Positively, the tradition has taught me what I can and cannot say about God.  We can know God because he has revealed himself to the world in Christ and Scripture.  We apprehend God according to this revelation, we do not comprehend God.  BIG difference.  I cannot ever suppose to fully grasp the nature of God, I can only describe him according to how he has revealed himself.  My thoughts and words are completely inadequate to describe him.  An axiom by which my theology works is found in Augustine’s On The Trinity book 7.7, “God can be thought aboout more truly than he can be talked about, and he is more truly than he can be thought about.” 

This means I do not try to come up with the new “bestest” way of describing God and his relationship to the world.  My thoughts and words are inadequate.  I seek to take up a defensive position.  I hope to understand what the Scriptures positively teach, assert these truths, and then defend against all the “stuff” that is flying out there.  To put it another way, theology is a grammar.  We seek to find ways to talk about God to mirror how he has revealed himself, and more importantly, make sure we do not talk about him inappropriately.  Creeds such as Nicaea sought to separate the orthodox from the Arian.  They wanted to make sure there was clarity on the Son being fully God.  Chalcedon sought to provide a grammar to talk about how Chirst is fully God and fully man.  And the examples could just continue. 

I have not answered Bruce’s question, which would be hard to do completely on a blog since books are written on these things.  But, he asked and here is a starting list.  First, the tradition lets me see how to use language when describing God.  Second, the tradition provides boundaries as to what I should say about God and what one cannot say about God.  Third, studying those before me provides excellent test cases for how to use common, contemporary habits of speech to express eternal truths.  An example of this is Augustine admitting the Eastern theologians may use a word (hypostasis) to express person that works in their common usage, but the term carries over negative implications in the Western usage.  This is important because many are seeking to “postmodernize the faith” which means expressing it with different terms and really with a different understanding of the cosmos.  I love this one-on-one time with Bruce, but I do miss our other elders. 

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