The Sovereignty of God

by Arthur W. Pink

The trend of modern theology—if theology it can be called—is ever toward the deification of the creature rather than the glorification of the Creator,

That Satan is to be blamed for much of the evil which is in the world is freely affirmed by those who, though having so much to say about “the responsibility of man,” often deny their own responsibility, by attributing to the devil what, in fact, proceeds from their own evil hearts (Mar 7:21-23).

Unrest, discontent, and lawlessness are rife everywhere, and none can say how soon another great war will be set in motion.

But what does “walking by faith” signify? It means that our thoughts are formed, our actions regulated, our lives molded by the Holy Scriptures, for, “faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God” (Rom 10:17). It is from the Word of Truth, and that alone, that we can learn what is God’s relation to this world.

He must be God in fact as well as in name.

Instead of beginning with man and his world and working back to God, we must begin with God and work down to man—“In the beginning God!”

Because God is holy His anger burns against sin; because God is righteous His judgments fall upon those who rebel against Him; because God is faithful the solemn threatenings of His Word are fulfilled; because God is omnipotent none can successfully resist Him, still less overthrow His counsel; and because God is omniscient no problem can master Him and no difficulty baffle His wisdom.

But so long as we are occupied with any other object than God Himself there will be neither rest for the heart nor peace for the mind. But when we receive all that enters our lives as from His hand, then, no matter what may be our circumstances or surroundings—whether in a hovel, a prison, a dungeon, or a martyr’s stake—we shall be enabled to say, “The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places” (Psa 16:6). But that is the language of faith, not of sight or of sense.

Here is the fundamental difference between the man of faith and the man of unbelief. The unbeliever is “of the world,” judges everything by worldly standards, views life from the standpoint of time and sense, and weighs everything in the balances of his own carnal making. But the man of faith brings in God, looks at everything from His standpoint, estimates values by spiritual standards, and views life in the light of eternity.

we are quite unable to think upon these matters: we are 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, “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 than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts” (Isa 55:8-9). In view of this Scripture, 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.

To say that God the Father has purposed the salvation of all mankind, that God the Son died with the express intention of saving the whole human race, and that God the Holy Spirit is now seeking to win the world to Christ; when, as a matter of common observation, it is apparent that the great majority of our fellowmen are dying in sin, and passing into a hopeless eternity; is to say that God the Father is disappointed, that God the Son is dissatisfied, and that God the Holy Spirit is defeated.

To argue that God is “trying His best” to save all mankind, but that the majority of men will not let Him save them, is to insist that the will of the Creator is impotent, and that the will of the creature is omnipotent. To throw the blame, as many do, upon the devil, does not remove the difficulty, for if Satan is defeating the purpose of God, then, Satan is almighty and God is no longer the Supreme Being.

Two alternatives confront us, and between them we are obliged to choose: either God governs, or He is governed; either God rules, or He is ruled; either God has His way, or men have theirs.

Each of the three persons in the blessed Trinity is concerned with our salvation: with the Father it is predestination; with the Son propitiation; with the Spirit regeneration. The Father chose us; the Son died for us; the Spirit quickens us. The Father was concerned about us; the Son shed His blood for us, the Spirit performs His work within us. What the One did was eternal, what the Other did was external, what the Spirit does is internal.

We read in verse 2, “And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep.” The original Hebrew here might be literally rendered thus: “And the earth had become a desolate ruin, and darkness was upon the face of the deep.” In “the beginning” the earth was not created in the condition described in verse 2. Between the first two verses of Genesis 1 some awful catastrophe had occurred—possibly the fall of Satan—and, as the consequence, the earth had been blasted and blighted, and had become a “desolate ruin,” lying beneath a pall of “darkness.”

The trouble is that, nowadays, there are so many who receive the testimony of God only so far as they can satisfactorily account for all the reasons and grounds of His conduct, which means they will accept nothing but that which can be measured in the petty scales of their own limited capacities.

