Ten Effects of Seeing and Savoring the Providence of God

00:00:00.000 | Welcome back to the podcast.

00:00:05.440 | This week we focus on God's providence.

00:00:07.480 | Yes, God is in control.

00:00:09.280 | He's orchestrating all things.

00:00:11.120 | Your life, my life, this world, everything.

00:00:14.040 | And he's doing it even when it doesn't feel like it.

00:00:17.160 | Like in 2020.

00:00:18.160 | Well, he is.

00:00:19.160 | He's at work.

00:00:20.160 | And making this case is Pastor John's next book release, simply titled "Providence,"

00:00:23.160 | a 750-page book releasing in less than two months on January 12th.

00:00:27.200 | Monday, you may remember, I asked Pastor John about the book on Wednesday, last time we

00:00:31.400 | heard the introduction to the book.

00:00:33.920 | And today we hear the conclusion to the book.

00:00:35.760 | With the demands on his time, it's really doubtful that he'll read any more of it.

00:00:39.000 | But we're grateful that he spent the time to record the intro and conclusion.

00:00:42.400 | For us, we mention the book this week because you can now pre-order the title from our friends

00:00:46.640 | at Westminster Books for just $19.99.

00:00:49.720 | We're thankful for their partnership and encourage you to order through them as you consider

00:00:53.120 | supporting faithful, independent Christian booksellers.

00:00:56.240 | Go to WTSBooks.com to pre-order.

00:00:58.640 | That's WTSBooks.com.

00:01:02.040 | Last time we heard the 32-minute introduction.

00:01:04.760 | Today the conclusion.

00:01:05.760 | 55 minutes long.

00:01:06.760 | Combined, it's an hour and a half of audiobook readings that serve as our podcast content

00:01:10.720 | for this week and all of next week as well.

00:01:12.760 | I hope you take time to listen to all of it as we take a brief break for Thanksgiving.

00:01:17.360 | We return with new episodes on Monday, November 30th, and with new features to unveil in the

00:01:22.360 | podcast in December.

00:01:23.360 | I can't wait to share those with you soon enough.

00:01:26.200 | Until then, here now is John Piper reading the conclusion to his forthcoming book, Providence,

00:01:31.840 | coming out on January 12th.

00:01:35.040 | Conclusion.

00:01:38.040 | Seeing and savoring the providence of God.

00:01:43.120 | The providence of God, his purposeful sovereignty, is all-embracing, all-pervasive, and invincible.

00:01:51.680 | Therefore, God will be completely successful in the achievement of his ultimate goal for

00:01:58.280 | the universe.

00:02:00.560 | God's providence is guided by the counsel of his will.

00:02:06.560 | This counsel is eternal, all-knowing, and infinitely wise.

00:02:12.320 | Its plans and goals, therefore, are perfect and cannot be improved.

00:02:17.880 | They never change.

00:02:20.200 | Providence is the purposeful sovereignty that carries those plans into action, guides all

00:02:25.880 | things toward God's ultimate goal, and leads to the final consummation.

00:02:31.920 | Job's prayer is true.

00:02:34.720 | You can do all things, and no purpose of yours can be thwarted.

00:02:40.440 | Or as God himself states it positively, "My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish

00:02:47.400 | all my purpose."

00:02:51.600 | The extent of providence.

00:02:56.520 | God's eternal plan includes everything, from the most insignificant bird fall, to the movement

00:03:05.160 | of stars, to the murder of his son.

00:03:09.800 | It includes the moral acts of every soul, its preferences, choices, and deeds.

00:03:18.320 | Neither Satan at his hellish worst, nor human beings at their redeemed best, ever act in

00:03:27.160 | a way that causes a revision in God's all-wise plan.

00:03:32.840 | Whether God planned to permit something or planned to be more directly involved, nothing

00:03:38.840 | comes to pass but what God planned as part of the process of pursuing his ultimate goal.

00:03:45.480 | Therefore, the extent of his providence is total.

00:03:50.120 | Nothing is independent of it.

00:03:52.240 | Nothing happens but by the counsel of his will, the infinite wisdom of his plan.

00:04:03.320 | Nature of Providence The nature of this providence is such that

00:04:10.280 | the preferences and choices of Satan and man are really their own preferences and their

00:04:16.900 | own choices.

00:04:18.620 | They are blameworthy or praiseworthy owing to the way they relate to God in faith and

00:04:24.920 | to man in justice and love.

00:04:27.920 | God's providence is decisive in what Satan and man decide and do, but it is not coercive.

00:04:37.280 | That is, its ordinary way of working is to see to it that Satan and man decide and act

00:04:43.520 | in a way that is their own preference while fulfilling God's plan at every moment.

00:04:51.380 | How God does this may remain a mystery while we see in a mirror dimly, but that he does

00:04:59.000 | it is what the Bible teaches.

00:05:01.240 | It is the glory of God to conceal things.

00:05:06.300 | The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to

00:05:13.120 | us.

00:05:16.680 | Ultimate Goal of Providence One essential aspect of the ultimate goal

00:05:22.840 | of this all-embracing, all-pervasive, invincible providence is the beautification of the Bride

00:05:29.640 | of Christ, the Church, the people of God, the elect.

00:05:35.160 | This is why the final twelve chapters of this book have focused on the creation, transformation,

00:05:42.000 | and glorification of the Bride.

00:05:44.560 | But defining the ultimate goal of providence requires more than pointing to the beautification

00:05:50.740 | of the Bride of Christ.

