Nothing can occur that Avas not foreseen, and if foreseen it must Jiave been inteiided. As the Scriptures teachlh'at the providential control of God extends to all events, even the most minute, they do thereby teach that his decrees are equally comprehensive.
4. Another argument is derived from the certainty of the divine government. As all events are more or less intimately connected, and as God works by means, if God does not determine the means as well as the event, all certainty as to the event itself would be destroyed. In determining the redemption of man, He thereby determined on the mission, incarnation, sufferings, death, and resur- rection of his Son, on the gift of the Spirit, upon the faith, repent- ance, and perseverance of all his people. The prediction of future events, which often depend on the most fortuitous occurrences, or which include those that appear to us of no account, proves that the certainty of the divine administration rests on the foreordina- tion of God extending to all events both great and small.
The Scriptures in various ways teach that God foreordains whatever comes to pass.
1. They teach that God works all things according to the coun- sel of his will. There is nothing to limit the words " all things," and therefore they must be taken in the fullest extent.
2. It is expressly declared that fortuitous events, that is, events which depend on causes so subtle and so rapid in their operation as to elude our observation, are predetermined ; as the falling of the lot, the flight of an arrow, the falling of a sparrow, the num- ber of the hairs of our heads.
Free Acts are Foreordained.
3. The Bible especially declares that the free acts of men are decreed beforehand. This is involved in the doctrine of prophecy, which assumes that events involving the free acts of a multitude of men are foreseen.and foreordained. God promises to give faith, a new heart, to write his law upon the minds of his people, to work in them to will and to do, to convert the Gentiles, to fill the world with the true worshippers of Christ, to whom every knee is gladly to bow. If God has promised these things. He must of course purpose them, but they all involve the free acts of men.
4. The Scriptures teach that sinful acts, as well as such as are holy, are foreordained. In Acts ii. 23, it is said, " Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain ; " iv. 27, " For of a truth against thy holy child Jesus, whom thou
544 PART I. — THEOLOGY. [Ch. IX. — The Decrees.
hast anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the people of Israel were gathered together, for to do whatso- ever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done.'' " Truly the Son of Man goeth as it was determined ; but woe unto that man by whom He is betrayed." (Luke xxii. 22.) It was fore- ordained that He should be betrayed ; but woe to him who fulfilled the decree. Here foreordination and responsibility are by our Lord Himself declared to coexist and to be consistent. In Rev. xvii. 17, it is said, " God hath put in their hearts to fulfil his will, and to agree, and give their kingdom unto the beast, until the words of God shall be fulfilled." The crucifixion of Christ was beyond doubt foreordained of God. It was, however, the greatest crime ever committed. It is therefore beyond all doubt the doctrine of the Bible that sin is foreordained.
5. Besides this, the conquests of Nebuchadnezzar, the destruc- tion of Jerusalem, and many other similar events, were predicted, and therefore predetermined, but they included the commission of innumerable sins, without which the predictions, and consequently Vthe revealed purposes of God, could not have been accomplished. / 6. The whole course of history is represented hs the develop- 'ment of the plan and purposes of God; and yet human history is little else than the history of sin. No one can read the simple nar- rative concerning Joseph, as given in the book of Genesis, without seeing that everything in his history occurred in execution of a pi-econceived purpose of God. The envy of his brethren, their sell- ing him into Egypt, and his unjust imprisonment, were all embraced in God's plan. " God," as Joseph himself said to his brethren, " sent me before you, to preserve you a posterity in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance. So now it was not you that sent me hither, but God." (Gen. xlv. 7, 8.) This is but an illustration. What is true of the history of Joseph, is true of all history. It is the development of the plan of God. God is in history, and although we cannot trace .his path step by step, yet it is plain in the general survey of events, through long periods, that they are ordered by God to the accompli'-hment of his divine pur- poses. This is obvious enough in the history of the Jewish nation, as recorded in the Scripture, but it is no less true in regard to all history. The acts of the wicked in persecuting the early Church, were ordained of God as the means for the wider and more speedy proclamation of the Gos])el. The sufferings of the martyrs were the means not only of extending but of purifying the Church. The apostasy of the man of sin being predicted, was predetermined. The