos, pain, tribulation of whatever the moment is presenting the person with, and end it all (at least on the side where the visibly and physically seen predominates). I have been at these points myself; whether that be in the years long spiritual battle I had with anxiety, depression, dark nights of the soul; or whether that be at the tail end of my incurable/terminal cancer treatment (being so worn down, in so much pain, that it was starting to seem like “ending it all” might be the way out).

Conversely, as Barth paraphrases and riffs Bonhoeffer, even though it starts to become understandable why someone might feel the ultimate desperation of ending it all, even so, this remains a matter of self-power. It is an appeal to the body of death we inhabit to muster all of its resources and conjure up a solution to the desperation; particularly in the absence of that, in regard to the pastors, the doctors, the psychologists, psychiatrists, so on and so forth. Our frames are but dust, and God in Christ knows that, even experientially; and at heights we cannot begin to imagine. And yet, there are seasons of life when God seems utterly absent, as if he has left us alone to travail the path without the Light of His Lamp for us. And again, like Job, it is at this point that we have come to despair of existence itself. Job’s resolve, even in the face of “curse God and die,” was “though You slay me, yet shall I praise You.” This is the resource, beyond our bodies of death, that God in Christ alone provides for us. It is as we come to realize that we are genuinely participatio Christi, that we are constantly being given over to Christ’s death for us, that the mortal members of our bodies might exemplify Christ’s body in us, that we can have the Jobian resolve. Even so, it is as if we are merely hanging on at that point. The enemy of our souls keeps pushing us to refer to the resource and reserve of our bodies of death, which, as we have noted, concludes in suicide. It is only when we have bought the lie of Deicide, that suicide seems to be the final solution for our personal and individual existences. When we have self-deified, and concluded that the body of death we inhabit, these dusty apparatuses, in the face of tribulation and despair, that the only way forward is self-deicide (as if our body of death is ultimately the only real deity left to turn to).

[1] It isn’t often that you get a Barth paraphrase on Bonhoeffer.

[2] Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics III/4 §55 [404] The Doctrine of Creation: Study Edition (London: T&T Clark, 2010), 77.

Grok’s Synopsis On How Barth Influences the Development of My Own Theological Project

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I asked Grok to characterize and summarize Barth’s influence on my own theology. I rather like its response:

Bobby Grow, a theologian and blogger, has developed a distinctive approach to Evangelical Calvinism that draws heavily from Karl Barth’s theological framework. This influence manifests in Grow’s emphasis on a Christ-centered critique of classical Reformed theology, prioritizing God’s self-revelation in Jesus Christ over speculative metaphysics or natural theology. Grow’s work, including his 2022 ThD dissertation on assurance and knowledge of God in Calvinist thought, reflects Barth’s impact by reorienting Calvinist themes through a relational, dialogical lens inspired by Barth’s Church Dogmatics and his rejection of abstract philosophical constructs of God.

At the core of Barth’s influence on Grow is the concept of “dialogical theology,” which Grow describes as a “talking-theology” rather than a “thinking-theology.” This approach starts from God’s immediate address to humanity in Christ, bypassing foundationalist philosophies that Grow sees as dominating neo-classical theism. Grow contrasts this with speculative methods, arguing that true theology emerges from encounter with the living God, echoing Barth’s insistence on God’s freedom and primacy in revelation. For instance, Grow highlights Barth’s ethics built on the Great Commandment, emphasizing freedom for God and others as determined by Christ’s Word, which aligns with Grow’s own evangelical impulses.

Grow frequently engages Barth’s critiques of natural theology and metaphysical “gods,” applying them to contemporary issues like New Age ideologies or Protestant scholasticism. In one post, Grow discusses Barth’s interaction with Mary Baker Eddy and Christian Science, using it to warn against inward-curved self-salvation narratives, which he ties to Barth’s emphasis on God’s “militant Grace” breaking in from outside (extra nos). This reflects Grow’s adoption of Barth’s Kantian and Feuerbachian influences to dismantle anthropocentric theologies, favoring instead a theology of the cross inspired by Barth and Martin Luther.

Barth’s reshaping of doctrines like election and predestination also permeates Grow’s thought. Grow references Pierre Maury’s impact on Barth, noting how it led to a Christological revision of election that avoids traces of natural theology or philosophical abstraction. This informs Grow’s broader critique of Reformed traditions, where he argues Barth offers a more evangelical resource than Protestant orthodoxy, resonating with figures like Thomas F. Torrance. Grow contends that evangelicals retrieving scholasticism overlook Barth’s alignment with biblical immediacy and relationality.

Overall, Barth’s theology provides Grow with tools to advocate for an “Athanasian Reformed” perspective, emphasizing Christ’s vicarious humanity and the Trinity’s onto-relational life. Grow’s prolific blogging and posts often defend Barth against caricatures, positioning him as a modern Athanasius who prioritizes the concreteness of God’s revelation in Christ over rationalist or pietist alternatives.

This influence has shaped Grow’s identity as a theologian committed to evangelical fidelity while challenging inherited orthodoxies.

