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Most Moved Mover: A Theology of God's Openness
In 1994, Clark Pinnock along with four other scholars published The Openness of God , which set out a new evangelical vision of God centered on his open, relational, and responsive love for creation.
Since then, dozens of books and articles have been written to discuss the open view of God. It has become a major subject of debate within the Evangelical Theological Society, and Christianity Today has called for ongoing study of the subject by both classical theists and openness theologians. Now Pinnock, in an effort to continue ongoing conversation, returns with Most Moved Mover to defend the open view of God against criticism.
Most Moved Mover , the most passionate and articulate defense of openness theology to date, begins with an analysis of the heated debate sparked by the publication of The Openness of God . Pinnock then clears up misconceptions about openness theology, points out areas of agreement between classical and openness theologians, and lays the groundwork for future discussions.
From an insider's perspective, Pinnock takes readers deep into the openness debate that is shaking the evangelical movement, detailing reactions and replies from thinkers as diverse as Millard Erickson, Greg Boyd, and John Polkinghorne.
Most Moved Mover is sure to inform all evangelicals, regardless of their viewpoint, of the latest developments concerning the open view of God movement. It will be required reading in the academy and for church leaders who want to keep current with the ongoing evangelical debate about God's nature and attributes.
Since then, dozens of books and articles have been written to discuss the open view of God. It has become a major subject of debate within the Evangelical Theological Society, and Christianity Today has called for ongoing study of the subject by both classical theists and openness theologians. Now Pinnock, in an effort to continue ongoing conversation, returns with Most Moved Mover to defend the open view of God against criticism.
Most Moved Mover , the most passionate and articulate defense of openness theology to date, begins with an analysis of the heated debate sparked by the publication of The Openness of God . Pinnock then clears up misconceptions about openness theology, points out areas of agreement between classical and openness theologians, and lays the groundwork for future discussions.
From an insider's perspective, Pinnock takes readers deep into the openness debate that is shaking the evangelical movement, detailing reactions and replies from thinkers as diverse as Millard Erickson, Greg Boyd, and John Polkinghorne.
Most Moved Mover is sure to inform all evangelicals, regardless of their viewpoint, of the latest developments concerning the open view of God movement. It will be required reading in the academy and for church leaders who want to keep current with the ongoing evangelical debate about God's nature and attributes.
218 pages, Paperback
First published March 31, 2001
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140 people want to read
About the author
Clark H. Pinnock
49 books20 followersClark H. Pinnock (d. 2010) was professor emeritus of systematic theology at McMaster Divinity College in Hamilton, Ontario. Widely regarded as one of evangelicalism's most stimulating theologians, he produced several widely discussed books, including The Wideness of God's Mercy and (with four other scholars) The Openness of God.
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
July 11, 2018
Got stuck on the first half of the book but glad I was able to push through to the end. Definitely raises some strong arguments that question conventional theism, which didn't necessarily upset me. I'm curious to learn more about the other viewpoints to better understand why this book struck a nerve with so many people. I, for one, mostly agree with Pinnock's points about the persuasive loving nature of God.
May 5, 2025
Wow. Theologically thick, scripturally robust and emotionally compelling what’s not to love! I was skeptical going into this as I have bounced back and forth from conventional to open theism for a long time now. But even if I do not agree with all of the conclusions and need time to digest, this book gave me an incredibly deeper understanding of God. If you want to take seriously the claim of an open theist read this book. To end, a quote for thought that is provocative- “If you start with exhaustive for knowledge, you go straight to predestination and impassibility, but if you start with God’s suffering, love, you go straight to the view of God as a real person.” Great book.
