The Sovereignty of
God Defined
Is. 12
I want to get it out of the way first of all
what kind of a god I hope and trust you do not believe in. This pretender to
the Name of God has been around since the beginning of time and has been
instrumental in leading many ‘believing unbelievers’ into a lost eternity in
hell. The Bible tells us that in the last days, - in particular, - this
‘god’ will be at his most successful in achieving his aim of deluding the
populations of the world (Mt.24:24)
insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.
The god in which many believe today, -
amongst even those who claim to belong to Christ, - is a usurper to the
title of the God of the Bible. This god who is worshipped by a great
majority is so helpless that it is as if he is cowering in a corner
somewhere in Heaven, feebly and pathetically begging for souls to be
saved … souls who are not in the least bit interested in anything he has to
say. This god is like Bartimaeus the beggar on the road to Jericho, -
hopeless and helpless … if it were not for the will of man.
This feeble god works outside of any plan of
his own and he tries his best to fit into the plans men and women have
devised … otherwise he fears he wouldn’t be listened to. He looks to see
what they are going to do and then he works in with their plans. Their will
is stronger than his. Their plans are more developed than his. This god is
also a sentimental god whose power is only in accordance with that which the
sinner, - whom he created, - allows him to have … and he is trying his best
to convince them against the mighty flow of the worldly torrents. But sadly,
we’ve got to conclude he is not very successful because it seems less and
less people are interested in what he has to say.
Friends, I want to assure you that is not
the god I believe in. I believe that that kind of god is a creation
that began in the mind of the devil and that the devil has succeeded in
permeating into the minds of deluded men and women. That god is the god of
the idolaters, the Romanists and the Arminians.
This created god of theirs fits neatly with
man’s imagination and expectations of who he ought to be. When I speak to
the unsaved, - especially at funeral times, - they can tell me about the god
they believe in … the god they have manufactured to meet their needs.
Similarly, the god of the meetings where hype and euphoria are the primary
objectives … it all goes to show the terrible danger we are in were
it not for the quickening grace of the Holy Spirit
of God.
Let’s leave those thoughts now behind us and
set out to define the Sovereignty of the one true God in the best way
we can discover it defined in the Word of God.
You know, - before we do, - it’s a sad
reflection on preaching that we have allowed the haze and the mist to dull
out the truth of this great subject. What the world needs again to see is
the Sovereignty of God … but even before the world sees it God’s people
need to see it again!
The Meaning of
God’s Sovereignty
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It ought not to be too hard for a
Bible-believing Christian to discover the meaning of this term, the
Sovereignty of God. |
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It means the absolute power and authority
is in the hands of the Almighty God. |
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It means Heaven and earth and all the
universes of creation have but only one King. |
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It means that out of all the gods and
idols and images and things being worshipped our God is the only God. |
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He alone, - the Bible says, - knows the
end from the beginning; how does He know that? … because He was alone
before the angels, before the stars, before anything was God was! |
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Before a single thought came into the mind
of God’s creation His plan was worked out in its complete and absolute
totality.
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You can’t understand that? No, neither
can I … but the Bible says, Ps. 139:2
Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, thou understandest my
thought afar off.
Ps. 139: 15 My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the
depths of the earth, 16 your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days
ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. |
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And look! … You are called not to
understand it but to believe it! For
Ps. 106:2 Who can utter the mighty acts of the
LORD? who can show forth all his praise? |
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Job cried out as he trusted in the
sovereignty of God, Job 14:4 Who can
bring a clean thing out of an unclean [man]? not one. 5 Seeing his
days are determined, the number of his months are with thee, thou hast
appointed his bounds that he cannot pass. |
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You see, to say that God is Sovereign is
not to confine Him by the human understanding , - otherwise you’ll get it
wrong; the meaning and the way to understand this most magnificent of
doctrines is to accept simply and without any inhibitions what God says
about Himself in His infallible Word.
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You don’t always need to understand it,
simply believe it! |
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He is Sovereign where you would least
expect Him. He is Sovereign in human government. He is Sovereign in
personal circumstances. … He is King of kings and absolute Lord of all His
creation. He reigns supreme; He reigns alone; He reigns without any
recourse to ask or seek the advice of His creation. |
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Such is the God of the Bible I hope you
are believing in for your salvation in ‘faith’ of itself will not save you
… only faith in the redeeming work of the eternal God of Heaven saves! |
The Marvel of
God’s Sovereignty
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You know, it angers and annoys me when I
hear Christians undermining the Sovereignty of God … because it is
offensive to me that they have rejected the plain teachings of Scripture. |
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I can’t understand how they think they can
belittle the power and Sovereignty of God, - even unknowingly, for that is
no excuse when they have the Bible. |
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I marvel at why it took God six days
consisting of twenty-four hours each to make this world, - I cannot
understand that … but I wouldn’t argue with God’s Word. He could have done
it quicker … why did it take Him as long as six days?! |
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I marvel at why He should see fit to plan
salvation even before He had created the sinner on earth and given him the
propensity to sin! I marvel at why God should have worked the plan of
salvation. |
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I marvel at how God, - God! –
couldn’t have worked it out some other way other than sending His Son to
the cross … but He did! |
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He could have ‘amused’ Himself and created
something for a time and then ‘scrunched’ it up and thrown it away and
think no more about it … why didn’t God do that?! |
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But
out of that which God created I marvel at why He ever chose in
eternity to evoke His Sovereign love and mercy so that in grace He would
save a people unto Himself. |
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You say that is awful cruel. I might tend
to agree with you … only that it was God that did the choosing and He
never does anything wrong! |
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But then what would you have said if you
watched and listened to God? … Dt. 7:6
For thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God: the LORD thy God hath
chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are
upon the face of the earth. |
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What would you have thought if you had
head Him say? … Mal. 1:2 saith the LORD.
