Providence
Jul 27th, 2007 by Nathan White
A few weeks ago I had the great enjoyment of making my way through John Flavel’s book, The Mystery of Providence. Flavel, one of my favorite Puritans for his pastoral style, covers the issue of Providence about as thorough as the subject can be dealt with. Monergismbooks.com, THE best site on the web for sound Christian books (with apologies to Solid Ground), said this about The Mystery of Providence:
“Considered by many to be THE classic work on Providence”
I must say that I agree with this assessment.
While reading this book, however, I kept being drawn back to the thought that the entire work is actually a very basic subject. That is, the sovereignty of God in providence, i.e., God’s sovereign control over every single event and element of life, is actually pretty common knowledge to me, and to many Christians, so I’d like to think.
The clarity of scripture in this matter seems to be overwhelming in my opinion, especially because God’s providence is rooted firmly in God’s character or His attributes. God ordaining every detail of life is what makes Him God!
But with a firm remembrance of some previous conversations I have had in Sunday School classes in the past, there is no doubt that this idea of God’s providence meets some opposition. Naturally, for those who reject God’s sovereignty in salvation, rejecting God’s sovereignty over everything else just comes natural. But using a term JC Ryle is famous for, I would say that rejecting God’s sovereignty over every single, minute detail of life is but a ‘flight of steps’ from rejecting the God of scripture outright.
Thus, the point of this post is to open the conversation for anyone who has trouble with this doctrine. Sometimes I envision that the readers of this blog, the relatively few that read on a regular basis no doubt, agree with me on just about everything. I know that’s not the case, but I do wonder if there are some reading who reject this notion outright.
So then, does God ordain every single event in our lives? Has He ordered the typing of my fingers at this very moment (12:33am, 7/27/07)? Did He guide my hands as I played some recreational baseball tonight and hit a two-run double? Harder yet, did He rule over me responding sinfully to my wife this morning? Did He give me the breath, health, cognitive thinking, situation, environment, etc., in which I committed this sin?
I believe scripture is crystal-clear: of COURSE He did all of those things and more. Flavel believed it, the great Puritan as he was, and countless other Godly men believe so as well. The question is, do you? If you don’t, what scripture specifically keeps you from doing so? Are you aware of how serious this affects your overall view of who God really is? Please, no superficial arguments about robots, puppets, or my personal favorite (from Adrian Rodgers): “Are we just pawns on the chessboard of faith??”
God is sovereign, and if He isn’t, then frankly, He isn’t God. Providence should be one of the very, very first things we learn when we become believers in the Triune God of scripture; which is why I am sometimes puzzled when so many professing Christians want to fight against it. On what basis, other than humanistic thinking, do men reject this notion? I am convinced by scripture as well as experience, and you should be too.
Nathan,
Hey man! I just wanted to give props for Mr. Flavel. Not many people know about him, but I think he is great. When I took the class, 17th Century English Puritanism, I made him my concentration (and bought his complete works). One of the easiest Puritans to read, Flavel is someone anyone could appreciate, whether minister or lay person.
So there’s my commercial for Flavel. Go buy his complete works. You will not be disappointed.
Great post Nathan!!
May I ask for some advice from the forum on a situation (as it relates to Providence) that I found myself in and was a little overwhelmed by. A good friend of mine had a scary situation with his little girl, where she put her arm through a glass door, and required 7 stiches at the emergency room. While at the hospital, she asked here dad, “why did God let little kids get hurt” and he was speechless. He called me because this really hurt him and as he said “shook his faith.”
In light of this post on Providence, how can I confidently answer my friend who is still searching for an answer to why this happened?
If this sounds trivial, I understand, however my friend has spent now 2 weeks with anger in his heart towards God.
Sometimes I envision that the readers of this blog, the relatively few that read on a regular basis no doubt, agree with me on just about everything.
Well, perhaps you’re not too far off.