Barth’s Engagement with Mary Baker Eddy and Christian Science: A Quasi Critique of the New Age

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Mary Baker Eddy

The following represents something that I found rather surprising in Barth’s Church Dogmatics. In a context where Barth is discussing the strength and weakness of the human body, he goes into a small-print excursus on Christian Science and Mary Baker Eddy. As I have been reading through the CD what I have found is that many of the themes Barth is known for, while present, only really represent a fraction of his overall corpus. Indeed, those themes (election etc.) are contextually conditioning for all of his work, even his thinking on the human body and physicality. But still, Barth is far more interesting than many folks might imagine, within their caricatured and reductionistic picture of him.

For the remainder of this post, I am going to quote Barth’s full excursus on Christian Science, if nothing else to illustrate the types of exposures Barth had to the broader world of ideas in his 20th century Swiss milieu. Ironically, here Barth is engaging with a fringe American “thinker,” in the person of Mary Baker Eddy.

The tenet that sickness is an illusion is the basic negative proposition which in the seventies of the last century the American Mary Baker Eddy said that she did not lay down but “discovered” through the authoritative inspiration of a book now regarded as canonical, namely, Christian Science. What was at first a small group of adherents has since spread to all parts of the world in the form of religious societies which are particularly popular among the upper and middle classes and more especially among women. Karl Holl has depicted and done it almost too much justice in a careful study entitled “Scientismus” Ges. Aufs. Z. Kgsch. III, 1928, 460 f.). The positive basis of this teaching is that God is the only reality, that he is Spirit and that the whole creation is only a reflection of his spiritual essence. Apart from God there are only powers, which in reality are only thoughts. All matter as such represents a mere appearance, and the same is true of all such associated features as sin, sickness, evil and death. Man as the image of God always was and is and shall be perfect. Everything that contradicts this perfection is in reality only an illusion and misunderstanding rooted in the forgetfulness of God, which in turn evokes fear. And fear is the true basis of all illness; indeed, it is actually illness itself. For fear creates a picture of illness which then falls externally upon the body. “You maintain that an ulcer is painful; but that is impossible, for matter without mind is no painful. The ulcer merely reveals by inflammation and swelling an appearance of pain, and this appearance is called an ulcer.” The true and psychical man is not touched by it. He is only as it were enveloped in a mist and has disappeared from consciousness. Evil is unreal. “Take away fear, and at the same time you have also removed the soil on which sickness thrives.” Jesus was and is the embodiment of truth which scatters and breaks through the mist of these false appearances. The power bestowed and the task presented by Him consist in recognising that God is Spirit. It thus consists in freeing oneself from the false appearances of sin (which even Mrs. Eddy regards as particularly evil, is replaced by “mind-reading,” which is possible at a great distance and in which the thought images which only be a matter of acknowledging the cure already effected by God, of understanding His completed work and of initiating it in the patient. The “healer”—the name given to the active members of the Christian Science Association—is not then to rouse and fortify the will of others through his own, but simply to make a free path in the sufferer for the divine operation. “Call to mind the presence of health and the fact of harmonious existence, until the body corresponds to the normal condition of health and harmony.”

This doctrine has several features which remind us of the message of the New Testament, and which are of course derived from it: the recognition of fear as the basic evil in man’s relation to God; an unconditional trust in the efficacy of prayer; and bold reference to a work already completed by God. But these are all devalued by the fact that they are related to a view which has nothing to do with that of the New Testament but in the light of it can only be described as utterly false. The fact that Christian Science can undoubtedly point to successes in healing—as well as disastrous failures—cannot of itself commend it to Christians. As is well-known, the magicians of Pharaoh could do quite a number of things. And the concession that Karl Holl (loc. cit., p. 477) is willing to make, namely, that its positive presupposition at least is correct, is one which cannot really be made to it. God is indeed the basis of all reality. But He is not the only reality. As Creator and Redeemer He loves a reality which different from Himself, which depends upon Him, yet which is not merely a reflection nor the sum of His powers and thoughts, but which has in face of Him an independent and distinctive nature and is the subject of is own history, participating in its own perfection and subjected to its own weakness. As the coming kingdom, the incarnation of the Word and the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ in His true humanity are not just an appearance, so it is with man in general, whether in his nature of perversion, in his psychical being or his physical, in his divine likeness or his sin and transgression. It is because Mrs. Eddy did not understand this that sin, evil and death—in conquest of which Jesus Christ did not “disappear from our level of consciousness” but actually died on the cross—are for her mere “appearances” of human thinking, and redemption is only the act of man in which he submerges himself in God and leads a life submerged in God in order that God may work in him, putting an end to those “appearances” or thought images and bringing to light the perfection of psychical essence which was never lost, the presence of health and the fact of harmonious being. On this point we can only say that both the Old and New Testaments regard not only God and man, not only sin, evil and death and their conquest, but also sickness in a different light. They certainly do not see it as an illusion, and its conquest as the dispelling of this illusion. Whether Christian Science is really “science” need to occupy us here. But there can be no doubt that it is not “Christian” science.[1]