00:05:53.460 | Too much glory is left unexpressed.

00:05:58.080 | What is this beautification?

00:06:00.800 | It is her sanctification, her holiness.

00:06:04.880 | That is, it is her joyfully obeying all the Word of God.

00:06:09.140 | It is, most essentially, her love for God, which overflows in God-glorifying love for

00:06:15.500 | people.

00:06:16.500 | It is her delight in God and her reflection of God.

00:06:21.180 | Therefore, to express it more fully, the ultimate goal of God's providence is to glorify His

00:06:27.900 | grace in the spiritual and moral beauty of Christ's undeserving, blood-bought Bride

00:06:35.220 | as she enjoys, reflects, and thus magnifies His greatness and beauty and worth above everything.

00:06:43.700 | But even that expression of God's ultimate goal needs one more expansion in order to

00:06:50.540 | have its biblical proportions.

00:06:53.260 | We must echo here the climax of Part 2.

00:06:56.820 | To be sure, the ever-increasing joy of the Bride in the inexhaustible riches of the glory

00:07:04.480 | of Christ's grace will be the essence of how God is glorified in the coming ages.

00:07:11.700 | But its essence is not its totality.

00:07:16.020 | The Bride will inhabit a new creation, and in that new creation she will see dimensions

00:07:23.540 | of the glory of God as never before.

00:07:27.900 | The heavens will be glad.

00:07:30.380 | The sun and moon and stars will praise the Lord.

00:07:35.200 | The earth will rejoice.

00:07:36.740 | The sea will roar with praise.

00:07:38.740 | The rivers will clap their hands.

00:07:40.580 | The hills will sing for joy.

00:07:42.740 | The field will exult and everything in it.

00:07:45.840 | The trees of the forest will chant their praise.

00:07:48.700 | The desert will blossom like the crocus.

00:07:51.500 | The created world, liberated and perfected, will never cease to declare the glory of God.

00:07:58.620 | That will be our dwelling.

00:08:02.200 | But the dwelling is not the family.

00:08:06.580 | The beauty of the new world is not the Bridegroom.

00:08:10.660 | The perfected theater of creation will be glorious, radiant with God.

00:08:15.980 | But the drama, the human experience of God in Christ, not the theater, will be foremost

00:08:23.740 | in magnifying the God of all-embracing, all-pervasive providence.

00:08:29.940 | And the unparalleled beauty and worth of the reigning Lamb who was slain will be the main

00:08:37.340 | song of eternity.

00:08:39.700 | And the joy of the children of God, the Bride of Christ, will be the main echo of the infinite

00:08:47.520 | excellencies of God and the focus of his eternal delight.

00:08:55.780 | Ten effects of seeing and savoring this providence.

00:09:04.500 | God did not reveal these glories for nothing.

00:09:09.140 | He meant them to be known and loved, or as I like to say, seen and savored.

00:09:17.100 | He intends that this seeing and savoring would result in showing, showing the greatness and

00:09:25.380 | the beauty and worth of God in his providence.

00:09:29.620 | So before I bid farewell, I offer ten examples of the effects that knowing and loving this

00:09:37.460 | providence will have.

00:09:39.520 | I say this providence, meaning the providence we have seen in the 45 chapters of this book,

00:09:48.220 | this providence, the all-embracing, all-pervasive, invincible, purposeful sovereignty of God.

00:10:00.940 | One, seeing and savoring this providence awakens awe and leads us into the depth of true God-centered,

00:10:11.980 | Christ-exalting, Bible-saturated worship.

00:10:18.060 | I stand back from the breathtaking panorama of God's glory in the Bible and lift my hands

00:10:24.980 | in silence, groping for words that do not feel pitiful before this majesty.

00:10:35.100 | He is great beyond our comprehension.

00:10:39.700 | Not that our praises ring loudest as we focus on what we do not know.

00:10:45.620 | No.

00:10:47.200 | God has shown us more of himself and more of his ways than we will ever exhaust in this

00:10:54.500 | world.

00:10:55.500 | I have filled a book by simply tracing his counterintuitive wonders.

00:11:02.360 | He has not been sparing in the revelation of his splendors.

00:11:07.760 | Before we sing of what we cannot comprehend, let us spend a lifetime singing of what he

00:11:14.800 | has revealed.

00:11:17.360 | Those who see and savor this providence sing, not because of ritualistic expectations, but

00:11:25.840 | because it's the nature of the God-besotted soul to sing.

00:11:32.080 | And how can we not be God-besotted when every day we are immersed in an ocean of God-given,

00:11:40.240 | God-governed, God-revealing wonders?

00:11:44.240 | Did not Hannah sing over this providence?

00:11:49.080 | The bows of the mighty are broken, but the feeble bind on strength.

00:11:54.440 | The Lord kills and brings to life.

00:11:57.000 | He brings down to shield and raises up.

00:11:59.800 | The Lord makes poor and makes rich.

00:12:02.240 | He brings low and exalts.

00:12:05.920 | Poor Samuel 2, 4, and 6 through 7.

00:12:12.040 | Did not Miriam sing over this providence?

00:12:16.480 | Sing to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously, the horse and the rider he has thrown into

00:12:22.720 | the sea.

00:12:23.960 | Exodus 15, 21.

00:12:26.080 | Did not Moses sing over this providence?

00:12:29.360 | I will sing to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously.

00:12:34.440 | Pharaoh's chariots and his host he cast into the sea.

00:12:38.960 | In the greatness of your majesty, you overthrow your adversaries.

