Glory of God Expressed in His Decrees

Decrees of God

“When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and stars, which thou hast ordained [prepared, fitted] : what is man, that thou art mindful of him?  Psalm 8:3,4.

The Hebrew word for  “consider” is raah and defined as behold. In our text David beholds the value of the stars, setting them in opposition against the worth of man.  David is overwhelmed that God favors diminutive man over the constellations.  Man is given life and soul and created in the image of God. Man’s estate is “a little lower than the angels, crowned with glory and honor.” Psalm 8:5

Creation speaks of form and function. The heavenly bodies are on an invisible ecliptic path maintained by gravitational forces that keep our planet on one plane around the sun. David was looking at the planets and stars appreciating the reflected light and brilliant luminescence but at the time could not appreciate the forces keeping the heavenlies in perfect tilt and juxtaposition.

Why did David use the word “ordained” (decreed) instead of created? The best definition for decrees I find is in the Westminster divines defining a decree as

“His eternal purpose,

         according to the counsel of his will,

           whereby, for his own glory,

            he hath foreordained whatsoever comes to pass”.

Eternal: 

“Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure.” Isaiah 46:10

God’s decrees declare a beginning and end. The genesis of God’s determinate counsels are linked to His sovereign pleasure and end in His glory. David understood the heavens were ordained from eternity and that all purposes and events are ordained of God.

Purpose:

 “The Lord has made everything for its purpose, even the wicked for the day of evil.” Even the wicked are used by God to accomplish his purposes for his people.  Proverbs 16:4

“The enemies of God do not frustrate God's decrees; they execute them.” [John Piper].

“The purpose or end of His counsel is the glory of God Himself, i.e. the goodness or perfection of God which is manifest in His efficiency and shines forth in His works.” Ames

 “And the heavens shall declare His righteousness . . . Psalm 50:6

 “The heavens declare the glory of God." Psalm 19:1

Counsel of His will:

God’s counsels can be hidden or revealed. God’s decrees concerning the moon and sun are revealed.

“And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to 

rule the night” Genesis 1:16

God’s determinate counsels issue forth from His sovereignty. God does as he pleases. “My counsel shall stand, and I will do all My pleasure.” Isaiah 46:10b.

His Glory

Purpose:  “I will show forth thy marvelous works”.     Psalm 9:1

                     “And the heavens shall declare His righteousness . . . Psalm 50:6

Glory:        “The heavens declare the glory of God”.         Psalm 19:1

                    “Who has set thy glory above the heavens”.   Psalm 8:1

Let’s examine a few of God’s eternal decrees in a context of purpose set forth from the counsel of His will.

Decree regarding Israel

Purpose:“This people I have formed for myself”.   Isaiah 43:21

Goal:      To sift Israel among all nations and restore Israel as a great nation,    

          descendents as the stars in heaven, and give Israel a land.   Genesis 15:5, Amos 9:9

        

Glory:   “They shall show forth my praise”.  Isaiah 43:21

Decrees regarding the Church

Purpose:    Choosing “His own peculiar people”.

 

“ But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own peculiar  people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.” ”.  1 Peter 2:9

Goal   Predestinate, mark out,  an elect to call out, justify, and glorify. This elect to be chosen by God (you are a chosen generation) to serve Christ as priests and kings. Both Israel and the church are God’s elect.

Glory

  “That you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.”   1 Peter 2:9

Decrees Regarding Redemption

Purpose: Redemption

Goal:  To die for our sins, to be “delivered up according to the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God”. Acts 2:22-23

Peter said, “Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know – this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men” (Acts 2:22-23).

Glory:   “That we should be to the praise of His glory, who first trusted in Christ.

Christians have no problem accepting God’s decrees regarding creation but judge and assail God’s salvific decrees. They deny God His prerogatives at their own peril. They condemn God for frustrating the will of man but are unable to see their own slavery as a result.

Decrees Regarding God’s Presence

Purpose:

Authenticate [verify] “show me now thy way, that I may know you, that I may find grace in your sight: and consider that this nation is thy people.” Exodus 33:13

Goal:

“And I will make all my goodness pass before you, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee; and will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.” Exodus 33:19

Glory:

“And it shall come to pass, while my glory passes by, that I will put you in a clift of the rock, and will cover you with my hand while I pass by.”

God’s glory is revealed in His revelation of Himself as well as His action. Who is God? He is the self contained, self revealed one. He has freedom to choose Israel as His elect and to “show mercy on whom I will show mercy.”  God’s revealed glory as He passed by Moses was no more glorious than God’s sovereignty in showing mercy to whom He wills. Many Christians deny God His Glory by rejecting His elective counsels.

Foreordained

"If God had not foreordained the course of events but waited until some undetermined condition was or was not fulfilled, His decrees could be neither eternal nor immutable. We know, however, that He is incapable of mistake, and that He cannot be surprised by any unforeseen inconveniences. His kingdom is in the heavens and He rules over all. His plan must, therefore, include every event in the entire sweep of history." - Loraine Boettner

We need to understand that decrees are issued forth from God. It is God providentially sustaining the rotations and trajectories of the heavenly bodies. It is God who has fixed by appointment their courses. The genesis of earth was not the result of a big bang but was the purposeful act of an omnipotent God who ordained the exact positions and synchronous 

interrelationships of the heavenly bodies.

God asks Job in a whirlwind  “Can you bind the sweet influences (star clusters) of Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion (constellation)? Can you bring forth Mazzaroth (whole constellation) in his season? Or can you guide the bear with his sons? Do you know the laws

Regarding his decrees

Only God can bind and loosen by decree.

God brings forth in His appointed time and in His way.

God alone guides the course of the heavenly bodies.

Trajectories have been foreordained. Trajectories are predictable allowing a tool for astronomers as important as a hammer for a carpenter. The trajectory for salvation is given in Romans 8:29-30.

God decrees all laws of both heaven and earth. Astronomical mysteries confound even the Einsteins of the world. Spiritual mysteries are revealed to God’s elect.

God decrees all boundaries.

God’s decrees are within Himself.

God binds the position and course of the planetary bodies. The moon’s elliptical orbit is fixed and continues to rotate around the earth precisely every 29.5 days. movement is. The moon’s predictable synchronous rotations insure seasons.

Evolutionists say our moon could be in peril.  Perhaps, but not until after the tribulation. God has decreed that “immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the  sun be darkened and the moon shall not give her light . . .” Matthew 24:29

Salvific Decrees

Synergists say eternal destinies depend on man in a continuum of time. Man in his own time musters up faith without any influence of salvific decrees. God lays aside His sovereignty over salvation, leaving man’s eternal destiny to himself.

Paul’s revelation of the potter’s salvific decrees in Romans, giving us a panoramic view of redemptive chronology is rejected by the clay“ . . . whom He did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified . . . salvific tenets are suppressed.

We dismiss attempts to suppress God’s determinate counsels as ignorance but in fact God takes a more stern view. He pronounces woe judgments on those who reject or corrupt His sovereignty.

“Therefore has He mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom He will He hardeneth. Romans 9:18.

“You will say then to me, why does he yet find fault? For who has resisted his will? No but O man, who are you to reply against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, why have you made me thus? Romans 9:19-20

Paul was familiar with Exodus 33:19, “I will show mercy on whom I will show mercy” as well as Isaiah 45:9.

“Woe unto him that strives with his Maker! Let the potsherd strive with the potsherds of the earth. Shall the clay say to him that fashions it, What maketh thou? Or thy work. He has no hands?” Isaiah 45:9

Romans 9:16 teaches “ It is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.” Just as God ordained trajectories for the stars, He has ordained a trajectory for our glorification that began before the foundation of the world. Just as the course of star clusters are bound and fixed so is the Christian’s efficacious calling.

Harmony in Decrees

God decrees all things harmoniously and in excellent order; one decree harmonizes with another, and there is such a relation between all the decrees as makes the most excellent order. Thus God decrees rain in drought because he decrees the earnest prayers of his people; or thus, he decrees the prayers of his people because he decrees rain. ₁

God’s love is intensive and not limited. God’s calling is extensive, limited only by decree.

God’s decrees are within a context of His sovereignty therefore giving us contentment that all things are working for the good. God ordains and His counsels stand.  They are unalterable, certain to occur and immutable.   

