The Invisible Hand

THE WORD 'PROVIDENCE" HAS ALL BUT DISAPPEARED FROM the vocabulary of the contemporary Christian. It is becoming obsolete and archaic. This word that once was commonplace, indeed central to Christian expression, now seems doomed to the ash heap of useful verbiage.

In the early nineties a television documentary on the Civil War gripped the interest of the nation as the drama of America's bloodiest conflict was retold.

Excerpts from letters written home by soldiers of both North and South were replete with references to "Providence." On the eve of battle soldiers wrote to their wives or parents about their fears and of the uncertainty of what would happen to them on the morrow and spoke often of their lives being in the hands of Providence. The term Providence was capitalized as it referred not so much to the rule of God over the affairs of men, but to God Himself. The term Providence became a title for the deity.

This link between the activity of God and the very being of God was deeply rooted in the conviction of nineteenth-century Christians that all that comes to pass occurs under the sovereign plan and rule of almighty God. There was a constant sense that all of life was lived coram Deo, before the face of God.

Now this attitude has changed. The culture in which we presently live has little room for thoughts of God's providence. At best we live in a modern climate of neo-deism; at worst the culture is defined by a climate of neo-paganism. The prevailing assumption of our day is that we live in a closed, mechanistic universe where events occur either by fixed, impersonal laws of impersonal forces—or merely by chance. It is the age of secularism, where there appears to be no access to the transcendent or the supernatural. Nature is viewed as being strictly natural. Religion, if it is tolerated at all, is relegated to an isolated compartment, a reservation with strictly defined borders. People may still indulge in religious activity for purposes of personal well-being and psychological fulfillment, but religion has no relevant role in the public square or in serious reflections about

the nature of the cosmos or the course of world history. The God of Christianity is in exile. Nobody thinks of naming a newly incorporated village or city "Providence," as was once deemed appropriate in Rhode Island.

Modern fads in religion, including the resurgence of Gnostic belief systems in New Age thinking, the fascination with the occult, and the preoccupation with angels and demons in some sectors may be seen as desperate attempts by modern people to break out of the rigid enclosure of the prevailing view of the universe. That every daily newspaper includes a horoscope and that New Age book and gift stores are proliferating all over the country are indicators of this desperate exercise in futility. A profound sense of the absence of God evokes these neo-mythological stabs toward transcendence.

In the eighteenth century Adam Smith wrote his classic work The Wealth of Nations in which he sought to apply the scientific method to the vagaries of economic enterprises and discover the laws that govern economics. Smith was searching for the "invisible hand" of Providence. In our time that invisible hand is not merely deemed invisible but nonexistent. The hand of Providence has been chopped off altogether, and with that amputation we are left to grope alone in a hostile or, even worse, an indifferent universe. We look no more to the invisible hand of Providence for our economic well-being but to the highly visible hand of human government to solve these questions.

Words have a nasty habit of slipping in and out of vogue. One generation's pet phrases are seen as "out of it" by later generations. In the forties the standard response to a good experience was summed up by the word swell. It seemed to exhaust the vocabulary of Hollywood's Van Johnson in his wartime repartee with June Allyson. But "swell" soon gave way to "cool" or "groovy" or "neat."

Trying to keep up with teenage nomenclature is an impossible mission for the aging adult. The phrases and words change too rapidly for us, and we merely sound foolish trying to keep up. As soon as we try to speak to teenagers in their own language, we see the smirks on their faces when they catch us using a word that is suddenly "out."

But the word providence is too rich and too heavily loaded with crucial theological nuance to allow it to pass from our language without a fight. It is not

a slang term fit for a specific generation but a term with centuries, indeed millennia, of historic significance. It is a theological term of the highest import, a term rooted in the ageless content of Scripture itself.

A Matter of Confidence

The word providence is derived from a Latin prefix and root. The prefix pro indicates "before" or "in front of." The basic root comes from the Latin videre, which means "to see." This root still figures prominently in current language as we are a culture highly influenced by the phenomenon of television. When we put the prefix and the root together we have a word that means "to see beforehand," so we might be tempted to conclude that providence simply refers to the foreknowledge, or prescience, of God. But although the concept of providence includes some reference to God's foreknowledge, it is by no means exhausted by this idea. Providence is not merely a synonym for foreknowledge.

Rather, the concept of providence is multifaceted and includes a wide range of divine activities, as I shall attempt to demonstrate.