00:12:44.040 | You send out your fury.

00:12:45.760 | It consumes them like stubble.

00:12:48.680 | Who is like you, majestic in holiness, awesome in glorious deeds, doing wonders?

00:12:56.040 | Exodus 15, 1, 4, 7, 11.

00:13:00.340 | Did not the psalmists sing over this providence?

00:13:04.720 | The Lord brings the counsel of the nations to nothing.

00:13:08.500 | He frustrates the plans of the peoples.

00:13:11.000 | The counsel of the Lord stands forever, the plans of his heart to all generations.

00:13:17.120 | Psalm 33, 10 through 11.

00:13:20.200 | Come, behold the works of the Lord, how he has brought desolations on the earth.

00:13:25.960 | He makes wars cease to the end of the earth.

00:13:28.820 | He breaks the bow and shatters the spear.

00:13:31.600 | He burns the chariots with fire.

00:13:35.120 | Psalm 46, 8 through 9.

00:13:37.800 | Whatever the Lord pleases, he does in heaven and on earth, in the seas and all deeps.

00:13:45.760 | Psalm 135, 6.

00:13:48.280 | Did not Mary sing over this providence?

00:13:53.040 | He has shown strength with his arm.

00:13:55.400 | He has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.

00:13:59.160 | He has brought down the mighty from their thrones and exalted those of humble estate.

00:14:05.040 | Luke 1, 51 to 52.

00:14:07.840 | And did not Paul sing over this providence?

00:14:11.040 | Oh, the depth of the riches and the wisdom and the knowledge of God.

00:14:15.520 | How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways.

00:14:21.040 | For who has known the mind of the Lord or who has been his counselor or who has given

00:14:26.120 | a gift to him that he might be repaid?

00:14:29.400 | For from him and through him and to him are all things.

00:14:35.600 | To him be glory forever.

00:14:38.040 | Amen.

00:14:39.120 | Romans 11, 33 through 36.

00:14:43.560 | If there are believers or churches whose worship feels thin and passive and routine, could

00:14:53.920 | it be that they do not know this providence, this God?

00:15:03.400 | Two, seeing and savoring this providence makes us marvel at our own salvation and humbles

00:15:12.720 | us because of our sin.

00:15:18.200 | God chose us from eternity when he saw that we deserved nothing but condemnation.

00:15:25.280 | He predestined us to be his children and share the likeness of his son in spite of our unworthiness

00:15:33.080 | and treason.

00:15:35.040 | He purchased us at the cost of his son's life.

00:15:38.520 | He called us the way Lazarus was called, out of death.

00:15:44.000 | He caused us to be born again.

00:15:46.880 | He gave us the gift of repentance and faith.

00:15:50.720 | He justified us.

00:15:52.440 | He gave us his Holy Spirit as a guarantee.

00:15:56.120 | He is working in us what is pleasing in his sight.

00:16:00.360 | He will keep us from falling and bring us to glory.

00:16:03.720 | He took away the sting of death and will bring us through it into the presence of Christ.

00:16:10.680 | He will perfect our souls, raise us from the dead, give us new bodies like his glorious

00:16:16.920 | body and present us with a new world for our eternal habitation where his glory is the

00:16:23.920 | light and the lamb is the lamp.

00:16:27.800 | It is a great tragedy that millions of Christians do not know that this is true about them.

00:16:36.680 | They have been taught a salvation with themselves as the decisive cause at the point of conversion.

00:16:44.540 | This view of their own decisive power obscures the glory of what God has actually done for

00:16:51.280 | them, strips them of stunned thankfulness for the gift of faith, dulls the intensity

00:16:59.200 | of their amazement that they were raised from the dead, and takes away the wonder that their

00:17:05.840 | perseverance is owing to the omnipotent moment-by-moment keeping of God.

00:17:12.680 | But if we see and savor this providence, oh, how we will exult in the freedom and fullness

00:17:20.860 | and sovereign effectiveness of our salvation.

00:17:24.920 | We will be glad that it is all from God and through God and to God.

00:17:31.140 | We will be made humble and happy and hopeful.

00:17:34.920 | We will give all the glory to God.

00:17:37.940 | The lowliness we feel because of our unworthiness will be accompanied and tempered by the wonder

00:17:44.500 | of God's merciful and infinitely loving providence.

00:17:49.080 | We saw Jonathan Edwards' beautiful expression of the saints' humility in chapter 10.

00:17:55.960 | I love this quote so much and long for this experience so earnestly that I give the last

00:18:03.640 | sentence again.

00:18:06.960 | The desires of the saints, however earnest, are humble desires.

00:18:13.760 | Their hope is a humble hope, and their joy, even when it is unspeakable and full of glory,

00:18:22.360 | is humble, brokenhearted joy and leaves the Christian more poor in spirit and more like

00:18:30.880 | a little child and more disposed to a universal lowliness of behavior.

00:18:39.560 | Three, seeing and savoring this providence causes us to see everything as part of God's

00:18:48.600 | design, everything as from him and through him and to him for his glory.

00:19:02.000 | When we hear God say that he works all things according to the counsel of his will, and

00:19:10.120 | then we see him doing this very thing countless times in his word and in his world, we are

00:19:17.220 | given a worldview with stunning implications.

00:19:23.000 | Everything, absolutely everything relates to God.

00:19:29.920 | As R.C. Sproul would often say, "There are no maverick molecules, nor are there any maverick

00:19:37.960 | athletes or actors or singers or presidents or scholars or street people.

