CHAPTER EIGHT: Of the Predestination and Providence of God (part 3 of 3)
Our duty is now plain. If the Lord has committed our life to our keeping, let us preserve it. If he gives us the means of doing so, let us employ them. If he shows us dangers, let us not cast ourselves into them foolishly and without cause. If he offers remedies, let us not despise them.
“But no danger can harm us,” someone will say, “unless it has been ordained to do so; and if it has, no remedy can prevent it.” But what if dangers are not invincible precisely because the Lord has appointed remedies by which they may be overcome?
Consider how well your argument agrees with the order of divine providence. You infer that we need not guard ourselves against dangers because, provided they are not invincible, we can escape them without taking precautions. The Lord, on the contrary, commands you to guard against them because he wills you to escape them.
These madmen fail to consider what is plainly visible: God has inspired men with the prudence to deliberate and protect themselves, so that by preserving their lives they may serve his providence. Conversely, through negligence and contempt they bring upon themselves the miseries he wills to impose upon them. For how does it happen that a prudent man, by ordering his affairs properly, turns aside an approaching evil, while a fool perishes through his rashness? Is it not because both folly and prudence are instruments of God’s administration, each serving its respective purpose?
The Lord has therefore willed all future things to remain hidden from us so that, not knowing what will happen, we may take precautions beforehand and not cease employing the remedies he gives us against dangers until either we overcome them or they overcome us.
As for events already accomplished and past, these fanatics consider God’s providence wrongly and perversely. We say that all things depend upon it as their foundation, and therefore that neither theft, adultery, nor murder occurs without the involvement of God’s will.
They therefore ask: Why should a thief be punished if he impoverished someone whom God willed to chastise through poverty? Why should a murderer be punished if he killed someone whose life God had determined to end? In short, if all such people serve God’s will, why should they be punished?
But I deny that they serve it. For we shall not say that a man driven by an evil heart devotes himself to God’s service when he seeks only to gratify his wicked desire. The one who obeys God is the one who, having been instructed in his will, goes wherever it calls him.
And where does God instruct us concerning his will except in his Word? Therefore, in everything we undertake, we must look to God’s will as he has declared it to us in that Word. God requires from us only what he commands.
If we do anything contrary to his commandment, it is not obedience but rather stubbornness and transgression. They reply that we would not do it unless he willed it. I confess this. But do we do it in order to please him? He does not command it. Rather, we undertake evil without considering what God requires. Indeed, we are so carried away by the fury of our intemperance that we deliberately strive to oppose him.
In this way, even while doing evil, we serve his righteous ordinance, because by the infinite greatness of his wisdom he knows how to employ evil instruments rightly to accomplish good. But consider how senseless their argument is. They insist that crimes should remain unpunished and that those who commit them should be acquitted because such acts do not occur apart from God’s disposition.
I say even more: thieves, murderers, and other evildoers are instruments of God’s providence, whom the Lord employs to execute the judgments he has decreed. Yet I deny that they can therefore claim any excuse. For what will they do? Will they involve God in the same iniquity with themselves, or cover their perversity with his righteousness? They can do neither. Their own consciences so thoroughly convict them that they cannot clear themselves. Nor can they accuse God, since they find all the evil in themselves, while in him they find nothing except a good and lawful use of their wickedness.
“But nevertheless,” someone will say, “he works through them.” From where does the stench arise in a carcass after it has been opened and has begun to rot? Everyone sees that the sun’s rays draw it forth, yet no one will therefore say that the rays themselves stink. Likewise, since the substance and guilt of evil reside in the wicked man, why should God contract any stain or defilement if he uses that evil according to his will?
Let us therefore drive away this doglike insolence, which may bark at God’s righteousness from a distance but can never touch it.
Nevertheless, these absurdities cannot be refuted better or more briefly than by showing what rule we must follow in rightly considering and meditating upon God’s providence.
The Christian heart, being firmly persuaded that nothing happens by chance but that all things occur through God’s providence, will always look to him as the principal cause of everything that happens. Yet at the same time it will not cease to consider secondary causes in their proper place.
Furthermore, the believer will not doubt that God’s providence watches over his preservation and will permit nothing to happen which does not contribute to his good and salvation. Since he must deal first with men and secondly with the other creatures, he will be assured that God’s providence reigns everywhere.
As for men, whether good or evil, he will recognize that their counsels, wills, strength, powers, and undertakings are under God’s hand, so that it belongs to him to bend them wherever he pleases and to restrain them whenever he pleases.
