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The Providence of God (Part 1) · Pastor John Piper's answers

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: We're beginning a ten part series on the doctrine of
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  Speaker 1: the providence of God. And what I'd like to do
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  Speaker 1: first is define the word and then talk about just
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  Speaker 1: a few minutes why this is so important to me.
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  Speaker 2: But in the providence of God. This morning I was.
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  Speaker 1: Having my devotions in the Book of Ruth, and in
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  Speaker 1: chapter four, verse thirteen, it says this, and Boaz took
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  Speaker 1: Ruth to be his wife, and he went into her,
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  Speaker 1: and the Lord gave her conception.
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  Speaker 2: And she had a child.
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  Speaker 1: Now, almost everybody in America, church included, would probably say
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  Speaker 1: bo has married her, they had sexual relation, got pregnant,
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  Speaker 1: she had a baby. That's not the way the Biblical
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  Speaker 1: writers think. Right in the middle of the most natural process,
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  Speaker 1: you can imagine without any evidence at all, that Ruth
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  Speaker 1: had any difficulty conceiving. She wasn't bren she wasn't infertile.
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  Speaker 1: It simply says God gave her conception. That's providence. So
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  Speaker 1: let's talk about a definition. That's my example, right off
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  Speaker 1: the front burner of this morning's devotions.
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  Speaker 2: It's all over the Bible. The Bible is.
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  Speaker 1: A pervasively providential book. But let's talk about the word
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  Speaker 1: providence first. You can hear in the word providence the
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  Speaker 1: word provide right, provide meaning supply, see two something, get
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  Speaker 1: it done, take.
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  Speaker 2: Care of it.
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  Speaker 1: Now, the word provide, interestingly, is got two Latin words
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  Speaker 1: pro v day provide pro meaning either forward or on
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  Speaker 1: behalf of, and v day meaning to see, to see
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  Speaker 1: forward or to see on behalf of. And so it
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  Speaker 1: sounds like it should be translated into English like four C.
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  Speaker 1: But we have this phrase in English called C two.
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  Speaker 1: Isn't that interesting to C two C two something, which
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  Speaker 1: is almost pro v day C two something needs to
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  Speaker 1: take care of it, not just to see it and
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  Speaker 1: to see it forward, but to take care of it.
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  Speaker 1: And that's getting at the heart of what the term
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  Speaker 1: providence means. And here's another interesting thing. That little hiddenness
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  Speaker 1: about the connection between seeing and seeing too, isn't just
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  Speaker 1: a trick of Latin etymology. It's rooted in the Hebrew
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  Speaker 1: of the Old Testament. Remember the story of Abraham taking
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  Speaker 1: his son Isaac to the mountain because God had said
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  Speaker 1: inconceivably to sacrifice her son. And when the son says, Daddy,
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  Speaker 1: where's the sacrifice? Here's what he said. He says, where's
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  Speaker 1: the sacrifice? For the burnt offering, and Abraham says, God
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  Speaker 1: will provide for himself a lamb. And then when the
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  Speaker 1: ram is discovered, they name the place, and the name
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  Speaker 1: they give is it shall be provided. Now here's the catch.
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  Speaker 1: In the Hebrew, the word provide is simply the ordinary
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  Speaker 1: word see. The Lord will see, it will be seen.
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  Speaker 1: And here's the question why in the Hebrew mind, this
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  Speaker 1: God centered God, god saturated Hebrew mind, did God simply
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  Speaker 1: seeing mean he'll take care of it.
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  Speaker 2: He'll see to it, He'll make sure that there's a lamb,
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  Speaker 2: a sacrifice. And my guess.
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  Speaker 1: Is that their worldview was so God saturated, and their
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  Speaker 1: God was so powerful, so pervasively involved in his creation,
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  Speaker 1: they couldn't even conceive of God who simply saw passively.
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  Speaker 1: If God sees, he sees too, right, he's involved, and see,
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  Speaker 1: all they need to say is God sees, meaning he'll
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  Speaker 1: take care of it. So behind the word provedence is
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  Speaker 1: the word provide, And the word provide, both biblically and
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  Speaker 1: in our ordinary usage, has come to mean supply, take
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  Speaker 1: care of, meet the needs. And so God's providence is
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  Speaker 1: his seeing the world and all that he has made
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  Speaker 1: in an engaged way. By which He upholds the world
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  Speaker 1: and takes care of the world, and guides or governs
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  Speaker 1: the world and orders the world. So let's go to
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  Speaker 1: a couple of catechisms and just let me read to
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  Speaker 1: you historically what the.
