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God's Lesser Glory: The Diminished God of Open Theism

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This is a thought provoking book, although I was not always satisfied with Ware's answer and arguments presented. Ware did a fine job in explaining what Open Theism is and why people are attracted to it. His critique of Open Theism was quite detailed and it shows that he knows his opponents well and is familiar with the materials.

However, there are a few major shortcomings in his arguments:

i) Ware's position would have a hard time dealing with the "Problem of Evil" due to its God-will-always-succeed approach. Ware admitted this in the book. He said he would deal with it in his forthcoming book but I doubt a satisfactory answer would be given. Let's wait and see.

ii) Ware has to have faith in God's benevolence given his position and the problem of evil, while Boyd has to have faith in God's power to be in control even if he does not completely foreknow the future. I do not see any obvious advantage in adopting Ware's position.

iii) Ware did not really address the problem of interpreting some passages in the Bible which portray a God who is vulnerable, say, for example, the book of Hosiah. Boyd's position would be simpler and more consistent than Ware's in explaining this. To me, a vulnerable and suffering God, who is not only loving but is also Love, is a more accurate portrayal than a sovereign king who controls everything.

iv) Ware did not really solve the problem on prayer. Does prayer make any difference after all? How could God truly "respond" to my prayer if the future is already, so to speak, fixed? Again, I could not see any obvious advantage in adopting his position.

I have to say some of Ware's arguments were well put and the overall presentation was clear. I enjoy reading the book. I was nearly convinced by him at some points (e.g. when he talked about Abraham's offer of Issac and God's knowledge about Abraham's thinking and intention). But when I come to think about the overall picture as presented in the Bible, I still tend to agree with Open Theism.

I am glad that Ware pointed out some of the weaknesses in the Open Theist position, which made me reflect upon them seriously. The book serves two purposes:

a) to reconfirm the belief of those agree with Classical Theism (with some good arguments); and

b) to push Open Theists to think about their own position and try hard to rebut through sound exegesis.

Personally, I think Ware's work is the best defense of Classical Theism against Open Theism so far. It is certainly better than Geisler's "Creating God in the Image of Man", which did not present Open Theism's position fairly.

I am now anxiously awaiting Boyd's reply. It will be an interesting debate.

Ware is excellent in his presentation of Classical Theism. The problem I run into is his lack of hermeneutical theory. He says that you cannot always interpret Scripture in a straightforward manner. On this point, he is correct. But then he turns around and wants the reader to believe the classical view, which is based upon the reading of Scripture in a straightforward manner. The problem with these types of classical theistic works is that they tell us that open theism is using metaphor incorrectly. Metaphors don't really tell us a whole lot about God, but then classical theists don't tell us what these passages are supposed to mean. They simply dismiss open texts as metaphorical deviance and never tell us how open texts fit in to the classical model. In other words, they ignore open texts. My other major problem with Ware's book comes on page 145 when he tells us that we should not use the life of Christ as the foundation for telling us what God is like. If we use Christ's life as a road-map to understand God, then "we conceive of God wrongly as being subject to experiencing those aspects of human weakness and limitations which Jesus underwent for the purpose of his mission." It seems to me that the more you try to make razor-thin distinctions between Jesus and God, the more you drift into polytheism. In other words, what characteristics or features would make Jesus God if you deny some of the aspects of humanity? In my opinion there are serious trinitarian issues in Ware's approach. Here is the question that Ware raises in my mind, does our concept of God come from the Old Testament or the New? Ware thinks Old Testament. This is shown by his concentrated look at God from the OT. Is the OT authoritative and overrides the NT in our conception of God? I don't think so. You cannot take the OT out of context when looking at the NT. If our conception of God comes from both the OT and the NT, then the life and humanity of Jesus should included in our look at the conception of God. What it comes down to is that classical theists are trying to tell us that their idea of God has more scripture than the openness position. Big deal. The contextual integrity of the Scriptures does not give classical theists the right to ignore open texts. All of scripture tells us about God not just classical scriptures.

