Back when I was a Van Til fanboy (as distinct from a mere Van Tilian, which I still am: but most theology is really just a substitute for listening to heavy metal or reading comic books, with all the attendent identity politics among the high-school and college-aged–and all the attendant weirdness among theologians who like having fanboys), I really loved the “full-bucket paradox” which Van Til insisted upon. God is all glorious and yet is glorified by creation, and indeed does all things to be glorified even though already all-glorious. The full-bucket paradox means that the bucket is full and yet is always being added to.

Later, I heard Gerstner refute this “paradox” but I simply discounted him, partly because I saw some flaws in him in other areas (which I latched onto as reasons to discredit him) but mostly because I was a Van Til fanboy. Also, it was a throwaway comment that might have been dealt with more thoroughly.

In any case, it now seems clear that Van Til is equivocating on what it means to “glory” in something or to “be glorified.” Compare this to the word “justified,” in Luke 7.29: “When all the people heard this, and the tax collectors too, they justified God, having been baptized with the baptism of John.” Now compare the used of justified here with its use in soteriology where God justifies sinners and so constitutes them as righteous when they were not righteous before. Obviously, that is no what happened here in the case of what the people did for God. Know, they aknowledged that God had revealed his own righteousness. (I’m not denying that there are parallels in Romans, by the way, which does call attention to God’s reputation being in doubt and being vindicated.)

Likewise, God “glorifies” himself and does things “to His glory” by revealing his glory in creation and sharing it with His people. This is basic creational Trinitarian monotheism 101, which says that God made the world and us, not to get, but to freely and generously give:

God hath all life, glory, goodness, blessedness, in and of himself; and is alone in and unto himself all-sufficient, not standing in need of any creatures which he hath made, nor deriving any glory from them, but only manifesting his own glory in, by, unto, and upon them.

This is the whole point of Christianity over against paganism as Paul preached it on Mars Hill:

The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served[root: therapeuo: heal, help] by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.

What does the “full-bucket paradox” really give us but an eternally thirsty God who, no matter how full he is supposed to be, is never quenched and always wanting more? Paul does tell the Corinthians to “do all to the glory of God.” But that obviously means in context 1) to acknowledge with thankfulness that the glory of eating and drinking and all other blessings is from Jesus and no one else and 2) to enjoy these blessings in a way that reflects God’s own generous and even self-denying character. Look at how the command is used in chapter 10:

Let no one seek his own good, but the good of his neighbor. Eat whatever is sold in the meat market without raising any question on the ground of conscience. For “the earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof.” If one of the unbelievers invites you to dinner and you are disposed to go, eat whatever is set before you without raising any question on the ground of conscience. But if someone says to you, “This has been offered in sacrifice,” then do not eat it, for the sake of the one who informed you, and for the sake of conscience— I do not mean your conscience, but his. For why should my liberty be determined by someone else’s conscience? If I partake with thankfulness, why am I denounced because of that for which I give thanks? So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. Give no offense to Jews or to Greeks or to the church of God, just as I try to please everyone in everything I do, not seeking my own advantage, but that of many, that they may be saved. Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.

So there is what it means to reflect God’s glory in imitation of him. It means to not seek personal advantage but to seek the advantage of other people just like God does.

Is that what any of us have been raised to understand about doing things to God’s glory.

Hopefully I’ll have time to get into more details about well-meant teachings that I don’t think are leading us in the right direction, but for now I’ll just mention that I am troubled by attempts to define (reduce?) the righteousness of God as his commitment to his own glory. We meet in the world all kinds of monsters who do horrible things for their glory. Is God like them? No, of course not. Well then, trying to explain all righteousness as an commitment to one’s glory doesn’t explain anything at all. It is exactly backwards, God’s glory must be explained by his righteous character which is revealed and specified for us. Trying to define righteousness as a commitment to God’s glory leads nowhere.

I fear that by insisting on a God who is in search of glory, we are, instead of preaching Christian theism as an alternative to paganism, making God into simply a “Supreme” kind of pagan deity. This is not an unprecedented confusion in the Church. When Jesus was dealing with the way he was to come into his Kingdom, his disciples could not understand how the cross could be an appropriate part of the plan. When Jesus hung on the cross, the proof for which he was mockingly asked was that he come down from there by an exercise of power and so reveal the glory that these mockers assumed was truly godlike.

The Gospel tells us that the cross reveals the true God, the sort of God we are supposed to imitate by trying to please everyone in everything we do, not seeking our own advantage, but that of many.