Chapter 52. Concerning the Decree of Reprobation.
WILLIAM PERKINS
Chapter 52. Concerning the Decree of Reprobation.
This much will suffice for the decree of Election.
Now follows the decree of Reprobation.
The decree of Reprobation is that part of predestination, by which God, according to the most free and just purpose of His will, has determined to reject certain men unto eternal destruction and misery, and that is to the praise of His justice. Rom 9.21, Has the potter power over the clay, to make of the same lump, one vessel to honour, and another to dishonour?
1Pet 2.8, To those who stumble at the word, being disobedient, to which thing they were even ordained
(Gr. ἐτέθησαν etethesan).
Jude 1.4, There are certain men who have crept in, who were before of old ordained (προγεγραμμένοι progegrammenoi)
to this condemnation. 1Th 5.9, God has not appointed us to wrath, but to salvation. In the Scriptures, Cain and Abel, Ishmael and Isaac, Esau and Jacob, are propounded to us as types of mankind, part elected and part rejected.
Neither do we set down here any absolute decree of Damnation, as though we thought that any were condemned by the mere and sole will of God, without any causes inherent in those who are to be condemned.
For there are certain means for the execution of it annexed to the decree of God itself. And therefore, though we never do or can separate God's decree from the means to execute it, yet we do distinguish them, and consider the purpose of God — sometimes by itself alone, and sometimes not by itself — but with middle causes that are subordinate to it. And in this second respect, Christ is said to be predestined.
But in the former, namely, as the decree is considered by itself, he is not predestined, but together with the Father, he is a Predestinator.
A GOLDEN CHAIN
Again, the decree of God is secret: I. Because it arises only from the good pleasure of God, unsearchable, and adored by the very angels themselves. II. Because it is not known except by what comes after it, namely, by its effects.