Knowing God - The Sovereignty of God
Knowing God • Sermon • Submitted
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Introduction:
Introduction:
Whatsoever the LORD pleased, that did he in heaven, and in earth, in the seas, and all deep places.
Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure:
And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?
For, lo, he that formeth the mountains, and createth the wind, and declareth unto man what is his thought, that maketh the morning darkness, and treadeth upon the high places of the earth, The LORD, The God of hosts, is his name.
It is he that buildeth his stories in the heaven, and hath founded his troop in the earth; he that calleth for the waters of the sea, and poureth them out upon the face of the earth: The LORD is his name.
But our God is in the heavens: he hath done whatsoever he hath pleased.
For he spake, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast.
I know that thou canst do every thing, and that no thought can be withholden from thee.
The counsel of the LORD standeth for ever, the thoughts of his heart to all generations.
There is no wisdom nor understanding nor counsel against the LORD.
Yea, before the day was I am he; and there is none that can deliver out of my hand: I will work, and who shall let it?
But if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it; lest haply ye be found even to fight against God.
I. The Meaning of the Sovereignty of God
I. The Meaning of the Sovereignty of God
When you attempt to define the sovereignty of God, you have to be very careful in the way that you define this term.
What I mean by that is that if you do not define the word in the Biblical context then you run the risk of emphasizing one attribute over another.
Meaning this; if one defines the Sovereignty of God apart from man’s responsibility to obey, then you run the risk of teaching a theology that does not teach that man is responsible.
If one defines the theology only in terms of man’s responsibility and not God’s control, then you run the risk of painting a God who is an impotent being who reacts instead of acts.
He reacts based on mankind does and based on the fact that He is God and God alone.
So, there must be a balance between the two realms that are absolutely true.
God is absolutely sovereign and man is absolutely responsible; those two twin truths are fact.
One must be defined by defining the other.
Lets start with defining The Sovereignty of God:
God’s sovereignty refers to His absolute and unrivaled rule over all His creatures and their circumstances.
Let’s think very basic; there two words in the above definition that tell us much about the fact that God is sovereign.
The first word is “absolute.”
This word is defined as having no restrictions, exceptions, or qualifications.
It is positive, it is unquestionable.
The second word is “unrivaled.”
This word is a 15th century word that means that you have something that no one else can possess.
There is no competition because there is no one that can even possess what you possess.
So, when we speak about the sovereignty of God, what we are saying is that God has no restrictions, no qualifications, no questions, and no competition of his authority over His creation.
God acts totally, completely, and independently of anything or anyone is His rule over His creation.
On the Sovereignty of God, the confession says:
Commentary on the Westminster Confession Section 2 of the Confession
The sovereignty of God is his absolute right to govern and dispose of the work of his own hands according to his own good pleasure.
The grounds of God’s sovereignty are His infinite superiority.
One of the main reasons why the sovereignty of God comes so hard for our finite brains is because God is not comprehensively or exhaustively knowable to humans.
Because when you think of God being sovereign, we sometimes trying to figure out why God would do the things the way He does and then when we cannot figure it out, then we usually come up with the idea, “well.....” and then go off and create an unscriptural designation of God.
When in reality, the reason that the answers fail us is because there are things that are only answerable in the mind of infinitely superior mind of our sovereign God.
Who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see: to whom be honour and power everlasting. Amen.
For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.
So, do not misapply and try and limit God’s sovereignty when our problem is that we cannot fully know God’s mind.
Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised; and his greatness is unsearchable.
Just because we lack the ability to understand all the ways of the Lord, does not mean that His control is limited by the boundaries of our understanding.
The secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.
There are those things that are only comprehensible in the mind of deity and by faith we leave those things there.
So, the first basis of the of his sovereignty is His infinite superiority.
The next basis of His sovereignty is his absolute ownership of all things.
Because He is the creator of all, that gives Him the right to control it all.
In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
Thou, even thou, art LORD alone; thou hast made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth, and all things that are therein, the seas, and all that is therein, and thou preservest them all; and the host of heaven worshippeth thee.
By the word of the LORD were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth.
For he spake, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast.
He healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds.
He telleth the number of the stars; he calleth them all by their names.
Great is our Lord, and of great power: his understanding is infinite.