January 3, 2021
Clark Pinnock is an important evangelical developer of open theology. Most Moved Mover is a collection of lectures in which he summarizes his views and argues for its inclusion within the palette of available evangelical theologies. While Sanders’ The God Who Risks is more comprehensive, Pinnock’s book has several helpful contributions. Generally, Pinnock establishes that an open and relational theology accounts thoughtfully for more of the Bible’s material on God. This includes the Bible’s language - in both testaments - for God dwelling on earth and the extensive language that implies God’s embodiment, even before the incarnation in Christ. I’ve begun thinking of this as God’s incarnational habit. God seems to love being in relationship with humanity so much, and so resonate with God’s image in us, that God becomes embodied, or we embody God at least in part, fairly often. Eastern Orthodox theological anthropology of divinization expresses this in some ways, as does pre-Maimonidic Jewish tradition.
Pinnock also argues movingly of how open and relational theology is a strong framework in which to understand central elements of Christian theology and devotion. The importance of faith - in Jesus’ healing ministry and in our ongoing relationship with God - is better explained when we trust in God’s wisdom and faithfulness in relationship with us and the earth, rather than God’s ironclad control of the present or complete exhaustive knowledge of the future. Dynamic relationship both within the triune God and between God and a creation of free agents also develops a picture of God’s sovereignty that centers the grace, creativity, and love with which God relates to creation. Liberterian human freedom also helps explain our sense or genuine human significance since our choices genuinely matters to us, to our world’s future, and to God.
I find myself frustrated by the limits and flaws of Pinnock writing within the North Atlantic White evangelical tradition and for those readers. Pinnock doesn’t engage other faiths or cultures with depth or curiosity. When groping for examples of evil, he casually mentions Hitler or the Holocaust on several occasions, using this example as a kind of trope. While exploring the theme of divine pathos over and against outdated notions of God’s impassibility, Pinnock footnotes on Korean and one Japanese theologian, writing: “At places in theologies like these, one senses the value of Third World thinking.” In one footnote, Pinnock manages to mislabel Japan’s place in the capitalist, industrialized world; patronize Asian theologians; and damn with faint praise the theological contributions of the global church. Later, in his section on limited or dynamic omniscience, Pinnock relates to African-American theology in the same manner, mentioning an author’s race for the only time in the text, as if Black theologians possess culture and race, in contrast with the culturally normative or neutral White theologians cited through the rest of the text. Pinnock is also writing from and in response to Calvinist-dominant North American evangelicalism, engaging Christianity Today as a central partner in dialogue and pleading for humility, inclusion, and irenic grace in evangelical theological discourse, even while regularly setting boundaries for process theology’s exclusion from said discourse. The specific limits of Pinnock’s background and audience make him perhaps an important voice in a intra-evangelical theological discussion but limit his relevance and insight beyond that racial, religious, and theological subculture.
Pinnock also argues movingly of how open and relational theology is a strong framework in which to understand central elements of Christian theology and devotion. The importance of faith - in Jesus’ healing ministry and in our ongoing relationship with God - is better explained when we trust in God’s wisdom and faithfulness in relationship with us and the earth, rather than God’s ironclad control of the present or complete exhaustive knowledge of the future. Dynamic relationship both within the triune God and between God and a creation of free agents also develops a picture of God’s sovereignty that centers the grace, creativity, and love with which God relates to creation. Liberterian human freedom also helps explain our sense or genuine human significance since our choices genuinely matters to us, to our world’s future, and to God.
I find myself frustrated by the limits and flaws of Pinnock writing within the North Atlantic White evangelical tradition and for those readers. Pinnock doesn’t engage other faiths or cultures with depth or curiosity. When groping for examples of evil, he casually mentions Hitler or the Holocaust on several occasions, using this example as a kind of trope. While exploring the theme of divine pathos over and against outdated notions of God’s impassibility, Pinnock footnotes on Korean and one Japanese theologian, writing: “At places in theologies like these, one senses the value of Third World thinking.” In one footnote, Pinnock manages to mislabel Japan’s place in the capitalist, industrialized world; patronize Asian theologians; and damn with faint praise the theological contributions of the global church. Later, in his section on limited or dynamic omniscience, Pinnock relates to African-American theology in the same manner, mentioning an author’s race for the only time in the text, as if Black theologians possess culture and race, in contrast with the culturally normative or neutral White theologians cited through the rest of the text. Pinnock is also writing from and in response to Calvinist-dominant North American evangelicalism, engaging Christianity Today as a central partner in dialogue and pleading for humility, inclusion, and irenic grace in evangelical theological discourse, even while regularly setting boundaries for process theology’s exclusion from said discourse. The specific limits of Pinnock’s background and audience make him perhaps an important voice in a intra-evangelical theological discussion but limit his relevance and insight beyond that racial, religious, and theological subculture.
