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The goodness of God means that "God is the final standard of good, and all that God is and does is worthy of approval." [ 12 ] Many theologians consider the goodness of God as an overarching attribute - Louis Berkhof , for example, sees it as including kindness , love , grace , mercy and longsuffering . [ 13 ]
A theodicy is an attempt "to reconcile the power and goodness attributed to God with the presence of evil in the human experience." [42] The Bible attributes both "power" and "goodness" to God. [43] The free-will theodicy, first developed by Augustine, defends God by placing all the blame for evil on "the misuse of free will by human beings."
According to Thomas Aquinas, God is the "Highest Good". [1] The Summa Theologiae (question 6, article 3) affirms that "God alone is good essentially". [2]Because in Jesus there are two natures, the human and the divine one, Aquinas states that in him there are two distinct wills: the human will and the divine will.
Conversely with agency, in other instances the Bible emphasises reliance on God and examples of Jesus serving or healing those who lacked the ability to help themselves, implying that self-reliance and reliance on God are complementary (See Mark 6:34; Mark 1:30–31; and Mark 10:46–52.)
In the Psalms, examples of God's grace include teaching the Law (Psalm 119:29) [18] and answering prayers (Psalm 27:7). [19] [14] Another example of God's grace appears in Psalm 85, a prayer for restoration, forgiveness, and the grace and mercy of God to bring about new life following the Exile.
This is somewhat illustrated in the Book of Exodus when Pharaoh is described as being raised up that God's name be known in all the earth (Exodus 9:16). This is mirrored in Romans 9, where Paul appeals to God's sovereignty as sufficient explanation, with God's goodness experientially known to the Christian. [46]: 178–79
The relationship between these two classes is such that the incommunicable attributes qualify all the communicable attributes, thus, God is infinite, eternal and unchangeable in his being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness and truth, following the classic definition of God in the Westminster Shorter Catechism. [75]
God's immutability defines all God's other attributes: God is immutably wise, merciful, good, and gracious: Primarily, God is almighty/omnipotent (all powerful), omnipresent (present everywhere), and omniscient (knows everything); eternally and immutably so. Infiniteness and immutability in God are mutually supportive and imply each other.