General Revelation

What is General Revelation?

General Revelation is:
"God's self-manifestation through nature, history, and the inner being of the human person." (Erickson, Christian Theology, p. 154).

General Revelation is called "general" for two reasons:

• First, it is general in its availability. General Revelation is available to all people for all times. From first people, Adam and Eve, to us living today in the almost 21^st century, general revelation is available to all of us.
• General Revelations is also "general" in its content. "General" is the opposite of specific. It is not detailed. It is basic, simple knowledge about life that is available to all people throughout time.

Throughout Christian history, different theologians have considered General Revelation in various ways. Martin Luther said, "all men have the general knowledge, namely that God is, that He has created heaven and earth, that He is just, that He punishes the wicked, etc." (Early Theological Works, ed. James Atkinson. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1962, p. 270).

Another reformer, John Calvin, identified two types of knowledge about God: knowledge of God as Creator and knowledge of God as Redeemer. He said that God gives general revelation, the knowledge about God as the Creator for two reasons: 1) that people everywhere might worship Him and 2) that all might be provided with the hope of eternal life.
(Institutes of Christian Religion, 2 volumes. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1949, I.v.10).

One of the few theologians in Christian history who seriously questioned validity of general revelations was Karl Barth. In his deep desire to express the incredible transcendency of God and humanity's complete loss of God without His special grace, Barth concluded that General Revelation was null and void and must be judged sinful. Natural Theology is the belief that people can come to a genuine knowledge of God on the basis of reason alone. Barth felt that those who held that knowledge of God could come through General Revelation were in essence saying that people could come to the Truth without Jesus Christ or the Bible. True knowledge of God, for Barth, meant obedience. Since "general revelation" failed to lead the person to obedience in Christ, this "general revelation" could not indeed be called "revelation" for it lead to no knowledge.

The Scriptures really do attest to General Revelation. As mentioned in the above definition, General Revelation comes through nature, history, and the inner being of a person.

• Psalm 19 (v.1-6 in nature; v. 7-12 revelation through the law)
• Psalms 8, 29, 93, 104
• Job 25:1-3
• Job 38-40
• Romans 1:20-32
• Acts 14:15-17

• Genesis 1:1
• The preservation of the nation of Israel

• Psalm 14:1
• Romans 2:14-15
• Acts 17:23
• Throughout all cultures and all people, there has always been a belief in a Supreme Being.

General Revelation & Its Implications

1. Believers can have a point of contact with unbelievers (for the most part). Without preaching hell, fire, and brimstone, we can point our unsaved friends to creation, history, or their inner senses and come to agreement that there must be a God.
2. We can understand some of God's attributes without reading His Word. However, His special revelation clearly gives us a fuller picture of who He is.
3. God is just in condemning those who do not accept Him (we'll look at Romans 1:18-32 in a minute). All people have some knowledge of Him, and everyone has had a chance in someway to get to know God.
4. General Revelation helps us understand why people are "religious" and why there are so many world religions - because people know there is a God out there.
5. Knowledge and morality, whether in those who believe in God or those who do not, is not something that is arrived at without God. The whole universe speaks of God's order and structure, not only in the physical world, but also the moral realm.
(from Millard Erickson, Christian Theology. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1985, pp. 174-75)

Examination of Romans 1:18-32

I. The Clarity of General Revelation (v. 19-20 & 32)

• what may be known about God is made plain to them because God has made it plain to them.
• "In other words, the God who in himself is invisible and unknowable has made himself both visible and knowable through what he has made. The creation is a visible disclosure of the invisible God, an intelligible disclosure of the otherwise unknown God." (Stott, Romans, p. 73)
• have been clearly seen from what has been made so that they are without excuse
• they know God's righteous decree...
• "know" = "know full well" (cf. 1 Corinthians 12:13 - "now I know fully")
• God implanted knowledge of human morality into the hearts of people (DeMarest 231)
• also Romans 2:14-15 testifies to God's law written on human hearts; God gave each person a conscience!

 II. The Content of General Revelation (v. 20)

• God's invisible attributes: his eternal power & divine nature
• This should have lead them to worship God, but instead...

III. The Catastrophe of General Revelation (v. 18-32)

• who suppress the truth...
• neither glorified him as God, nor gave thanks
• thinking became futile, hearts were darkened
• became fools
• God gave them over...

The question then is "Can General Revelation Save?" Romans 1:18-32 says Absolutely Not! They are without excuse.

Stott (74) "For what Paul says here is that through general revelation people can know God's power, deity, and glory (not his saving grace through Christ), and that this knowledge is enough not to save them but rather to condemn them, because they do not live up to it."

The view of the early church was almost unanimously that General Revelation does not lead to saving knowledge. If you read through the writings of the various early church fathers, you will find that the strong majority of them believed that general revelation showed God's power and glory, but did not lead to a saving knowledge.

Conclusion: Read Romans 10:14-15

Bibliography
Millard J. Erickson. Christian Theology. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1985.
John Stott. Romans. Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 1994.

This page was last updated September 8, 2000.
© Copyright 1999-2000 Prairie Bible Institute & Steven C. Ibbotson
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