The Sovereignty of God
by J. C. Philpot
The Sovereignty of God is a great, an unfathomable
depth, and needs ever to be approached by the saints and servants of the
Most High with trembling steps, and looked at and into with believing,
reverent eyes. "My flesh trembles for fear of you, and I am afraid of your
judgments." "My heart stands in awe of your Word." "To this man will I look,
even to him that is poor, and of a contrite spirit, and trembles at my
word." Such is the frame of soul in vital experience, however in our day
little known and less regarded, in which it becomes "those who are escaped
of Israel" (Isa. 4:2) to look at the sovereign good pleasure of Jehovah in
"doing according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the
inhabitants of the earth."
Many fight, with all the desperate enmity and rebellion
of the carnal mind, against the bare idea that all men and all things are at
the sovereign disposal of the great God of heaven and earth; and others, who
are not thus held down hard and fast in the chains of rebellion and error,
hold the doctrine of divine sovereignty, if not in unrighteousness, at least
in a carnal, presumptuous spirit, which plainly shows that they never
learned it feelingly and experimentally in their own souls under the
teaching and unction of the Holy Spirit. It is hard, perhaps, to say which
of the two is the more repulsive to the spiritual mind—the daring denial of
the 'rebellious Arminian', or the flippant boldness of the 'dead Calvinist'.
Error is hateful, but truth in a hardened conscience is awful.
The grand and glorious truths which are revealed in the
word of God are to be received not as mere speculative doctrines into the
natural judgment and reasoning mind—but into the tender heart and living
conscience—as the gracious unfolding of the mind and counsel, the will and
wisdom of Him who is "greatly to be feared in the assembly of the saints,
and to be had in reverence by all of those who are about him." And surely of
all truths revealed in the Scriptures none is more to be regarded with
trembling awe and holy reverence than the sovereignty of Jehovah in
electing some to eternal life and appointing others to eternal destruction.
We believe this on the authority of Him who cannot lie; but when we look up
into heaven, and see its unspeakable bliss and glory, and look down into
hell and view its ever-burning flames, we may well pause and say, "Your way
is in the sea, and your path in the great waters, and your footsteps are not
known." (Psalm 77:19.)
There are those who seem almost to exult in a carnal
spirit over the destruction of the reprobate. There is, indeed, a
solemn submission to, and a believing acquiescence in the sovereign will of
the Judge of all the earth, knowing that he must do right, as Aaron "held
his peace" when fire from the Lord went out and devoured his two sons, Nadab
and Abihu. (Lev. 10:2, 3.) No, more, there is a holy joy in the conquest of
the Lamb over his enemies, as expressed in the words, "Rejoice over her, O
heaven, and you holy apostles and prophets; for God has avenged you on her"
(Rev. 18:20;) and, "So let all your enemies perish, O Lord; but let those
who love him be as the sun when he goes forth in his might." (Judges 5:31.)
But this is a very different feeling from a carnal exultation over the lost,
which shows a state of mind, to say the least of it, the exact opposite of
Paul's "great heaviness and continual sorrow of heart" for his unbelieving
brethren, (Rom. 9:2,) and breathes a language very unlike the prayer of
Moses, "Yet, now, if you will forgive their sin—and if not, blot me, I pray
you, out of your book which you have written." (Exodus 32:32.)
Who can think, without grief and sorrow of heart, upon a
dear parent, child, or husband—departed without any evidence of a work of
grace upon the soul? When you awake at midnight and think of the departed
one, where is your exultation over those fixed decrees which determined his
eternal state? Submission there may be and should be to the will of God—but
a man must be a very heathen—"without natural affection, implacable,
unmerciful," (Rom. 1:31,) who has neither sigh nor tear for his own
family—at the thought of their eternal woe.
It is when we look at the sovereignty of God on what we
may perhaps call its bright side—its merciful and gracious aspect, as
plucking innumerable brands out of the fire, and especially when the decree
of election turns its smiling face upon us, that we can rejoice in it,
and admire and adore the electing love of God in delivering our souls from
the bottomless pit. And not only we who have been made alive from the
dead, but every regenerate soul is a living witness of the sovereignty of
grace. There is not, there never was, there never will be—a manifested
vessel of mercy, who is not a monument of the sovereign electing, redeeming,
regenerating, and preserving love of a Triune Jehovah; and this every saint
of God feels when mercy visits his heart and he is sealed by the Holy Spirit
unto the day of redemption. "Why me? why me?" must ever be the
wondering, admiring, adoring cry of every child of God when blessed with a
feeling, appropriating sense of his personal saving interest in the precious
blood and love of the Lamb!
But there are instances which seem to shine forth with
peculiar luster, and to stand out beyond the usual dealings of God as
prominent examples of the sovereignty of his eternal love. As in a garden
every flower may be beautiful in its kind—and all were planted by the same
gardener's hand to deck and adorn his beds—but there may be some which
strike the eye as more outstanding in beauty of shape and brightness of
color than the other occupants of the garden—so in the church of God there
are trees of his right hand planting which display more conspicuously than
others—the wonders of his sovereign, distinguishing grace.