00:19:44.280 | All are in the sway of God's pervasive providence.

00:19:48.680 | All things and all persons fit into God's all-embracing plan."

00:19:55.680 | That is where ultimate meaning is found.

00:19:59.400 | If we are going to understand anything at the most important level, we start with this

00:20:06.040 | reality.

00:20:08.120 | God created the world, holds it in existence, and governs all of it for his purposes.

00:20:16.740 | Everything relates to everything because everything relates to God.

00:20:21.400 | The knowledge of this and the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.

00:20:28.000 | Where this is denied, all knowledge is enveloped in a cloud of folly.

00:20:34.640 | Where it is affirmed, the possibilities of profound, amazing, beautiful, helpful insights

00:20:42.800 | abound.

00:20:46.480 | Four, seeing and savoring this providence helps protect us from the trivializing effects

00:20:55.040 | of culture and from trifling with divine things.

00:21:02.520 | One of the curses of our culture, and it has permeated the church and most Christian communication,

00:21:11.040 | is banality, triviality, silliness, superficiality, and an eerie addiction to flippancy and levity.

00:21:25.000 | This is accompanied by what to me seems like a baffling, allergic reaction to seriousness,

00:21:32.360 | dignity, and articulate precision in public speech.

00:21:38.360 | Carelessness in speech and casualness in demeanor turn up in times and places where you would

00:21:44.440 | expect carefulness, clarity, earnestness, and even gravity.

00:21:51.240 | My impression is that at the root of this culture of inarticulate, casual trifling is

00:21:59.680 | a loss of the weight of the greatness and awfulness of God.

00:22:07.000 | Everything is light and funny because God is a lightweight.

00:22:12.600 | The boats of our communication bounce around with a chipper bearing on the waves of cultural

00:22:18.460 | trifling because the heavy ballast of a big and holy God has been offloaded at the docks

00:22:26.000 | of man-centered theology and endless screen time.

00:22:30.820 | This is a tragedy not only because it is the fruit of trivializing God, but also because

00:22:37.680 | it hinders us from seeing him and experiencing him as he really is in the majesty of his

00:22:44.520 | providence.

00:22:46.240 | My guess is that some who read these lines will have no categories for viewing what I

00:22:52.840 | am saying any other way than as a summons to somberness and boredom.

00:22:59.680 | We live in a culture that can scarcely imagine something like glad gravity or joyful sorrow.

00:23:10.920 | Humor has been so identified with the silliness and levity of slapstick verbal antics that

00:23:19.760 | the robust, reality-rooted, natural explosiveness of humor is for many inconceivable.

00:23:31.040 | Charles Spurgeon was a very funny man, but he was not a man of levity.

00:23:38.680 | He did not trifle with sacred things or think that worship was a place for casual clowning.

00:23:47.340 | He was not allergic to seriousness or dignity.

00:23:53.440 | Three years after his death, Robertson Nicole expressed my concerns and used Spurgeon as

00:23:59.680 | a counter-example.

00:24:02.680 | Some of the humorous type may attract multitudes, but it lays the soul in ashes and destroys

00:24:10.140 | the very germs of religion.

00:24:12.400 | Mr. Spurgeon is often thought by those who do not know his sermons to have been a humorous

00:24:19.040 | preacher.

00:24:20.440 | As a matter of fact, there was no preacher whose tone was more uniformly earnest, reverent,

00:24:28.720 | and solemn.

00:24:30.560 | Of course, every mature and healthy person knows that unbroken seriousness of a melodramatic

00:24:39.320 | or somber kind will inevitably communicate a sickness of soul.

00:24:45.680 | But that is not our danger in the first half of the 21st century.

00:24:50.800 | My point here is that seeing and savoring the all-embracing, all-pervasive providence

00:24:58.180 | of God has a wonderful effect in helping us recover the gift of authentic earnestness

00:25:07.240 | and the beautiful interweaving of gladness and gravity.

00:25:14.360 | Five, seeing and savoring this providence helps us be patient and faithful amid the

00:25:23.200 | most inexplicable circumstances of life.

00:25:29.180 | When our minds are saturated with Scripture and day after day we are exposed to God's

00:25:35.860 | inscrutable ways in the Bible, we become accustomed to trust him in the dark.

00:25:42.720 | It is one thing to be told by God, "My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways

00:25:50.020 | my ways," declares the Lord.

00:25:53.240 | But it is even more sobering and peace-giving to immerse ourselves in his providence and

00:26:00.320 | watch him time and again do and say things that are strange and contrary to our ordinary

00:26:07.680 | ways of thinking and acting.

00:26:10.720 | In this way, the reality of providence shapes our minds and affections.

00:26:16.780 | We become less vulnerable to panic and perplexity and dread, not because there are no perplexing

00:26:24.180 | and fearful circumstances, but because we have seen this before in God's Word.

00:26:30.560 | God has shown us again and again that things are not what they seem and that he is always

00:26:36.660 | weaving something wise and good out of the painful, perplexing threads that look like

00:26:43.240 | a tangle in our lives.

00:26:46.500 | A story may help us grasp how seeing and savoring God's providence helps deal with the perplexities

00:26:53.900 | of life.

00:26:54.900 | I created this story based very loosely on a tale from T.H.

00:27:01.660 | White's The Once and Future King.

00:27:05.500 | Once upon a time, there was a very wise old man named Job.

00:27:13.020 | In his old age, God gave to him a daughter whom he named Jemima, which means "little

00:27:22.820 | dove."