Ware quibbles with Pinnock, Boyd, Sanderson, and Hasker throughout. Ware's world is the classical view of God, with exception of his introduction of "relational mutability" of God. Essentially he says that God has exhaustive foreknowledge with a new twist. Even though God acted, created, and planned instantly one time trillions of years ago (the Super Big Bang), that when time rolls around to events in our lives, God steps into it takes special notice and gets in the fray emotionally. This makes no sense. It would appear that a God that has exhaustive foreknowledge could have no future. He couldn't plan. There are no such concepts as "plan", "look ahead", "tomorrow", or "the future" or a "now" to such a God. It seems to be his effort to try to soften the stoic, impassible God of Calvin and Augustine. Ware offers us the same classical portrayal of God as microscopically controlling the world and through direct or indirect cause bringing about every act in the human drama. This would include all rape, murder, wars, holocaust, or whatever. He concludes the last few pages by going back to the example Sanders used of the death of Sanders brother. Ware tells us the only way to view events like this is that God "took him." The answer to his death is, as Ware writes, "Yes, the God of all wisdom, goodness, and power has ordained to take these lives." It was all brought about by God personally for reasons we cannot know. This is tantamount to saying God loaded the boxcars personally of those going into Hitler's ovens, or placing select individuals in the WTC when the buildings collapsed. Or, that he takes every sparrow by divine decree. He advises us as we have been advised for centuries by "classical" theologians that all evil, even gratuitous evil, is designed and brought about by God. This thinking is in the same vein of R.C. Sproul, who points out, "not even one molecule" of the universe is moved without God specifically controlling it. All human thought, since it must precede human acts and our behavior, is controlled, motivated, and directed by God, for His "greater" purposes.

His explanations of verses used by open theists, starting with Abraham's example, are through the eye of the beholder. He introduces "relational mutability" which he brings into the Abraham story in Genesis 22. Ware says "he (God) does interact with his people in the experiences of their lives as they unfold in time." God seems to get into the movie he made trillions of years ago since it is now being shown in theaters. "God literally sees and experiences in this moment what he has known from all eternity." He argues against himself somewhat in this area as he feels open theists do in their choices of emphasis of scripture. He points out that these verses as a whole should be taken as anthropomorphic statements, but he stops and chooses God's statement of "for now I know that you fear God", as teaching us "in the experience of this action, I (God) am witnessing Abraham demonstrate dramatically and afresh that he fears me, and I find this both pleasing and acceptable in my sight." He takes what he says is anthropomorphic language describing what goes on and pulls a whole new thought allegedly of God from the exchange of God and Abraham. All of the many other verses he covers to debunk open theology could just as easily be emphasized as open theists do. I didn't come away from any of his explanations saying--"Now I know."

He ends by stating that what gets everyone's ire up (open theists) is that they can't give up the idea there is no "free will" in the universe. He views them and their model as "diminishing" God and how human vanity or pride is swelled. God can't be diminished. One's view or take or image which has been created within their belief system of thought, can be diminished.

It always amazes me that individuals (Ware is one of them) that feel that libertarian free will believers bring God "down" by believing in a world where human beings can choose, make choices, contrary to the will of God. He says in his opinion that is the main problem of "open" theists.

Free will or freedom to choose is the greatest responsibility any human being has on earth. We must make choices. I believe that it doesn't reduce God, bring him down to our level, or elevate us up to his level by his granting us free will or free choice before him. It does just the exact opposite. It makes God a far more powerful God, unthreatened by us - one willing to, for His higher purpose, allow His creation to spurn him, reject him, curse him, and vilify him. God lets his creatures say no to him. Hell is, as C.S. Lewis stated, "locked from the inside." That is a free choice, unconstrained by God, or anyone else. Phillip Yancey made a great comment in his most recent book--Prayer. He wrote that--"History is the story of God giving away power." George Eldon Ladd wrote in his Theology of the New Testament that "evil is the price God paid for human freedom."

I still embrace after reading it concepts of the "open" model, particularly human beings having free will to choose what we do in life and all its decisions, and that God is not microscopically ruling our world. God does have a future. He can plan. He has things which he can look forward to. He is not brain dead. He interacts with us in our time zone. Prayers do move him.

