Making Sense of the Moody Blues of God
by Andy Perry

Not long ago I began studying the Bible taking just a chapter a day, reading it through slowly, writing down questions and thoughts as I go. One of the questions I’m always asking the text as I read is this: ‘What does it tell me about the character of God—about Who He is?’ Since a solid grasp of His character is needed for us to make sense of our world and our place in it, ‘Who is He?’ proves to be the most important Bible study question one can ever ask.

Recently, when I came to Genesis 6 in my study, part of me wished I had not been asking that question, for what I found in verse six disturbed and confused me. It reads, “And the LORD was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and it grieved Him to His heart.” Such a statement would likely not disturb or confuse a reader who believes in a whimsical god like those worshipped by the Greeks and Romans. But I believe in a sovereign and unchanging God Who is the same yesterday, today and forever (Heb. 13:8). How do we make sense of statements such as Genesis 6:6—or, for that matter, other texts which ascribe to God fluctuating emotions like Psalm 78:40 where He is grieved, Deuteronomy 1:37 where He is angry, I Kings 3:10 where He is pleased, Zephaniah 3:17 where He is joyful and Judges 2:18 where He is moved to pity? What do we do with the scene in Exodus 32:10-11 where God became so angry against Israel’s sin that He threatened to kill them all and make null and void His eternal covenant with Abraham? How does that picture of God square with statements like James 1:17 which says that with God “...there is no variation or shadow due to change?” Or, consider the foundation of the Lord’s unchanging mercy revealed in Lamentations 3:22: “It is because of the Lord’s mercies that we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not.” One reads these texts side by side and wants to shout with exasperation, “Would the true God please stand up!”

So, how do we make sense of them in a way that reveals the true God of the Bible? Throughout church history there have been several attempts to sort the matter out. The most recent and shocking attempt has been led by those who espouse what’s called ‘Open Theism.’ Open Theists believe that the future is ‘open’ in the sense that since (so they say) the choices of people are completely self-determined and free, no one can know the future - not even God. Part and parcel of Open Theism is the constant potential for all beings to be impacted by the free choices of others. Therefore, God, like us, is at the mercy of the choices of others and can be deeply affected emotionally by human choices which result in His alternating joy, rage, confusion, frustration, pain, etc. Though that does explain the texts which describe God’s strong emotional responses to human choices, it also leaves us with a god stripped of omniscience and omnipotence—reduced to a temperamental superhero status hardly worth worshipping and one in whom little trust could wholeheartedly be placed.

The primary, orthodox response to the seemingly divergent evidence about God’s emotions found in Scripture has been rightly understanding and affirming the doctrine of His impassibility. Article Two of the Westminster Confession of Faith states that God is “...without body, parts or passions, immutable.” But how can they say that God is without passions when we’ve already observed that the Bible reveals Him at various points as angry, joyful, etc.? The same way we can say that God is without a body even though Exodus 15:17 speaks of His hands, I Kings 5:3 speaks of His feet and 2 Chronicles 16:9 speaks of His eyes. According to John 4:24 God is spirit—He does not have a literal body. Yet, the only way we who are bound by physical reality can understand God is by picturing Him through our physical context. This is a mechanism called ‘accommodation’ whereby God accommodates communicating Himself to us in a form we can grasp and with which we can relate. If this is done frequently in physical terms, why could it also not be done in emotive terms?

But this is unsatisfactory to those who consider God’s true emotions much more central to His reality and glory than a true physical form. Think about it. Few of us find personal comfort from knowing that God literally has hands or feet. But if we thought God was not truly angry when the Israelites made the golden calf or that the image of God passionately coming to our rescue in Psalm 18 was nothing more than a metaphor, our trust and love for Him might very well diminish. Does the doctrine of God’s impassability turn Him into an emotive iceberg?

A recent article by theologian Phillip Johnson has helped me sort through this issue to satisfaction. On the one hand Johnson reminds us that we must not think of God or any description of Him in largely human terms. As Romans 11:33 affirms, “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and how inscrutable His ways!” For instance, God’s love is utterly unlike our human love, for the quality of ours is constantly changing (see I Cor. 13:4-7) but God’s love never does. God’s anger is the overflow of perfect holiness, but ours flows from a constant admixture of pride and righteousness. We must let the Bible, not human experience, shape our understanding of God’s affections.