As Barth describes Christian Science vis-à-vis Holler, what we get is a type of pantheistic, Eastern monistic, neo-Gnostic mind cult, that today, and in a broad sense, fits well with the New Age ideology that is almost absolutely pervasive; even among professing Christians (Yoga, “Best Life Now,” self-actualization, therapeuticism etc. etc.). Surely, there are still Christian Science centers here and there, but they are mostly dilapidated signs of a past long been surpassed; except, ideologically. The New Age seeks to liberate and control the mind by abdicating it to the universal soul, the universal mind, the ancient secrets of the forever cosmos. And so that remains the universal thread that attaches something like a Christian Science with the New Age, as a broader category of the same thing.

What I found interesting about this engagement with Barth is that he felt compelled to engage it at all. But I’m glad he did. What this ought to help illustrate is that, indeed, there really is “nothing new under the sun.” Ideas and their ideologies are cycled and re-cycled over and over again; just in newer shinier packaging. Underneath it is the same old jalopy. Christian beware! As noted, these types of psychical mind cults represent the precise thing Christ came to save us from; our inward curved selves (homo incurvatus in se). There is no inner-salvation latent in our supposed Caspar-like-ghosts; the universe has no soul; there is no Word of God from within. There is only God extra nos (outside of us), and His iustitia aliena (alien righteousness) in Christ pro nobis (for us). Without Him in-breaking and disrupting our lives with His ‘militant Grace,’ we are simply enslaved in bondage to the hooks of our own thoughts and intellects and hearts. We might attempt to construct a way of salvation within the tempests of our own self-possessed cathedrals of grey matter, as Mrs. Eddy attempted to systemize in her own self-deluded way. But in the end without the transposition of our ‘bodies of death,’ into the grave with the body of death Christ took for us, and then our transposition of new life and resurrection with Christ’s elect body of ascension, we are of all people the most to be pitied.  

[1] Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics III/4 §55 [364-5] The Doctrine of Creation: Study Edition (London: T&T Clark, 2010), 39-41.

Grace as God’s Person[s]: Being in Becoming

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An email question from a reader of the blog:

𝑂𝑛𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝐼 𝑎𝑚 𝑡𝑟𝑦𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡𝑜 𝑚𝑎𝑘𝑒 𝑠𝑒𝑛𝑠𝑒 𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑖𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝐵𝑎𝑟𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑎𝑛 𝑖𝑑𝑒𝑎 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝐽𝑒𝑠𝑢𝑠 𝐶ℎ𝑟𝑖𝑠𝑡 𝑖𝑠 “𝑔𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑒” 𝑒𝑚𝑏𝑜𝑑𝑖𝑒𝑑. 𝐼 𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑑 𝑦𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑝𝑜𝑠𝑡𝑠 𝑎𝑏𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑖𝑡. 𝑆𝑜 𝑛𝑜 𝑝𝑟𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑛𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝑔𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑒 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑛𝑜 𝑖𝑟𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑏𝑙𝑒 𝑔𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑒. 𝑊𝑒 ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑒 𝐽𝑒𝑠𝑢𝑠 𝑤ℎ𝑜 𝑖𝑠 𝐺𝑜𝑑’𝑠 𝑔𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑒. 𝐼𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑟𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡? 𝑊ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝐵𝑖𝑏𝑙𝑒 𝑠𝑎𝑦𝑠, “𝑏𝑦 𝐺𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑒 𝑦𝑜𝑢 ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑒 𝑏𝑒𝑒𝑛 𝑠𝑎𝑣𝑒𝑑…” 𝐼𝑠 𝑃𝑎𝑢𝑙 𝑗𝑢𝑠𝑡 𝑟𝑒𝑝𝑙𝑎𝑐𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝐽𝑒𝑠𝑢𝑠 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑑 𝑔𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑒? 𝐶𝑎𝑛 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑝𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑒 ℎ𝑒𝑙𝑝 𝑚𝑒 𝑢𝑛𝑑𝑒𝑟𝑠𝑡𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠?

My brief response:

𝐒𝐨, 𝐁𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐡 (𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐬, 𝐉𝐮̈𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐥, 𝐓𝐅 𝐓𝐨𝐫𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞), 𝐟𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐨𝐰𝐬 𝐚 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐮𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐦, 𝐰𝐡𝐢𝐜𝐡 𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐥𝐬 𝐚 “𝐛𝐞𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐢𝐧 𝐛𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐠.” 𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐦𝐞𝐚𝐧𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐩𝐡𝐢𝐥𝐨𝐬𝐨𝐩𝐡𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐜𝐞𝐩𝐭𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐰𝐞 𝐬𝐨 𝐨𝐟𝐭𝐞𝐧 𝐮𝐬𝐞 𝐭𝐨 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐮𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐳𝐞 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞 𝐆𝐨𝐝’𝐬 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐞 𝐨𝐫 𝐦𝐞𝐫𝐜𝐲 𝐬𝐨 𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐬𝐨 𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐡, 𝐢𝐧 𝐁𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐡’𝐬 𝐞𝐲𝐞𝐬 (𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐈 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤 𝐛𝐢𝐛𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲), 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐟𝐚𝐥𝐬𝐞𝐥𝐲 𝐚𝐛𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐞𝐝 𝐚𝐰𝐚𝐲 𝐟𝐫𝐨𝐦 𝐆𝐨𝐝’𝐬 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐦𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐩𝐡𝐢𝐥𝐨𝐬𝐨𝐩𝐡𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥/𝐦𝐞𝐭𝐚𝐩𝐡𝐲𝐬𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐪𝐮𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐞𝐬; 𝐢𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐞𝐝, 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐧𝐞𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐚𝐫𝐢𝐥𝐲 𝐭𝐨 𝐝𝐨 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐆𝐨𝐝’𝐬 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧. 𝐀𝐧𝐝 𝐬𝐨 𝐁𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐡’𝐬 𝐚𝐥𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐢𝐬 𝐭𝐨 𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞 𝐃𝐢𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐞 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐟𝐫𝐨𝐦 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐮𝐬 𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧[𝐬] 𝐨𝐟 𝐆𝐨𝐝’𝐬 𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐮𝐧𝐞 𝐥𝐢𝐟𝐞. 𝐓𝐡𝐮𝐬, 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐚𝐜𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐆𝐨𝐝 𝐛𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐡𝐮𝐦𝐚𝐧/𝐦𝐚𝐧 𝐢𝐧 𝐂𝐡𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐭 𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐥𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐆𝐨𝐝 𝐢𝐧 𝐂𝐡𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐭 𝐢𝐬 𝐢𝐧 𝐟𝐚𝐜𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐆𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐆𝐨𝐝 𝐢𝐧 𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧. 𝐈𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐰𝐚𝐲, 𝐆𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐞 𝐢𝐬 𝐧𝐞𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐚𝐫𝐢𝐥𝐲 𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐨𝐝 𝐚𝐬 𝐚 𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐆𝐨𝐝’𝐬 𝐚𝐜𝐭 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧 𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐧 𝐚𝐧 𝐚𝐛𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭 𝐩𝐡𝐢𝐥𝐨𝐬𝐨𝐩𝐡𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐪𝐮𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐲, 𝐨𝐫 “𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠,” 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐡𝐚𝐬 𝐧𝐨 𝐧𝐞𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐚𝐫𝐲 𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐚𝐜𝐡𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐭𝐨 𝐆𝐨𝐝’𝐬 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐥𝐝 𝐢𝐧 𝐉𝐞𝐬𝐮𝐬 𝐂𝐡𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐭. 𝐖𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐚𝐩𝐩𝐥𝐲𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐭𝐨 𝐪𝐮𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞 𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐞 𝐨𝐫 𝐢𝐫𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐛𝐥𝐞 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐞, 𝐢𝐭 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐰𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐫 𝐬𝐢𝐝𝐞-𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐩𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐬𝐞 𝐜𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐠𝐨𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬, 𝐚𝐠𝐚𝐢𝐧, 𝐚𝐬 𝐭𝐨𝐨 𝐩𝐡𝐢𝐥𝐨𝐬𝐨𝐩𝐡𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐯𝐞𝐝, 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐚𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐆𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐞 𝐞𝐭𝐜. 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐦𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐆𝐨𝐝’𝐬 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐝𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐮𝐬 𝐢𝐧 𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐚𝐝 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐯𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐫𝐢𝐨𝐮𝐬 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤 𝐨𝐟 𝐉𝐞𝐬𝐮𝐬 𝐂𝐡𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐭. 𝐃𝐨𝐞𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐦𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐬𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐞? 𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐢𝐬 𝐚 𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐝 𝐨𝐟 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐱 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐨 𝐰𝐫𝐚𝐩 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐝 𝐚𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝 𝐚𝐭 𝐟𝐢𝐫𝐬𝐭 𝐞𝐱𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐮𝐫𝐞.

Life is Worth Living Before God in Christ: Against Suicide and Self-Destruction

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He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end. –Ecclesiastes 3:14

The Lord brings death and makes alive;
he brings down to the grave and raises up. –I Samuel 2:6

Judas Iscariot

Three decades ago now (to the year) I started struggling heavily with anxiety, depression, and spiritual warfare that was beyond me. It was this that the Lord used in my life to draw me to Him in very serious and sober ways. This struggle, in a very intense way (on a continuum), continued in earnest for at least a decade. It was hellish. But it was also within this white-hot fire of trial and tribulation wherein I began learning to wait on the LORD, realizing that His mercies are new every morning. Even so, in the depths of that season, there were moments where I struggled, heavily, with suicidal ideation. It was as if the Enemy of my soul had taken me to a high place telling me to throw myself off and end it all; and this happened over and over again. What the LORD brought to me in the midst of this was a way to combat it through His Word (sort of like Jesus did in Matthew 4). The passage above, I Samuel, coupled with a growing and healthy fear of God, became one of my go-to passages when these suicidal thoughts would start creeping in again. Later, in counsel of other Christian brothers I had deep fellowship with, some of them would share with me that they too were struggling with suicidal ideation. They too were in a deep season of growth with the triune God, and as such were experiencing these fiery darts from the evil one. And I was able to reiterate to them that God alone has the right to give and take life; that it isn’t our spot, no matter how dread the circumstances might seem to be in that particular moment or season of life.