SDG,
dbh
JayZ said: “A good friend of mine had a scary situation with his
little girl, where she put her arm through a glass door, and required 7
stiches at the emergency room. While at the hospital, she asked here dad,
“why did God let little kids get hurt” and he was speechless. He called me
because this really hurt him and as he said “shook his faith.” In light of
this post on Providence, how can I confidently answer my friend who is still
searching for an answer to why this happened?”
You know, I might not be the right person to respond to this
question….just yet, as my little girl is barely 5 months old (and has yet
to go through something like this, though I’m sure it won’t be long). I’d
like to say that I would respond rightly, but I can imagine what a tough
issue that is.
First, we can never know the answer of ‘why’; that’s for certain. And if we
read the story of Job, we learn that during this life we will never truly
know ‘why’. We can speculate, but God never tells Job why He did all of that
to Job.
Secondly, the question of ‘why’ presupposes that it is something terrible
and undeserved. In Lamentations 3:39 Jeremiah says “Why should a living man
complain,
a man, about the punishment of his sins?” –pointing to the fact that we
have no right to complain about anything, given that we are sinners and
deserve far worse than anything that can happen to us here on earth.
Nothing, no matter how terrible, is undeserved, for God is a just and
righteous God, and we of course were ‘concieved in iniquity’.
Furthermore, we never know what is truly terrible. Yes, the cut arm may seem
like a terrible thing, but just like Joseph being sold into slavery, it
could one day become the greatest blessing imaginable. I can testify to this
from my own experience as well, as the worst thing that has ever happened to
me turned out to be the ’straw that broke the camel’s back’ in leading to my
repentance and faith in Christ. Yes, what happened still hurts and hurts
deeply on a temporal level, but I rejoice because that is what was necessary
for God to break me –and He breaks all of His children at some point or
another.
Here is a story a friend once shared with me:
A wise old Chinese gentleman lived on the troubled Mongolian border. One day
his favorite horse, a beautiful white mare, jumped the fence and was seized
on the other side by the enemy. His friends came to comfort him. “We’re so
sorry about your horse,” they said. “That’s bad news.”
“How do you know it’s bad news?” he asked. “It might be good news.”
A week later, the Chinaman looked out his window to see his mare returning
at breakneck speed, and alongside her was a beautiful stallion. He put both
horses into the enclosure, and his friends came to admire the new addition.
“What a beautiful horse,” they said. “That’s good news.”
“What is wrong with you people?” replied the man to his neighbors. “You
cannot say whether this is good news or bad.” “Say only that the horse has
returned, and leave it at that.”
The next day, the man’s only son decided to try riding the stallion. It
threw him, and he landed painfully, breaking his leg. The friends made
another visit, all of them sympathetic, saying, “We’re so sorry about this.
It’s such bad news.”
“How do you know it’s bad news?” replied the man. “It might be good news.”
Within a month, a terrible war broke out between China and Mongolia. The
Chinese recruiters came through the area, pressing all the young men into
the army. All of them perished—except for the Chinaman’s son, who couldn’t
go off to war because of his broken leg.
“You see,” said the gentleman, “the things you considered good were actually
bad, and the things that seemed to be bad news were actually for our good.”
Lastly, if my little girl one day said this to me, I would take the
opportunity to point out to her that Jesus, in answering why bad things
happen to (seemingly) innocent people (falling tower of salom), said “Unless
you repent, you will likewise perish”. The question isn’t why did it happen,
but why has God even given me breath when my heart is so set against Him?
Why hasn’t He eternally punished my evil heart? Why the delay? Better yet,
why did His innocent Son have to die His horrible death? Any response which
points out the seriousness of sin and the mercy/patience of God up to this
point, is probably the right one.
SDG
Everything? I don’t know … do you really suppose the Creator cares much about whether we wear blue or black socks?
Excellent response Nathan.
I could point to numerous things people could question about “bad things” (DSS, Hannah’s esophogus growing into her windpipe, my mototcycle wreck, etc.) and when we take time to look back on those things we see the hand of God. In most instances bringing us to repentance or at the very least to our knees. God is truly sovereign and we must trust His words that He is working out all things for good to those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.