Sometimes the Openness debate generates more heat than light, but Ware's book is a delightful exception.

The volume is shot through with sound exegesis that demonstrates God's exhaustive and definite foreknowledge of the future choices of free agents. Chapter 4 corrects exegetical errors made by Openness Theology, and chapter 5 is Ware's refreshingly careful exegesis of a long list of passages that teach the traditional view.

The book's argument is both penetrating and devastating. Rather than sweep the "partly open future" motif into the "dustbin of anthropomorphism," Ware shows that if an exegete takes the "open future" passages at "face value," as the Openness theologians think we should, then God would be ignorant of the present as well as the past, and He would need reminding of things. A "face value" hermeneutic proves too much for the Open Theists (reductio ad absurdum). The book also gives a helpful definition of the all too often undefined category of "anthropomorphism" on page 86.

Unlike some theologians who have taken up their pens against this contemporary error, Ware rightly and judiciously discriminates between Open Theism and Arminianism. The former is outside the camp of evangelicalism, not the latter. This book never targets Arminianism; instead, it aims directly at the diminished god of Open Theism and proves that he is not the God of the Bible.

Finally, throughout the entire work, the author's tone is urgent but kind, firm but loving, and polemical but pastoral.

I heartily recommend this book to everyone who wants to know what the Bible says about God's knowledge of the future.

I recently had to give a guest lecture on Open Theism for a theology course, and thought it would be wise to read some books about Open Theism before I did, to make sure all my information was accurate. I discovered one thing in my research: both the books for and against Open Theism are poor books. The books by Open Theists I find filled with poor arguments, but so are the books against Open Theism. I have yet to find a good book against Open Theism, and I doubt a good book supporting Open Theism can really be written. Why is this a poor book? For many reasons. First, Ware is simply not a good writer. I do not doubt that he is a good professor, but writer, no. Second, as someone who leans more toward Arminianism than Calvinism, I find many of Ware's arguments just as poor as those by Open Theists. In many places, Ware seems to be saying that Open Theism cannot be true because Calvinism is. While Calvinism seems to be slightly less Biblically inaccurate than Open Theism, even if I believed in Calvinism I would still not find Ware's argument against Open Theism especially convincing when he goes into defend-Calvinism mode. When you are writing a book against a certain position, supporting your own positions is something that you should do AFTER showing that theirs is inadequate, for then they will be looking for something else to turn to. If you go up to a non-Christian who is perfectly happy being a non-Christian, it is likely that you will not be able to convert them if you simply support your own position and never give them a reason to doubt their own. I am not saying that Ware does not give any good arguments against Open Theism, but rather that he should have spent more time arguing against Open Theism and less time arguing for Calvinism. If I wanted a book supporting Calvinism I could have found far better books than this.

That said, Ware does provide some good information about Open Theists, and he points out many sources that one can look into if you are interested in reading Open Theist literature (and he makes sure to take their statements out of context somewhat frequently as well).

In all, it's not a great book, but there aren't really many better ones out there (to the best of my knowledge), so I guess it's as good a place to start as any.

Overall grade: C

I had a nice, long, maybe even scholarly review of this book ready to go but then I thought, "You know, there's been toomuch angry ink spilled over this subject already." So I ditched all my really juicy points and am just going to give you the short version:

On the whole, this book is an unwelcome addition to the open theism debate. Even if Ware's arguments are correct (a big if, in my opinion), his unending sarcasm and invective pretty much guarantee that no open theist is ever going to be able to listen to him. If you want to learn about open theism, this book is definitely not the place to start. Ware just doesn't seem able to sustain the fair-mindedness he manages to show in his early chapters. He draws too many unwarranted conclusions and produces too many distortions of the open thiesm position. Instead, I would suggest the Intervarsity Press book "Divine Foreknowledge: Four Views", and the many works referenced therein. (This is available from Amazon, by the way.)