In the first instance, the word providence refers to God's provision for His people. We use the word provisions to refer to things we acquire for future needs and exigencies. I do not know what tomorrow will hold for me or for my family, so I take certain steps today to provide for tomorrow. When the weather channel warns of tropical storms and hurricanes that threaten our part of Florida, my wife fills the bathtub with water and stocks up with foodstuffs and other supplies. I have met with my attorney and drawn up a will to make provisions for my wife and children in the event of my death.

Yet with all the provisions I seek to make for my family's future, I realize that ultimately their well-being is in the hands of God. I look to Him as the Great Provider for them as well as for myself. I do not control my destiny or that of my family. This is not my world; it is my Father's world. I do not entrust my family to Allstate; there are better hands than theirs. I take seriously the admonition of Jesus: "Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than

food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them.

Are you not of more value than they? Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature? "So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? "Therefore do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.

Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble." (Matt. 6:25-34) These words of Jesus do not prohibit the exercise of responsible stewardship.

They are designed to be a lesson on anxiety. We are not to be frantic about our future needs. We are not to live in the bondage of worry. Our worry and anxiety are to be assuaged by our confidence in the providence of God. The lily has no need for worry beads or the psychiatrist's couch.

It is a matter of focus. If we are diligent in our quest for the kingdom of God and His righteousness, our concern for earthly provisions will be clearly met. As David said, "I have been young, and now am old; Yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his descendants begging bread" (Ps. 37:25).

Jesus' teaching in the Sermon on the Mount calls attention to the providence of God. He speaks of the birds of the air who are fed by the hand of Providence, and He insists that we are of more value than birds. The point of the comparison is in the concept of "much more." God places a premium of value on the welfare of His children that exceeds the value of the animal kingdom. Yet His providential care extends to both. Not only does He number the hairs on our heads but He notices the fall of every sparrow. As the song declares, "His eye is

on the sparrow . . . but He also watches us."

Because the word providence is rooted in the Latin term for seeing or vision, we may be tempted to restrict its theological application to God's mere observance of human activity. It is not merely that God looks at human affairs. The point is that He looks after human affairs. He not only watches us, He watches over us. The child's most simple prayer is, "Please watch over Mommy, Daddy, Grandma," etc.

It is the watching over us that goes to the heart of divine providence. It is God's fatherly care of His creatures that the word providence encompasses. This means God is involved in human affairs. He is not like Aristotle's god, the Unmoved Mover, who remains aloof and totally uninvolved with human history. Will Durant once compared Aristotle's god with the monarch of England, whom he described as a "do-nothing king who reigns but doesn't rule." The biblical God is not unmoved. He is a moved and moving Mover who rules as well as reigns.

The God of deism and neo-deism is more like the god of Aristotle, a supreme clockmaker who designs and fashions an intricate clock, winds it up, and then steps out of the picture and lets it run by itself. This view regards the laws of nature as laws that operate somewhat independently from divine providence, allowing for no intrusion from on high. These laws are fixed and mechanical. In contrast the Christian faith allows for natural laws but sees these laws as the law of God, always subject to His sovereign rule. They reflect the normal or ordinary way in which God governs His universe.

Divine Sustenance

Making provisions for things has to do with the providing of sustenance.

Sustenance is what is required to keep things going or to keep them alive. The ancient Hebrew looked to the benediction of God whereby God would not only bless His people but also keep them. This benediction was deeply concerned with the preservation of His people. In a word, it focused on the sustaining of His people.

Divine sustenance is tied to the biblical concept of creation. The opening words of the Bible say, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" (Gen. 1:1). The Hebrew word for "create" is the word bara. Built into this concept of bara is the notion of sustenance.

We may look to the realm of music for an analogy. We know the sound of a staccato note: short, brief, and abrupt, like the sound beep! In contrast if the tone is sustained it is elongated and drawn out: beeeeeeeeeeep. We can strike a note on the piano and hold the pedal down to sustain the sound. Similarly, God's work of Creation is not a staccato action; what God creates He sustains. He not only brings things into being out of nothing, He keeps them in existence. The usual biblical term for this is to uphold.

God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds; 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 at the right hand of the Majesty on high. (Heb. 1:1-3) In this text the reference to Christ is to the One who upholds "all things by the word of His power."