James,
Of course the Creator cares. He was very detailed in the dress of the priests that’s for sure. A sparrow doesn’t fall to the ground apart from His decree. Likewise I might ask the same thing about deer. If a deer dies at the hands of a hunter, does it have anything to do with how the hunter is dressed? Does God then decree the death of the deer? and for what purpose? Could it be to feed His people. Most people don’t really think through the ramifications of seemingly insignificant things that happen in life. I would suggest maybe you take a step back and do that:)
James said: do you really suppose the Creator cares much about whether we wear blue or black socks?
Well, does God care what happens to nuclear bombs? On what basis do we say ‘He has sovereign control over a bomb’ but He doesn’t have control over socks? Is it because a bomb seems to be much more ‘important’ in our eyes?
What if today, you go shopping with your wife (or if single, your girlfriend), and, as all men must one day do, you must sit with the bags while she tries on a mountain of clothing. While, there, you meet another customer, who, seeing your legs are crossed, notices you have a nifty pattern on them. She compliments your taste, and begins a conversation. In the course of this conversation, you find out that she’s a fellow Christian and out with her little sister, who is also a Christian but is new to the area and looking for a new church home. You tell her about your church and invite them. They come to church, and her sister joins. At the church, two years later, she meets her husband, who goes off to seminary and goes to the mission field, where the two of them spend their lives ministering the gospel and planting churches in unchurched lands…all because of the socks you wore today…
So, let me ask, do you think God cares what socks we wear or not?
The question isn’t, “Does God ordain the events in our lives down to the minuate?” The minuate may not be so minute. Rather, the question is “How does God do this?” That is why we speak of the efficiency of second causes and yet deny libertarian freedom to those causes. God does intervene directly for miracles, creation, the Incarnation, the Resurrection, the eshaton, inspiration of Scripture, regeneration of the heart, etc., but He also allows other things to fall out according to the nature of second causes. He has so ordered the world both externally and our natures internally, that we freely do all that He has ordained as if we were under the greatest compulsion but with as much freedom as can be had such that we are under no compulsion at all. We willingly do these things. God does not directly “stir the pot with His finger” as it were, but He does order all things and orchestrate them to the smallest detail.
Genembridges, I see your point about the sock thing, but then you go on to say:
“He has so ordered the world both externally and our natures internally, that we freely do all that He has ordained as if we were under the greatest compulsion but with as much freedom as can be had such that we are under no compulsion at all”
I’m sorry, but … what?? Are we under compulsion or not? I don’t see what’s so hard about simply saying, “Look, we have no freedom to do anything but what God wills, whatever that may be.” There is no free will and we don’t do, say or think anything that He hasn’t ordained and decreed from the beginning of time (including these words I’m typing). Why bother with the word “freedom” which implies an ability to choose? It’s meaningless in this context.
No, it isn’t. I’m drawing a distinction between God’s absolute and ordinate power, between primary and secondary causes. See for example Charles Hodge’s theology text or Francis Turretin’s work.
Saying that God has “decreed” something as if that implies there is no freedom of choice does not take into count the mode by which those decrees are executed. That’s a classic Arminian misunderstanding of what the Calvinist is saying. It conceives of the ends without respecting the means. This is a classic distinction that theologians have recognized for several centuries.
A. We don’t say it because that’s not what we believe or teach. To say that would be to misrepresent our theology.
B. Are you arguing that the ability to choose must be libertarian in order to use the term “freedom?” That strikes me as a philosophical argument. If so, where are the supporting arguments, particularly the text of Scripture that teaches that “freedom” requires a libertarian framework?
Freedom of choice does not require libertarian freedom. There is a vast philosophical literature on that very point, not withstanding the exegetical material.
C. Are you arguing for something like Cheung’s views on Scripturalism and theodicy in which secondary causality is denied? Cheung is a Calvinist with whom several including Steve Hays, Paul Manata, Evan May, and “Aquascum” have interacted in the past and who from time to time raises his head in protest. Triablogue contains an archive with their material.
Both views err in opposite directions. One makes men a first cause in order to have true freedom and makes “permission” as the older theologians called it “bare,” and the other makes God the only cause in the universe.
Does God control the “nature” of an individual? Certainly, each of us lives at a particular point in time, in a particular place, with particular persons, and with a particular psychological and spiritual makeup. As creatures, those items are not under our control, and unless you’re an Open Theist, you’ll have to agree that God has placed us in that time and place, with those persons, and created us with that makeup.
Do we recognize secondary causality? Certainly:Paragraph 1. God hath decreed in himself, from all eternity, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely and unchangeably, all things, whatsoever comes to pass;1 yet so as thereby is God neither the author of sin nor hath fellowship with any therein;2 nor is violence offered to the will of the creature, nor yet is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established;3 in which appears His wisdom in disposing all things, and power and faithfulness in accomplishing His decree.4
1 Isa. 46:10; Eph. 1:11; Heb. 6:17; Rom. 9:15,18
2 James 1:13; 1 John 1:5
3 Acts 4:27,28; John 19:11
4 Num. 23:19; Eph. 1:3-5
The word “compulsion” implies that one does something against his will that he would not otherwise wish to do. Nobody is compelled to do anything. They act very willingly.
A decree does nothing in and of itself except render an end certain. A decree requires an agency to be enacted. His decrees, through either action or inaction render events necessary, but, evil is the result of permission, not His direct causation, or a result of His judicial hardening of sinners, an act of justice Scripture supports repeatedly, as in th Romans 1. Nothing happens that compels a man or demon to act in a way it does not wish to act or against its nature. He may withhold constraining grace, as in the fall, in order to render a thing certain, but the agent of the evil, in this case Adam simply acts in accordance with his nature as a second cause, for reasons and motives sufficient for himself and arising from his own nature. Men thus do what God decrees, but for motives all their own. In so doing, they may incur judgment. In this way men act as infallibly as if they had no liberty, yet as freely as if there was no decree rendering their acts certain. See, for example, the predestination of Judas betrayal and Jesus crucifixion. These men did, with evil desires, what God desired and planned to happen since before creation, for Jesus is the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world itself.
CHAPTER 9; OF FREE WILL
Paragraph 1. God has endued the will of man with that natural liberty and power of acting upon choice, that it is neither forced, nor by any necessity of nature determined to do good or evil.1
1 Matt. 17:12; James 1:14; Deut. 30:19
Paragraph 2. Man, in his state of innocency, had freedom and power to will and to do that which was good and well-pleasing to God,2 but yet was unstable, so that he might fall from it.3
2 Eccles. 7:29
3 Gen. 3:6
Paragraph 3. Man, by his fall into a state of sin, has wholly lost all ability of will to any spiritual good accompanying salvation;4 so as a natural man, being altogether averse from that good, and dead in sin,5 is not able by his own strength to convert himself, or to prepare himself thereunto.6
4 Rom. 5:6, 8:7
5 Eph. 2:1,5
6 Titus 3:3-5; John 6:44
Paragraph 4. When God converts a sinner, and translates him into the state of grace, He frees him from his natural bondage under sin,7 and by His grace alone enables him freely to will and to do that which is spiritually good;8 yet so as that by reason of his remaining corruptions, he does not perfectly, nor only will, that which is good, but does also will that which is evil.9
7 Col. 1:13; John 8:36
8 Phil. 2:13
9 Rom. 7:15,18,19,21,23
Paragraph 5. This will of man is made perfectly and immutably free to good alone in
the state of glory only.10
10 Eph. 4:13
CHAPTER 3; OF GOD’S DECREE
Paragraph 1. God hath decreed in himself, from all eternity, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely and unchangeably, all things, whatsoever comes to pass;1 yet so as thereby is God neither the author of sin nor hath fellowship with any therein;2 nor is violence offered to the will of the creature, nor yet is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established;3 in which appears His wisdom in disposing all things, and power and faithfulness in accomplishing His decree.4
1 Isa. 46:10; Eph. 1:11; Heb. 6:17; Rom. 9:15,18
2 James 1:13; 1 John 1:5
3 Acts 4:27,28; John 19:11
4 Num. 23:19; Eph. 1:3-5
Paragraph 2. Although God knoweth whatsoever may or can come to pass, upon all supposed conditions,5 yet hath He not decreed anything, because He foresaw it as future, or as that which would come to pass upon such conditions.6
5 Acts 15:18
6 Rom. 9:11,13,16,18
Paragraph 3. By the decree of God, for the manifestation of His glory, some men and angels are predestinated, or foreordained to eternal life through Jesus Christ,7 to the praise of His glorious grace;8 others being left to act in their sin to their just condemnation, to the praise of His glorious justice.9
7 I Tim. 5:21; Matt. 25:34
8 Eph. 1:5,6
9 Rom. 9:22,23; Jude 4
Paragraph 4. These angels and men thus predestinated and foreordained, are particularly and unchangeably designed, and their number so certain and definite, that it cannot be either increased or diminished.10
10 2 Tim. 2:19; John 13:18
Paragraph 5. Those of mankind that are predestinated to life, God, before the foundation of the world was laid, according to His eternal and immutable purpose, and the secret counsel and good pleasure of His will, hath chosen in Christ unto everlasting glory, out of His mere free grace and love,11 without any other thing in the creature as a condition or cause moving Him thereunto.12
11 Eph. 1:4, 9, 11; Rom. 8:30; 2 Tim. 1:9; I Thess. 5:9
12 Rom. 9:13,16; Eph. 2:5,12
Paragraph 6. As God hath appointed the elect unto glory, so He hath, by the eternal and most free purpose of His will, foreordained all the means thereunto;13 wherefore they who are elected, being fallen in Adam, are redeemed by Christ,14 are effectually called unto faith in Christ, by His Spirit working in due season, are justified, adopted, sanctified,15 and kept by His power through faith unto salvation;16 neither are any other redeemed by Christ, or effectually called, justified, adopted, sanctified, and saved, but the elect only.17
13 1 Pet. 1:2; 2; Thess. 2:13
14 1 Thess. 5:9, 10
15 Rom. 8:30; 2 Thess. 2:13
16 1 Pet. 1:5
17 John 10:26, 17:9, 6:64
Paragraph 7. The doctrine of the high mystery of predestination is to be handled with special prudence and care, that men attending the will of God revealed in His Word, and yielding obedience thereunto, may, from the certainty of their effectual vocation, be assured of their eternal election;18 so shall this doctrine afford matter of praise,19 reverence, and admiration of God, and of humility,20 diligence, and abundant consolation to all that sincerely obey the gospel.21
18 1 Thess. 1:4,5; 2 Pet. 1:10
19 Eph. 1:6; Rom. 11:33
20 Rom. 11:5,6,20
21 Luke 10:20
Much confusion seems to arise from this emphasized section. This is where the confession is implicitly affirming soft determinism NOT libertarianism. That is in a thought experiment in which man has a choice to do A or non-A and given one “do over” under the exact same conditions of his nature and his circumstances, man can do otherwise if he wants to do otherwise. That is what it means that he acts without “any necessity of nature.”
“The word “compulsion” implies that one does something against his will that he would not otherwise wish to do. Nobody is compelled to do anything. They act very willingly.”
Yet, where does that “wish” come from? If God is the First Cause, then it arises from God, yes? Their wills are what they are because God wills it, otherwise it would be something different. You want to have your cake and eat it too, as they say. You want God to be the origin of everything, yet not everything. This cannot be. You may as well assert the existence of a square circle.
James,
honestly that was a weak response to and in depth response to your question. Could you tell us from Romans 9 how God forms all the vessels from one lump? Could you tell us how He formed Pharoah as well as Moses? Could you tell us how He can form vessels for both wrath and mercy? Consequently the vessels are not forming themselves:) I am interested in your understanding of this.
BTW, it looks like Gene nailed you on the socks issue since you dropped that one like a hot potatoe.