I will give Ware credit for one thing: he does show that the open theists have not produced iron-clad arguments in defence of their position. He shows that they have their work cut out for them, particularly in regard to prophecy. (He thinks his arguments along these lines pretty much put an end to open theism, but I think that is far overstating the case.) If you are somewhat familiar with open theism and are maybe thinking of taking the open theism plunge, you should definitely look before you leap and familiarize yourself with some of the arguments Ware makes. But I really don't think this book is the place of choice to do it. Again, I would start with "Divine Foreknowledge" and move on to the works referenced there.

If you want a very good overview of the more traditional approaches to the foreknowledge question, I can't think of a better book than Linda Zagzebski's "The Dilemma of Freedom and Foreknowledge" (ISBN 0195065581 -- don't know if Amazon carries it or not), but be prepared to digest some real philosophical red meat!

In recent years the movement known as open theism has claimed to be a more biblical and more practical alternative to the traditional view. In this book, Bruce Ware carefully and systematically refutes both those claims, showing that the traditional view better handles the biblical evidence and the issues of Christian living, while better preserving the glory of God. His examination of the biblical material is especially strong.

MILLARD J. ERICKSON Distinguished Professor of Theology

George W. Truett Theological Seminary, Baylor University

Open theism, which denies that God can foreknow free human choices, dishonors God, distorts Scripture, damages faith, and would, if left unchecked, destroy churches and lives. Its errors are not peripheral but central. Therefore, I thank God for Bruce Ware's loving, informed, penetrating, devastating critique of this profoundly injurious teaching. I pray that God would use this book to sharpen the discernment of leaders and prepare the people of God to recognize toxic teaching when they taste it. O how precious is the truth of God's all-knowing, all-wise, all-powerful care over our fragile lives. For your name's sake, O Lord, and for the good of the suffering church who rest in your all-knowing providence, prosper the message of this beautiful book and shorten the ruinous life of open theism."

JOHN PIPER Senior Pastor, Bethlehem Baptist Church

Open theism offers a God who, like us, does not know the future. Its sponsors see this humanizing of God as logical and devotional gain. Bruce Ware sees it as a way of misreading Scripture and impoverishing the life of faith, and he makes a compelling case for this view. I heartily commend this thorough and insightful book.

J. I. PACKER Professor of Theology, Regent College

Bruce Ware offers a compelling scriptural defense of an informed classical theism-that God's knowledge of the future is exhaustive, his providential governance is complete, and his eternal purposes will triumph-while fully preserving our authentic humanness. This book exalts the God who is truly God in undiminished greatness for the confidence, hope, and victory of his people.

BRUCE DEMAREST Professor of Theology and Spiritual Formation, Denver Seminary

While I (basically a traditional Arminian) do not agree with all of Ware's answers, I applaud his keen discernment of the questions and issues raised by openness theology. He clearly sets forth the key differences between this view and traditional views of God, both Arminian and Calvinist; and he perceptively identifies its major weaknesses. I benefited especially from Ware's treatment of the biblical teaching on God's foreknowledge.

JACK COTTRELL Professor of Theology, Cincinnati Bible Seminary

Evangelical theology faces a crisis of unprecedented magnitude. The denial and refutation of God's perfections will lead evangelical theology into disintegration and doctrinal catastrophe. The very identity and reality of the God of the Bible is at stake. The real question comes down to this-does God really know all things, past, present, and future? Or, is God often surprised like the rest of us? The Bible reveals that God is all-knowing and all-powerful. Bruce Ware sets out the issues carefully in God's Lesser Glory. This book is a much needed antidote to contemporary confusion, and it is a powerful testimony to the truth of God set forth in the Scripture. I can only hope that Christians will read it and rejoice in the knowledge of the true and living God.

R. ALBERT MOHLER, JR. President, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary

Not even God knows whether you will decide to buy this book or read it, at least according to "open theism." But Bruce Ware shows that this position, which is seeping into evangelical churches, is contrary to Scripture, internally contradictory, and destructive to our Christian lives. This is a clear, fair, well-reasoned, and Bible-centered critique of a doctrinal error so far-reaching that it ultimately portrays a different God than the God of the Bible.