April 16, 2020
This book is on the defensive. You feel the author's hurt as he details how the open theism view was met with much criticism. And the author puts his heart out there, explaining how his theology keeps Jesus at the center and how, even if this particular expression of the theology is dismissed, he still hopes will enrich biblical studies. That seems totally fair, does it not? Poor guy. I think it's a good thing for all of us to wrestle with what it means exactly for God to be a dynamic being rather than a flat concept.
I am really eager to read a booklet called "What Does God Know?" By Ravi Zacharias and William and William Lane Craig. I understand it serves as a good rebuttal to certain points of open theism.
I don't personally vibe with everything in this book BUT none of us have it all figured out, and this sure seems like a biblically faithful and in good faith attempt to talk of God's love.
This book is therefore thought-provoking and I recommend it to evangelicals of all subgroups. :-)
I am really eager to read a booklet called "What Does God Know?" By Ravi Zacharias and William and William Lane Craig. I understand it serves as a good rebuttal to certain points of open theism.
I don't personally vibe with everything in this book BUT none of us have it all figured out, and this sure seems like a biblically faithful and in good faith attempt to talk of God's love.
This book is therefore thought-provoking and I recommend it to evangelicals of all subgroups. :-)
February 10, 2018
Filling the Gaps in Aquinas
Pinnock presents a reconsideration of the Aristotelian definition of God as the Unmoved Mover. The original concept is based on the idea of Plato that anything that changes in any way is not perfect.
So for Aristotle, God was only an organizing principle or concept, not an interactive entity. This was the limitation facing Thomas Aquinas in using the popular philosophical approaches of medieval Europe's growing secular academic scholasticism.
He made some great progress, but his followers missed much of the insights peeking through Aquinas' new philosophical formulation. And they failed to deal with the fully interactive and relational portrayal of the God of the Hebrew revelation. Pinnock attempts to fill that gap.
Pinnock presents a reconsideration of the Aristotelian definition of God as the Unmoved Mover. The original concept is based on the idea of Plato that anything that changes in any way is not perfect.
So for Aristotle, God was only an organizing principle or concept, not an interactive entity. This was the limitation facing Thomas Aquinas in using the popular philosophical approaches of medieval Europe's growing secular academic scholasticism.
He made some great progress, but his followers missed much of the insights peeking through Aquinas' new philosophical formulation. And they failed to deal with the fully interactive and relational portrayal of the God of the Hebrew revelation. Pinnock attempts to fill that gap.
September 3, 2010
I have read as much of this book as I am going to. While the idea of God's openness, Pinnock's key theological concept, is certainly one that I accept and applaud, much of the theological context in which the discussion is set is very uncomfortable for me. The author is out of that segment of the evangelical tradition that sees the Bible as the ultimate authority on all questions. God is totally anthropomorphized and, not surprisingly, male. These are just a few of the contextual elements that made reading it uncomfortable for me. After struggling with it off and on for some time, I finally decided to release myself from it.
December 11, 2022
In these four lectures, Clark Pinnock sets out to defend open theism from criticism by his fellow evangelicals. They charge Pinnock and his colleagues with nothing less than heresy in denying the conventional view of God as omnipotent, omniscient, and impassible (that is, unaffected by the suffering of this world). Pinnock's defense, covered in the first lecture, centers on examining biblical statements about God. He makes a convincing case that openness is more in keeping with the picture he assembles of a compassionate God who changes his mind due to prayer.
