God’s Providence Pt 2

0:02 Looking at our world from a theological perspective. This is the Theology Central podcast, making Theology Central. Your phone ring at four a m. The person on the other line, the person on the other side of the phone, is in a complete and total panic, and they're like, you have got to get up. You've got to get ready. You've got to get to the airport. You've got to get here as fast as you can. You have to. This is an emergency. A tragedy has happened. Your father, your mother, your daughter was in a severe accident, and they're barely hanging on. They're in the hospital that we don't know if they're going to make it. You've got to get here. And you jump up. You're like, oh no, what am I going to do? What am I going to do? You run, you get together, you throw some things in a suitcase, and you get to the airport as fast as you possibly can. And as you run to the airport, you look around, you're like, what is happening? Thousands of people everywhere, lines wrapping almost all the way around inside the airport, outside the airport, and you're like, okay, someone move, I've got to get to the ticket line. I gotta get to the front. I gotta get to the desk. I've got to get somewhere. My loved one is in the hospital dying. I have to get there. And you are informed because of an overhead announcement, Ladies and gentlemen, we are sorry to inform you, due to a global IT outage, thousands of flights are being canceled. In fact, as you sit

1:38 there and you're trying to look and see what's going on, you find out that over seventeen thousand flights have been canceled. And you're like, well, I'm not going. There's no way I cannot make it. You can, and you sit there. An hour turns into two hours, and two hours turns into four hours. Flight canceled, canceled, canceled, canceled, nothing you can do. You think, okay, maybe i'll go. I'll go rent a car and you try to get to the rental agency and they're like, all of our systems are down. There's a global IT outage. There's nothing we can do. And you start getting phone calls from your family members are like, oh, the hospital computer systems are down. The whole situation is horrible, and you're like, what am I going to do. What am I going to do? And you get a call an hour later and you were told, we're sorry you didn't make it in time. Your loved one, your daughter, your mother, your father, they're gone. So you sit down in the midst of all the chaos. What do you do?

2:45 What do you say? Do you say? Well, praise God for his providence, Praise God for his eternal decrees. He decreed this to be this way, He guided it, he directed it. This is all what God wanted. I simply accept God's will. How do you see the entire situation? Well, what I'm describing is not too far fetched because I don't know if you've been paying attention to the news this morning, but there's been a global IT outage, and over the last report I have, over seventeen thousand flights have been canceled. I'm getting pretty minute by minute updates because my daughter is currently in the midst of all of this because she works for an airline and she's trying to get home. She had a flight last night, she got in and then she was supposed to be flying at some point headed back home, and she can't get home. She's stranded. She's stranded and She's like, it's complete chaos in the airport lines everywhere, people yelling, griping, frustrated. As one news article that I have here is global chaos is the way they're describing it. You could argue that that's hyperbole, but my daughter basically describes it as chaos, and she doesn't know what She doesn't have any ideas right ideas right now of what's going to happen or how she's even going to get home. This has impacted banks, this has impacted hospitals,

4:18 airlines, It's a major situation. So how if you were in the midst of even if it didn't lead to some kind of tragic like someone dying, if it just led to you being massively inconvenienced. Right, Hey, you're trying to get home. It's it's you know, your summer vacation has ended. You and the kids. You're ready to get back home. They're getting frustrated, they're getting irritated, you're getting in all argument with your spouse. Does everyone sit down and go hey, guys, guys, guys, or do you say hey everyone ever, honey, calm down, kids, come down. Look, this is great, This is God's providence. This is God's eternal decrease. We should just accept it and celebrate it. This is what God has eternally decreed for us to be stranded and we cannot get back home. Is that? Is that how you handle your normal daily inconveniences, your normal daily frustrations. Is that how you handle tragedy? Well, I say all of that to introduce what we have been talking about, what you suppose, what you have supposedly have been focusing on all week, and what hopefully we're going to continue to focus on this for at least maybe another week to come, because we have been focusing on God's eternal decrees and God's providence. Now let me give you a proper introduction. Good morning everyone.