WAYNE GRUDEM Chairman, Department of Biblical and Systematic Theology Trinity Evangelical Divinity School

Bruce Ware's book is not the last word on this crucially important subject. Rather, it is the first book-length serious response to open theism-a movement that is beginning to inflict serious damage on confessing evangelicalism. Presenting itself as a legitimate variant within evangelicalism, "open" theism in reality so redefines the God of the Bible and of theology that we wind up with a quite different God. Ware's book demonstrates that this is so, and launches a courteous but firm attack against this incursion.

D. A. CARSON Research Professor of New Testament, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School

God's Lesser Glory is a carefully reasoned and well-argued critique of open theism. Employing both philosophical rigor and outstanding biblical exegesis, Ware convincingly shows why the great minds in church history have with near unanimity affirmed that the God of classical theism is the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Jesus of Nazareth. Every pastor, philosopher of religion, and theologian should have this book in his or her library.

FRANCIS J. BECKWITH Associate Professor of Philosophy, Culture, and Law Trinity International University, California Campus

At once businesslike and practical, Bruce Ware's restatement of classical Christianity in the face of contemporary challenges to it within evangelicalism is bold and bracing. Driven by the pastoral and practical importance of God's greatness, Ware's approach keeps his defense from bogging down in pedantic rhetoric. This book clearly demonstrates that the historic Christian view, against centuries of antecedents to "open theism," has been favored for so long for one reason: It is so evidently biblical.

MICHAEL HORTON Associate Professor of Historical Theology Westminster Theological Seminary in California

In their controversy with classical Christian theism, open theists have tried to seize the evangelical high ground by claiming that their view of God is truer to the Scriptures. God's Lesser Glory rebuts this claim. Bruce Ware goes to the heart of the hermeneutical issue, cogently arguing the biblical case for classical theism and showing why open theists should themselves be uneasy with some of their biblical interpreations.

MARK R. TALBOT Associate Professor of Philosophy, Wheaton College Vice Chairman, Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals

One of the many challenges facing the Church and the Gospel today is the concept of open theism; the concept that while God is all wise, and all loving, He does not know the future in any detailed sense. While God does know all the possibilities, He doesn't know which possibility will become real. His love is all encompassing, but He has self-limited His power to allow absolute libertarian freedom for humans. Bruce Ware writes God's Lesser Glory to counter this view of God.

Mr. Ware begins his book by explaining why his readers should be concerned about the rise of open theism within the Church. He provides a short overview of what open theism proposes, centering on the philosophical foundations of open theism's belief system. He then considers two results of open theism; the result on the nature of God, and the result on living the Christian life. Several specific cases are used to illustrate the inroads open theism has made into the Church at large, including the adoption of a resolution by the Baptist General Council allowing open theism to be within the bounds of Evangelical thought, and the decision by several Christian publishers to publish books supporting open theism within their portfolios. Once beyond the introductory material, Mr. Ware divides the book into three central parts. The first part examines the foundations and beliefs of open theism, the second provides a critique of these foundations, and the third examines the practical issues believers encounter when accepting the open theism view of God.

The first section begins by explaining the origin of open theism as an alternative to the classical Arminian view of the nature of God. Mr. Ware sets up the problem presented by open theism; how can God know the future, if the course of the future is dependent on the choices of morally free agents? He defines the concept of libertarian freedom as contra-causal freedom, or the ability of a morally free agent to decide between two choices freely. The result of working through this problem is the dichotomy: "Comprehensive foreknowledge and libertarian freedom are mutually exclusive notions. You cannot have both together." He then states that if you step out of this dichotomy by stating that knowing doesn't imply controlling, you've simply stepped into another dilemma. If God doesn't control history, then how can God be said to providentially guide history to His ends? The open theism solution to this pair of problems is that God simply doesn't have comprehensive foreknowledge.

The author continues by assessing the perceived benefits of open theism, primarily that understanding God in this way allows for a truly personal relationship with God. In the open theism view of relationships, trust must be built in both directions, rather than in one direction only. In order for a true relationship to exist, then, God must learn to trust people, just as His people must learn to trust in God.