… I loved Jacob, 3 And I hated Esau |
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What! Says Paul,
Rom. 9:13 Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I
hated. 14 What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God
forbid. 15 For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have
mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. 16 So
then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God
that showeth mercy. |
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You can’t understand it? Don’t worry about
it … you’re called to believe it! |
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When we acknowledge God as Sovereign we
acknowledge His right to govern as He pleases for everything He does is
for His glory ... and as His child I’m happy with that! |
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He is under no rule or authority. He
doesn’t have to answer to you or me. He works in accordance to His will
and is answerable only to Himself. |
The Manner of
God’s Sovereignty
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I recognise by now I might have offended
some, or you might think I am inhibiting man’s freedom and power too much. |
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I’m not; I’m showing you and emphasising a
great truth that needs to be brought before God’s people again. These
truths were the bedrock of the Church when it was strong. |
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The truth of God’s Word is this: God works
in the manner which in sovereignty exercises His power as He wills,
when He wills and where He wills. |
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Where was His power when the children of
Israel were in Egypt for those 430 years? … and then, at the time of His
choosing, He exploded across the land with unstoppable might. |
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Where was His power when His people were
being held captive in Babylon? … and then after 70 years He mightily
releases them and restores to Jerusalem. |
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He exercised His power when a young
shepherd boy felled a mighty warrior of a giant with a single stone … |
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He made like lambs the lions in the
company of Daniel … |
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He rescued Jonah by the
mouth of the whale, in the mouth of the whale, and
from the mouth of the whale. |
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On the other hand, why did He allow John
the Baptist to be beheaded? Why did He allow Stephen to be stoned to death
and yet Paul and Silas to be released from the prison? |
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I daren’t hear anyone say, “That was the
way they worked it out for themselves!” No, this was God’s plan, why? Rom. 9: 11 (For the children being not
yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God
according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth. |
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Listen to this,
Ex. 9: 13 And the LORD said unto Moses, Rise up
early in the morning, and stand before Pharaoh, and say unto him, Thus
saith the LORD God of the Hebrews, Let my people go, that they may serve
me. 14 For I will at this time send all my plagues upon thine heart, and
upon thy servants, and upon thy people; that thou mayest know that there
is none like me in all the earth. 15 For now I will stretch out my hand,
that I may smite thee and thy people with pestilence; and thou shalt be
cut off from the earth. 16 And in very deed for this cause have I
raised thee up, for to show in thee my power; and that my name may be
declared throughout all the earth.
… Can you understand it? I can’t, but it’s what God’s Word says … and I’m
not frightened of it or perturbed in any way because I believe in the
absolute Sovereignty of God and this is my God that does these things and
even though I sometimes can’t understand what He’s doing and why He’s
doing it I know this, Gen. 18:
Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?
… for besides, God says, Is. 55:8 my
thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the
LORD. 9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways
higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.
… That puts me in my place and it keeps Him in His! |
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The meaning of God’s Sovereignty,
the marvel and the manner of God’s Sovereignty … |
The mercy in
God’s Sovereignty
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Do you and I honestly believe God owes us
mercy? Could you tell me why you think He should show mercy to you? |
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Are you a sinner? Have you ever been a
sinner? … You know then that sin disgusts God so much so that He turned
His face away from His Son because all the weight of the sin of His people
was placed on His holy body and God couldn’t look at His only-begotten
Son. |
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Do you honestly believe God owes you
goodness and mercy?! |
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I’ll give you my answer to that question …
God does not owe me mercy! Why should He? Who do I think I have the right
to demand from God, the King of kings, that He shows me mercy?! Surely
mercy is at the behest of the one able to grant it! |
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Mercy is not earned, it is not deserved,
it cannot be worked for. Mercy is wholly at the goodness of the one who
offers it. |
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If I went down among you and gave some of
you a square of my chocolate that I was given yesterday for my birthday
and I accidentally missed out some of you and you were ‘miffed’ and you
grabbed out and took a piece for yourself … you got that piece of
chocolate not because of my ‘mercy’ to you, you got that piece of
chocolate because you took it from me, i.e. you stole it!
Jesus said, one time, Jn. 10:1 He that
entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other
way, the same is a thief and a robber. |
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There are people in many churches who put
up to be saved but, sadly, they have never been recipients of the mercy of
God but have chosen a damnable perversion of the salvation of God and the
devil has continued in blinding their eyes so that they cannot and will
not see. |
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They have chosen a salvation outside of
the gift God has offered … a salvation that does not save and sadly their
form of salvation will have them cast into outer darkness. |
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But there is mercy in God’s Sovereignty in
this plan of salvation which God has defined in His Word. |
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There is no other salvation but that
through the work of Christ on the cross; He, Whom the Bible describes as
the Lamb of God, was – as it were, in the mind of God, - slain from before
the foundation of the world. |
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You see, this is the mercy of God’s
Sovereignty that in grace He reaches out and saves those whose hearts have
been prepared by the Holy Spirit
for Eph. 2:5 Even when we were dead in
sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;) |
Conclusion
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Have I managed to get across … No! Has the Holy Spirit
managed to get across something of what the Bible says about how we define
this subject of the Sovereignty of God? |
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I’m grateful to God that He led me to this
great truth that has been loved and taught and preached by faithful men
and women down through the centuries. |
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I’m grateful to God that I’m not trusting
in a salvation partly of Him and partly of me. |
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This is a most important subject to grasp
hold of … this great truth defined, - God is Sovereign in all
things, in the exercise of His grace, bestowing in what ever manner He
pleases, to whoever He pleases His great goodness with the purpose that He
will bring unto Himself all the glory. |
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And may He find us faithfully working
towards that end! Amen. |
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