References

1.) The Harmony of God’s Decrees, Jonathan Edwards, Miscellanies # 29

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Hound of Heaven and Determinism

Hound of Heaven  of 1893

I fled Him down the nights and down the days
I fled Him down the arches of the years
I fled Him down the labyrinthine ways
Of my own mind, and in the midst of tears
I hid from him, and under running laughter.
Up visited hopes I sped and shot precipitated
And down titanic glooms of chasmed hears
From those strong feet that followed, followed after
But with unhurrying chase and unperturbed pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,
They beat, and a Voice beat . . .
More instant than the feet:
All things betray thee who betrayest me… 

'Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest,

I am He Whom thou seekest!

Thou drawest love from thee, who drawest Me.

Francis Thompson’s poem “Hound of Heaven” uniquely and rightly expresses the effectual workings of God in salvation. The sequence of salvific events in the deterministic chain is 

uniquely portrayed.

God’s (Hound) sovereignty in election is observed as He alone has purposed in His free will to choose who is hunted. He ordains the hunt. He sets the rules. He distributes grace.

It is not the hunted’s desire to seek the hound. As a matter of fact, he tries for years to run away from the hound; “I fled Him down the nights and down the days, I fled Him down the arches of years.”

 

Love initiated the hunt and decree insured its outcome. Love is observed in the choosing by the Hound of a man who describes himself as “ of clotted clay the dingiest clot”. God describes the man as “fondest, blindest and weakest”. To this man God gave grace.

“. . . and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty.” I Corinthians 1:26

Decree is observed in the confidence we have that the Hound is going to triumph. The “strong feet that follows” and the “beat and voice beating more instant than the feet”. The Hound is faithful and is willing to continue the chase for whatever time, “the arches of the years” and wherever necessary, “down labyrinthine ways”.

 “ The LORD of hosts hath sworn, saying, surely as I have thought, so shall it come to pass; and as I have purposed, so shall it stand”  Isaiah 14:24   God’s purposes are never thrwarted.

Great men of faith are often those who were running from God including spiritual giants such as C.S. Lewis, Charles Spurgeon and John Newton.“. . . there is none that seeketh after God.” Romans 3:11

I must confess, says Charles Spurgeon, "that I never would have been saved if I could have helped it. As long as ever I could, I rebelled, and revolted, and struggled against God. When He would have me pray, I would not pray, and when He would have me listen to the sound of the ministry, I would not. And when I heard, and the tear rolled down my cheek, I wiped it away and defied Him to melt my soul. But long before I began with Christ, He began with me."

The author of “Hound of Heaven”, Francis Thompson,  believed he could disannul God’s purposes in the hunt, not realizing that a decree had been made.

 “There is no escape from God. But then I bewitched myself to believe in escape and nearly destroyed myself by self-delusion.” [Francis Thompson].

Synergists reject Thompson’s metaphor altogether. God’s sovereignty must be diminished to accommodate an autonomous free will. Man determines his own destiny. There is no salvific decrees, no predestination or efficacious calling.

Thompson’s entering the labyrinth in life is understandable. Man creates vast webs of intrigue and deceit. What is interesting is man’s creation of a salvific labyrinth. Once the elective purposes of God are rejected, a vast complex of human imaginations begin to devise different paths than that of grace. 

The hunted determines the rules. Mutable counsels replace decree. Salvation becomes man centered rather than God centered. Salvation terms such as grace and faith are re-defined. New concepts appear such as an indifferent mind, island of righteousness, synergism and prevenient grace. Foreknowledge of God becomes  causative, grace becomes cooperative. Faith is universal rather than a gift of God and breaks through spiritual death itself.  The labyrinth becomes a “titanic gloom” that no one can understand.

The truths in Thompson’s poem “Hound of Heaven” disarms the synergist position as he presents a beautiful picture of amazing grace –unmerited favor. God’s salvific decrees will end with God receiving glory. The hunt is real and those predestinated for salvation are assured justification without compulsion. Once marked by decree for justification we praise God for the “unhurried, unperturbed, deliberate and majestic chase by voice and feet”.