There are many evident promises testifying that God’s providence watches and, as it were, keeps guard to preserve the salvation of believers. For example:
“Cast your care upon the Lord, and he will sustain you, for he cares for us.”
Again:
“He who dwells under the protection of the Most High shall be preserved beneath his safeguard.”
Again:
“Whoever touches you touches the pupil of my eye.”
Again:
“I will be to you a shield and a wall of bronze, and I will fight against your enemies.”
Again:
“Even if a mother should forget her children, I will never forget you.”
Indeed, the chief purpose of the biblical histories is to demonstrate that God guards his servants so carefully that he will not permit them to strike their foot against a stone.
Although I rightly reproved above the opinion of those who imagine a universal providence of God which does not descend to the particular care of every creature, we must above all acknowledge this special care toward us. For this reason, after Christ says that not even the smallest sparrow falls to the ground without God’s will, he immediately applies the statement to us:
“You are of greater value than many sparrows. Even the hairs of your head are all numbered.”
He does this so that we may be certain that, since we are more precious to God than little birds, he watches over us more carefully than over them—so carefully that not one hair can fall from our head without his permission. What more could we ask, if not even a single hair can fall from us without God’s will?
The servant of God, being strengthened by all these promises and the corresponding examples, will also join to them the testimonies declaring that all men are under God’s power, whether their hearts must be inclined to love us or their wickedness restrained so that it cannot harm us. For it was the Lord who gave his people favor, not only with those who were already friendly toward them, but even with the Egyptians (Exodus 3:21; 12:36).
As for the fury of our enemies, he knows how to break it in various ways. Sometimes he deprives them of understanding so that they cannot form sound plans. Thus he dealt with Ahab, sending a lying spirit to deceive him through the mouths of all his prophets (1 Kings 22:19–23). He did the same to Rehoboam, blinding him through the foolish counsel of the young men so that he would be stripped of his kingdom (1 Kings 12:6–15).
Sometimes, after giving them understanding to see and perceive what would be advantageous, he so completely casts down their courage and fills them with fear that they dare not undertake what they have conceived. Sometimes he permits them to strive to execute what their rage demands, but opposes their violence and does not allow them to accomplish their purpose. In this way he brought Ahithophel’s counsel to nothing before its time, though it would have been destructive to David (2 Samuel 17:14).
Thus God takes care to govern and direct every creature for the salvation of his people—even the Devil, who, as we see, did not dare to attempt anything against Job without God’s permission and command.
When we possess this knowledge, it will necessarily produce gratitude for God’s goodness in all prosperity, patience in adversity, and singular confidence concerning the future. Therefore, whatever happens according to our desire, we shall attribute it to God, whether we experience his kindness through men or he assists us through his other creatures.
We shall reason in our hearts: Certainly, it was God who turned their hearts to love me and made them instruments of his kindness toward me. In times of fruitfulness, we shall recognize that it was the Lord who commanded heaven to rain upon the earth so that it might bear fruit. In every other kind of prosperity, we shall not doubt that God’s blessing alone is its cause. These admonitions will not permit us to be ungrateful.
On the contrary, if any adversity befalls us, we shall immediately raise our hearts to God, who alone can form them to patience and tranquility. If Joseph had confined himself to contemplating his brothers’ treachery and the shameful deed they had committed against him, he would never have shown a brotherly spirit toward them. But because he turned his thoughts to God and forgot their injury, he was moved to gentleness and kindness, even consoling them himself:
“It was not you who sent me into Egypt, but by the Lord’s will I was sent before you for your benefit. You intended evil against me, but the Lord turned it to good.”
—Genesis 45:8; 50:20
If Job had looked only at the Chaldeans who had wronged him, he would have been inflamed with a desire for vengeance. But because he likewise recognized the work of God, he consoled himself with this beautiful declaration:
“The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.”
Likewise, if David had occupied himself entirely with the wickedness of Shimei, who pursued him with insults and stones, he would have incited his men to vengeance. But because he understood that Shimei did not act without God’s direction, he calmed them instead of provoking them:
“Leave him alone, for perhaps God has commanded him to speak evil against me.”
If there is no better remedy against anger and impatience, we shall have profited greatly when we have learned so to contemplate God’s providence in this matter that we can always bring our thoughts back to this point: The Lord willed it; therefore, it must be borne patiently —not merely because it is impossible to resist him, but because he wills nothing that is not just and beneficial.