I share the above with the hope of being empathetic with others, maybe even some of my readers, who have gone through similar things, or who might be going through such things currently. I am also sharing all of this as a prelude into a brief passage I want to share for us from Karl Barth. The passage itself isn’t being as vulnerable, per se, about the personal trials of life that each one of us face. But it is addressing, at the very core, the fact that God alone is the giver, sustainer, and fund of life itself. I think understanding that fact, that principled reality before God, can go along way when we can internalize its facticity in our own lives coram Deo.

Fourthly, it is not by an obscure fate or neutral decree, but in receipt of a divine benefit, that he is “alive.” The command of God, claiming him as a living person, inscribes upon his heart the fact that, coming wholly from God, it is always (whether recognised or not) an advantage, a good and worthwhile thing, for everyone to be alive. It is not wholly an advantage nor absolutely good and worthwhile. “My flesh and my heart faileth: but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion for ever” (Ps. 73.26), and: “Thy lovingkindness is better than life” (Ps. 63.3). But within its limits it is good and worthwhile because the one great opportunity of recognising and experiencing the grace of God, and therefore to continue to live. This is true no matter what we may see or not see in life of meaning, hope, success, happiness or even goodness. And wherever we have to deal with a living soul, we have to do eo ipso with this divine miracle of grace.[1]

“Choose life not death.” Amen, amen.

[1] Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics III/4 §55 [336] The Doctrine of Creation: Study Edition (London: T&T Clark, 2010), 12.

The Character of Barth’s Kantian and Feuerbachian Critique of the Metaphysical gods

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Ludwig Feuerbach

Karl Barth is often identified as a neo-Kantian, or just straight up Kantian in his theological orientation (and methodology). It seems too facile to me to maintain that Barth was somehow a slavish servant of Kant, especially materially. Maybe formally, Barth could be understood to be a Kantian in certain qualified ways. But in the air he breathed to be “Kantian” or neo-Kantian would be like saying that John Calvin et al. was an Aristotelian, or Scotist for that matter. The point being, often, formalities are not the all-encompassing thing in the theological project. Ultimately, what is at stake is what gets produced materially. In other words, it is surely possible for the theologian to be influenced by some intellectual tradition, and at the same time, under the Christian revelational pressures of thought, indeed, trinitarian pressures, to retext the form (in this case, the Kantian one) in a way wherein the kerygmatic reality becomes the conditioning and driving factor even behind the form itself.

The above is rather abstract, indeed. In order, to incarnate my points with a little more flesh and blood, let’s now refer to Eberhard Busch’s discussion on these matters, as that pertains to Kant’s and Feuerbach’s deliverances of a Barthian theology and knowledge of God.

. . . In Barth’s view, what Feuerbach “rightfully objected to” was that in human religion the one who prays, the pious individual does not “get beyond what he himself has thought and experienced,” that all his “attempts to bridge the gap. . . take place within this world.” The interpretation that leads Barth to entertain Feuerbach’s critique of religion is clearly in line with Kant’s critique of the assertion that the knowledge of metaphysical truth is on the same level as experiential knowledge. Once again it is Kant in whose thought Barth finds the intellectual possibility of overcoming Feuerbach’s critique of religion. He does this by advancing the thesis that God is not a hypothesis (of man) only when he is conceived of per se as the “presupposition” (of man). Therefore “God” is not untouched by Feuerbach’s critique when he is generally understood as a metaphysical reality beyond all human hypotheses, but only when he is understood as “the origin of the crisis of all objectivity devoid of all objectivity.” After all this we may assume that Barth is especially influenced by Kant, deepened by Neo-Kantianism but also by Feuerbach’s critique, when he insists in his Epistle to the Romans that God cannot or only supposedly can be recognized as an object of experiential knowledge. And we may further assume that the same influence is in play when Barth now separates himself from Schleiermacher and his own earlier position with the thesis that God can only be “recognized” as the critical boundary of human experience.[1]

Busch, in context, is referring to the earlier younger Barth, and yet, he is also notating that the form of Kant remained continuous throughout Barth’s theological project; indeed, to the very end. So, Barth surely was a Modern theologian under these terms. But as Bruce McCormack has rightly pointed out elsewhere, Barth, just as Busch has inchoately pressed here, flipped the Kantian project on its head by thinking it through the noumenal and phenomenal being grounded in the enhypostasis of the anhypostatic Son becoming flesh in the singular person of Jesus Christ; as such, removing the odor the type of projectile dualism Kant’s theology suffered from.