Now all will acknowledge that from the foundation of the world God certainly foreknew and foresaw who would and who would not receive Christ as their Saviour, therefore in giving being and birth to those He knew would reject Christ, He necessarily created them unto damnation.

Our business is not to reason about it, but to bow to Holy Scripture. Our first duty is not to understand, but to believe what God has said.

In the nature of things there cannot be anything known as what shall be unless it is certain to be, and there is nothing certain to be unless God has ordained it shall be.

The hundreds of prophecies which are found in the Old and New Testaments are not so much predictions of what will come to pass, as they are revelations to us of what God has purposed shall come to pass.

The redemption of sinners by Christ was no mere after-thought of God: it was no expediency to meet an un-looked-for calamity. No; it was a divine provision, and therefore when man fell he found mercy walking hand in hand with justice.

If then a man does “follow after” that which by nature he cordially dislikes, if he does now love the One he once hated, it is because a miraculous change has taken place within him; a power outside of himself has operated upon him, a nature entirely different from his old one has been imparted to him, and hence it is written, “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creation: old things are passed away; behold all things are become new” (2Co 5:17).

The new birth is very, very much more than simply shedding a few tears due to a temporary remorse over sin. It is far more than changing our course of life, the leaving off of bad habits and the substituting of good ones. It is something different from the mere cherishing and practising of noble ideals. It goes infinitely deeper than coming forward to take some popular evangelist by the hand, signing a pledge-card, or “joining the church.” The new birth is no mere turning over a new leaf, but is the inception and reception of a new life. It is no mere reformation, but a complete transformation. In short, the new birth is a miracle, the result of the supernatural operation of God. It is radical, revolutionary, lasting.

we can no more “persevere” without God preserving us than we can breathe when God ceases to give us breath; we are “kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (1Pe 1:5).

The will is not causative, because, as we have said, something causes it to choose, therefore that something must be the causative agent. Choice itself is affected by certain considerations, is determined by various influences brought to bear upon the individual himself, hence, volition is the effect of these considerations and influences, and if the effect, it must be their servant; and if the will is their servant then it is not sovereign, and if the will is not sovereign, we certainly cannot predicate absolute “freedom” of it.

I hold in my hand a book. I release it; what happens? It falls. In which direction? Downwards; always downwards. Why? Because, answering the law of gravity, its own weight sinks it. Suppose I desire that book to occupy a position three feet higher; then what? I must lift it; a power outside of that book must raise it. Such is the relationship which fallen man sustains toward God. Whilst divine power up-holds him he is preserved from plunging still deeper into sin; let that power be withdrawn and he falls—his own weight (of sin) drags him down. God does not push him down anymore than I did that book. Let all divine restraint be removed and every man is capable of becoming, would become, a Cain, a Pharaoh, a Judas. How then is the sinner to move heavenward? By an act of his own will? Not so. A power outside of himself must grasp hold of him and lift him every inch of the way. The sinner is free, but free in one direction only—free to fall, free to sin. As the Word expresses it: “For when ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness” (Rom 6:20). The sinner is free to do as he pleases, always as he pleases (except as he is restrained by God), but his pleasure is to sin.

Christ came here not to help those who were willing to help themselves, but to do for His people what they were incapable of doing for themselves:

True liberty is not the power to live as we please, but to live as we ought!

Let it be emphatically said that God does not produce the sinful dispositions of any of His creatures, though He does restrain and direct them to the accomplishing of His own purposes. Hence He is neither the author nor the approver of sin.

God’s decrees are not the necessitating cause of the sins of men but the fore-determined and prescribed boundings and directings of men’s sinful acts. In connection with the betrayal of Christ, God did not decree that He should be sold by one of His creatures and then take up a good man, instill an evil desire into his heart and thus force him to perform the terrible deed in order to execute His decree. No; not so do the Scriptures represent it. Instead, God decreed the act and selected the one who was to perform the act, but He did not make him evil in order that he should perform the deed; on the contrary, the betrayer was a “devil” at the time the Lord Jesus chose him as one of the twelve (Joh 6:70), and in the exercise and manifestation of his own deviltry God simply directed his actions, actions which were perfectly agreeable to his own vile heart, and performed with the most wicked intentions. Thus it was with the crucifixion.

