Natural Revelation

What can we learn about God through natural theology? Do we also need special revelation to guide us?

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Answer

I would want to be very careful about what we can learn about God through the label or through the category of natural theology. I would want to hang my hat upon a statement like Romans 1:20 that does talk about his majesty, his power. I think those are things you can hang your hat on in terms of what you can learn. But I would want to say immediately that we are in desperate need of special revelation to have the proper perspective. If one were to try to deduce who God is and what God is like simply through the observation of the created realm, you could easily make a case that God is the Devil, depending upon where you are and what you have experienced. Now, I'm not saying that God is the Devil, please understand that. I'm saying it could be deduced. Therefore, you are in need of special revelation to check human reasoning — autonomous, or I should say independent human reasoning — because the created realm yields some things that can also be read and understood problematically. Special revelation, the reality of the Lord Jesus Christ, fills in accurately who God is. Consultation with his word just to keep our reasoning in line, desperately need, otherwise you can legitimate all kinds of evil in the name of God based upon who has power, who can impose power, who has the means to violate others in particularly problematic ways, and yet wave the banner that this is God's design: look how we're being blessed in or endeavors, look how we're being blessed in what we're doing. I could make site examples. I sometimes use my classes' initial interpretations of people, of Adolf Hitler, for example, in Nazi Germany; westward expansion in the United States. Just to be honest I would say that there's always need for special revelation to come and check how events are unfolding and whether they truly are of God or not. Yes, yes, yes, preacher brother, we need special revelation because to build understanding of God based upon observation will go into all kinds of direction. So, that's a major concern of mine.