Saul of Tarsus and the thief on the cross have always
struck our own mind as two of the most striking instances of sovereign grace
contained in the Scriptures. Paul—the self-righteous Pharisee, imbued with
all the learning and pride of the Sanhedrin, and overflowing with all the
persecuting spirit of the murderers of Stephen; and the dying thief—loaded
with the crimes of a life of violence and bloodshed, yet snatched from the
jaws of hell at the last gasp! Reader, and admirer of the grace of God, can
you strike the balance between these two monuments of electing love, and
decide which was the more indebted to sovereign grace?
"Ah," but say you, "I know a greater monument of
sovereign grace than either." Well, be it so; but next to yourself,
can you decide whether Paul or the dying thief was the more indebted to the
heights and depths, lengths and breadths of atoning blood and redeeming
love? We really, for our part, cannot tell. We look at PAUL before and after
his conversion, and wonder at and admire the grace of God that made out of
such a pharisee, such a bigot, such a strict consistent legalist, such a
bloodthirsty persecutor—a saint so rich in every grace, an apostle so
endowed with every fruit and gift of the Holy Spirit. Saul on his road to
Damascus, "breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of
the Lord," and Paul, with the words in his heart and mouth, "Why are you
weeping and breaking my heart? for I am ready not to be bound only, but also
to die at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus;" (Acts 21:13;)—O what
grace thus to change the lion into the lamb, the man ready to martyr—into
the man ready to be martyred!
But next we turn to the DYING THIEF. Listen with
wondering ears and admiring heart to his believing prayer, addressed under
such circumstances and at such a moment to the Son of God, in his deepest
humiliation, at his lowest point of ignominy and shame, when his very
disciples all forsook him and fled, and his glory was hidden under the
densest, darkest veil. A risen Jesus appeared to Paul in all the blaze of
heavenly glory; a crucified Jesus was hanging before the dying thief in
little less shame and degradation than himself and his twin malefactor. O,
what faith at such a moment to call him, "Lord," and to believe he had a
kingdom, and to desire to be made a partaker of its present grace and future
glory! Has not this prayer, believing reader, been mine and yours? Have not
we sought to realize the blessed Redeemer as set thus before our eyes? and
while we threw all our heart and soul into the petition, breathed forth,
"Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom?" The prayer of the dying
thief shines, we must say, in our eyes as one of the greatest, if not the
greatest act of faith recorded in the Scriptures, and only paralleled, we
cannot say surpassed, by Abraham's sacrifice of his son.
But let us not think that there are not now walking on
the face of the earth similar monuments of sovereign grace. Up that court,
in that garret, there is a dying Mary Magdalene, out of whom the Lord has
cast seven devils. Down in that coal-mine there is one whom once "no man
could bind, no, not with chains," "neither could any man tame him;" but he
is now "sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind."
Walking under that hedge, now weeping, now praying, now singing, now looking
into his little Bible, is a returned prodigal—a base backslider whom the
Lord has forgiven, but who can never forgive himself. Hiding his face in the
corner of the pew is that persecutor of his poor broken-hearted wife, now in
glory, whom since her death the Lord has called by his grace, and whose
tears and sighs show how deeply he repents of his sins against her and Him.
While the world is going on buying and selling, eating and drinking,
marrying and giving in marriage, God is here and there raising up these
monuments of his grace to live forever and ever in his presence, when the
world and all the fashion of it shall have utterly passed away.
To a spiritual mind, what sweet food for faith, what a
field of holy meditation is opened up in the sovereignty of grace as thus
displayed in those wonders of redeeming love which every now and then come
under our own special knowledge and observation! To what praise and
adoration does it give birth; what openings up of the depths of the Father's
love; what views of the fullness and perfection of the Redeemer's blood and
obedience; what a sight of salvation as a free, irrevocable gift; how
independent of all creature works of righteousness, how distinguishing, how
superabounding over all the aboundings of sin and guilt, is grace seen to
be; what love and union are felt to the objects of this signal mercy; how
the soul is more and more firmly established thereby in the truth of God;
and that "it is not of him that wills, nor of him that runs, but of God who
shows mercy!"
Dare any call the sovereignty of God in his electing love
and discriminating grace "a licentious doctrine?" Ignorance coined that lie;
and enmity gave it circulation. The sovereignty of grace received into a
believing heart has led many a one from sin; it never, under the unction of
the Holy Spirit, led one into sin. Many a poor, despairing wretch it has
saved, not only from the guilt of sin that distressed his conscience, but
from the power of sin that entangled his inclinations, and carried him
captive. The same Christ Jesus who is made to his people "righteousness and
redemption," is also made unto them "wisdom and sanctification;" (1 Cor.
1:30;) and those who are "washed and justified in the name of the Lord
Jesus," are also "sanctified by the Spirit of God." (1 Cor. 6:11.)