00:27:24.080 | He loved his little girl, and she loved her daddy.

00:27:28.860 | One day, Job decided to go on a journey and asked Jemima if she would like to go along.

00:27:36.260 | "Oh, yes," Jemima said.

00:27:38.380 | "I would love to go along."

00:27:41.420 | And so they started off on their journey and walked all day.

00:27:46.460 | At sundown, they saw a little cottage and knocked on the door.

00:27:52.220 | A very poor man and his wife and baby lived there.

00:27:57.260 | Job asked if he and Jemima could spend the night there before they continued on their

00:28:02.720 | journey in the morning.

00:28:04.900 | The poor man and his wife were very happy to let them stay.

00:28:08.620 | They gave Job and Jemima their own room and made them a simple supper.

00:28:15.380 | This special treat was fresh milk from their only cow.

00:28:20.380 | This was how the poor couple made a living.

00:28:22.880 | Their cow gave good milk, which they sold for enough to live on.

00:28:29.460 | In the morning, when Job and Jemima got up, they heard crying.

00:28:36.160 | The cow had died during the night.

00:28:39.900 | The poor man's wife was weeping.

00:28:42.700 | "What will we do?

00:28:45.580 | What will we do?" she sobbed.

00:28:48.540 | The poor man was about to cut the cow into pieces and sell the meat before it spoiled.

00:28:54.900 | But Job said, "I think you should not cut the cow in pieces, but bury him by your back

00:29:02.860 | wall under the olive tree.

00:29:06.580 | The meat may not be good to sell.

00:29:09.260 | Trust God and he will take care of you."

00:29:13.620 | So the poor man did as Job suggested.

00:29:17.940 | Then Job and Jemima went on their way.

00:29:20.600 | They walked all day again and were very tired when they came to the next town and noticed

00:29:26.540 | a fine home.

00:29:28.360 | They knocked on the door.

00:29:29.980 | A very wealthy man lived in this house, and they hoped that they would not be an inconvenience

00:29:36.660 | to one so wealthy.

00:29:39.860 | But the man was very gruff with them and said they could stay in the barn.

00:29:44.760 | He gave them water and bread for supper and let them eat it by themselves in the barn.

00:29:51.980 | Job was very thankful and said to the wealthy man, "Thank you very much for the bread

00:29:57.100 | and water and for letting us stay in your barn."

00:30:00.380 | In the morning, Job noticed that one of the walls of the house was crumbling.

00:30:05.940 | So he went and bought bricks and mortar and repaired the hole in the wall for the wealthy

00:30:10.380 | man.

00:30:11.580 | Then Job and Jemima went on their way and came to their destination.

00:30:16.340 | As they sat by the fire that night, Jemima said, "Daddy, I don't understand the ways

00:30:22.340 | of God.

00:30:23.340 | It doesn't seem right that the poor man's cow should die when he was so good to us and

00:30:30.580 | that you should fix the rich man's wall when he was so bad to us."

00:30:35.900 | "Well, Jemima," Job said, "many things are not the way they seem.

00:30:43.460 | Perhaps this once I will tell you why, but after this you will have to trust God, who

00:30:50.380 | does not usually explain what He is doing."

00:30:54.620 | The poor man's cow was very sick, but he didn't know it.

00:30:59.980 | I could taste it in the milk that he gave us for supper.

00:31:03.500 | Soon he would have sold bad milk, and the people would have gotten sick and died, and

00:31:09.300 | they would have stoned him.

00:31:11.620 | So I told him not to sell the meat, but to bury the cow under the olive tree by his back

00:31:17.780 | wall, because the Lord showed me that if he dug the grave there, he would find a silver

00:31:24.100 | cup buried from long ago and sell it for enough money to buy two good cows, and in the end,

00:31:31.620 | things would be better for him and his wife and child.

00:31:36.540 | When we spent the night at the rich man's house, I saw the hole in the wall, and I saw

00:31:42.140 | more than that.

00:31:43.900 | I saw that hidden in the wall from generations ago was a chest full of gold.

00:31:50.300 | If the rich man had repaired the wall himself, he would have found it and continued in his

00:31:55.140 | pride and cruelty.

00:31:57.260 | So I bought brick and mortar and closed the wall so that the man would never find this

00:32:04.860 | treasure.

00:32:05.860 | "Do you see, Jemima?"

00:32:08.580 | "Yes, Daddy, I see."

00:32:11.180 | 6.

00:32:16.220 | Seeing and savoring this providence shows us that the problem of God's sovereignty

00:32:21.060 | in suffering is more than relieved by the sustaining purpose and power of his sovereignty

00:32:27.620 | through suffering.

00:32:31.260 | I mean this as a theological truth in the ultimate sense and as a precious experiential

00:32:38.700 | reality for those who trust Christ.

00:32:42.380 | Many people stumble over the conclusion of this book because the all-pervasive providence

00:32:48.500 | of God means that his purposeful sovereignty holds sway over all suffering.

00:32:55.780 | Satan's power to deceive and destroy is real.

00:33:00.380 | Human sin against fellow humans is real.

00:33:04.180 | Natural disasters are real.

00:33:07.200 | But what we have seen in this book is that neither Satan, nor man, nor nature ever does

00:33:14.780 | anything that was not in the plan of God.

00:33:20.000 | In the entire sequence of events in the world, God decides finally which causes will be effective.

00:33:28.620 | Therefore all suffering is in the sway of God's providence.

00:33:32.940 | He could always stop it.