This is why Scripture so carefully labors to establish this article. Amos declares:
“There shall be no evil in the city which the Lord has not sent.”
Jeremiah likewise reproves those who imagine that any calamity can occur without God’s command:
“Who is he who speaks, and it comes to pass, when the Lord has not commanded it?”
If the evils we suffer proceed from men, Scripture says that God has consecrated them to execute his work. They are therefore called nets, swords, and axes which he directs by his hand, and instruments of his wrath which he summons merely by whistling for them (Isaiah 5:26; 10:5, 15; 13:3; Ezekiel 12:13).
Thus Pilate and Herod, when they conspired to put Christ to death, are said to have gathered together to accomplish what God’s counsel had decreed beforehand (Acts 4:27–28). In the same sense it is said that the Jews killed Christ according to what the heavenly Father had determined (Acts 2:23).
Thus they fulfilled everything that had been written concerning him (Acts 13:29). Likewise, the Gospels frequently repeat that the soldiers who crucified him carried out everything foretold in Scripture (John 19:24, 28, 36–37).
All these things teach us that whenever men afflict us through their wickedness, we must not cease looking to God and holding it certain that, although they act unrighteously toward us, nothing happens except by his righteous ordinance, so that he permits, wills, and disposes it in this manner.
Likewise, if some adversity presses upon us without human involvement, Scripture declares that barrenness of the earth, famine, every disease, and the other things we regard as accidental are God’s curses, or at least chastisements which he sends us (Leviticus 26; Deuteronomy 28).
Nevertheless, we shall not close our eyes to secondary causes. Although we regard those from whom we receive some benefit as ministers of God’s kindness, we shall not despise them as though they had deserved no gratitude from us for their kindness. Rather, we shall acknowledge our obligation to them and confess it willingly, and we shall endeavor to repay them according to our ability when opportunity permits.
In short, we shall render God the honor of acknowledging him as the principal author of every good, while also honoring men as the ministers and dispensers of his benefits. We shall recognize that he intended to place us under obligation to them, since he showed himself our benefactor through their hands.
If we suffer some loss through our own negligence or carelessness, we shall indeed recognize that it occurred by God’s will, yet we shall not cease to impute the fault to ourselves. If one of our relatives or friends, whose care had been entrusted to us, dies without having been properly attended, although we shall know that he had reached the limit which he could not pass, we shall not thereby diminish our own guilt. Because we failed to perform our duty, we shall regard his death as having occurred through our fault.
Much more, therefore, if fraud or deliberate malice was involved in committing murder or theft, we ought not to excuse such crimes under the pretext of God’s providence. Rather, in the same act we shall contemplate both God’s righteousness and man’s iniquity, as each plainly manifests itself.
As for future things, we shall take our point of departure chiefly from the secondary causes of which we have spoken. For we shall regard it as a blessing from God if he gives us human means by which we may sustain and preserve ourselves. We shall therefore deliberate, according to our ability, concerning what we ought to do, and shall not disdain to seek the assistance of those whom we see to be capable of helping us.
Rather, recognizing that it is God who places at our disposal every creature that may benefit us, we shall employ them as lawful instruments of his providence. And because we are uncertain what outcome our undertakings will have, except that we possess firm confidence that God will provide in everything for our good, we shall pursue what, so far as our understanding can discern, appears profitable to us.
Nevertheless, in forming our plans, we shall not follow our own judgment alone, but shall commend and submit ourselves to God’s wisdom so that it may direct us rightly. Finally, our confidence will not be so fixed upon human assistance and means that we rest in them when they are available or lose courage when they fail us. For our understanding will remain fixed upon God’s providence alone, and consideration of present circumstances will not distract us from beholding it.
Here we may perceive the singular blessedness of believers. Human life is surrounded and almost besieged by innumerable miseries. Without looking any further, since our body is a receptacle of a thousand diseases and even nourishes their causes within itself, wherever a man goes he carries many forms of death with him. Thus his life is, as it were, wrapped in death. For what else can we say when we cannot even grow cold or perspire without danger?
Furthermore, whichever way we turn, everything around us is not merely suspect but openly threatens us, as though it intended to bring death upon us. If we board a ship, there is scarcely a foot between us and death. If we mount a horse, it need only stumble with one foot for us to break our neck. If we walk through the streets, every tile upon the roofs represents a danger hanging over us. If we hold a sword, or someone near us holds one, the slightest movement may wound us.
