Is God Ever Surprised?

00:00:00.000 | Welcome back to the Ask Pastor John podcast with longtime pastor and author, John Piper.

00:00:09.440 | And a longtime listener to this podcast, Romella, wants confirmation on something that she's

00:00:13.920 | beginning to sense in Scripture and from listening to what we've been saying on this podcast

00:00:18.680 | over the years.

00:00:19.680 | Romella asks this, "Pastor John, is it true that nothing ever takes God by surprise?"

00:00:26.000 | Yes, that's true.

00:00:28.560 | God is never surprised.

00:00:31.160 | To be surprised, you have to be uncertain about what's coming.

00:00:35.440 | You have to be ignorant.

00:00:37.000 | God is never ignorant about the future or about anything.

00:00:41.000 | He is never uncertain about what is coming.

00:00:46.200 | And we can know this for at least two reasons.

00:00:49.900 | One is that the Bible shows that knowing the future, even the future of human decisions,

00:00:57.720 | is part of what it means to be God.

00:01:00.280 | And the other is that the Bible shows that God's foreknowledge is not the knowledge of

00:01:05.320 | something different from His will and plan, but that He knows the future because He plans

00:01:12.040 | the future.

00:01:13.240 | So let's look at those one at a time and passages to support them.

00:01:18.560 | Isaiah 41, 22.

00:01:21.440 | God calls the idols.

00:01:24.080 | He calls them to give an account, and He challenges them to show that they are God's.

00:01:30.000 | How does He do it?

00:01:31.000 | Like this, "Announce to us what is coming.

00:01:34.920 | Declare the things that are going to come afterward, that we may know that you are God's."

00:01:40.440 | What does that mean?

00:01:42.920 | In other words, in God's mind, the capacity to predict the future belongs to God as God.

00:01:51.640 | It was part of His deity to be able to declare things that come afterwards.

00:01:56.880 | He makes the same point in Isaiah 42, 8.

00:01:59.840 | He connects the power to foreknow and divine glory.

00:02:03.200 | "I am the Lord, that is my name.

00:02:06.160 | I will not give my glory to another nor my praise to graven images.

00:02:10.640 | Behold, the former things have come to pass.

00:02:15.880 | Now I declare new things before they spring forth.

00:02:20.960 | I proclaim them to you."

00:02:23.440 | So you see the connection.

00:02:24.440 | "I am Yahweh, and this is part of my divine glory.

00:02:28.720 | Before they spring forth, I proclaim them to you.

00:02:32.040 | Foreknowledge, knowledge of the future, is part of my glory," He says.

00:02:37.400 | Here it is again, Isaiah 45, 21.

00:02:40.320 | God throws up the challenge of whether there is any other God besides Him, and He does

00:02:45.780 | it by asking about their powers to announce the future.

00:02:49.560 | "Declare," He says, "set forth your case.

00:02:53.200 | Indeed, let them consult together.

00:02:56.240 | Who has announced this from of old?

00:02:58.520 | Who has long ago declared it?

00:03:00.480 | Is it not I, the Lord?

00:03:02.720 | And there is no other God besides Me, a righteous God and a Savior.

00:03:06.680 | There is none except Me."

00:03:08.360 | So here it is again.

00:03:09.600 | God says that what's at stake in His capacity to announce the future affairs of men and

00:03:16.240 | nations, that's a lot of human decision, what's at stake is His divinity, His godness.

00:03:25.080 | "I, the Lord, there is no other God besides Me when I predict the future.

00:03:31.520 | I show that."

00:03:33.320 | And then, this is really important, I think, in settling issue, then we see Jesus do the

00:03:40.760 | very same thing as God.

00:03:44.520 | He connects His foreknowledge, even His knowledge of sinful choices like Judas' sinful choice

00:03:51.080 | and Peter's sinful choice to deny Him.

00:03:54.240 | He connects that with His deity, just like Isaiah did with God's deity in John 13, 19,

00:04:02.680 | where he says at the Last Supper, "From now on, I am telling you before it comes to pass,"

00:04:10.200 | he's referring to Judas' betrayal, "I'm telling you about Judas' betrayal before it comes

00:04:15.520 | to pass so that when it does, you may believe that I am."

00:04:23.680 | Period.