It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in:
Thus saith the LORD, thy redeemer, and he that formed thee from the womb, I am the LORD that maketh all things; that stretcheth forth the heavens alone; that spreadeth abroad the earth by myself;
For thus saith the LORD that created the heavens; God himself that formed the earth and made it; he hath established it, he created it not in vain, he formed it to be inhabited: I am the LORD; and there is none else.
Ah Lord GOD! behold, thou hast made the heaven and the earth by thy great power and stretched out arm, and there is nothing too hard for thee:
God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands;
We have two options in this and two options only.
Either God created everything by His power and then left man to act and do on his own or God created everything and because He created everything He has the right to control everything.
Therefore, because is the creator of everything, He has the right to control it all.
And we understand the fact that God absolutely controls His creation because after the fall, His perfect creation obeyed the voice of its creator and the once perfect creation became cursed at sound of His voice.
The same sovereign voice the created it all, was the same sovereign voice that cursed it.
So, the grounds for God’s sovereignty is that He is infinitely superior to everything.
Second, the grounds of God’s sovereignty is His absolutely ownership of everything because He is the creator.
Third, the grounds of God’s sovereignty is the perpetual and absolute dependence of all things upon him for being.
Everything was created by Him and everything is held together because of Him.
And he is before all things, and by him all things consist.
Thou, even thou, art LORD alone; thou hast made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth, and all things that are therein, the seas, and all that is therein, and thou preservest them all; and the host of heaven worshippeth thee.
The earth and all the inhabitants thereof are dissolved: I bear up the pillars of it. Selah.
Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high;
So, the Scriptures are clear that God is absolutely sovereign and we have laid out the basis of that.
So, when we define the sovereignty of God we are talking about His absolute right to rule and control all as He sees fit and proper.
II. The Manifestation of God’s Sovereignty
II. The Manifestation of God’s Sovereignty
One cannot fully define and teach on the Sovereignty of God without also speaking in regards to the element of how His sovereignty is manifest in the Human Responsibility.
To the writers of the Scripture, it was as plain to them that God controls everything that it was plain to them that He is the supreme authority.
And once you set up God as the authority, that constitutes responsibility to that authority.
The writers of Scripture understood that we are answerable to God for out attitudes, thoughts, words, and actions.
We are responsible that everything we do bring glory to God.
Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.
With the commands of Scripture comes, naturally, the facts of responsibility.
Paul teaches that because of Adam’s sin, his descendents were made sinners.
For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.
And that natural sinfulness, with which we are born, leads to our condemnation, if God does not bless us with saving grace.
But not as the offence, so also is the free gift. For if through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many.
And not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift: for the judgment was by one to condemnation, but the free gift is of many offences unto justification.
For if by one man’s offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ.)
Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life.
God is sovereign and controls everything and we are responsible for what we are.
This is what is known as Compatibilistic Theodicy.
Which means, when properly defined, that human free will and divine determinism are complementary ideas; that is, it is possible to accept both without being logically inconsistent.
Compatibilism contends that one’s will is free within the boundaries of one’s nature.
Unregenerate human will is free only within the limitations of human finiteness and depravity.
Since depraved human nature cannot obey God, fallen humans are free only to sin.
Fallen humans sin freely in that they want to sin, doing so with coercion.
A Biblical Theodicy says that man in his fallenness does not have the ability to obey God but rather that fallen humans in their corrupted nature choose only what serves their own pleasure and power.
Sovereignty does not teach that man does not have a free will, but it teaches that the Sovereignty of God and Human Responsibility are compatible and logical two sides of the same coin.
But the question that is usually asked is, “well, if God is sovereign and in control of everything, doesn’t that make Him the author of sin?”
Not at all; the Scriptures are clear on this.
Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man:
This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.
God is sovereign, yes, but human nature is sinful and rebels against the commands of God.
But God does not put in the heart of fallen humans the desire for sin; that is already there because of the fall.
Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain:
We see those twin truths in that verse; God determined and you have crucified.
Sovereignty on the one hand and Responsibility on the other.
The lot is cast into the lap; but the whole disposing thereof is of the LORD.
God uses the already existing evil in the hearts of humans for His sovereign purpose.
We will develop this and you give a Biblical illustration next time together.
