The Sovrereignty Of God # 1

 The Sovereignty Of God # 1

The sovereignty of God may be defined as the exercise of His supremacy. Being infinitely elevated above the highest creature, He is the Most High God, Lord of Heaven and earth. Subject to none, influenced by none, absolutely independent; God does as He pleases, only as He pleases, always as He pleases. None can thwart Him, none can hinder Him.

So His own Word expressly declares: "My counsel shall stand, and I will do all My pleasure." (Isaiah 46:10); "All the peoples of the earth are regarded as nothing. He does as He pleases with the powers of Heaven and the people of the earth. No one can hold back His hand or say to Him, "What have you done?" (Daniel 4:35).

Divine sovereignty means that God is God in fact, as well as in name, that He is on the Throne of the universe, directing all things, working all things "after the counsel of His own will." (Eph. 1:11).

Rightly did the late Charles Spurgeon say in his sermons on Matthew 20:15, "There is no attribute more comforting to His children than that of God's sovereignty. Under the most adverse circumstances, in the most severe trials, they believe that sovereignty had ordained their afflictions, that sovereignty overrules them, and that sovereignty will sanctify them all. There is nothing for which the children of God ought more earnestly to contend then the doctrine of their Master over all creatures, the kingship of God over all the works of His own hands, the throne of God and His right to sit upon that throne.

"On the other hand, there is no doctrine more hated by worldlings, no truth of which they have made such a football, as the great, stupendous, but yet most certain doctrine of the sovereignty of the infinite Jehovah. Men will allow God to be everywhere except on His throne. They will allow Him to be in His workshop to fashion worlds and make stars. They will allow Him to be in His almonry to dispense His alms and bestow His bounties. They will allow Him to sustain the earth and bear up the pillars thereof, or light the lamps of Heaven, or rule the waves of the ever-moving ocean; but when God ascends His throne, His creatures then gnash their teeth!

"And we proclaim an enthroned God, and His right to do as He wills with His own, to dispose of His creatures as He thinks well, without consulting them in the matter. Then it is that we are hissed and execrated, and then it is that men turn a deaf ear to us, for God on His throne is not the God they love. But it is God upon the throne that we love to preach. It is God upon His throne whom we trust." (Spurgeon).

"Our God is in Heaven; He does whatever He pleases." (Psalm 115:3). "I know that You can do anything, and no plan of Yours can be thwarted." (Job 42:2). "The Lord does whatever He pleases in Heaven and on earth, in the seas and all the depths."

Yes, dear reader, such is the imperial Potentate revealed in Holy Writ. Unrivaled in majesty, unlimited in power, unaffected by anything outside Himself. But we are living in a day when even the most "orthodox" seem afraid to admit the proper Godhood of God. They say that to press the sovereignty of God excludes human responsibility; whereas human responsibility is based upon divine sovereignty, and is the product of it.

God sovereignly chose to place each of His creatures on that particular footing which seemed good in His sight. He created angels - some He placed on conditional footing; others He gave an immutable standing before Him (1 Timothy 5:21), making Christ their head. Let it not be overlooked that the angels whicxh sinned, were as much His creatures as the angels that sinned not. Yet God foresaw they would fall, nevertheless He placed them on a mutable, creature, conditional footing, and allowed them to fall, though He was not the Author of their sin.

~A. W. Pink~

(continued with # 2)