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  Speaker 2: Doctrine of providence has meant.
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  Speaker 1: Here's the Heidelberg Catechism, Question number twenty seven. What do
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  Speaker 1: you mean by the providence of God? Answer? The almighty
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  Speaker 1: and everywhere present power of God, whereby as it were,
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  Speaker 1: by his hand he upholds and governs heaven and earth,
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  Speaker 1: all creatures, so that herbs and grass, rain and drought,
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  Speaker 1: fruitful and bearing years, meet and drink, health and sickness,
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  Speaker 1: riches and poverty. Yeay, And all things come not by chance,
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  Speaker 1: by His fatherly hand or Westminster Larger Catechism, Question number eighteen.
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  Speaker 1: What are the works of providence?
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  Speaker 2: Answer?
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  Speaker 1: God's works of providence are His most holy, wise and powerful,
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  Speaker 1: preserving and governing all his creatures, ordering them and all
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  Speaker 1: their actions to His glory. That's an amazing reality. Spurgeon
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  Speaker 1: loved it. He loved this doctrine. I love this quote.
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  Speaker 1: He says, I believe that every particle of dust that
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  Speaker 1: dances in the sunbeam does not move an atom more
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  Speaker 1: or less than God wishes that every particle of spray
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  Speaker 1: that dashes against the steamboat has its orbit as well
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  Speaker 1: as the sun in the heavens, and that the chaff
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  Speaker 1: from the hand of the winter work is steered as
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  Speaker 1: the stars in their courses. The creeping of an aphid
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  Speaker 1: over the rosebud is as much fixed as the march
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  Speaker 1: of the devastating pestilence. The fall of leaves from the
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  Speaker 1: poplar is as fully ordained as the tumbling of an avalanche.
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  Speaker 1: When people said to Spurgeon, that is not reality, that's fatalism,
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  Speaker 1: that's stoicism.
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  Speaker 2: Here's what he said.
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  Speaker 1: What is fate. Fate is this, whatever is must be.
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  Speaker 1: But there's a difference between that and providence. Providence says
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  Speaker 1: whatever God ordains must be. But the wisdom of God
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  Speaker 1: never ordains anything without a purpose. Everything in this world
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  Speaker 1: is working for some great end. Fate does not say
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  Speaker 1: that there is all the difference between faith and providence.
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  Speaker 1: That there is between a man with good eyes and
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  Speaker 1: a blind man. So that's what has historically been met
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  Speaker 1: by providence, is what I mean by And let me
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  Speaker 1: just end like this, Why would somebody like me, who's
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  Speaker 1: a Christian hedonist care so much about this. When I
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  Speaker 1: say Christian hedonism, I mean God is most glorified in
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  Speaker 1: me when I am most satisfied in him. I don't
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  Speaker 1: mean when I glorify Him it brings me satisfaction.
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  Speaker 2: That's theoretically true.
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  Speaker 1: I mean that when I look at God in the Bible,
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  Speaker 1: especially in the Gospel, especially in the Cross, especially in
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  Speaker 1: Jesus on the Cross, rising from the dead, ruling the world,
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  Speaker 1: this glorious Christ, when I see him, I find in
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  Speaker 1: him my deepest treasure and satisfaction. And when I do,
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  Speaker 1: God or Christ in Gods or God in Christ is
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  Speaker 1: made to look beautiful because of my satisfaction in Him.
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  Speaker 1: And I regularly add the sentence, God is most glorified
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  Speaker 1: in me when I'm most satisfied in Him, especially when
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  Speaker 1: I walk through suffering, at those moments when the world says, Oh,
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  Speaker 1: he should be angry, he should be bitter, he should
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  Speaker 1: be depressed, And instead I am able to maintain my
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  Speaker 1: tear streaked joy in God. I make God look good.
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  Speaker 2: At that moment. And here's the point.
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  Speaker 1: Not in a thousand years could I maintain that joy
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  Speaker 1: in God. If I were assured God can take the
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  Speaker 1: tear causing troubles of my life, and in complete omnipotent
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  Speaker 1: Providence work them together for my good. So providence and
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  Speaker 1: Christian hedonism are both essential in our lives.