THE ABSOLUTE PREDESTINATION OF ALL THINGS
[Note: The
following is a combination of four separate articles by Gilbert Beebe, editor of
the SIGNS Of The Times paper from 1832-1880. The publisher has edited these in
the following manner: They are joined together because they do not replicate
thoughts contained in each separately, and by omitting the salutation or query
at the beginning. He has separated the articles by placing the publication date
at the end of each. It is appropriate to note two things about Elder Beebe: He
expressly and repeatedly denied that his views “made God the author of sin,”
which a fair reading by an enlightened mind can easily ascertain, and he did not
use the word “permissive” relative to God’s will. —Publisher]
On this important part of the
doctrine of Christ, we wish to be well understood, as we consider it a
fundamental part of the faith of the Gospel. In the absence of this doctrine we
can have no confidence in the predictions of the Word of God. If the prophets
spake and wrote of undetermined events, events concerning which the Holy One
Himself had not made up His mind, they must have spoken and written with the
utmost uncertainty. If it were possible to banish the doctrine of Predestination
from the Holy Scriptures, we should not only lose thereby our interest in the
ancient predictions of the Old Testament, but we should find it impossible to
believe the testimony of the New. What consolation would the exceedingly great
and precious promises of the Gospel afford us, if we had reason to believe that
God had not yet determined whether they should ever be verified? Again, what
confidence could we have in the veracity of God if it were certain that His
promises were made without any determination on His part to perform them? Indeed
there could be no certainty of a future state without the predestination of such
a state. No heaven, no hell, no resurrection of the body, or final judgment.
Thus we see to what an awful dilemma we should be driven without this doctrine.
Predestination is the
pre-determination of all events that can possibly come to pass. It involves the
doctrine of Divine Sovereignty, and exhibits the wisdom and the power of God;
the one presents the purpose, the other carries into execution the thing
decreed.
Predestination is the result of the counsel of God’s own will, originating with Himself alone. “With whom took He counsel, and who instructed Him..,” (Isa. 40:14). In the doctrine of Predestination all the Attributes of God shine forth, with dreadful majesty. The entire history of mankind is by Predestination established in the view of God, and the final destiny of all things are held in His Almighty hand.
“There’s not a
sparrow nor a worm,
But’s found in
His decree;
He sits on no
precarious throne,
Nor borrows
leave to be.”
We may consider this doctrine
first in the economy of salvation, and then in its more general bearings. First,
God has chosen, or predestined, His people unto salvation, “through
sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth,” (2 Thess. 2:13).
Agreeable to His own sovereign pleasure as expressed in the above text, He has
predestinated them “to the adoption of children by Jesus Christ unto Himself
according to the good pleasure of His will,,” (Eph. 1:5). He has predestinated
them unto eternal life. “As Thou hast given Him power over all flesh that He
should give eternal life to as many as Thou hast given Him,,” (John 17:2). “And
as many as were ordained to eternal life believed,” (Acts 13:48). He has
predestined their calling, conformity to the image of Jesus Christ, their
justification and glorification. “For whom He did foreknow He also did
predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the
First-born among many brethren. Moreover whom He did predestinate them He also
called, and whom He called them He also justified, and whom He justified, them
He also glorified,” (Rom. 8:29-30). In short, every thing in relation to His
people here and hereafter is so firmly established in the decree of God that no
power can prevail against them. “He rideth upon the heavens in their help and in
His excellency on the sky. The eternal God is their refuge, and underneath are
the everlasting arms,” (Deut. 33:26, 27). “Surely there is no enchantment
against Jacob, neither is there any divination against
Second, Predestination is not
confined to the adorable purpose of Salvation by Grace; but it has a direct
bearing on all things. Not a sparrow can be brought to the ground, nor can the
troubled ocean dash her foaming waves one inch beyond the limits of God’s
decrees. “And said, Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further: and here shall thy
proud waves be stayed,” (Job 38:11).
If any thing was left upon
uncertainties, every thing must have been equally uncertain. If the smallest
atom in creation were suffered to fly at random in the full sense of the word,
God Himself not knowing where, or when it would alight, it would prove what
cannot be proved, viz: that God is deficient in knowledge. The omniscience, and
the predestination of God, must stand or fall together; they cannot be
separated. We are confident that both exist in glorious harmony in the mind of
Him who has “declared the end from the beginning, saying, My counsel shall stand
and I will do all My pleasure,” (Isa. 46:10).
The doctrine of Absolute
Predestination, when rightly understood, does
not involve the idea of man’s
acting involuntarily in sin; nor does it exonerate him from accountability; this
may be discovered by noticing the following examples: The crucifixion of Christ,
the abduction of Joseph, together with many other circumstances recorded in Holy
Writ. “For of a truth against Thy holy child Jesus, whom Thou hast anointed,
both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the people of Israel were
gathered together, for to do whatsoever Thy hand and Thy counsel determined
before to be done,” (Acts 4:27). “Him being delivered by the determinate counsel
and foreknowledge of God, YE have taken and by wicked hands crucified and
slain,” (Acts, 2:23).
The brethren of Joseph had no
knowledge of the purpose of God when they sold him to go down into
We might notice the objections
commonly brought against this doctrine, but we shall wait until such objections
are presented; and in the mean time earnestly request our brethren to examine
the Word of God on this important subject. And that the God of all grace may
give us light and wisdom from
above, that in His light we may see light, is our prayer in Jesus’ name, to whom be glory, power and dominion, now and forever, Amen.
February
6, 1833
Our Standard Lexicon defines
absolute to mean, in its literal, or general sense, free, independent of
anything extraneous. 2. Complete in itself; positive, as an absolute
declaration. 3. Unconditional, as an absolute promise. 4. Existing independent
of another cause, as God is absolute. 5. Unlimited by extraneous power or
control; as an absolute government or prince. 6. Not relative, as absolute
space. (See Webster’s definition). As this word is nowhere used in the
Scriptures to qualify the word predestination, we will not contend for it,
especially as the word predestination when rightly understood needs no such
qualification, as it cannot be otherwise than absolute. We merely use the word
absolute to distinguish our views of predestination from those who, while they
admit that the term is frequently used in the Scriptures; deny its plain and
obvious meaning as though it were only vaguely used by the inspired writers
without any positive or unequivocal meaning.
On the signification of the
word predestination, it means foreordination by an unchangeable purpose. But the
grand question on which we are principally at issue, is, whether the
predestination of God extends to the wicked actions of men or devils. We have
rejoiced greatly in the firm belief that God’s government is universal, that
there is not a sparrow or a worm, but is found in His decree. That sin, and
death, and hell are under His control, so that “the wrath of man shall praise
Him, and the remainder of wrath He will restrain.” If the Scriptures do not
authorize us so to believe, we know not at what hour we may fall a prey to the
unbridled rage of the enemies of God and of His people.
If the divine government of
Jehovah only extends to the “good” conduct of His creatures, His government is
much more limited in regard to this world, than we had supposed, for He has
informed us that there is “none that doeth good; no not one.” But that He has
set limits to wicked men, we should infer from His declaration, “I have formed
the smith that bloweth the coals in the fire, and bringeth forth an instrument
for his work; I have created the waster to destroy. No weapon that is formed
against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that riseth against thee in
judgment, thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord,
and their righteousness is of Me, saith the Lord,” (Isa. 54:16,17). If God has
created the blacksmith, and the waster, to destroy, and so limited their
operations that they cannot go beyond His decree, and if this is a part of the
heritage of His servants, they cannot yield it up without marring our
inheritance. We confess that to us this part of the saints’ inheritance is too
valuable to be sold for a mess of pottage, as Esau’s birthright. Paul has said,
that God “worketh all things after the counsel of His own will;” and God has
told us, by the mouth of Isaiah, that He has declared the end from the
beginning, &c., “saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all My pleasure:
calling a ravenous bird from the east, the man that executeth My counsel from a
far country: yea, I have spoken it, I will also bring it to pass, I have
purposed it, I will also do it.” How unmeaning would all this language be to us
in the absence of predestination!
The end declared from the
beginning, and yet not determined in the mind and purpose of God, how
preposterous! We cannot believe that our God would declare a thing beforehand
that He was undecided upon, and which might be quite different from what He had
declared; and if He has only declared what He had determined on, that is the
most “absolute” predestination that we have any knowledge of. This
predetermination of events extends throughout all the intervening space, from
“the beginning to the end,” and consequently embraces “all things.” When wicked
men conspired against the life and liberty of Joseph, and against the
predestination of his and their own destiny, as signified by Joseph’s dreams,
they intended evil, “but God meant it for good.” If God had not previously
intended to harden Pharaoh’s heart, He would not have told Moses that He would
do so. If He had not predestinated that the children of Israel sojourn in a
strange land, and be afflicted cruelly by the Egyptians four hundred years, He
certainly would not have told Abraham so, (Gen. 15: 12-16). Let it be remembered
that God told Abram this long before either the children of Israel or the
Egyptians, who were to be concerned in it, were born, and the things which the
Egyptians were to do to the children of Israel were such, as God told Abram He
would judge and punish them for.
The Son of God was delivered
into the hands of wicked men, that they should, with wicked hands, do to Him
what God’s “hand and counsel had before determined to be done.” He was, in fact,
“delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God.”
Paul writes to the
Thessalonians concerning the manifestation of that wicked people, whom the Lord
would destroy, and says, “God shall send them strong delusion, that they should
believe a lie, that they all might be damned, (2 Thess. 2:11). God said by the
mouth of Isaiah, that He would “choose their delusions,” (Isa. 66:4). This is
solid Bible testimony, and it is what we intend to express by the words absolute
predestination. And pray brother, what objections have you to it? Would you wish
the right, the power, or the government of God to be circumscribed? Would you
wish to restrict His government, and confine His dominion to “good people” and
their “good works” and leave the powers of darkness to rage at random, without
the restraint of God’s predestinating decrees? Are you fearful that this view
reflects upon the purity and holiness of God? But why these fears? Are not the
inspired Scriptures sufficiently guarded to secure the honor of their supreme
Author? If not, all our attempts to supply the supposed deficiency will be as
vain, if not as presumptive, as Uzzah’s attempt to protect the Ark of God.
Because God controls, restrains, overrules and disposes of all beings, and all
events, precisely as He eternally designed to do, it does not BY ANY MEANS
FOLLOW THAT HE IS THE FOUNTAIN FROM WHENCE IMPURITY PROCEEDS. He is perfectly
holy, just and good; but He has all power to set bounds and limits to that which
is unholy, unjust, and wicked. If it be admitted that God now has power to
restrain the wickedness of men and devils, according to His sovereign pleasure,
and that He is immutable, then it follows, that He always had that power. If it
is denied that He has that power, where is the safety of His church? Or, if He
has now a perfect knowledge of all beings and of all events, then He must always
have had that knowledge. It certainly does not become us to say that either His
wisdom, holiness, prescience or power, are at fault, that He has allowed His
creatures to rebel against His government, when He had power and wisdom enough
to have prevented it, if it had been His pleasure so to have done. We do not
charge or brethren with attempting to limit Jehovah, or set bounds for Him to be
governed by, but we would give and take the admonition, “Be still and know that
He is God.” If we cannot comprehend Him, it still is our privilege to confide in
Him, for He is too wise to err, and too good to do that which is wrong.
We have no disposition to press
our views on those who do not understand the Scriptures as we do on every
subject. But we wish all our readers to understand that we do as firmly believe,
and as greatly rejoice in the doctrine of Predestination, and its extension to
everything in heaven, earth and hell, as we do in any other part of divine
revelation.
July 1,
1855.
Predestination, as a highly esteemed writer in the Signs once remarked, does not
require to be qualified by prefixing to it the word absolute, as the
predestination of God must of necessity be absolute in every particular. Jehovah
is an absolute God, and all that He purposes or performs must be absolute. There
can be no fiction or anything merely nominal with Him. Pre-destination is
destination beforehand, and as nothing can be beforehand, or subsequent with
Him, the term as it is used in the Scriptures is used in reference to our finite
state, as creatures of time; or rather as creatures of God, but for the present,
in the time state of existence. God inhabits eternity, and all things are ever
present with Him. The progression of time and development of events can add
nothing to His stock of knowledge. We His creatures may and certainly do both
live and learn. He has Himself called our attention to the fact that He “has
declared the end from the beginning, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will
do all My pleasure.” This declaration of the end from the beginning proves His
prescience so conclusively, that but few are so hardened in Infidelity as to
openly and in so many words, deny His foreknowledge of all events; for if He
were deficient in knowledge He could not with unerring certainty declare the end
from the beginning and from ancient times, the things which are yet to
transpire. But there are those who, while they admit what is called the
foreknowledge of God, deny that His knowledge is based upon His own purpose and
determinate counsel. They urge the following objections to predestination.
It, they say, is fatalism, it
destroys man’s free-agency, and his accountability, and makes God the author of
sin; and some there are who go still farther and say if the doctrine of
predestination be true, God in predestinating the events in time, etc., has
transcended His right and therefore is unjust. Our friends, we think, will agree
with us, that it verily becomes poor sinful dying mortals thus irreverently, not
to say blasphemously, to question the eternal right of God to do what seems to
Him good, “in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth,” or to
set up their own standards of justice and denounce their Creator if He does not
abide by their decisions. Let all such first meet the searching interrogative of
the inspired Apostle, “Hath not the potter power over the clay, to form one a
vessel of honor,” etc.? The holy prophet of Jehovah, by inspiration, has
informed us that God is the potter, and we are the clay. Hence we must
acknowledge His eternal right to dispose of all things, all events, and of all
worlds according to His own pleasure. Let this be admitted and all murmuring
against His predestination will cease.
It
is not our purpose to meet the objections urged by men to the doctrine of divine
revelation, and by logical argument to put them to silence; nor do we design to
attempt to make the doctrine palatable to the natural mind of man which “is
enmity against God,” for all such attempts are without the least prospects of
success. The enmity of the carnal mind is fully demonstrated in the objections
which they bring, but we design rather to search out and call attention of our
friends to what God has revealed in the Scriptures on the subject, and this we
will do, if God permit, whether men will hear, or whether they forbear.
The term predestination, as we
have intimated, has reference to the order and succession of events in time, by
which the eternal designs of God are brought to pass. And, so far as God’s
providence is concerned in bringing His designs to pass, predestination simply
signifies that God had purposed, decreed, ordained, or destined the
accomplishment of those things before they were, in order of time brought to
pass. Hence to us, it is pre-destination, with God it is destination, because
His infinity connects and comprehends the end with the beginning, for He is
Himself the First and the Last, the Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the
Ending.
Predestination is a Bible Doctrine
Having, as clearly as we are
able, defined predestination, we pass to enquire whether it is a Bible doctrine.
If it is a Bible doctrine, we must admit it, or reject the Bible as a record of
infallible and eternal truth, and take the open ground of Infidelity. And who
can trace the sacred pages of the Holy Book and say that it contains no
testimony in support of the doctrine? In the absence of predestination how was
it that the prophets of Jehovah foretold the events of ages, thousands of years
before those events were actually fulfilled? Who, or what directed the prophetic
vision of holy men of old, to look down the vista of intervening centuries, and
in the name of the Lord Jehovah predict the things that should come to pass down
to the end of time, and even the resurrection of the slumbering dead, and the
judgment of the last day. If these things were not before determined of God, how
were they known by His prophets? and if they were unknown to God and man how
were they foretold so precisely? And if they were foreknown of God, and He
inspired holy men to foretell them, then that knowledge and purpose of God was
what the Bible calls, predestination. But we have no need of ifs in this
investigation.
The
Scriptures do most clearly and emphatically declare that “Holy men of old spake
as they were moved by the Holy Ghost,” that God “spake to the fathers by the
prophets,” and also that the Spirit of Christ, which was in the prophets, “did
testify beforehand of His sufferings and of the glory that should follow,” (Heb.
1:1; 1 Pet. 1:11). This was and is predestination. God spake by the prophets,
saying, “It shall come to pass.” Do not these words imply a decree when uttered
by Him who speaks the Word, and it stands fast, who commands, and it is done?
How harmoniously do both Testaments agree in this fundamental doctrine.
Throughout the Old Testament, God, by His prophets, declared the things that
“should come pass.” Apostles and inspired evangelists in the New Testament
respond, saying, “And it came to pass.” This is predestination. But perhaps some
may demand, “What came to pass?” We reply all that God by the prophets said
should come to pass.
First, in reference to the
advent of the blessed Savior, for He Himself declared that all that was written
of Him in the law, and in the prophets and in the psalms must be fulfilled, and
when dying on the cross of Calvary He exclaimed, “It is finished!” and in awful
confirmation the retiring sun, prevailing darkness, the quaking earth, rending
rocks, opening graves, rising dead, and rending veil of the temple gave ample
demonstration. Daniel, in harmony with all the other prophets of the Lord, had
predicted that at a specific time the God of heaven should set up a kingdom that
should never be destroyed, that the Messiah should come, should be cut off,
should make an end of sin, and bring in everlasting righteousness. The New
Testament is a record of the faithful and precise fulfillment of these
predictions. Long had the prophet slumbered with his fathers, before the
accomplishment of his “seventy weeks,” but the Word of our God could not die, it
liveth and abideth forever. That is predestination.
The Predestination of our God
also embraces all the heirs of immortality. “For whom He did foreknow, them He
also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be
the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom He did predestinate, them He
also called, and whom He called, them He also justified, and whom He did justify
them He also glorified,” (Rom. 8:28-30). This predestinated people is blessed
with “all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, according as
He (God) hath chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world, that they
should be holy and without blame before Him in love. Having predestinated us
unto the adoption of children, according to the good pleasure of His will.
In
whom we have received an inheritance, being predestinated according to the
purpose of Him who worketh all things after the counsel of His own will,” (Eph.
1:4-6,111).
There are those who admit the
doctrine of predestination, so far as it applies to the coming of the Savior,
the work which He was to perform, the sufferings which He was to endure, and the
glory which was to follow; and also in relation to the good works which God
before ordained that His people should walk in; but reject the idea that His
purpose and foreknowledge extends to the wicked acts of men and devils. This
they claim would make God the author of sin. But for ourselves, it is our firm
conviction that if a single event could possibly transpire from the creation of
the world to the end of time, from the rise and fall of empires, to the falling
of a sparrow, or a hair of our head to the ground, that such unforeseen and
consequently unprovided for events would unavoidably endanger and render
uncertain the execution of what is admitted to be ordained and decreed of God.
How could it be otherwise? Can we consistently believe that it was predestinated
that Christ should suffer on
they
saw such harmony in the purpose, decrees, and actual accomplishment of the
designs of God, as led them simultaneously and with one accord to lift up their
voices in devout adoration and praise to the Most High God, whose providential
government was so clearly manifested in controlling all events. The things which
they now saw brought to pass were distinctly spoken of by David in his day, and
pointed out by the slaughtered lamb which Abel, by faith, offered to God some
four thousand years before any of the actors in the crucifixion of Christ, were
born. God had not only decreed what they should do, but He had also decreed what
they should not do. “The enemy should not exact upon Him, nor the son of
wickedness afflict Him.” “A bone of Him should not be broken.” “He should not be
holden of the pains of death.” His soul should not be left in hell, nor should
His flesh see corruption. Neither death nor hell could go beyond the purpose and
decree of God. None but Judas could betray Him, without involving a
contradiction of the purpose and decree which was recorded in Psalm 109; the
pieces of silver for which He was betrayed were all numbered and recorded in the
decree of God and His revelation as published by the prophet hundreds of years
before Judas was born. The parting of His raiment, and casting lots for His
garment, was all a matter of ancient record, together with all the minute
circumstances which occurred; all of which we are informed were done “that the
Scripture should be fulfilled.”
The murder of the infants by
Herod, brought to pass the decree published by the prophet Jeremiah six hundred
years before. “Thus saith the Lord, A voice was heard in Ramah, lamentation, and
bitter weeping; Rachel weeping for her children refused to be comforted for her
children because they were not,” (Jer. 31; Matt. 2:18).
The case also of Joseph and His
brethren is a very clear and striking illustration of the overruling government
of God, as embracing all events. And who shall dare charge God with
unrighteousness, because He retains in His own hand a supreme control of all
things and of all events, because He “worketh all things after the counsel of
His own will”? Who has a right to infer that God is the fountain of sin or
unholiness; when we are informed that men “with wicked hands,” do “whatsoever
His hand and His counsel before determined to be done”? Paul when declaring what
God had said of Pharaoh, that for this very purpose He had raised him up to make
His power known in him, etc., anticipated the blasphemous out breakings of the
human mind in opposition to the predestination of God. “Thou wilt surely say
unto me, Why doth He yet find fault,” or hold man as an accountable being, “for
who has resisted His will?” But the Apostle did not forbear to declare this
doctrine because men resisted and blasphemed it; but says the Apostle, “Nay, but
who art thou, 0 man, that replieth against God?” etc.
When the enmity of the human
heart is subdued by the quickening power and grace of God in regeneration, then
the heaven-born child is reconciled to God, and loves to contemplate the power
and glory of Jehovah. Then is he prepared, with the inspired psalmist, to
rejoice that the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth; that all power in heaven and in
earth is vested in the blessed Savior. But if left to doubt His all-pervading
power and providence for a moment, now sinks his spirit at the fearful thought
that some wheel in the vast, and apparently complicated machinery of nature
might be suffered to revolve unbound by the wisdom and foreknowledge of God. If
one of the wheels could work without the power and providence of God, its
effects might be to ungear the whole system of divine government, and worlds on
worlds be dashed in irretrievable ruin. When the enlightened mind of God’s dear
children contemplates the glory of this subject, they fall down before God in
admiration, and with the four beast, and four and twenty elders, cry “Holy,
Holy, Holy, Lord, God, Almighty.” They are filled with the most profound
reverence for, and confidence in the God of their salvation.
One reason we have thought why
some of the children of God have seemed to be unreconciled to this doctrine is
that they have failed to discriminate between the overruling power and
providence of God and the effusions of His Spirit. “Let no man say when he is
tempted, that he is tempted of God; for God cannot be tempted, neither tempted
He any man.” When men are tempted to sin they are tempted of their own lusts,
and by the devil. But how hopeless and desperate would be the condition of all
who are tempted, if God had not the power and providence to control the
temptation, and overrule its effect according to His eternal purpose and
pleasure for the good of His tried and tempted children, and for the glory of
His own great name. Our every temptation, though they flow not from God, are
directed, and restricted and made serviceable to His saints, by Him, is
absolutely certain. Hence Peter assured the saints that God would control this
matter, “He will not suffer you to be tempted beyond that which ye are able; but
will also with the temptation make a way for your escape.” That glorious High
Priest which becomes us, was Himself tempted in all points as His children are,
and knows how to succor them that are tempted. Soon after He was baptized, He
was led up by the Spirit, unto the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. He was
not led there by the devil; but by the Holy Spirit of the Lord God which was
upon Him. Neither was He tempted of the Spirit of God which led Him into the
wilderness; but He was tempted of the devil. The devil could neither afflict
poor old Job, nor even drown the herd of swine, until he received permission of
the Lord, and it is hard for us to think that any of the saints, however shy
they may seem to be of the doctrine of predestination, really would wish or be
willing that God should have less, or that sin or Satan should have more power.
It is a blessed reflection to us that
“Death and hell
can do no more
Than what our
Father pleases.”
Volumes have been written upon this subject, and volumes may still be written. It is too rich and boundless ever to be exhausted, but after all that we can say, it is the Spirit of the Lord alone who can present it in its beauty to the sons of men. He, the Spirit of Truth, whom the world cannot receive, can slay the enmity of our carnal mind, and give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God, shining in the face of Jesus Christ. May that Spirit in all its quickening power and grace be with our friends and all others who earnestly desire a knowledge of the true God and eternal life.
February
1, 1854.
Although it is common for all
wise men to lay out their plans and predetermine, or predestinate what they
intend to do, it is exceedingly hard for men to comprehend the doctrine in its
application to Him who has “Declared the end from the beginning, saying, My
counsel shall stand, and I will do all My pleasure.” Although our Savior has
called that man a fool who without predestinating, pre-concerting his
arrangements, or predetermining in regard to his undertakings, would attempt to
build a house; yet it is thought by many incompatible with the divine
perfections of our Lord that He should predetermine, pre-arrange or
predestinate, in the building of a world. If God has declared the end from the
beginning, He has so declared on the ground of positive knowledge of the end,
and if He absolutely foreknew all things, all things must have been before
determined, either by Himself or by some other power. If not predetermined by
Himself it might well be demanded, “With whom took He counsel, and who
instructed Him, or taught Him, when He measured the waters in the hollow of His
hand, and meted out the heavens with a span, and comprehended the
dust
of the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in
a balance?” (Isa. 40:12-14). We must admit that God possessed all this knowledge
of Himself independently, or deny His Omniscience; and we must acknowledge that
His perfect knowledge rested on the counsel of His own sovereign will and
pleasure, or, conclude that He was instructed by some other, which conclusion we
think none who know the Lord will be likely to make. But we need not speculate,
nor attempt to establish this matter by inferences, however clearly drawn, for
in His holy Word we are informed that it is the theme of reverence and worship
of the four beasts in Revelations, and the four and twenty elders, who, falling
down before Him, and casting their crowns before His throne, continually cry,
“Thou art worthy, 0 Lord, to receive glory and honor and power; for Thou hast
created all things, and FOR THY PLEASURE they are and were created,” (Rev.
4:10,11). And in His Word Jehovah claims that He has “created all things for
Himself, yea, even the wicked for the day of evil;” and He says, in vindication
of His supreme Godhead, “I form the light, and I create darkness; I make peace
and I create evil; I the Lord do all these things.” We cannot read these
declarations from the mouth of God Himself, and resist the conviction that our
God “worketh ALL THINGS after the counsel of His own will,” (Eph. 1:11).
We will speak more particularly
on the words, “all things.” There are those who profess to believe that God has
predestinated some few things, but they cannot comprehend the idea that He has
predestinated all things. Among the things which these allow that He has
predestinated, are the redemption of His people from sin, and their eternal
justification and immortal glory, the unspeakable gift of His dear Son, His
advent to our world, His sufferings, death, resurrection and ascension to glory;
but they cannot admit that God absolutely ordained that sin should enter into
the world, that there should be any sinners to redeem, or that wicked men
should, with wicked hands, crucify and slay the Lord of life and glory.
Did the Lord predestinate that
Joseph should lay up corn in Egypt, but had nothing to do with his dreams, the
envy of his brethren, or any of the circumstances of their projecting his
murder, had no hand in sending the Ishmaelitish merchants to intercept their
wicked designs, or with his being sold to Potiphar, nor the strange course of
Potiphar’s wife, or the dreams of the butler and baker, who were fellow
prisoners with Joseph? But we confess we cannot conceive how anything can be
predestinated unless all things are. In regard to both the cases referred to, we
are informed that God did control all the events. Peter, being inspired by the
Holy Spirit, charged upon the Jews the murder of our Redeemer, in these words,
“Him being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye
have taken, and by wicked hands, have crucified and slain,” (Acts 2:23). Again,
“For of a truth, against Thy holy child, Jesus, whom Thou hast anointed, both
Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the people of Israel, were
gathered together, for to do what Thy hand and Thy counsel determined before to
be done,” (Acts 4:27,28). In regard to the case of Joseph, God had made known to
his great-grandfather Abraham, His control over this matter, and that the
children of
His providential government,
which is based upon the pleasure of His own will, according to which He works
all things, extends to the falling of a sparrow, and the numbering of the hairs
of our heads, and it is and should be a consoling thought to all of God’s dear
children.
But it is argued by the
opponents of Predestination, that if God has predestinated all things, man is
not accountable; and some go so far as to blasphemously say that God would be
the author of sin. The Apostle Paul anticipates the blasphemous cavilings of the
enemies of divine sovereignty. “Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth He yet find
fault?” or why doth He hold men accountable for their wicked actions? “For who
hath resisted His will?” It is true that God’s eternal and immutable will cannot
be successfully resisted or thwarted, for He “doeth His pleasure in the army of
heaven, and among the inhabitants of earth, and none can stay His hand,” (Dan.
4:35). This the Apostle does not deny or modify to avoid their blasphemous
cavils; but he says, “Nay but, 0 man, who art thou that repliest against God?
Shall the thing formed say unto Him that formed it, Why has Thou made me thus?
Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel
unto honor and another unto dishonor? What if God, willing to shew His wrath,
and to make His power known, endureth with much long-suffering the vessels of
wrath fitted to destruction: and that He might make known the riches of His
glory on the vessels of mercy, which He had afore prepared unto glory,” (Rom.
9:20-23).
As it is a mercy to us when God
restrains us from sinning, and “leads us not into temptation, but delivers us
from evil;” so is a manifestation of His wrath, upon the vessels of wrath, when
He endured with long-suffering, or allows them to fill up the cup or allotted
measure of their iniquities, and when He “sends them strong delusion that they
may believe a lie, that they all may be damned who believe not the truth, but
have pleasure in unrighteousness,” (2 Thess. 2:11,12). That the purpose and
predestination of all things do not exculpate men from blame, nor involve the
supreme Jehovah as the author of sin, in the manner urged by the opponents of
the truth, is very apparent from what is recorded in connection with the events
to which we have made allusion. Although Christ was delivered by the determinate
counsel and foreknowledge of God; those who were charged with His crucifixion
were guilty of doing it with “wicked hands.” They acted as voluntarily and
maliciously as though no such determinate counsel had determined beforehand what
they should do. Joseph told his brethren that God had, for their sake, brought
him to
Every intelligent being knows
that in committing sin, he acts voluntarily, and follows the impulse of his own
depraved nature, and every one who is born of God and taught by His Spirit,
knows that sin is the opposite of holiness; that God is holy, and that sin is of
the devil and man’s lust, and not of God. Still a consciousness of God’s supreme
power and wisdom, to fix its bounds, and say to it as He has said to the waters
of the deep, “Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further; and here shall thy proud
waves be stayed,” affords a strong consolation to all who look alone to God for
succor, protection and support, while destined to remain as strangers and
pilgrims on the earth.