Once finished with describing the beliefs of open theism, Mr. Ware turns his writing to undermining the basis of this theology from the Scriptures. He begins with an examination of the problems with the hermeneutic used by the proponents of open theism, using specific passages identified by these proponents to show how this hermeneutic cannot be applied uniformly. God shows knowledge of the future even using the reading they propose. He then spends a chapter discussing various Scripture passages that show God does have exhaustive foreknowledge, including middle knowledge, or the knowledge of things that might have been, but were not. Mr. Ware then discusses the concept of risk in open theism, and how this idea undermines the wisdom of God.

The final section focuses on the impact open theism, and the beliefs held in this theology, have on the everyday life of Christians. Mr. Ware argues that there is no comfort in following a God who grieve with us, and who does not know the future perfectly, even if that God faces the future with more knowledge and wisdom than we can muster as humans. He shows that unless God can truly control circumstances, then He cannot truly answer prayer, and He cannot truly fulfill the promises of working all things to the best for the individual believer. He shows how open theism weakens our confidence in God's ability to guide us; God may make mistakes on our behalf because of his imperfect view of the future. Mr. Ware returns to the theme of suffering and evil in the world to drive his points in this area home.

Mr. Ware's analysis of the Akedah, the Binding of Isaac, in Genesis 22 is an example of the excellent reasoning that marks portions of this book. The problem revolves around the words of God in Genesis 22:12, where God states He "now knows," that Abraham loves Him. The implication is that Abraham didn't, before the Akedah, know that Abraham loved Him, so God couldn't have had knowledge of the future. The problem for open theism in this passage is three-fold. The first is that if God truly knows all current things exhaustively, then how could He not know whether or not Abraham loved him? The second is that if God doesn't know the future, then how could this one test prove that Abraham will always be faithful to God's calling? Wouldn't future tests be needed as well--in fact, wouldn't moment by moment testing be required for God to know this for certain? Finally, how could Abraham go into the test knowing God would restore his son to life if he really did go through with the sacrifice, as described in Hebrews 11? None of this makes sense in the view of open theology.

Mr. Ware outflanks the openness belief system in this case by arguing God can change His relationship to humans without changing His nature. He uses the example of a mother taking her daughter to the dentist for the first time. She knows what is about to happen, and in a sense experiences the pain and fear with her daughter. But this doesn't decrease the mother's knowledge of the future, or ability to control the situation. The author's argument against the mutable nature of words our modern culture, and the deep concern with self-esteem, are well argued and powerful in the face of open theism theology.

There are a number of points, however, where Mr. Ware's arguments fall flat. The underlying theme is that if God doesn't control the actions of individual humans, then He cannot control history; a God that cannot control the course of history is a "lesser god." This is, however, a false dichotomy; there are two responses the author does not consider.

The first possible response is that the statement itself has an implied everything built in. That in order for God to control the course of history, He must control everything, down to the last detail of the lives of every human being. This is a clear leap in logic that needs much more support to be accepted.

The second possible response is to note that only in God do the will to act, the knowledge to act, and the ability to act exist in equally balanced proportions. In other words, only in God does the will to act automatically translate into action. It is perfectly reasonable to propose that while God controls history through controlling human action and maintaining control over some part of human will, God does not need to control every corner of human will to achieve His ends, because human will does not (and in fact cannot) always translate into action. The author ends up placing God's will in a position of pre-eminence over His knowledge and love, resulting in the same unbalanced view of God he decries among the open theist.

In spite of these flaws, however, this is a well-argued book, and well worth the time required to read and digest. Mr. Ware's refutation of open theism is well grounded, and total.

Recently I read all the way through Gregory Boyd's "God of the Possible" and Bruce Ware's "God's Lesser Glory" which are now the two most important arguments for opposing viewpoints in this debate within contemporary evangelism over the nature and extend of God's sovereignty and knowledge.

Boyd's "God of the Possible" is actually quite a bit better than Pinnock's "The Openness of God." Boyd uses more Scripture and resorts to less caricatures and purple prose. I must admit that it is well-written and superficially compelling and persuasive (although containing many internal contradictions and hideous examples of bad hermeneutics that the discerning reader will immediately detect). Since I am a Southern Baptist in Texas, the superficial appeal of Boyd is somewhat disturbing, since an increased amount of money and students are going to Baylor's Truett Seminary where Roger Olsen endorses Boyd's book and says that he is open to open theism . The average Southern Baptist college/seminary student/pastor is very Arminian and very vulnerable to Boyd's arguments.