00:04:24.680 | Now, most of the English translations say that "I am he," which is understandable because

00:04:30.760 | it sounds odd to just, "that you may believe I am."

00:04:33.840 | That's what the Greek says.

00:04:36.320 | And we know where that phrase "I am" comes from.

00:04:39.640 | It's a play on the name of God from Exodus 3.

00:04:44.720 | "I am who I am.

00:04:46.520 | Tell them I am sent you."

00:04:48.400 | Jesus is claiming to be God, and the basis of it is, "I know Judas is going to betray

00:04:55.200 | me."

00:04:56.200 | This is huge.

00:04:57.200 | So, the same thing is true of Peter's denial.

00:05:01.360 | Jesus knows precisely who will deny Him.

00:05:04.560 | He knows how many times He will deny Him.

00:05:06.920 | He knows when in the morning He will deny Him.

00:05:11.600 | Same thing with Judas—when, where, why.

00:05:15.360 | And He knew this about Judas from the beginning.

00:05:19.120 | We know that from John 6, 64.

00:05:21.880 | I knew from the—when He chose Judas, He knew what He would do.

00:05:26.560 | Now, here's the text that connects the prediction of God with the planning or the performing

00:05:35.000 | of God.

00:05:36.000 | Let's say of 46.9, "I am God, and there is no other.

00:05:39.360 | I am God, and there's none like Me, declaring"—now, here's His foreknowledge—"declaring

00:05:45.160 | the end from the beginning."

00:05:46.640 | So He declares it.

00:05:47.640 | He knows it.

00:05:48.640 | And then He goes on.

00:05:49.640 | "And from ancient times, things not yet done, saying, 'My purpose will stand, and

00:05:57.760 | I will accomplish all My good pleasure.'"

00:06:02.760 | So now we get a window onto how God knows the future.

00:06:06.920 | He knows it because He plans it and does it.

00:06:11.280 | He knows it because He plans it and performs it.

00:06:14.400 | Jeremiah 1, 12, the Lord said, "I am watching over My word to perform it."

00:06:21.680 | God doesn't just predict.

00:06:23.440 | He does what He predicts.

00:06:25.280 | Or Ezekiel 12, 25, "For I am the Lord, I will speak the word, I will speak it, and

00:06:32.400 | I will perform it."

00:06:35.640 | I will speak the word and perform it, declares the Lord God.

00:06:40.680 | In other words, God knows the future because He performs the future.

00:06:47.720 | He's never surprised because He's not surprised at His own work.

00:06:55.000 | Foreknowledge is not an awareness of what the fates will make happen.

00:07:01.080 | Foreknowledge is not an awareness of what random chance is going to bring about.

00:07:06.640 | Foreknowledge is not an awareness of what ultimate human autonomy is going to produce.

00:07:13.280 | There is no fate.

00:07:15.440 | There is no random chance.

00:07:18.060 | There is no ultimate human autonomy.

00:07:21.280 | What God knows is what God will do.

00:07:24.760 | The future is not some kind of freewheeling reality separate from God's will that He has

00:07:30.720 | to try to catch on to and adapt to.

00:07:33.760 | He knows the future because He plans the future, and He's never surprised by what He plans.

00:07:41.320 | Profoundly true from Scripture and a deep personal comfort to know that God is in sovereign

00:07:47.760 | control and in His reign over His creation.

00:07:51.280 | Thank you, Pastor John, and thank you for the question, Romella.

00:07:54.880 | As you know by now, nothing is off limits on this podcast.

00:07:57.880 | We welcome questions all across the spectrum of issues in life from people who are struggling

00:08:03.420 | with faith or struggling with suffering or struggling with various relationships.

00:08:09.160 | All of us struggle, and we want to offer you hope from God's word.

00:08:12.440 | So thank you for joining us, and thank you for sending your questions in to us.

00:08:16.480 | For just about everything you need to know about this podcast, go to our online home

00:08:19.760 | at zeroingod.org/askpastorjohn.

00:08:23.560 | Of course, there you can send us a question of your own.

00:08:25.480 | You can browse our archive now of over 1,000 episodes to date as well.

00:08:31.180 | But for now, we must break for the weekend, and we'll be back on Monday.

00:08:34.720 | I'm your host, Tony Garanki.

00:08:36.240 | We'll see you then.

00:08:36.760 | [END]

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Is God Ever Surprised?

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