The Attributes of God

by Arthur W. Pink

There was nothing, no one, but God; and that, not for a day, a year, or an age, but “from everlasting.” During eternity past, God was alone: self-contained, self-sufficient, self-satisfied; in need of nothing. Had a universe, had angels, had human beings been necessary to Him in any way, they also had been called into existence from all eternity. The creating of them when He did, added nothing to God essentially. He changes not (Mal 3:6), therefore His essential glory can be neither augmented nor diminished.

God was under no constraint, no obligation, no necessity to create.

The force of this is, it is impossible to bring the Almighty under obligations to the creature; God gains nothing from us.

our obedience has profited God nothing.

Nay, we go further; our Lord Jesus Christ added nothing to God in His essential being and glory, either by what He did or suffered. True, blessedly and gloriously true, He manifested the glory of God to us, but He added naught to God.

Yet had God so pleased He might have continued alone for all eternity, without making known His glory unto creatures. Whether He should do so or not was determined solely by His own will.

How vastly different is the God of Scripture from the “god” of the average pulpit!

He sustains all, but is Himself independent of all. He gives to all, but is enriched by none.

Such a God cannot be found out by searching. He can be known only as He is revealed to the heart by the Holy Spirit through the Word.

The so-called argument from design by well-meaning “Apologists” has, we believe, done much more harm than good, for it has attempted to bring down the great God to the level of finite comprehension, and thereby has lost sight of His solitary excellence.

The God of Scripture can only be known by those to whom He makes Himself known.

But fallen man is not spiritual; he is carnal. He is dead to all that is spiritual.

Carnality is the opposite of spirituality.

The Holy Spirit has to shine in our hearts (not intellects) in order to give us “the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ”

The decree of god is his purpose or determination with respect to future things. We have used the singular number as Scripture does (Rom 8:28; Eph 3:11), because there was only one act of His infinite mind about future things.

“Known unto God are all His works from the beginning of the world” (Acts 15:18).

He had one will and one decree to carry out that will.

When a man’s will is the rule of his conduct, it is usually capricious and unreasonable; but wisdom is always associated with “will” in the divine proceedings, and accordingly, God’s decrees are said to be “the counsel of His own will” (Eph 1:11).

The decrees of God relate to all future things without exception: whatever is done in time was foreordained before time began.

Nothing takes place that God did not ordain to happen in eternity past.

Sin could not proceed from a holy God by positive and direct creation, but only by decretive permission and negative action.

As God works all things after the counsel of His own will, we learn from His works what His counsel is (was), as we judge of an architect’s plan by inspecting the building which was erected under his directions.

He did not merely decree that general laws should be established for the government of the world, but He settled the application of those laws to all particular cases.

First, they are eternal. To suppose any of them to be made in time is to suppose that some new occasion has occurred; some unforeseen event or combination of circumstances has arisen, which has induced the Most High to form a new resolution. This would argue that the knowledge of the Deity is limited, and that He is growing wiser in the progress of time—which would be horrible blasphemy.

Secondly, the decrees of God are wise. Wisdom is shown in the selection of the best possible ends and of the fittest means of accomplishing them.

He who perceives the workings of admirable skill in the parts of a machine which he has an opportunity to examine, is naturally led to believe that the other parts are equally admirable. In like manner we should satisfy our minds as to God’s works when doubts obtrude themselves upon us, and repel any objections that may be suggested by something that we cannot reconcile to our notions of what is good and wise.

We should make sense of what is unclear in our lives in light what has been made clear to us.

God was alone when He made His decrees, and His determinations were influenced by no external cause. He was free to decree or not to decree, and to decree one thing and not another.

There is no higher mind than God's for him to consult.

In every instance where God has decreed an end, He has also decreed every means to that end. The One who decreed the salvation of His elect also decreed to work faith in them (II Thess 2:13).

God will supply us with all we need to accomplish the end he has appointed for us.

And if our thoughts are formed from God’s Word the maintenance of the one will not lead to the denial of the other.

High mysteries are these, yet faith receives them unquestioningly.

Whether God has decreed all things that ever come to pass or not, all that own the being of a God, own that He knows all things beforehand. Now, it is self-evident that if He knows all things beforehand, He either doth approve of them or doth not approve of them; that is, He either is willing they should be, or He is not willing they should be. But to will that they should be is to decree them (Jonathan Edwards).

O my reader, how thankful should we be that everything is determined by infinite wisdom and goodness! What praise and gratitude are due unto God for His divine decrees.

God is omniscient. He knows everything: everything possible, everything actual; all events and all creatures, of the past, the present, and the future. He is perfectly acquainted with every detail in the life of every being in heaven, in earth, and in hell.

How solemn is this fact: nothing can be concealed from God!

Though He be invisible to us, we are not so to Him.

No human eye beheld Cain murder his brother, but his Maker witnessed his crime.

“Be sure your sin will find you out” (Num 32:23).

There is no danger of the individual saint being overlooked amidst the multitude of supplicants who daily and hourly present their various petitions, for an infinite Mind is as capable of paying the same attention to millions as if only one individual were seeking its attention. So too the lack of appropriate language, the inability to give expression to the deepest longing of the soul, will not jeopardize our prayers, for “It shall come to pass, that before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear” (Isa 65:24).

God’s knowledge of the future is as complete as is His knowledge of the past and the present, and that, because the future depends entirely upon Himself.

The wisdom and power of God being alike infinite, the accomplishment of whatever He hath purposed is absolutely guaranteed.

He has complete power to carry out whatever he wills.

None of His decrees are left contingent either on creatures or secondary causes. There is no future event which is only a mere possibility, that is, something which may or may not come to pass: “Known unto God are all His works from the beginning” (Acts 15:18).

Such prophecies could only have been given by One who knew the end from the beginning, and whose knowledge rested upon the unconditional certainty of the accomplishment of everything foretold.

It should, however, be pointed out that neither God’s knowledge nor His cognition of the future, considered simply in themselves, are causative. Nothing has ever come to pass, or ever will, merely because God knew it. The cause of all things is the will of God.

So God’s knowledge does not arise from things because they are or will be, but because He has ordained them to be.

How far exalted above the wisest man is the Lord!

Nothing we do, say, or even think, escapes the cognizance of Him with whom we have to do:

What a curb this would be

unto us, did we but meditate upon it mo...

The apprehension of God’s infinite knowledge should fill the Christian with adoration. The whole of my life stood open to His view from the beginning. He foresaw my every fall, my every sin, my every backsliding; yet, nevertheless, fixed His heart upon me. Oh, how ...

Yet, the controversies which have been waged over them did not close the mouths of God’s faithful servants; why, then, should we avoid the vexing question of God’s foreknowledge, because, forsooth, there are some who will charge us with fomenting strife? Let others contend if they will, our duty is to bear witness according to the light vouchsafed us.

It takes away the independency of God, for it makes His decrees rest upon what He discovers in the creature.

False theology makes God’s foreknowledge of our believing the cause of His election to salvation; whereas, God’s election is the cause, and our believing in Christ is the effect.

What is needed is to find out how the word is used in Scripture. The Holy Spirit’s usage of an expression always defines its meaning and scope.