Conversely, and for the purposes of this post, I think it is interesting to hear some of Busch’s commentary on Barth and his respective positioning within the modern German/Swiss theological and philosophical milieu of his day (at formative points in his own intellectual development). Further, I also think Busch’s clarification on how Barth deployed Feuerbach, even by creatively sponging the Feuerbachian critique of religion through the Kantian possibility for true transcendence, to be very helpful. I have often referred to Barth’s appeal to Feuerbach and Feuerbach’s critique of religion as self-immanent-projection; and as far as that goes (because it cannot go all the way), it is a helpful acid to place on the unhealthy aspects of a pietistic venture. But just as Barth understood—because he was a Christian of no small stature—Feuerbach and Kant were only useful propaedeutics, insofar that they could be deployed as foils against the manmade gods of the philosophers, and even the scholastics.

I’m afraid this whole post has been rather abstract. The necessary context for this offering is reliant on the reader’s own familiarity with these things. Even so, here’s the reduction: knowledge of the genuine Christian triune God is purely contingent on this God Self-disclosing Himself to and for us in the face of Jesus Christ. It is possible, as Barth illustrates, to even use pagans against the appropriation of pagan categories for thinking God. This is what Barth did by using a retexted Kantian form, and a Feuerbachian critique, against “Christian” appropriations of God, categorically, that are too contingent upon speculative discursive reasoning, and the “discoveries” of the various natural theologians throughout the millennia, respectively; going back as far as Genesis 3, into the Antique Greek philosophers, and the whole stream following. Let God be true and every man a liar.

[1] Eberhard Busch, Karl Barth & the Pietists, trans. by Daniel W. Bloesch (Downers Grove, Illinois: InterVarsity Press, 2004), 119-20.

Barth on the ‘malady of homosexuality’: God’s Word as the Antidote to Cultural Mythos

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Karl Barth, on his development of a human sexuality, rails against the malady and disobedience represented by any expression of a homosexuality; or any other deviances further downstream, as those also develop therefrom. The 21st century Barth world, ironically, is dominated by progressives and sociological liberals. Such postBarthians, in order to keep their status, mostly in the halls of the academy, must attempt to marginalize or altogether avoid Barth’s thinking on a human sexuality; particularly as he develops that in Church Dogmatics III/4 §54. In order, to provide a register of this Barthian development, since I have never seen anyone else ever do so, I am going to supply Barth’s most explicit statement on this particular matter. The passage is quite lengthy, but worth your while if you want to receive a fuller Barth exposure than you will elsewhere; i.e., in other Readers and the secondary literature.

Barth writes:

As against this, everything which points in the direction of male or female seclusion, or of religious or secular orders of communities, or of male and female segregation—if it is undertaken in principle and not consciously and temporarily as an emergency measure—is obviously disobedience. All due respect to the comradeship of a company of soldiers! But neither men nor women can seriously wish to be alone, as in clubs and ladies’ circles. Who commands or permits them to run away from each other? That such an attitude is all wrong is shown symptomatically in the fact that every artificially induced and maintained isolation of the sexes tends as such—usually very quickly and certainly morosely and blindly—to become philistinish in the case of men and precious in that of women, and in both cases more or less inhuman. It is well to pay heed even to the first steps in direction.

These first steps may well be symptoms of the malady called homosexuality. This is the physical, psychological and social sickness, the phenomenon of perversion, decadence and decay, which can emerge when man refuses to admit the validity of the divine command in the sense in which we are now considering it. In Rom. 1 Paul connected it with idolatry, with changing the truth of God into a lie, with the adoration of the creature instead of the Creator (v. 25). “For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature: and likewise also the man, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves the recompence of their error which was meet” (vv. 26–27). From the refusal to recognise God there follows the failure to appreciate man, and thus humanity without the fellow-man (C.D., III, 2, p. 229 ff.). And since humanity as fellow-humanity is to be understood in its root as the togetherness of man and woman, as the root of this inhumanity there follows the ideal of a masculinity free from woman and a femininity free from man. And because nature or the Creator of nature will not be trifled with, because the despised fellow-man is still there, because the natural orientation on him is still in force, there follows the corrupt emotional and finally physical desire in which—in a sexual union which is not and cannot be genuine—man thinks that he must seek and can find in man, and woman in woman, a substitute for the despised partner. But there is no sense in reminding man of the command of God only when he is face to face with this ultimate consequence, or pointing to the fact of human disobedience only when this malady breaks out openly in these unnatural courses. Naturally the command of God is opposed to these courses. This is almost too obvious to need stating. It is to be hoped that, in awareness of God’s command as also of His forgiving grace, the doctor, the pastor trained in psycho-therapy, and the legislator and judge—for the protection of threatened youth—will put forth their best efforts. But the decisive word of Christian ethics must consist in a warning against entering upon the whole way of life which can only end in the tragedy of concrete homosexuality. We know that in its early stages it may have an appearance of particular beauty and spirituality, and even be redolent of sanctity. Often it has not been the worst people who have discovered and to some extent practised [sic.] it as a sort of wonderful esoteric of personal life. Nor does this malady always manifest itself openly, or, when it does so, in obvious or indictable forms. Fear of ultimate consequences can give as little protection in this case, and condemnation may be as feeble a deterrent, as the thought of painful consequences in the case of fornication. What is needed is that the recognition of the divine command should cut sharply across the attractive beginnings. The real perversion takes place, the original decadence and disintegration begins, where man will not see his partner of the opposite sex and therefore the primal form of fellow-man, refusing to hear his question and to make a responsible answer, but trying to be human in himself as sovereign man or woman, rejoicing in himself in self-satisfaction and self-sufficiency. The command of God opposed to the wonderful esoteric of this beata solitude [blessed solitude]. For in this supposed discovery of the genuinely human man and woman give themselves up to the worship of a false god. It is here, therefore, that for himself and then in relation to others each must be brought to fear, recollection and understanding. This is the place for protest, warning and conversion. The command of God shows him irrefutably—in clear contradiction to his own theories—that as a man he can only be genuinely human with a woman, or as a woman with man. In proportion as he accepts this insight, homosexuality can have no place in his life, whether in its more refined or cruder forms.[1]