Every wild, untamed, or unmanageable beast we see is armed against us. If we shut ourselves within a beautiful garden filled with nothing but delight, a serpent may be concealed there. The houses in which we dwell are continually liable to burn: by day they threaten to impoverish us, and by night to collapse upon us. Whatever lands we possess, since they are exposed to hail, frost, drought, and other storms, threaten us with barrenness and consequently with famine.
I pass over poisonings, ambushes, and assaults, by which human life is threatened partly at home and partly in the open country. Amid such perplexities, must not man be more than miserable? Even while living, he is only half alive, barely sustaining himself amid languor and distress, as though he saw a knife held to his throat at every moment.
Someone will say that these things happen rarely, or at least that they do not always happen to everyone, and that they can never all happen at once. I grant this. But because the examples of others warn us that they may happen to us, and that our life ought not to be considered exempt from any of them, we cannot avoid fearing them as though they were about to befall us.
What greater misery could be imagined than to live continually in such trembling and anguish? Furthermore, it would dishonor God to say that he had abandoned man, the noblest of his creatures, to the randomness of fortune. But my purpose here is merely to speak of the misery in which man would live if his life were governed by chance.
On the contrary, if God’s providence shines within the believer’s heart, he will not only be delivered from the fear and distress which previously oppressed him, but also relieved of every uncertainty. For just as we would rightly fear fortune if it governed us, so we have good reason boldly to entrust ourselves to God.
It is therefore a wonderful consolation to understand that the Lord so holds all things within his power, governs them by his will, and directs them by his wisdom that nothing occurs except as he has appointed it. Furthermore, he has received us into his safekeeping and committed us to the care of his angels, so that neither water, fire, sword, nor anything else can harm us except insofar as his good pleasure permits.
For it is written in the Psalm:
“He will deliver you from the snares of the hunter and from destructive plagues. He will shelter you beneath his wing, and you shall be safe beneath his feathers. His truth shall be your shield. You shall not fear the terrors of the night, nor the arrow that flies in broad daylight, nor the destruction that passes through the darkness, nor the evil that strikes in the brightness of day.”
From this arises the confidence with which the saints glory:
“The Lord is my helper; I will not fear anything flesh can do to me.”
Again:
“The Lord is my protector; what should I fear? Though an army encamp against me, I will not be afraid.”
—Psalm 27:1, 3
Again:
“Though I walk through the darkness of death, I will not cease to hope.”
From where could the believer derive such an unshakable assurance unless, where the world appears to be turned upside down at random, he recognizes that God is at work directing it and confidently expects all God’s works to contribute to his salvation?
If he sees himself assaulted or harassed by the Devil or by wicked men, does he not then especially need to strengthen himself by recalling God’s providence, without which he could only despair?
On the contrary, when he recognizes that the Devil and the entire company of the wicked are held tightly by God’s hand as by a bridle, so that they cannot conceive any evil, nor, after conceiving it, devise how to commit it, nor, after devising it, carry it out, nor even lift a little finger except insofar as God commands—he possesses abundant consolation.
For just as it belongs to God alone to arm their fury and turn and direct it wherever he pleases, so it also lies within his power to restrain them, so that they cannot act according to the full measure of their intemperance.
For this reason Rezin and the king of Israel, although they had conspired to destroy the land of Judah and appeared to be blazing torches capable of setting the whole land on fire, were nevertheless said to be nothing but smoking firebrands from which only a little smoke could arise (Isaiah 7:4).
In short, so as not to remain any longer upon this subject, I say that the greatest misery man can suffer is to be ignorant of God’s providence, while rightly knowing it is a singular blessedness.
We would now have said enough concerning God’s providence and predestination, insofar as is necessary for the instruction and consolation of believers—for nothing could ever satisfy the curiosity of fools, nor should we trouble ourselves to do so—were it not that certain passages of Scripture appear to signify that God’s counsel is not firm and immutable, as we have said, but changes according to the disposition of secondary causes.
First, Scripture sometimes speaks of God’s repentance. Thus it is said that he repented of having created man, of having raised Saul to the throne, and that he will repent of the evil he had determined to send upon his people when he sees some amendment in them (Genesis 6:6; 1 Samuel 15:11; Jeremiah 18:8).