5:46 It is Friday, July the nineteenth, twenty twenty four. It is currently ten nineteen am Central time, and yes, my daughter is currently in the midst of all of this chaos. Because of this it global outage that has occurred so far, at least here in the Theology Central Studio. I think most of the outages of not impacting like things I would be utilizing for broadcasting or for anything along those lines. It seems to have been impacting specific systems. So I don't know how that's all going to play out. I've been reading news articles about it and mainly just you know, listening to my daughter talk about what she is witnessing. It's chaos right now. And as I've been watching all of it, I've been thinking about it, because that's what we've been talking about and thinking about, how do I understand this from God's eternal decrees and God's providence, And as you know, that's what we've been focusing. And this all started because of well, what happened on Saturday when Donald Trump was shot. The assassination attempt of Donald Trump. We've been watching.

6:55 We watched all of that, and then I started watching how Christians were responding to it, and over and over and no where I'd hear the word providence, providence, providence, providence, providence, providence, providence, providence, providence. So I'm like, okay, let's dig in. So I have told everyone that you need to supposed to be reading the London Baptist Confession of Faith, the chapter on God's Decrees and on God's Providence. I think it's chapter three and chapter five. You're supposed to be reading it over and over and over and over and over and over. This week. You're also supposed to be reading the book The Mystery of Providence by John Flavel. Hopefully you've been reading that. I know it's the Puritans. I know it's not easy to read. I know it's a little tedious. You may want to get the modernizer version. I mean it probably is a good idea, but at least looking at that. And remember I told you with the book, take it slow. Don't be trying to just rush through it. Read a paragraph and stop for the day, right, Just think about it, meditate on it. I gave you some specific questions about God's decrees and providence to try to answer. There's a lot of things. I told you to start listening to random sermons on the sermon's two point oh app on God's decrees in God's providence, and I have told you about a series of sermons that I wanted you to find and follow. I almost just dropped my iPad. Did you hear that in my voice? Did you hear it? Did you hear that in my voice? Could I have played it off? I don't know if I would have dropped it with it. I mean, God's providence, God's decree. Okay, see see now, I'm I'm just thinking about the situation and regards to everything. But I'm opening up the sermon's two point zero

8:28 app here really quick. I'm going to go to my library and see if I can find the sermons series. Hang on, I don't think I have it saved here, so let me go find it. Hang on, let me go find it. I thought I had it saved. To have it, I'm using too many different See David's God and Ours. That's the name of the first sermon I see here. I hate one of the things.

9:09 Okay, here it is. No, here it is. There's interesting. There's a couple of sermons with that exact same title. All right, So here it is. It took me a minute to find it, all right. It's the name of the series is the Mystery of Providence. The speaker is Dave Advance from Redeemer Church AARP. All right, Remember I told you to find that series currently. Make sure they haven't added any new to the series. There's only three sermons in the series so far. David's God, David's God in Ours is Providence real? My life in his hands? And I want you to listen to all three of those. Now, what I was going to do this morning, or just what I have been doing, is I've been well, I've been arguing with artificial intelligence about God's providence in God's eternal decrees. We've gone round and round and round and circles. AI can't necessarily reconcile how we understand God's eternal decrees and God's providence and our actions are our actions free not free. AI has done a very good job giving me a history lesson on how people have tried to reconcile these things. But when I look at the way people have tried to reconcile these things, I just get mad and want to throw my iPad across the room and tell AI you're fired. Go find a new job. You're not helping me here, because all they do is like, well, this is how people in church history tried to understand them, but look at the way they try to explain it. That doesn't mean anything, like either God is controlling, guiding, directing, decreeing everything that happens, or he's not. And the minutes you

10:45 start limiting God's involvement in this or this or this or this, you can try to say, well, God's still sovereign, but he's allowing this. Either God's in charge or he's not in charge, And the minutes you start limiting God's sovereignty will yet me you ultimately in a slippery slope down to open theism. Or God's just not involved. And I don't know what you do there. But it was getting frustrating just trying to see how it's trying to reconcile. It's like, Okay, everyone's using great, big philological terms to sound so smart and to make everyone sitting in the pew think, oh, look, we've got this figured out. No, nobody has it figured out. Nobody. But I've been just working on trying to compile a lot of things about God's providence and God's decree to kind of see how I want to approach it, because I think what I may do is I may deal with some of this on Sunday at Victory Baptist Church, and I may try to use it somewhat in light of Psalm eighty three. Now I know in Psaw eighty three we have a specific thing we're working on. So I don't know.