The Westminster Confession of Faith defines the providence of God as follows: God the great Creator of all things doth uphold, direct, dispose, and govern all creatures, actions, and things, from the greatest even to the least, by his most wise and holy providence, according to his infallible foreknowledge, and the free and immutable counsel of his own will, to the praise of the glory of his wisdom, power, justice, goodness, and mercy, (v/i) This confessional definition refers to several aspects of God's providence. We will elaborate more fully on these various aspects later. For now we will focus on the first assertion of the work of the Creator, namely on His work of upholding His creation. We note that this upholding refers to all creatures, actions, and things, from the greatest even to the least. This refers to the scope of

the sustenance of divine providence, which extends to and includes everything that is. It is not that God is merely interested in the "big picture." His management of His creation is micromanagement, concerned with and involved with the smallest details.

The confession indicates that God's providential upholding of all things is "by his most wise and holy providence." The word by in this phrase indicates the means by which God sustains what He upholds. Here the means are rooted in His wisdom and holiness. We must not pass too glibly over these adjectival qualifiers. God's work of upholding His creation is grounded in His wisdom.

As mortals we are prone to mistakes in holding on to things either for too short a period or too long a time. What speculator in the stock market has never sold too early or purchased too late? God makes no mistakes in His holdings. He sustains whatsoever He sustains to a perfect degree precisely because He upholds according to His perfect wisdom.

The upholding work of God is also a holy sustaining. In this regard the term holy refers both to His transcendent majesty and to His perfect righteousness. There is no flaw of intelligence, wisdom, or righteousness in His work of sustenance.

What God keeps, He keeps righteously. At times we wonder about the duration of pain and affliction and ask, "How long, O God, must we endure these things?"

We wonder why God allows evil to go on unchecked. Yet the duration of all things is in His hands, and their time span is controlled by His providence according to His wisdom and according to His holy purpose.

We also note that God sustains things according to His foreknowledge, which the confession reminds us is infallible. God does not indulge in guesswork in His prognostications. He does not consult a tote board to figure the odds. His foreknowledge is both infallible and absolute. There is nothing in the future that He does not already know. He knows the end from the very beginning. It is said that God knows all future contingencies yet He does not know them contingently. That is, if we were to ask God about some future possibility, He would never answer us by saying, "That depends."

From our creaturely perspective we regard the future in terms of contingencies.

We have a plan B in case our plan A fails to materialize. To the finite mind,

future events appear contingent. That is because we are contingent beings, dependent upon something outside ourselves for our very existence. But God is not a dependent or contingent Being. He knows what He knows absolutely. He foreknows what He foreknows because what He foreknows He also forewills.

We are instructed by Scripture to bracket our statements about the future by saying "Deo Volente" (God willing). God does not have to speak in those terms because He is the Deo of the Deo Volente.

God upholds all things by the free and immutable counsel of His own will. This is important to grasp. The sustaining providence of God is driven by His will, and His will is absolutely free. It is bound and determined by no creaturely thing.

It is not subject to our whims or actions. His will is not only free but immutably so. Nothing can change His freedom or suddenly arise to block it. His counsel remains forever. He does not change His mind because He receives new information or needs to correct an error. He has an eternal plan that contains no defects. There is no plan B for God. His counsel is immutable because He is immutable in all that He is. His omniscience does not change. His omnipotence never weakens. His wisdom never falters. His memory never fails. There are no mutations in the divine being or character.

The Highest Possible Good

To what end or purpose does God uphold all things? It is to the praise of His glory. This is a difficult concept to embrace in full measure because it suggests a kind of self-centeredness in God, and we are taught to see self-centeredness as sin. Indeed, to be self-centered is a sin for any creature. We mortals are called to be God-centered in our thinking. For creatures, God-centeredness is a virtue, and self-centeredness a vice. But for God, self-centeredness is pure virtue because it is also God-centeredness. For us to be God-centered is to fix our attention upon the most perfect Being. So it is for God Himself.

Though what God does in His providence benefits us, its highest virtue is found in its glorification of God Himself. God's upholding of His creation reflects upon His own glory, and that glory is not a divine vice but is the highest possible good. If God were centered on something less than Himself, that focus would reflect a defect in Himself and render Him less than God and unworthy of our

worship.

It is a sweet and excellent paradox that God's provision for His creatures and His upholding of His creation is also the manifestation of His eternal glory.

Calvin remarked about this when he wrote: First, then, let the reader remember that the providence we mean is not one by which the Deity, sitting idly in heaven, looks on at what is taking place in the world, but one by which he, as it were, holds the helm, and overrules all events.

Hence his providence extends not less to the hand than to the eye. That is to say, he not only sees, but ordains what he wills to be done. (Institutes, 175) In these works of Providence the glory of His wisdom, power, justice, goodness, and mercy is made manifest.