00:33:35.460 | When he doesn't, his permissions are planned and purposeful and, in his overall design,

00:33:44.980 | wise.

00:33:46.500 | This wise, purposeful sovereignty will be the final answer to the justice and goodness

00:33:52.700 | of God's painful dealings in this world.

00:33:56.100 | As we saw in chapter 22, all his ways are justice.

00:34:01.880 | He loves righteous deeds.

00:34:05.580 | Righteousness and justice are the foundation of his throne.

00:34:10.020 | He will judge the world with righteousness.

00:34:14.180 | His righteousness endures forever.

00:34:17.960 | No one will ever be able to rightly accuse God of treating him worse than he deserves.

00:34:25.040 | Sin is universal in the heart of man and its denigration of God is an outrage beyond all

00:34:31.840 | its painful consequences.

00:34:35.400 | Why have things come to this?

00:34:38.500 | The closest the Bible comes to giving an ultimate answer is Romans 9, 22, and 23.

00:34:47.920 | If God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much

00:34:54.440 | patience the vessels of wrath prepared for destruction in order to make known the riches

00:35:00.380 | of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory, how should

00:35:08.040 | this sentence be completed?

00:35:11.320 | I argued in chapter 7 that Paul's intention was that we complete it with something like

00:35:17.600 | this, "Then no legitimate objection can be raised."

00:35:24.240 | The reason no legitimate objection can be raised is that it is right and fitting that

00:35:31.520 | the fullness of the glories of God be manifest, including, as verse 22 says, wrath and power.

00:35:40.440 | Therefore a world exists in which God's holy wrath and righteous judgment fall on

00:35:47.480 | guilty sinners.

00:35:50.180 | If anyone in this world for whom the painful wrath of God is not fitting is swept away

00:35:55.340 | in the judgments, God will restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish them in the age

00:36:02.280 | to come.

00:36:03.500 | For those who trust Christ, God's sovereignty in suffering is not an unyielding problem

00:36:10.500 | but an unfailing hope.

00:36:13.260 | It means that in the suffering of Christians, neither Satan, nor man, nor nature, nor chance

00:36:22.560 | is wielding decisive control.

00:36:26.040 | God is sovereign over this suffering, which means it is not meaningless.

00:36:32.220 | It is not wrath.

00:36:34.320 | It is not ultimately destructive.

00:36:37.420 | It is not wanton or heedless.

00:36:40.760 | It is purposeful.

00:36:42.560 | It is measured, wise, and loving.

00:36:47.340 | Even if, as I have seen personally, the suffering is terrible in the last hour of death, when

00:36:55.220 | there is no life left in which the sufferer can be sanctified by it, even then it is eternally

00:37:02.380 | purposeful.

00:37:04.640 | For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all

00:37:11.680 | comparison as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen.

00:37:17.540 | For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

00:37:24.540 | If I may bear witness from fifty years of ministering the Word of God to many suffering

00:37:29.540 | people, here is what I would say.

00:37:32.780 | For every one person whom I have heard or seen forsaking the truth of God's all-pervasive

00:37:41.060 | providence because of suffering, or more often because of the suffering and death of a loved

00:37:47.540 | one, I have seen ten others bear witness that the biblical truth of God's absolute sovereignty

00:37:55.940 | in and over their suffering and loss saved their faith, and some have said their sanity.

00:38:04.380 | Indeed, it saved not only their faith in God and sanity of mind, but also their love for

00:38:10.340 | people.

00:38:11.340 | How is that?

00:38:13.900 | Love cannot flourish where fear and greed consumes the heart with self-protecting or

00:38:20.460 | self-enhancing passions.

00:38:23.020 | The heart must be set free from self-focus for the sake of focusing on others.

00:38:30.500 | Something must break this double power, fearing loss and craving gain.

00:38:37.780 | What breaks this power is the unshakable certainty of hope warranted by the unstoppable, blood-bought

00:38:46.900 | omnipotence of merciful providence.

00:38:51.840 | We saw how this works in chapter 43, killing sin and creating love, by faith.

00:39:00.640 | If our suffering turns us in on ourselves, we will not love well in the midst of affliction.

00:39:10.200 | But that is precisely where Christian love should shine.

00:39:14.800 | In a severe test of affliction, their abundance of joy overflowed in a wealth of generosity.

00:39:22.920 | Joy overflowing with generosity in affliction, that is the beauty of Christian love.

00:39:31.280 | And how can there be such triumphant joy in affliction?

00:39:36.360 | Hope, certain hope.

00:39:39.920 | We heard of the love that you had for all the saints because of the hope laid up for

00:39:46.280 | you in heaven.

00:39:48.440 | What are you when others persecute you?

00:39:51.080 | Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven.

00:39:57.040 | Jesus, for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross.

00:40:02.320 | In every case, hope, the confidence of a joyful future, broke the power of fear and greed

00:40:11.520 | and freed the heart for love.

00:40:15.760 | This is how the Christian soul in suffering is saved from bitterness and revenge and self-indulgence

00:40:21.460 | and self-pity.

00:40:23.620 | God promises to turn every sorrow to joy, every loss to gain, every groan to glory.

00:40:35.480 | And this promise does not hang in the air.

00:40:38.680 | It is rooted, warranted, secured, and guaranteed by the power that enables Christ even to subject

00:40:48.600 | all things to himself.

00:40:51.160 | In other words, for thousands of suffering Christians, the all-pervasive providence of

00:40:57.760 | God is not a barrier for faith, but the ground of faith-preserving, sanity-sustaining, love-empowering

00:41:09.800 | hope.