Furthermore, we read that he annulled and revoked what he had determined. Through Jonah he had announced to the Ninevites that their city would perish after forty days, yet afterward their conversion moved him to mercy (Jonah 3:4, 10). Likewise, through the mouth of Isaiah he had announced death to Hezekiah, but moved by his tears, he deferred it (Isaiah 38:1–5).
From these passages many argue that God did not determine by an eternal decree what he would do toward men, but ordains from day to day and hour to hour what he knows to be good and reasonable, according as each person’s merits require.
As for the word repentance, we must hold firmly to this conclusion: repentance can no more apply to God than ignorance, error, or weakness. For since no one knowingly and willingly places himself under the necessity of repenting, we cannot say that God repents without confessing either that he was ignorant of what would happen, that he was unable to prevent it, or that he rashly formed his purpose without due consideration.
But this is so far from the Holy Spirit’s meaning that, in the very passage which speaks of God’s repentance, he denies that God can repent because he is not a man (1 Samuel 15:29). It is therefore certain that God’s government of human affairs is constant, perpetual, and exempt from every change of mind.
Indeed, so that his constancy might not be doubted, even his adversaries were compelled to bear witness to it. Whether he wished to or not, Balaam could not refrain from saying:
“God is not like men, that he should lie, nor like the children of Adam, that he should change his purpose. Therefore, everything he has spoken must be fulfilled.”
What, then, does this word repentance mean? I answer that it bears the same sense as all the other forms of speech which describe God in human terms. Because our weakness cannot reach his height, the description given of him must stoop to our capacity so that we may understand it. The way it does so is by representing him not as he is in himself, but as we perceive him.
Although he is free from every disturbance, he is said to be angry with sinners. Therefore, when we hear that God is angry, we must not imagine that some agitation exists within him. Rather, we must recognize that this expression is drawn from our own experience, because when he exercises the severity of his judgment, he presents the appearance of one who is angry.
Likewise, under the word repentance we must understand nothing other than a change in his works, because when men change their works, they testify that those works displease them. Since every change among men is a correction of something displeasing, and correction proceeds from repentance, the change which God makes in his works is therefore signified by the word repentance.
Meanwhile, his counsel is not overturned, his will is not reversed, nor is his disposition changed. Rather, he constantly pursues without variation what he foresaw, approved, and decreed from all eternity, although in human perception there appears to be a sudden change.
Therefore, when Scripture recounts that the calamity Jonah announced to the Ninevites was remitted and that Hezekiah’s life was prolonged after he had received the message of death, it does not indicate that God revoked his decrees. Those who think so misunderstand the warnings. Although expressed without qualification, such warnings nevertheless contain an implied condition, as may be understood from the purpose toward which they were directed.
For why did God send Jonah to the Ninevites to foretell the destruction of their city? Why did he announce Hezekiah’s death through Isaiah? He could certainly have destroyed them without sending them any message.
He therefore had another end in view than merely giving them advance warning of their approaching ruin. He did not will them to perish, but rather to amend their lives so that they might not perish. Thus Jonah prophesied that Nineveh would be destroyed after forty days precisely so that it might not be destroyed. Hezekiah was deprived of the hope of living any longer so that he might obtain a longer life.
Who does not now see that by such threats God intended to move those whom he threatened to repentance, so that they might escape the judgment they had deserved by their sins? If this is true, the natural order of the matter leads us to supply an implied condition, although it is not expressly stated in these warnings.
We may confirm this by similar examples. When the Lord reproved King Abimelech for taking Abraham’s wife, he spoke these words:
“Behold, you shall die because of the woman whom you have taken, for she has a husband.”
After Abimelech had defended himself, God answered:
“Therefore, restore the woman to her husband, and he will pray for you, so that you may live. Otherwise, know that you shall surely die, you and all that you possess.”
Do we not plainly see how, in the first declaration, he speaks with greater severity to terrify Abimelech’s heart and thereby induce him more effectively to perform his duty, and then afterward clearly explains his intention?
Since the other passages bear the same meaning, it cannot be inferred from them that God departed in any respect from his original counsel by revoking what he had previously announced. On the contrary, he prepares the way for the fulfillment of his eternal counsel and ordinance when, by announcing the punishments that would befall them if they persisted in their sins, he brings to repentance those whom he wills to pardon.
So far is he from changing his will, or even his word. He simply does not explain his intention syllable by syllable, though it is nevertheless easy to understand. Therefore, this declaration of Isaiah must remain firmly established:
“The Lord of hosts has decreed it, and who shall overturn it? His hand is raised, and who shall turn it back?”