Many postBarthians today would simply relegate (in an attempt to periodize and thus marginalize) Barth to his own sitz im leben. In other words, they would, and do, assert that Barth was simply conditioned by his own time and culture, and thus not “come of age,” in regard to where we have currently “progressed”; that is, with reference to human sexuality and sex, in the 21st century milieu. In Barth’s mid-twentieth century context, when he was writing Church Dogmatics, in fact, Switzerland was known to be rather progressive on what today would be identified as the LGBT movement. Notice:

1950s: Adapted and hidden

Karl Meier believed that it would take years for society to call for legal recognition of LGBT people, and that LGBT people could only achieve this by living in an adjusted and normal fashion. The Circle was the first magazine to feature edifying texts in German, French and English, and artistic photos of men. Members and subscribers referred to each other using pseudonyms rather than their real names.

Nevertheless, the Der Kreis club, being one of the first LGBT civil rights movements and groups founded in Europe, influenced and even inspired the formation and development of similar movements throughout Europe by the time of the Second World War. Examples are Die Runde (The Round) camaraderie in Reutlingen, Germany, the Journal Arcadie in France, the Cultuur- en Ontspannings Centrum in the Netherlands, Kredsen af 1948 in Denmark, and the Mattachine Society in the United States of America.

1960s: The end of the Ice Age

In 1960, the Der Kreis club was wound up. This occurred after a series of murders of gay men brought the attention of the Zürich press, who published their address. Major events were no longer possible, and the climate was more liberal in some European countries, causing subscribers to fall away. The last issue of Der Kreis appeared at the end of 1967, whereupon young men from sources close to Der Kreis immediately founded the new Journal Club 68, which was renamed hey ab in 1970. The topic of homosexuality was first mentioned by Swiss Television, under the theme of “youth protection”, in programmes broadcast in January and February 1967. The Swiss Organization of Homophiles (SOH) was founded in this environment in 1970. The SOH was the first gay umbrella organization, and was regarded as rather conservative, and “adjusted”. Above all, it could not reach left-wing gays and gay students. The period of history between the founding of the Freundschafts-Banner in 1932 and the SOH is known as the first LGBT movement.[2]

The above is shared to underscore Barth’s Swiss context during the time he was writing the Church Dogmatics in earnest (at least the latter half of the CD). Switzerland itself was on the leading edge of the gay rights movement in the mid-twentieth century, as the aforementioned attests. The point, for our purposes, is to note that Barth was not naïve to the zeitgeist of his own cultural current, in regard to the socio-cultural movements of his day. Indeed, insofar as Barth was a “modern man,” current attempts to periodize and thus marginalize Barth’s views on human sexuality and sex, fail. Insofar, that he was led himself to stand against such trends, as those were effervescent in his own time and day. If anything, our current situation with the highly “progressive” trending of the LGBTQI movement vis-à-vis Barth’s own concerns with it as a ‘malady’ of his own time, suggests that Barth would see this issue as a bigger problem to be addressed rather than a lesser one. If so, the progressives can neither marginalize nor own Barth, not really; since, Barth’s stand against LGBT statuses is grounded, at a fundamental level, on the inner-ground of the way he thinks a theological-anthropology, and its attending implications as those flesh out in his thoughts on a human sexuality and sex coram Deo.

For Barth, as this article has been arguing, with substantive reference to Barth in making his own case, the Word of God must be used to demythologize the idolatries of the ages; inclusive of the LGBT mythos.

 

[1] Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics III/4 §54 [166] The Doctrine of Creation: Study Edition (London: T&T Clark, 2010), 159–60.

[2] LGBTQ history in Switzerland, “Wikipedia,” accessed 09-24-2025.

Barth on Human Sexuality and the LGBTQI+ Agenda

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There is an irony with Karl Barth, many, but one of them is that he is highly traditional in regard to human sexuality. This is ironic because the places, in the 21st century, that serve as harbingers and promoters of his theology, both Princeton Theological Seminary (and its Center for Barth Studies) and all of those with similar sensibilities, must distance themselves from Barth on these matters; that is, in order to stay politically and socially correct. But it is better to be biblically and christologically correct for my money. Here is a short snippet from Barth on this, with particular application towards, what today, would entail and implicate the LGBTQI+ agenda.