00:41:12.800 | The all-embracing, all-pervasive, invincible providence of God found in the Bible is theologically

00:41:21.660 | more comprehensive and experientially more comforting and more fruitful than its denial.

00:41:32.520 | 7.

00:41:35.080 | Seeing and savoring this providence makes us alert and resistant to man-centered substitutes

00:41:43.560 | that pose as good news.

00:41:47.360 | Indeed, I would say that seeing and savoring this providence sends the roots of our counter-cultural

00:41:56.280 | conviction so deeply into the rock of Scripture that lovers of this truth are not easily blown

00:42:04.040 | over by the winds of false teaching.

00:42:08.180 | Why this is true may be owing mainly to the fact that this providence is so contrary to

00:42:14.160 | fallen human nature and so out of step with self-exalting culture that if Christians break

00:42:21.760 | ranks with the world on this point, they can on any point, which means they are safe from

00:42:31.640 | much deception.

00:42:35.120 | But I think the reason goes deeper than that for why embracing this providence makes us

00:42:41.800 | resistant to man-centered substitutes.

00:42:46.000 | I think the sheer enormity of God, the sheer weight and seriousness and authority of God

00:42:56.240 | creates in the soul a spiritual sense, a kind of holy acumen that can detect in any idea

00:43:07.280 | or doctrine or behavior a tendency toward exalting man while diminishing God.

00:43:17.760 | Eight, seeing and savoring this providence makes us confident that God has the right

00:43:25.880 | and the power to answer prayer that people's hearts and minds would be changed.

00:43:35.480 | Prayer is one of the great wonders that God has given to the world.

00:43:40.920 | That God would plan for his own sovereign hand to be moved by the prayers of his creatures

00:43:50.240 | is amazing.

00:43:51.240 | It is a thoughtless objection to say, "There's no point in praying since God has all things

00:43:59.120 | planned anyway."

00:44:00.240 | It's thoughtless because just a little thought would reveal that God has planned millions

00:44:08.920 | of human acts every day that cause other acts to happen.

00:44:15.160 | A nail sinks into a board because God planned for a hammer to hit it.

00:44:20.840 | A student makes an A on a test because God planned for the student to study.

00:44:27.400 | A jet flies from New York to Los Angeles because God planned for fuel to be available, wings

00:44:34.160 | to stay put, engines to thrust, and a pilot to know what he's doing.

00:44:40.160 | In none of these cases do we say that the cause was pointless—the hammer, the studying,

00:44:47.040 | the fuel, the wing, the engine, the pilot.

00:44:50.440 | Neither is prayer pointless.

00:44:52.640 | It is part of the plan.

00:44:56.160 | In fact, the all-embracing, all-pervasive, unstoppable providence of God is the only

00:45:03.800 | hope for making our most heartfelt prayers effective.

00:45:09.480 | What is your greatest longing?

00:45:12.600 | Your most heartfelt prayer?

00:45:17.080 | Probably it is for the salvation of someone you love.

00:45:21.160 | Or it may be for the liberation of your soul from some sinful bondage.

00:45:27.280 | When you pray that God would save your loved one or liberate you from bondage to sin, what

00:45:36.360 | are you asking God to do?

00:45:40.120 | You are asking him to do what he promised to do in the new covenant, which Jesus bought

00:45:48.080 | with his blood, which is why we pray in Jesus' name.

00:45:52.680 | So we pray, God, take out of their flesh the heart of stone and give them a new heart of

00:45:59.840 | flesh.

00:46:01.320 | Lord, circumcise their hearts so that they love you.

00:46:06.560 | Father, put your Spirit within them and cause them to walk in your statutes.

00:46:13.560 | Lord, grant them repentance and the knowledge of the truth that they may escape from the

00:46:19.920 | snare of the devil.

00:46:21.760 | Father, open their hearts so that they may believe the gospel.

00:46:28.160 | The only people who can pray like that are people who believe that saving faith is a

00:46:35.520 | gift of providence.

00:46:38.320 | Many people do not believe this because they believe that human beings have the power of

00:46:45.280 | ultimate self-determination at the point of conversion.

00:46:49.780 | In other words, God can woo sinners, but he cannot create their faith.

00:46:56.560 | Man must have the final say.

00:46:59.080 | At the point when faith comes into existence, man, not God, is decisive.

00:47:08.360 | My point here is that people who really believe this cannot consistently pray that God would

00:47:16.720 | convert unbelieving sinners.

00:47:20.400 | Why?

00:47:21.820 | Because if they pray for divine influences in the sinner's life, they are either praying

00:47:27.960 | for successful influence, which takes away the sinner's ultimate self-determination,

00:47:34.200 | or they are praying for unsuccessful influence, which is not praying for conversion.

00:47:40.920 | So either they must give up praying that God would convert people or give up ultimate human

00:47:48.360 | self-determination or go on acting inconsistently.

00:47:56.240 | Prayer is a spectacular gift.

00:48:01.200 | No one believed more firmly than Paul that humans do not have the final say in their

00:48:07.920 | conversion but that God does.

00:48:12.240 | It depends not on human will or exertion but on God who has mercy.

00:48:19.140 | But probably no one prayed with more tears and more urgency than Paul for the conversion

00:48:27.180 | of sinners.

00:48:29.260 | I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart for the sake of my brothers, my

00:48:34.740 | kinsmen according to the flesh.

00:48:36.800 | My heart's desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved.