God has been pleased to give to men the Holy Scriptures which “testify” of the Saviour, and make known the way of salvation. Every sinner has the same natural faculties for the reading of the Bible as he has for the reading of the newspaper; and if he is illiterate or blind so that he is unable to read he has the same mouth with which to ask a friend to read the Bible to him, as he has to enquire concerning other matters. If, then, God has given to men His Word, and in that Word has made known the way of salvation, and if men are commanded to search those Scriptures which are able to make them wise unto salvation, and they refuse to do so, then it is plain that they are justly censureable, that their blood lies on their own heads, and that God can righteously cast them into the Lake of Fire.

Happy the soul that has been awed by a view of God’s majesty, that has had a vision of God’s awful greatness, His ineffable holiness, His perfect righteousness, His irresistible power, His sovereign grace.

Irreverence begets disobedience.

It is natural to murmur against afflictions and losses. It is natural to complain when we are deprived of those thing upon which we had set our hearts. We are apt to regard our possessions as ours unconditionally. We feel that when we have prosecuted our plans with prudence and diligence, that we are entitled to success; that when by dint of hard work we have accumulated a “competence,” we deserve to keep and enjoy it; that when we are surrounded by a happy family no power may lawfully enter the charmed circle and strike down a loved one; and if in any of these cases disappointment, bankruptcy, death, actually comes, the perverted instinct of the human heart is to cry out against God. But in the one who, by grace, has recognized God’s sovereignty, such murmuring is silenced, and instead, there is a bowing to the divine will and an acknowledgment that He has not afflicted us as sorely as we deserve.

Because God is infinitely wise He cannot err, and because He is infinitely righteous He will not do wrong. Here then is the preciousness of this truth. The mere fact itself that God’s will is irresistible and irreversible, fills me with fear, but once I realize that God wills only that which is good my heart is made to rejoice.

the recognition of the sovereignty of God, and the realization that the sovereign Himself is my Father, ought to overwhelm the heart and cause me to bow before Him in adoring worship.

Some two hundred years ago the saintly Madam Guyon, after ten years spent in a dungeon lying far below the surface of the ground, lit only by a candle at meal-times, wrote these words: “A little bird I am, Shut from the fields of air; Yet in my cage I sit and sing To Him who placed me there; Well pleased a prisoner to be, Because, my God, it pleases Thee. Nought have I else to do I sing the whole day long; And He whom most I love to please, Doth listen to my song; He caught and bound my wandering wing But still He bends to hear me sing. My cage confines me round; Abroad I cannot fly; But though my wing is closely bound, My heart’s at liberty, My prison walls cannot control The flight, the freedom of the soul. Ah! it is good to soar These bolts and bar above, To Him whose purpose I adore, Whose Providence I love; And in Thy mighty will to find The joy, the freedom of the mind.”

The fact is, the love of God is a truth for the saints only, and to present it to the enemies of God is to take the children’s bread and cast it to the dogs. With the exception of John 3:16, not once in the four Gospels do we read of the Lord Jesus, the perfect teacher, telling sinners that God loved them! In the book of Acts, which records the evangelistic labors and messages of the apostles, God’s love is never referred to at all! But when we come to the epistles, which are addressed to the saints, we have a full presentation of this precious truth—God’s love for His own.

Just as the sinner’s despair of any help from himself is the first prerequisite of a sound conversion, so the loss of all confidence in himself is the first essential in the believer’s growth in grace; and just as the sinner despairing of help from himself will cast him into the arms of sovereign mercy, so the Christian, conscious of his own frailty, will turn unto the Lord for power. It is when we are weak we are strong (2Co 12:10): that is to say, there must be consciousness of our weakness before we shall turn to the Lord for help.

The secret of development of Christian character is the realization of our own powerlessness, acknowledged powerlessness, and the consequent turning unto the Lord for help.

God gives commands we cannot perform, that we may know what we ought to request from Him.”