Ware's "God's Lesser Glory" is a devastating response to Boyd's book. Ware has obviously read all the openness literature, but he focuses his attention on Boyd's "God of the Possible" and John Sander's "The God who Risks." It is amazing that Ware was able to respond to Boyd's book which was published earlier this year and get a response published in November that does not read like a hastily-written rush job. Indeed, I was extremely impressed by the book. Ware's beautiful prose style is worthy of emulation. He thoroughly refutes the open theist interpretation of Scripture and exposes all of the internal contradictions of this system. He finishes the book by lamenting the harmful implications of open theism for our understanding of prayer, guidance, and suffering. Although Ware is strongly motivated by practical and pastoral concerns, he effectively employs satire and sarcasm that is often quite funny (I was laughing out loud at page 80, footnote 15). Ware briefly mentions middle knowledge primarily in terms of the openness response to it, but his own development of the the doctrine of divine providence is Reformed, and he does not appear to incorporate middle knowledge (at least in this book). Of course, the purpose of this book for Ware was largely negative rather than positive. He is trying to refute open theism rather than develop his own view of providence, so his discussions of providence are not that elaborate, and his future work may describe how he uses middle knowledge categories in his understanding of God's eternal decree.

Notice that Ware teaches at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. As a Southern Baptist, it is great to see that the leading defenses of orthodoxy are being written at (some of) our seminaries.

I would recommend that everybody buy Boyd's and Ware's books. Read Boyd first, then Ware.

This is really only Round One between Boyd and Ware. Both of them promise to write more comprehensive books on divine providence in the future (although only Ware's God knows exactly when or if these books will be published).

I think Ware has done a fine job of defending classical theism's belief in a God who has exhaustive knowledge of all things both possible and actual in the past, present, AND future. Open-theism has been attacking this vital doctrine of God's omniscience and Bruce Ware kindly, yet firmly, puts his exegetical skill to work in defense of exhaustive divine foreknowledge.

The strength of this book is it's expository method. Ware doesn't build straw men to tear down. He seriously and honestly interacts with the writings of Open-theists like Greg Boyd, Clark Pinnock, and John Sanders, answering their arguments from texts which apparently support openness theology and also presenting the full gammit of Biblical passages which most open-theists fail to mention, such as Isaiah 41:21-29, 42:8-9, 43:8-13, 44:6-8, 44:24-28, 45:20-23, 46:8-11, 48:3-8, and 48:14-16. Just a brief perusal of those texts should reveal the many holes in open-theism. Questions of God's immutability and "repentance" are also handled with care and answered well, in my opinion.

Reading this book helped me understand what attracts some people to open-theism - namely, the idea that suffering happens outside of God's knowledge and will. Some people seem to derive comfort from the idea that God is as surprised by the calamity which befalls us as we are. Personally, I find this concept totally unbiblical and without much comfort to offer. Open-theism's god is like a crippled king with a good heart, not an all-wise and all-powerful Sovereign who must be trusted by us. He is like a handicapped friend who empathizes with us, but cannot really help us. Open-theism puts God in a wheel-chair. I have experienced trials (as have we all) when I didn't fully understand why God had allowed it or what He was doing at the time. I suppose there are some questions that won't be answered this side of heaven. But I find much more comfort in believing that "behind a frowning Providence, He hides a smiling face," than I would if I believed that God didn't know what was going on any sooner than I did.

It boils down to this. Either the Bible teaches that God actually has all knowledge of all things - past, present, and future - including the free choices of men, angels, and demons and all the sin and suffering which results from those choices - and has a purpose in permitting it all to happen as He does; OR, the Bible teaches that God is less than this: a kind-hearted but straight-jacketed despot who feels our pain but won't interfere because He exalts free-will above His own wisdom. I'm convinced that the Bible teaches the former, not the latter. Ware gives a good defense. If you are wrestling with the issue, I highly recommend this book.