While Pinnock may be correct as far as this goes, there are other traits of God in the Bible—jealousy, vengeance, and war-making—that he downplays. In addition, the value he places on the biblical witness even leads him to speculate that God possesses corporality in some form. This suggestion reflects Pinnock's uncritical acceptance of scripture as God's direct self-revelation and subordinates the role that tradition, reason, and experience play.
The second lecture aims to demonstrate that the conventional view of God is an unsuccessful synthesis of scripture and ancient Greek philosophy. Once one posits that God is perfect, then Aristotle's ideas of divine perfection were imported into the mainstream Christian view. Aristotle famously conceived of God as the unmoved mover; Pinnock's title is a riff on this. The challenge for the resulting view—with its Thomist stress on omnipotence and its Calvinist stress on absolute foreknowledge, with its corollary, double predestination—is how to accommodate Christ's incarnation and passion.
This description separates these two lectures more precisely than Pinnock does. In the second, he repeats much of what he said in the first. Additionally, he has an annoying tendency to repeat himself several times. This book is the first of his I have read, so I wonder if this is characteristic of his writing or if this is evidence of intellectual decline or insufficient time to prepare.
In the third lecture, Pinnock seeks to distinguish openness from process theology. Evangelicals appear to have already written that project off as heretical. By alleging that open theism is simply a variant of it, they hope to dismiss it as well. As far as I can tell, points of contact between openness and process include the acceptance that God suffers together with his creation and that his perfect knowledge is limited to all that can be known. This includes the future only to the extent of complete understanding of all factors likely to affect that future, but the future is also open, depending on our choices.
The main differences between open theism and process theology seem to be the status of scripture and the universe's necessity or contingency. On both of these points, I'm limited to Pinnock's description of the propositions of process theology since I have yet to read Hartshorne and its other proponents. Concerning scripture, Pinnock appears to accept the general evangelical objection that process originates in philosophical thought rather than the Bible (this is consistent with Pinnock's view of scripture mentioned above). As for necessity or contingency, process theologians, on Pinnock's telling, seem to believe that God's existence necessitates a universe as a counterpart to that existence. In contrast, Pinnock accepts the traditional Aristotelian-Christian view of God as fully sufficient in himself, especially in light of modern trinitarian thought, which emphasizes the relationships within God. Creation, in this understanding, is a free choice on God's part. It is an act that is self-limiting (given the role of chance in the universe, especially the limited freedom humans possess). Paradoxically, this self-limitation enhances the glory of God by expanding the potential for loving relationships. In this way, Pinnock counters the charge of evangelical critics that open theism somehow diminishes God's glory.
In the final lecture, Pinnock describes how our life experience supports the open theist model. One fascinating insight: Open theism, with its assumption of God's involvement in the world and his response to creaturely suffering, helps motivate us each day. In other words, we live "as if" open theism is true. Conversely, Christians who adhere to the conventional view live "as if not," for instance, they pray, which makes no sense if the future is predetermined.
One final quibble, not addressed to the author, but to the book's designer and typesetters: Whenever a raised numeral that refers to a footnote appears under a character that extends below the baseline (such as a "g"), the two touch. This is poor leading (the space between two lines) and should not be.
Usually, I would not have finished reading a book this poorly written, nor would I review it. However, I make an exception here because the main points interest me. The second star is meant to reflect that.
While Pinnock may be correct as far as this goes, there are other traits of God in the Bible—jealousy, vengeance, and war-making—that he downplays. In addition, the value he places on the biblical witness even leads him to speculate that God possesses corporality in some form. This suggestion reflects Pinnock's uncritical acceptance of scripture as God's direct self-revelation and subordinates the role that tradition, reason, and experience play.
The second lecture aims to demonstrate that the conventional view of God is an unsuccessful synthesis of scripture and ancient Greek philosophy. Once one posits that God is perfect, then Aristotle's ideas of divine perfection were imported into the mainstream Christian view. Aristotle famously conceived of God as the unmoved mover; Pinnock's title is a riff on this. The challenge for the resulting view—with its Thomist stress on omnipotence and its Calvinist stress on absolute foreknowledge, with its corollary, double predestination—is how to accommodate Christ's incarnation and passion.