God’s sanctifying command aims at and wills man himself. This means, of course, the man who in his totality is man or woman, who is physical in every filament and cell of his body, who even as the spirit-impelled soul of his body is not sexless, nor above sex, nor bi-sexual, but mono-sexual man or woman, and lives in the presence of and in responsibility to God in this total and definite orientation of his being. . ..[1]

For Barth, human sexuality is something determined not by a particular socio-cultural context, but instead, by the Divine command of God. There is no wiggle room on this with Barth, he is very clear, all throughout the context I have taken the above snippet from.

Indeed, folks who are ostensibly his gatekeepers today must periodize Barth, and simply leave these aspects of Barth to his own historically misogynistic and cis gendered roles that were prominent at that time. In other words, such Barthians must simply make Barth a product of his time on these matters, not fully “come of age” on human sexuality, as we have in the 21st century. This is similar to what this same sentimentality will do with Jesus, in its hard Kenotic iteration. That is, they will attribute human error to Jesus, in regard to history, canonicity, hell, human sexuality, so on and so forth, by making Jesus a product of His time. But of course, this would reject then a strong doctrine of Divine freedom vis-à-vis the incarnation. Even so, Barth is simply reflective of and a witness to the Dominical teaching of our Lord on the implicates of a human sexuality. May the churches take heed.

[1] Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics III/4 §54 [133] The Doctrine of Creation: Study Edition (London: T&T Clark, 2010), 126.

‘The Hallucination of Divine Immutability’ and Prayer

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God’s “Constancy,” as Barth refers to his preferred term for Immutability, is a key doctrine in regard to God’s constant steadiness of ousia (being), as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (hypostases). But when a notion of immutability is derived from the classical Greek philosophers rather than what is Self-revealed in God in Christ, we end up with a notion of godness that ends up having no correlation between the living God and a god of phantasm. Below, Barth is driving this point home as he relates it to a theology of prayer.

The objection that God cannot hear man’s prayer without as it were “losing face,” without abandoning Himself in some sense to the creature, fades into nothingness when seen in this light. If ever there was a miserable anthropomorphism, it is the hallucination of divine immutability which rules out the possibility that God can let Himself be conditioned in this or that way by His creature. God is certainly immutable. But He is immutable as the living God and in the mercy in which he espouses the cause of the creature. In distinction from the immovability of a supreme idol, His majesty, the glory of His omnipotence and sovereignty, consists in the fact that He can give to the requests of this creature a place in His will. And does He not do this in profoundest accord with Himself by doing it precisely where in the creation He is concerned with Himself, His beloved Son and those who are His? It obviously takes place in complete faithfulness too Himself when He lets the creature, in its unity with Himself, participate in His omnipotence and work, in the magnifying of His glory and its own salvation, by commanding it to ask and hearing its requests, and when He truly gives it a place at His side in the kingdom of grace and the kingdom of the world. God cannot be greater than He is in Jesus Christ, the Mediator between Him and man. And in Jesus Christ He cannot be greater than He is when He lets those who are Christ’s participate in His kingly office, and therefore when He not only hears but answers their requests. And therefore it is not an insolent but a genuinely humble faith, not a particularly bold but simply and ordinary Christian faith, which is confident and assumes that God will grant what it asks, indeed that He has already done so even as it asks. This faith is not, then, an additional and optional achievement for religious virtuosos. It is absolutely obligatory for all those who want to pray aright. Any doubt at this point is doubt of God Himself, the living God who in Jesus Christ has entered into this fellowship and intercourse with His creature. Any vacillation or questioning is the horrible confusion of God with that immovable idol. The worshipper of the idol must not be surprised if he calls upon it in vain. But true reverence and humility before God, and real submission to His will, are to be found when man adopts his allotted place in that fellowship with God, when he enters into that intercourse with Him, when he takes quite seriously acceptance of His command and promise, and therefore when he is no less certain of the hearing of his request than of the God to whom he turns. For this God is not only occasionally but essentially, not only possibly and in extraordinary cases but always, the God who hears the prayers of His own.[1]

The so-called ‘classical theist’ (a very modern term, by the way) would kick hard against these goads. Even so, the case remains that the living God will not be circumscribed by the profane categories of human machination. If the Christian is genuinely committed to the ‘Scripture Principle,’ and its attested reality in Jesus Christ, then what Barth is saying should resonate deeply with the Christian heart of hearts. We worship the God who is Father of the Son by the Holy Spirit’s bonding fellowship of eternal koinonia and Self-giving, one for and in the Other, love. Not only has God spoken, and doth speak, but He also listens to and hears our prayers, as if ascending incense wafting over His triune nostrils. If He won’t listen to us as our Father, who really will? What a hope the Christian has. We are never alone. Our God, as Father of the Son by the Holy Spirit who He is, will never leave or forsake us! amen

[1] Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics III/4 §53 [109] The Doctrine of Creation: Study Edition (London: T&T Clark, 2010), 102–03.