00:48:43.700 | He prayed this way because he knew that the new birth is not a mere decision but a miracle.

00:48:52.640 | With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.

00:48:58.740 | The providence we have seen in this book does not make prayer a problem.

00:49:04.180 | It makes prayer powerful.

00:49:07.860 | 9. Seeing and savoring this providence shows us that evangelism and missions are absolutely

00:49:17.900 | essential for people to be converted to Christ because God makes them the means of his work

00:49:24.900 | in creating saving faith.

00:49:29.700 | Just as thoughtless as the previous objection about prayer is the objection that says there's

00:49:37.260 | no point in evangelism and missions since God has planned whom he will save.

00:49:42.980 | A moment's thought will reveal that the plan to save people through the Word of God includes

00:49:52.300 | the plan to send preachers of the Word.

00:49:55.580 | No one believes and is saved without hearing the gospel.

00:50:01.080 | The new birth comes through the living and abiding Word, the gospel.

00:50:06.920 | You have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living

00:50:11.520 | and abiding Word of God.

00:50:14.140 | And this Word is the good news that was preached to you.

00:50:18.140 | This gospel is not written in the clouds.

00:50:21.420 | It is entrusted to Christians who become witnesses and missionaries.

00:50:29.120 | If there were no human witnesses, there would be no salvation.

00:50:36.300 | Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

00:50:39.220 | How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed?

00:50:44.380 | And how are they to believe in him whom they have never heard?

00:50:48.020 | And how are they to hear without someone preaching?

00:50:51.660 | And how are they to preach unless they are sent?

00:50:55.300 | So faith comes from hearing and hearing through the Word of Christ.

00:51:02.780 | Romans 10, 13 through 15 and 17.

00:51:07.780 | When Paul spoke of his own commissioning from the risen Christ, he described it in the most

00:51:15.140 | impossible terms.

00:51:17.500 | Jesus commissioned him to the Gentiles to do what only God can do.

00:51:25.080 | Jesus said to Paul, "I am sending you to open their eyes so that they may turn from

00:51:32.660 | darkness to light, from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness

00:51:37.880 | of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me."

00:51:42.560 | Acts 26, 17 to 18.

00:51:45.920 | Open blind eyes?

00:51:48.360 | Liberate from Satan?

00:51:49.360 | That's Paul's mission and ours.

00:51:53.600 | This is how the blind see and the enslaved are set free—by evangelism and missions.

00:52:00.720 | They are the instruments.

00:52:03.060 | But the instruments are not the miracle of conversion.

00:52:06.920 | They are another kind of miracle—the miracle of obedience.

00:52:11.080 | But we are talking here about evangelism and the miracle of conversion.

00:52:16.560 | When the Word is spoken, the Lord opens hearts.

00:52:21.920 | That is what we read about Lydia.

00:52:24.520 | The Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul.

00:52:31.520 | The Word spoken by Paul is the essential instrument.

00:52:36.360 | The work of the Lord is the miracle of the heart-opening conversion.

00:52:43.000 | As in the case of prayer, the unthwartable providence of God is not a problem for evangelism

00:52:50.560 | and missions.

00:52:52.280 | It is their only hope of success.

00:52:55.120 | The obstacles to missions around the world today are insurmountable but for one thing—the

00:53:02.520 | providence of God is unstoppable.

00:53:04.960 | It cannot be stopped by closed countries.

00:53:07.580 | It cannot be stopped by hostile religions.

00:53:10.200 | It cannot be stopped by difficult languages and cultures.

00:53:13.920 | And it cannot be stopped by the ultimate self-determination of the fallen human soul because in the world

00:53:22.000 | of God's purposeful sovereignty such self-determination does not exist.

00:53:29.520 | We may and we must build our lives and our mission on this confidence.

00:53:36.880 | I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

00:53:44.800 | And to that end, this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world

00:53:49.800 | as a testimony to all the nations and then the end will come.

00:53:55.000 | I pray that God will use this book to catapult thousands of new missionaries into God's

00:54:03.520 | harvest with undaunted confidence.

00:54:09.360 | 10.

00:54:12.520 | Seeing and savoring this providence assures us that for all eternity God will be increasingly

00:54:21.820 | glorified in us as we are increasingly satisfied in him.

00:54:31.760 | Running through this book like a golden thread is the truth that God designed the world and

00:54:40.720 | performs his providence so that his glory in saving us and our joy in seeing him would

00:54:49.680 | be forever united as each increases in the increase of the other.

00:54:57.160 | When the immeasurable riches of God's glory in saving us through the slaying of the lamb

00:55:03.300 | are forever and continually dispensed from his infinite treasury, our gladness will increase

00:55:12.600 | with every fresh sight.

00:55:16.000 | And as our gladness in God increases, his worth will be seen as a greater and greater

00:55:23.400 | treasure reflected in the pleasures of his people.

00:55:28.280 | The all-embracing, all-pervasive, unstoppable providence of God is precious in proportion

00:55:36.700 | as we hope for this day to come.

00:55:39.640 | And it will come.

00:55:42.100 | God will forever be increasingly glorified in us as we are increasingly satisfied in

00:55:49.200 | him.

00:55:51.100 | In your presence there is fullness of joy.

00:55:54.740 | At your right hand are pleasures forevermore.

00:55:59.160 | Be exalted, O God, above the heavens.

00:56:02.680 | Let your glory be over all the earth.

00:56:07.560 | Our Lord, come.

00:56:09.240 | Amen.

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Ten Effects of Seeing and Savoring the Providence of God

Chapters