Sovereignty of God

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I am fast approaching two major milestones. First, I will shortly celebrate my seventieth birthday and three weeks later, our church will celebrate its forty-fifth anniversary. Since, in God’s good providence, I have pastored the church from the beginning, the church’s milestone is also the completion of my forty-five years as pastor of Beacon Baptist Church. Both of these celebrations are remarkable tokens of God’s kindness. I frankly did not expect to reach either one, but unless something unexpected intervenes, I will soon be looking at these milestones in the rear view mirror of life.

I enjoy playing vintage hymns with my concertina. It is a pleasure to hear songs that, in some cases, I haven’t sung in decades, hymns you may never have heard, like, “Let the Lower Lights Be Burning,” “The Old Fashioned Way,” and “He the Pearly Gates Will Open.”

But there is one hymn with a few lyrics that trouble me, namely, “It Is No Secret What God Can Do.” Although the premise of the hymn is fine (God’s work is renown), one statement ruins it for me: “what He’s done for others, He’ll do for you.”

Reposted from Analogical Thoughts, with permission. Read Part 1.

Reposted from Analogical Thoughts, with permission.

One simple premise undergirds the ideas that either humanity has free volition or that God is sovereign, and that ultimately the two concepts are mutually exclusive. That premise is the hinge upon which the argument turns, favoring either human freedom or Divine sovereignty. Montague Brown illustrates the premise with the following statement:

“The issue of free choice also plays a critical role in that other vexed philosophical puzzle—the problem of evil. For if we do not have free choice, we are not to be blamed or praised for our actions; rather, it is all God’s doing. God becomes responsible for moral evil, either by causing it Himself or by punishing us who are not responsible for it.”¹

We can formalize Brown’s statement as follows:

You recall how the story goes—God and Satan are having a discussion about a man named Job. He was a man of great character whom God had given much wealth and blessing. God commends Job, and Satan accuses Job, betting that Job would deny God if God would simply allow difficulty in Job’s life (1:7-12). God allows Satan to test Job, and Job loses all of his wealth, most of his family, and his health.

Job is, of course, unaware that he is being tested, and is deeply frustrated by his change of fortune. He feels that he has done nothing to deserve these tragedies, and he speaks out—essentially proclaiming his innocence and the unfairness of the situation. Thankfully, Job has three friends who come to the rescue. They all have the same message: this could only be happening to Job if he had done something wrong. They understood that God would not allow such things to happen to an innocent person.

Daniel 9:24-27 is a monumental passage, emblematic of God’s sovereignty over human events. It provides the chronological skeletal system of Biblical prophecy, recording Gabriel’s revelation to Daniel in around 516 B.C., of a 490-year timeline for Israel’s future: “for Jerusalem, to make an end of sin, to make atonement for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy” (9:24). The clock begins its countdown with “a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem” (9:25).

(Read the series so far.)

Almost in the perfect center of the north end of the city of Paris, the hill of Montmartre and its grand white Cathedral of “Sacré-Cœur” (Sacred Heart) seem perched above the city. From the church you are afforded one of the most magnificent views of the “city of lights” that doesn’t require going up in a rickety elevator on an old “erector set” called the Eiffel Tower.

Montmartre is noted for several things, but probably best known for the quarter’s daily working street artists. Gathered near the square due west of the church, these artists sit in front of easels painting either in oils or watercolor, while others around them are sketching, chalking and creating in a host of artistic media.

Though I could not do what they do, I confess that I love to walk around and see artists at work.