Recently there were some comments about the propriety of identifying God by the initials G.A.O.T.U.  In reading The Grand Design by Wallace McLeod, I came across the following  which I found to be most interesting;

. . . this phrase entered Freemasonry by way of the first Book of Constitutions, printed in 1723.  The compiler was Rev. Dr. James Anderson, a graduate of Aberdeen University, and minister of the Scottish Presbyterian church in Swallow Street, Piccadilly, London, from 1710 to 1734.  He did not invent the phrase, but took it over from John Calvin, who uses it, for example, in his Commentary on Psalm 19; the heavens *were wonderfully founded by the Great Architect* again, according to the same paragraph, *when once we recognize God as the Architect of the Universe*, we are bound to marvel at his Wisdom, Strength, and Goodness.  In fact, Calvin repeatedly calls God *the Architect of the Universe,* and refers to His works in nature as *Architecture of the Universe* ten times in the Institutes of the Christian Religion alone . . .

fraternally

Ron Eveson

PM 691 G.R.C.