The central theme in these debates appears to be the sustaining and providential interaction by God with His creation. I think a simple argument about theism and deism may miss the point. The theological point deals more with time and God’s eternity. There is a debate even to this day on this matter. Is God part of the time/space and thus “caught” in temporal moments within His creation, and thus somehow directs at moments that somehow bind Him to such? Or is He “out of time and space” and yet may interact with His creation in some way. Can we talk of His energies and essence and in this way keep the truth of the trinity and eternity, while providing a basis for primal cause? What of times when He spoke with Abraham and Moses, for example? Was He experiencing time dependent events and these are part of His memories and experiences? Just what do we understand when we say the Word created all, and there was nothing that was not created by the Word (or God said, let there be …)?
These are deep questions and errors can easily creep into theological speculations, such as: did God use random events? or did God “front load” it all? and such odd phrases.