This description separates these two lectures more precisely than Pinnock does. In the second, he repeats much of what he said in the first. Additionally, he has an annoying tendency to repeat himself several times. This book is the first of his I have read, so I wonder if this is characteristic of his writing or if this is evidence of intellectual decline or insufficient time to prepare.
In the third lecture, Pinnock seeks to distinguish openness from process theology. Evangelicals appear to have already written that project off as heretical. By alleging that open theism is simply a variant of it, they hope to dismiss it as well. As far as I can tell, points of contact between openness and process include the acceptance that God suffers together with his creation and that his perfect knowledge is limited to all that can be known. This includes the future only to the extent of complete understanding of all factors likely to affect that future, but the future is also open, depending on our choices.
The main differences between open theism and process theology seem to be the status of scripture and the universe's necessity or contingency. On both of these points, I'm limited to Pinnock's description of the propositions of process theology since I have yet to read Hartshorne and its other proponents. Concerning scripture, Pinnock appears to accept the general evangelical objection that process originates in philosophical thought rather than the Bible (this is consistent with Pinnock's view of scripture mentioned above). As for necessity or contingency, process theologians, on Pinnock's telling, seem to believe that God's existence necessitates a universe as a counterpart to that existence. In contrast, Pinnock accepts the traditional Aristotelian-Christian view of God as fully sufficient in himself, especially in light of modern trinitarian thought, which emphasizes the relationships within God. Creation, in this understanding, is a free choice on God's part. It is an act that is self-limiting (given the role of chance in the universe, especially the limited freedom humans possess). Paradoxically, this self-limitation enhances the glory of God by expanding the potential for loving relationships. In this way, Pinnock counters the charge of evangelical critics that open theism somehow diminishes God's glory.
In the final lecture, Pinnock describes how our life experience supports the open theist model. One fascinating insight: Open theism, with its assumption of God's involvement in the world and his response to creaturely suffering, helps motivate us each day. In other words, we live "as if" open theism is true. Conversely, Christians who adhere to the conventional view live "as if not," for instance, they pray, which makes no sense if the future is predetermined.
One final quibble, not addressed to the author, but to the book's designer and typesetters: Whenever a raised numeral that refers to a footnote appears under a character that extends below the baseline (such as a "g"), the two touch. This is poor leading (the space between two lines) and should not be.
Usually, I would not have finished reading a book this poorly written, nor would I review it. However, I make an exception here because the main points interest me. The second star is meant to reflect that.
December 15, 2024
I despise systematic theology. So this book took me a couple of years to get through and I’m so glad to be done. That said, it was surprising to learn how different open theism is from process theology, and how much platonic syncretism exists within conventional theology.
October 10, 2018
One of the most fascinating books I have read in a long time.
November 23, 2022
I’ve read it 3 times and it never fails to impress me and encourage my faith!
January 13, 2025
My copy smells like warmed-over heresy for some reason….
January 4, 2023
Really really provocative theory Pinnock has to how God interacts with the world. It is helpful to see the streams or denominations one has been influenced by and for me to hear a fresh voice on how Pinnock views the problem of evil
June 2, 2021
I gave this a 3 star rating not because I disagree with Pinnock's move toward the openness of God but because I think he stops well short of the creative re-imagining of God that is desperately needed today. I find him too tied to the idea that the Bible is somehow an authoritatively inspired self-revelation of God. For example, when Pinnock cites biblical passages that indicate that God can change her/his own mind or can regret or repent of past actions, he seems to assume this is an unequivocally authentic revelation of God. If this is what Pinnock believes, then it makes sense to say God reveals her-/himself in ways that run counter to classical theism. Yet this implies (to me, at least) a very flat, wooden reading of the Bible and runs counter to clear indications of progressive shifts in the Bible's portrayal of God.
September 13, 2014
Excellent dissertation on the concept of "the openness of God".
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August 18, 2009One of the best on the subject. Well written book about a deeply complex subject.
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews