The Godhood of God
Typed by: Kathy Sewell, ksewell@gate.net, May 08,
1997
This electronic text is in public domain
THE GODHOOD OF GOD
A. W. Pink
The Godhood of God! What is
meant by this expression? Ah, sad it is that such a question
needs to be asked and answered. And yet it does: for a
generation has arisen that is well nigh universally ignorant
of the important truth which this term connotes. That which
is popular today in the colleges, in the pulpits, and in the
press, is the dignity, the power, and the attainments of
man. But this is only the corrupt fruit that has issued
from the Evolutionary teachings of fifty years ago. When
Christian theologians (?) accepted the Darwinian hypothesis,
which excluded God from the realm of Creation, it was
only to be expected that more and more God would be
banished from the realm of human affairs. Thus it has
proven. To the twentieth-century mind God is little more than
an abstraction, an impersonal "First Cause," or if
a Being at all, One far removed from this world and having
little or nothing to do with mundane affairs. Man, forsooth,
is a "god" unto himself. He is a "free
agent" and therefore the regulator of his own life and
the determiner of his own destiny. Such was the Devil's
lie at the beginning - "Ye shall be as God" (Gen.
3:5). But from human speculation and Satanic insinuation we
turn to Divine revelation.
The Godhood of God! What is
meant by the expression? This: the omnipotency of God, the
absolute sovereignty of God. When we speak of the Godhood of
God we affirm that God is God. We affirm that God is
something more than an empty title: that God is something
more than a mere figure-head: that God is something more than
a far-distant Spectator, looking helplessly on at the
suffering which sin has wrought. When we speak of the Godhood
of God we affirm that He is "King of kings and
Lord of lords." We affirm that God is something more
than a disappointed, dis-satisfied, defeated Being, who is
filled with benevolent desires but lacking in power to carry
them out. When we speak of the Godhood of God we affirm that
He is "the Most High." We affirm that God is
something more than One who has endowed man with the power of
choice, and because He has done this is therefore
unable to compel man to do His bidding. We affirm
that God is something more than One who has waged a
protracted war with the Devil and has been worsted.
When we speak of the Godhood of God we affirm that He is the
Almighty.
To speak of the Godhood of God
then, is to say that God is on the Throne, on the
Throne as a fact and not as a say so; on a Throne that
is high above all. To speak of the Godhood of God is to say
that the Helm is in His hand, and that He is steering
according to His own good pleasure. To speak of the Godhood
of God is to say that He is the Potter, that we are
the clay, and that out of the clay He shapes one as a vessel
to honor and another as a vessel to dishonor according to His
own sovereign rights. To speak of the Divine Despot
doing "according to His will in the army of heaven, and
among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay
His hand, or say unto Him what doest Thou?" (Dan. 4:35).
Therefore, to speak of the Godhood of God is to give the
mighty Creator His rightful place; it is to recognize His
exalted majesty; it is to own His universal scepter.
The Godhood of God stands at
the base of Divine revelation: "in the beginning
God" - in solemn majesty, eternal, un-caused,
self-sufficient. This is the foundation doctrine, and
upon it all other doctrines must be built, and any
other doctrine which is not built upon it will inevitably
fail and fall in the day of testing. At the beginning of all
true theology lies the postulate that God is God - absolute
and irresistible. It must be so. Without this we face a
closed door: with it we have a key which unlocks every
mystery. This is true of Creation; exclude an Almighty
God and nothing is left but blind and illogical materialism.
This is true of Revelation: the Bible is the solitary
miracle in the realm of literature; exclude God from it and
you have a miracle and no miracle-Worker to produce it. This
is true of Salvation. Salvation is "of the
Lord," entirely so; exclude God from any aspect or part
of salvation, and salvation vanishes. This is true of
History, for history is His story: it is the
outworking in time of His eternal purpose; exclude God from
history and all is meaningless and purposeless. The absolute
Godhood of God is the only guaranty that in the end it
shall be fully and finally demonstrated that God is "All
in all" (1 Cor. 15:28).
"In the beginning
God." This is not only the first word of Holy
Scripture but it must be the firm axiom of all true
philosophy - the philosophy of human history, for example.
Instead of beginning with man and his world and attempting to
reason back to God, we must begin with God and reason forward
to man and his world. It is failure to do this which leaves
unsolved the "riddle of the universe." Begin with
the world as it is today and try to reason back to God, and
what is the result? If you are honest of heart and logical of
mind, this - that God has little or nothing at all to do with
the world. But begin with God and reason forward to the world
as it is today and much light is cast on the problem. Because
God is holy, His anger burns against sin. Because God
is righteous, His judgments fall on those who rebel
against Him. Because God is faithful, the solemn
threatenings of His Word are being fulfilled. Because God is
omnipotent, no problem can master Him, no enemy defeat
Him, and no purpose of His can be withstood. It is just
because God is who He is and what He is that we now behold
what we do - the gathering clouds of the storm of Divine
wrath which will shortly burst upon the earth.
"For of Him, and through
Him and to Him, are all things" (Rom. 11:36). In
the beginning - God. In the center - God. At
the end - God. But as soon as this is insisted upon
men will stand up and tell you what they think about
God. They will prate about God working consistently with His
own character, as though a worm of the earth was capable of
determining what was consistent and what was inconsistent
with the Divine perfections. People will say with an air of
profound wisdom that God must deal justly with His creatures,
which is true, of course, but who is able to define
Divine justice, or any other of God's attributes? The
truth is that man is utterly incompetent for forming a
proper estimate of God's character and ways, and it is
because of this that God has given us a revelation of
His mind, and in that revelation He plainly declares,
"For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your
ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher
than the earth, so are My ways higher then your ways, and My
thoughts than your thoughts" (Is. 55:8,9). In view of
such a scripture as this it is only to be expected that much
of the contents of the Bible conflicts with the
sentiments of the carnal mind which is "enmity
against God." And further: in view of such a Scripture
as the above we need not be surprised that much of human
history is so perplexing to our
understandings.
The natural world, to begin
with the simplest, presents sufficient problems to humble
man, were it not that he was blinded by pride. Why should
there be diseases and remedies for them? Why poisons and
their antidotes? Why rats and mice, and cats to kill them?
Why not have left un-made the evils, and then no necessity
for the instruments to remove them! Ah, why are we so slow to
learn that God's ways are different from ours? And when
we enter the human realm the mystery deepens. What is man
placed here for at all? To learn some lesson or lessons or to
undergo some test or experience which he could not learn or
undergo elsewhere? If so, then why is such a large proportion
of the race removed in infancy, before such lessons can be
learned and such experiences be gained? Why indeed! Such
questions as these might be multiplied indefinitely, but
sufficient has been said to point out the manifest
limitations of human wisdom. And if we are confronted
with insolvable problems in the domain of nature and of human
existence, what of the Divine realm! Who can fathom
the ways of the Almighty? Canst thou by searching find out
God? No indeed. "Clouds and darkness are round about
Him" (Ps. 97:2). If God were not a mystery He would not
be God to us.
But why write in this strain?
Surely the need of our day is for that which will strengthen
faith, not that which paralyzes it. True; but what is faith?
we mean faith in the abstract. Faith is, essentially, an
attitude rather than an act: it is that which lies behind the
act. Faith is an attitude of dependency, of recognized
weakness. Faith is a coming to the end of ourselves and
looking outside of ourselves - away from ourselves.
Faith is that which gives God His proper place.
And if we give God His proper place, we must take our proper
place, and that is in the dust. And what is there that will
bring the haughty, self-sufficient creature into the dust so
quickly as a sight of the Godhead of God! Nothing is so
humbling to the human heart as a true recognition of the
absolute sovereignty of God. So then, instead of seeking to
weaken faith, we write to promote and strengthen it. The
chief trouble is that so much that passes for faith today is
really only maudlin sentimentality. The faith of Christendom
in this twentieth century is mere credulity, and the
"god" of many of our churches is not the Father of
our Lord Jesus Christ, but a mere figment of the imagination.
Modern theology has invented a "god" which the
infinite mind can understand, whose ways are pleasing to the
natural man, a "god" who is altogether "such a
one as" (Ps. 50:21) those who profess to worship him, a
"god" concerning whom there is little or no
mystery. But how different the God which the Holy Scriptures
reveal! Of Him it is said, His ways are "past
finding out" (Rom. 11:33). To particularize:
1. The "god" of the
moderns is altogether lacking in power. The popular
idea of today is that deity is filled with amiable intentions
but that Satan is preventing the making good of them.
It is not God's will, so we are told, that there should
be any wars, for wars are something which men are unable to
reconcile with their ideas of Divine mercy. Hence, the
conclusion is, that all wars are of the Devil. Plagues and
earthquakes, famines and tornadoes, are not sent from God,
but are attributed solely to natural causes. To affirm
that the Lord God sent the recent Influenza epidemic as a
judgment scourge, would be to shock the sensibilities of the
modern mind. All such things as this are a cause of
grief to "god" for "he" desires
nought but the happiness of everybody.
2. The "god" of the
moderns is altogether lacking in wisdom. The popular
belief is that God loves everybody, and that it is His will
that every child of Adam should be saved. But if this be
true, He is strongly lacking in wisdom, for He knows quite
well that under existing conditions the majority will be
lost. If He is really desirous that every creature should
have an equal chance to be saved, then why suffer so many to
be born into families (of criminal parents, for example) and
be brought up under conditions where they will never hear the
Gospel - and there are many thousands such in this country.
If it should be said in reply God has not created these
criminal conditions, the point is readily ceded, but
nevertheless God is responsible for sending children into
them, for the fruit of the womb is solely in His hands. Why
not produce sterility among criminals, if it is contrary to
His will for children to be born into such conditions,
conditions which frequently preclude all reading of the
Scriptures and all hearing the Gospel.
3. The "god" of the
moderns is lacking in holiness. That crime
deserves punishment is still allowed in part, though more and
more the belief is gaining ground that the criminal is really
an object of pity rather than censure, and that he stands in
need of education and reformation rather than of punishment.
But that SIN - sins of thought as well as deed, sins of the
heart as well as life, sins of omission as well as
commission, the sinful root itself as well as the fruit -
should be hated by God, that His body nature burns
against it, is a concept that has gone almost entirely out of
fashion; and that the sinner himself is hated by God
is indignantly denied even among those who boast most loudly
of their orthodoxy.
4. The "god" of the
moderns is altogether lacking in a sovereign
prerogative. Whatever rights the deity of
present-day Christendom may be supposed to possess in theory,
in fact they must be subordinated to the
"rights" of the creature. It is denied, almost
universally, that the rights of the Creator over His
creatures is that of the Potter over the clay. When it is
affirmed that God has the right to make one as a vessel unto
honor, and another as a vessel unto dishonor, the cry of
injustice is instantly raised. When it is affirmed that
salvation is a gift and that this gift is bestowed on
whom God pleases, it is said He is partial and unfair.
If God has any gifts to impart, He must distribute them
evenly, or else bestow them on those that merit them,
whoever they may be. And thus God is allowed less freedom
than I, who may disburse my charity as I best please, giving
to one beggar a quarter, to another a dime, and to a third
nothing at all if I think well.
How different is the God of
the Bible from the "god" of the moderns!! The God
of Scripture is all-mighty. He is one who speaks and
it is done, who commands and it stands fast. He is the One
with whom "all things are possible" and "who
worketh all things after the counsel of His own
will" (Eph. 1:11). He is the One "who hath
measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and meted out
heaven with the span, and comprehended the dust of the earth
in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the
hills in a balance" (Is. 40:12). He is the One with whom
"the nations are as a drop of a bucket, and are counted
as the small dust of the balance," with Whom "all
nations before Him are as nothing and they are counted to Him
less than nothing, and vanity" (Is. 40:15,17). He is One
that "sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the
inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that spreadeth them
out as a tent to dwell in; that bringeth the princes to
nothing; He maketh the judges of the earth as vanity"
(Is. 40:22,23). He is the One who declares, "Thus saith
the Lord, thy Redeemer, and He that formed thee from the
womb, I am the Lord that maketh all things; that stretched
forth the heavens alone; that spreadeth abroad the earth by
Myself. That frustrateth the tokens of the liars, and maketh
diviners mad; that turneth wise men backward, and maketh
their knowledge foolish. That confirmeth the word of His
servant, and performeth the counsel of His messengers; that
saith to Jerusalem, Thou shalt be inhabited; and to the
cities of Judah, Ye shall be built, and I will raise up the
decayed places thereof. That saith to the deep, Be dry, and I
will dry up thy rivers: That saith of Cyrus (a heathen
idolater) he is My shepherd, and shall perform all My
pleasure" (Is. 44:24-28). Such is the God of the
Bible, the God who throws out the challenge, "To whom
then will ye liken God, or what likeness will ye compare unto
Him?" (Is. 40:18). And as though that were not enough,
in the same chapter He asks again, "To whom then will ye
liken Me, or shall I be equal? saith the Holy One. Lift up
your eyes on high and behold who hath created these things,
that bringeth out their host by number: He calleth them all
by names by the greatness of His might, for that He is strong
in power, not one faileth...Hast thou not known? has thou not
heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the
ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary?" (Is.
40:25,26,28).
The God of Scripture is
infinite in wisdom. No secret can be hidden from Him, no
problem can baffle Him, nothing is too hard for Him. God is
omniscient - "Great is our Lord, and of great
power: His understanding is infinite" (Ps.
147:5). Therefore is it said, "There is no searching of
His understanding" (Is. 40:28). Hence it is, that in a
revelation from Him we expect to find truths which transcend
the reach of the creature's mind, and therefore the
presumptuous folly and wickedness of those who are but
"dust and ashes" undertaking to pronounce upon the
reasonableness or unreasonableness of doctrines which are
above their reason, and of speculating upon things that
are a matter of pure revelation. Instead of coming to the
Scriptures to be taught thereof, men first fill their minds
with objections, and then instead of interpreting the
Divine Oracles according to their obvious meaning, they
submit and twist them according to the dictates of their own
finite reason. Surely if we are unable to comprehend
the mode of God's existence, because it is infinitely
above us, then for the same reason we are unable to
comprehend the counsels of infinite wisdom. Such is
the explicit assertion of Holy Writ itself - "The
natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of
God; for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he
know them, because they are spiritually discerned" (1
Cor. 2:14).
The God of Scripture is
infinite in Holiness. The "only true God" is
He who hates sin with a perfect abhorrence and whose nature
eternally burns against it. He is the One who beheld the
wickedness of the antediluvians and who opened the windows of
Heaven and poured down the flood of His righteous
indignation. He is the One who rained fire and brimstone upon
Sodom and Gomorrah and utterly destroyed these cities of the
plain. He is the One who sent the plagues upon Egypt, and
destroyed her haughty monarch together with his hosts at the
Red Sea. He is the One who caused the earth to open its mouth
and swallow alive Korah and his rebellious company. Yes, He
is the One who "spared not His own Son" when He was
"made sin for us...that we might be made the
righteousness of God in Him." So holy is God and such is
the antagonism of His nature against evil, that for one sin
He banished our first parents from Eden; for one sin He
cursed the posterity of Ham; for one sin He turned Lot's
wife into a pillar of salt; for one sin He sent out fire and
devoured the sons of Aaron; for one sin Moses died in the
wilderness; for one sin Achan and his family were all stoned
to death; for one sin the servant of Elisha was smitten with
leprosy. Behold therefore, not only the goodness, but also
"the severity of God" (Rom. 11:22). And this
is the God that every Christ-rejector has yet to meet in
judgment!
The God of Scripture has a
will that is irresistible. Man talks and boasts of
his will, but God also has a will! Men had a will on
the plains of Shinar and undertook to build a tower whose top
should reach unto heaven; but what came of it? God had a
will, too, and their willful effort came to naught.
Pharaoh had a will when he hardened his heart and refused to
allow Jehovah's people to go into the wilderness and
there worship Him, but what came of it? God had a will, too,
and being Almighty His will was performed. Balak had a
will when he hired Balaam to come and curse the Hebrews; but
of what avail was it? The Canaanites had a will when they
determined to prevent Israel occupying the promised land; but
how far did they succeed? Saul had a will when he hurled his
javelin at David, but instead of slaying the Lord's
anointed, it entered the wall instead. Jonah had a will when
he refused to go and preach to the Ninevites; but what came
of it? Nebuchadnezzar had a will when he thought to destroy
the three Hebrews; but God had a will too, and so the fire
did not harm them. Herod had a will when he purposed to slay
the Child Jesus, and had there been no living and reigning
God, his evil desires had been effected; but in daring to pit
his puny will against the irresistible will of the Almighty,
his efforts came to naught. Yes, my reader, and you
had a will when you formed your plans without first seeking
counsel of the Lord, and therefore did He overthrow
them. As well might a worm seek to resist the tread of an
elephant; as well might a babe step between the railroad
tracks and attempt to push back the express train; as well
might a child seek to prevent the ocean from rolling, as for
a creature to try and resist the outworking of the purpose of
the Lord God - "O Lord God of our fathers, art not Thou
God in heaven? and rulest not Thou over all the kingdoms of
the heathen? and in Thine hand is there not power and might,
so that none is able to withstand thee?" (2 Chron.
20:6).
The God of Scripture is
absolute Sovereign. Such is His own claim: "This is
the purpose that is purposed upon the whole earth: and this
is the hand that is stretched out upon all the nations. For
the Lord of hosts hast purposed, and who shall disannul
it? and His hand is stretched out, and who shall turn it
back?" (Is. 14:26,27). The Sovereignty of God is
absolute and irresistible: "All the inhabitants of the
earth are reputed as nothing: and He doeth according to His
will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the
earth: and none can stay His hand, or say unto Him,
What doest Thou?" (Dan. 4:35). The Sovereignty of God is
true not only hypothetically, but in fact. That is to say,
God exercises His sovereignty, exercises it both in
the natural realm, and in the spiritual. One is born black,
another white. One is born in wealth, another in poverty. One
is born with a healthy body, another sickly and crippled. One
is cut off in childhood, another lives to old age. One is
endowed with five talents, another with but one. And in all
these cases it is God the Creator who maketh one to differ
from another, and "none can stay His hand." So also
is it in the spiritual realm. One is born in a pious home and
is brought up in the fear and abomination of the Lord;
another is born of criminal parents and is reared in vice.
One is the object of many prayers, the other is not prayed
for at all. One hears the Gospel from early childhood,
another never hears it. One sits under a Scriptural ministry,
another hears nothing but error and heresy. Of those who do
hear the Gospel, one has his heart opened by the Lord to
receive the truth, while another is left to himself. One is
"ordained to eternal life" (Acts 13:48), while
another is "ordained to condemnation (Jude 4). To whom
He will God shows mercy, and whom he wills He
"hardens" (Rom. 9:18). To particularize:
With whom took He counsel in
creation? Whom did He consult when He determined the
various and manifold arrangements, adjustments,
adaptations, relationships, equipments of His myriad
creatures? Did He not do everything after the counsel of
His own will? Did He not decide that birds should
fly in the air, beasts roam the earth, and fishes live in
the sea? Did He not decide there should be one vast
gradation among the creatures of His hand, instead of
making everything equal and uniform? Did He not determine
to make a revolving world on the one hand, and a floating
atom on the other? Did He not determine to create the
exalted seraphim to stand before His throne throughout
endless ages, and also to make another creature which dies
the same hour it is born?" Was He not undisputed
Sovereign in all His creative acts? Yea, verily, for the
Three Persons of the Godhead were all alone in their
solitary majesty. Why should God take counsel? Could
man add to His knowledge, or correct His errors? God
sovereignly assigned His myriad creatures their various
habitations, members, movements, as it pleased Him. God
never consulted man about a single member of His body, or
about its size, color, or capacity; instead, "God set
the members everyone of them in the body, as it hath
pleased Him" (1 Cor. 12:18). Man is as truly the
product of Sovereign creation as any other of God's
creatures - sovereign, we say, not arbitrary.
God not only created
everything, but everything which He created is subject to
His immediate control. God rules over the works of
His hands. God governs the creatures He has made.
God reigns with universal dominion. When He
pleased, the sun and moon stood still (Josh. 10:12,13); and
at a word from Him the sun went backward ten degrees
on the dial of Ahaz (Is. 38:8). At His command the Red Sea
ceased to flow, and at His command it resumed its normal
course (Ex. 14). In response to the prayer of Elisha, He
made iron to float on the top of the water (2 Kings 6:5).
Yes, when He pleases, He reverses the order of
nature, as when the fires of Nebuchadnezzar's furnace
burnt not, as when the hungry lions touched not Daniel, as
when the ravens, which are birds of prey, were made to
minister of Elijah. At a word from Him who made it, a fish
carried a coin to Peter, a tree withers suddenly (Matt.
21:4), the raging tempest becomes a calm.
So it is also with men;
they, too, are ruled by God; ruled by and unseen Hand;
often, unknown to themselves. Little did
they know it, yet nevertheless, the sons of Jacob were
but performing the pleasure of Jehovah when they sold
Joseph into the hands of the Ishmaelites who carried him
down into Egypt. Little was she aware of it, but when
Pharaoh's daughter went to the Nile to bathe, she was
being directed by God, directed there to rescue from the
waters the babe Moses. Little did he know it, but in
issuing the decree that all the world should be taxed (Luke
2:1) Caesar Augustus was but setting in motion a movement
which caused the word and decree of God to be fulfilled.
Yes, even "The King's heart is in the hand
of the Lord, as the rivers of water: He turneth it
whithersoever He will" (Pro. 21:1). And so it is with
Satan himself. He, too, is the (unwitting and unwilling)
servant of God. He could not touch Job without first
gaining Divine permission. He could not sift the apostles
till he gained consent from Christ. At a word from the Lord
Jesus Satan "left" Him (Matt. 4:10,11). Of him,
also, God has said, Thus far shalt thou go and no
farther.
Even death, the
"king of terrors," that which no arts of man can
defy, is absolutely subject to the bidding of the Lord. In
his sermon on Ps. 68:20,21 - "unto God the Lord belong
the issues from death" - the late C. H. Spurgeon well
said, "The prerogative of life or death belongs to God
in a wide range of senses. First of all as to natural life,
we are all dependent upon His good pleasure. We shall not
die until the time which He appoints: for our death-time,
like all our time, is in His hands. Our skirts may brush
away the portals of the sepulchre, and yet we shall pass
the iron gate unharmed if the Lord be our guard. The wolves
of disease will hurt us in vain until God shall permit them
to overtake us. The most desperate enemies may waylay us,
but no bullet shall find its billet in any heart unless the
Lord allows it. Our life does not even depend upon the care
of angels, nor can our death be compassed by the malice of
devils. We are immortal till our work is done, immortal
till the immortal King shall call us home to the land where
we shall be immortal in a still higher sense. When we are
most sick, we need not despair of recovery, since the
issues from death are in Almighty hands. "The Lord
killeth and maketh alive: He bringeth down to the grave and
bringeth up!" When we have passed beyond the skill of
the physician we have not passed beyond the succour of our
God, to whom belong the issues from death."
What part or lot did man
have in the composition of the Bible? None whatever. Its
very words are the words of God. "All Scripture is
given by inspiration of God." No part of it was of
human origination, "for the prophecy came not at any
time by the will of man" (2 Pet. 1:21). Did not holy
men of God speak "moved by the Holy Spirit"? And
how did they then record what the Holy Spirit communicated
to them - in words of man's selecting? Nay verily,
"not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but
which the Holy Spirit teacheth" (1 Cor. 2:13). Balaam
longed to speak otherwise than he did; but he could not.
Caiaphas prophesied "not of himself" (John
11:51). Pilate was asked to make a change in the one
sentence which God moved him to write, but he declared
"What I have written I have written" (John
19:22). God acted sovereignly in the writing of the
Scriptures as in everything else. The very words were
chosen by Him; and did He not sovereignly choose?
Did He take counsel with either angels or men as to the
words He should select for the communicating of His
thoughts? No indeed.
God's absolute and
irresistible proprietorship has been and is being displayed
in the spiritual realm as manifestly as in the
natural. Isaac is blessed, but Ishmael is cursed. Jacob is
loved, but Esau is hated. Israel becomes God's favored
people, while all other nations are suffered to remain in
idolatry. Jesse's seven sons were all passed by, and
David the shepherd-boy was found to be the one after
God's own heart. The Saviour took on Him the "seed
of Abraham" (Heb. 2:16), not the seed of Adam. His
ministry was not worldward, but confined to the people
chosen of God. The proud Pharisees were rejected, while
publicans and harlots were sweetly compelled by sovereign
grace to sit down at the Gospel feast. The rich young
ruler, who from his youth up, had kept the commandments,
was allowed to go away from Christ "sorrowing,"
even though he had sought Him with real earnestness and
humility, while the fallen Samaritan woman (John 4) who
sought Him not is made to rejoice in the forgiveness of her
sins. Two thieves hung by Christ on the cross; they were
equally guilty, equally needy, equally near to Him. One of
them is moved to cry: "Lord, remember me" and is
taken to Paradise, while the other is suffered to die in
his sins and sink down into a hopeless eternity. Many are
called, but few are chosen.
Yes, Salvation is God's
sovereign work. "God does not save a man
because he is a sinner, for if so He must save all men, for
all are sinners. Nor because he comes to Christ, for `no
man can come except the Father draw him;' nor because
he repents, for `God gives repentance unto life;' nor
because he believes,' for no one can believe `except it
were given him from above;' nor yet because he holds
out faithful to the end, for `we are kept by the power of
God.' It is not because of baptism, for many are saved
without it, and many are lost with it. It is not because of
regeneration, for that would make the new birth a practical
duty. It is not because of morality, for the moralist is
the hardeth to reach, and many of the most immoral are
saved - the ground of distinguishing grace is the
Sovereignty of God: `Even so Father, for so it seemed good
in Thy sight'" (J. B. Moody).
But is God partial?
We answer, Has He not a right to be? Again we quote
from Mr. Spurgeon's sermon "The Royal
Prerogative" -"Spiritually, too, this prerogative
is with God. We are by nature under the condemnation of the
law on account of our sins, and we are like criminals
tried, convicted, sentenced, and left for death. It is for
God, as the great Judge, to see the sentence executed, or
to issue a free pardon, according as He pleases; and
He will have us know that it is upon His supreme
pleasure that this matter depends. Over the head of a
universe of sinners, I hear this sentence thundering.
"I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I
will have compassion on whom I will have compassion."
Shut up for death, as men are by reason of their sins, it
rests with God to pardon whom He may reserve: none have any
claim to His favour, and it must be exercised upon mere
prerogative, because He is the Lord God, merciful and
gracious, and delighteth to pass by transgression and
sin." How far away have the present-day admirers of
Spurgeon departed from the teaching of this prince of
preachers: Mark carefully the next sentences: "Our
text, however, puts the prerogative upon the one sole
ground of Lordship, and we prefer to come back to
that. `Unto God the Lord belong the issues from
death.' It is a doctrine which is very unpalatable in
these days (it always has been. - A.W.P.), but one
nevertheless which is to be held and taught, that God is
an absolute Sovereign, and doeth as He wills. The words
of Paul may not be suffered to sleep, - "Nay, but O
man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the
thing formed say to Him that formed it, why hast Thou made
me thus?" The Lord cannot do amiss, His perfect nature
is a law unto itself. In his case Rex is Lex, the King is
the Law."
Is God partial? Certainly He
is. And has He not the right to be? Shall He not dispense
His favours as He wills, and bestow His gifts on whom He
pleases? But it is reasonable to suppose that God who is
Love has created millions of creatures to be lost? seeing
that His elect constitute but a "remnant." a
"few," in comparison with the great multitudes
who die unsaved? We reply, it is not a question of
reason but of revelation. There are many things
revealed in Scripture which are contrary to reason.
Is it reasonable to think that God would give His
only begotten Son to die for sinners? Ah, reason is ruled
out entirely here. And so in many other things. If it lay
within the power of the reader, would you suffer your worst
enemy to be eternally tormented? And if you are honest, you
will promptly answer, No! But God will deal thus with His
enemies, and the sentence will be a righteous one,
whether we can now discern its justice or not, for the
Judge of all the earth will do right. How far
asunder then is carnal reasoning from the teaching of Holy
Writ concerning Eternal Punishment! Once more: would the
reader "laugh at" and "mock" his worst
enemy if that enemy was being severely punished before him
and was entirely helpless to deliver himself from that
punishment? Yet Scripture explicitly declares that God
will "laugh" at the calamity of His
enemies and "mock" when their fear cometh (see
Ps. 2:4; Prov. 1:26). Can your reason harmonize this with
your knowledge of God? And again we say, If you are honest
you must reply, No! Then why prate so loudly and blatantly
about the unreasonableness of Reprobation and of God's
absolute Sovereignty in salvation? Once more: here is
Satan, the age-long enemy of God and many, the one who has
wrought incalculable evil, securely imprisoned at last in
the bottomless pit. There he remains chained for a thousand
years. Now would you, my reader, suggest for a moment that
the Devil be released from that prison after the earth had
been freed for a thousand years from his vile presence?
Certainly you would not, and yet this is precisely what
Divine revelation declares shall come to pass. The
Scriptures of Truth make known how that God will cause the
Serpent to be "loosed" for a little season, that
God will suffer this even though He knows beforehand that
the consequences will be the most dreadful revolt on the
part of men, under Satan, revolt against God, which this
earth has ever witnessed. Truly God's ways are
different, very different from ours. Learn then the utter
folly of man attempting to pronounce upon the
reasonableness or unreasonableness of the doings and
dealings of the Most High God. And now a few words by way
of exhortation and we must conclude.
One of the most flagrant
sins of this age is irreverence. By irreverence I am not
now thinking of open blasphemy, or the taking of God's
name in vain. Irreverence is, also, failure to ascribe the
glory which is due the great and dreadful majesty of the
Almighty. It is the limiting of His power and actions by
our degrading conceptions: it is the bringing of the Lord
God down to our level. There are multitudes of those
who do not profess to be Christians who deny that God is
the omnipotent Creator, and there are multitudes of
professing Christians who deny that God is absolute
Sovereign. Men boast of their free will, prate of
their power, and are proud of their achievements. They know
not that their lives are at the sovereign disposal of the
Divine Despot. They know not that they have no more power
to thwart His secret counsel than a worm has to resist the
tread of an elephant. They know not that God is the Potter,
and they the clay.
Ah, my reader, this is the
first great lesson we have to learn: that God is the
Creator, we the creature; that He is the Potter, we the
clay. This is the harvest of all life's lessons, and
when we think we have learnt them, we soon discover
that we have need to re-learn them. God is God and has the
right to dispose of me as He sees fit. It is for Him
to say where I shall live - whether in America or
Africa. It is for Him to say under what
circumstances I shall live - whether amid riches or
poverty, whether in health or in sickness. It is for Him to
say how long I shall live - whether I shall be cut
down in youth, like the flower of the field, or whether I
shall live unto old age. Yes, and it is for Him to say
where I shall spend eternity.
The first sin of man was the
refusal to be clay in the Potter's hand; Adam wanted to
be something more - "Ye shall be as God's
was the bait which the Tempter used to hurl him to his
destruction.
One of the profoundest
mysteries of the Incarnation is that "the mighty
God" descended from highest heaven and took upon Him
the nature of the creature and came down here to show us
how to wear it. That which differentiated the Life of
Christ from all other lives, was His absolute and joyous
submission to the Father's will - "My meat is to
do the will of Him that sent Me" struck the keynote of
the thirty-three years that He tabernacled among men. Have
you profited by the example left us by the Beloved
of the Father? Has Divine grace shown you how to wear your
creature nature? Only if you live not in self-assertion,
but in self-renunciation. Only if in the school of Christ
you have been taught to say, "Not my will, but Thine
be done." O may Divine grace so subdue our rebellious
hearts that more and more we can say:
"I
bow me to Thy will, O God,
And
all Thy ways adore!
And
every day I live I'd seek
To
please Thee more and more.
Thy
will, the good, the blessed rule
Of
Jesus' toil and tears:
Thy
will the passion of His heart
Those
three and thirty years.
I
love to kiss each print where Christ
Did
set His pilgrim feet:
Nor
can I fear that blessed path,
Whose
traces are so sweet.
When
obstacles and trials seem
Like
prison walls to be,
I
do the little I can do,
And
leave the rest to Thee.
I
know not what it is to doubt,
My
heart is ever gay;
I
run no risk, for, come what will,
Thou
always hast Thy way."