11:46 I don't want to, I don't wanna. I got to figure out the best way to advance it. So I will have to make that determination, because I mean, there's so much here exactly how do we approach this? How do we understand this? And I think I'm hoping by this point, if you've been listening to sermons on God's eternal decrees and God's Providence, if you've been reading the book The Mystery of Providence, if you've been reading the London Baptist Confession of Faith on God's Eternal Decrease and God's Providence, hopefully at this point on this Friday morning, maybe you're starting to feel yourself like you're like, I can't I'm losing it. This is just like I don't know what to do with this, and you feel like your mind is starting to unravel a little bit, and you're just becoming more confused and a little bit bothered and a little bit disturbed. I'm hoping by this point you're starting to feel that. If you're not, I don't know what you've been doing this week, obviously you've not been meditating on God's eternal decrees and God's providence.

12:50 Because I think the more you meditate on it, the more confusing it becomes. So I was like, so how do I I got it started in this? So what do I do? And I'm like, well, I could talk about this, I could talk about this. I'm like, you know what, let's just go back to that series of sermons, the Mystery of Providence we were reviewing, you know, the sermon David's God and Ours. Let's just kind of go back to that and just just kind of pick it up in the middle, just just see where he goes. Let's just just kind of run this. We kind of started down this path, Let's continue down this path and just kind of see where it takes us, and then we'll just I don't know, I don't know how to navigate this at this point because it's like literally it's like walking up to an ocean and like, okay, where to begin? You know, Like where am I even going to go? I obviously can't swim across it? Okay, what do I do? Do I just kind of walk in a little bit and then run back out? Do I do I try to swim? What do I do? I remember? This is just kind of illustrate this point.

13:56 I was I think I was in either not galves, I think was an corpus Christie wherever. But we went out to go swimming right there on the coast of Texas, and everyone kept telling us there was a sandbar, like if you swim way out there's there's a sandbar, but it's it's and it's really crazy because you're like, you know, way out here in the Gulf, you know of Mexico. You're right, we're way out here in the ocean, and you are all of a sudden, you can just stand up and like, you know, you just like the water will only be like to your knees or maybe even to your waist because it's there's this huge sand bar out there. And so we're like okay, okay, or hey, now we were relatively little and so we're like okay. Now. Of course, we didn't check with any adults, We didn't check with any grown ups.

14:45 We didn't do any of that. We just decided, well, let's go find it. Let's go. So we started swimming, and we started swimming, and we started swimming, and we started swimming, and we were going against the waves and it was, you know, it was tough going. We kept going and then we kind of stopped and looked back and it's like where's the beach? Like we like, we could barely even see the beach at this point, so then we start thinking, wait, where are we now? We finally did find the sandbar. We did. I thought we were going to drown temporarily, but we did finally find the sand bar. Almost drowned, but we we found it. Then we were thinking how are we going to make it back? Like we are so far out, I mean, and of course nobody I don't know if anyone knew that we were even gone at this time, but I'm thinking we're gonna die, Like we're gonna die. And then I started thinking we're gonna get eaten by a shark. And then I started thinking this, Well, in some ways, when you start kind of studying God's providence of God's eternal decrease, it's kind of like, Okay, this is this study, and we're gonna begin it.

15:50 We're gonna have a middle, we're gonna have this powerful ending, and when it's all said and done, everyone's gonna be like, I understand God's providence and God's eternal decrees better than I ever because of the Theology Central podcast, and everyone's going to be grateful. They're gonna be like, that's an amazing series. It's gonna be wonderful. And so that's how you start out, and then you just keep swimming and swimming and swimming. You're like, wait a minute, where's the beach, where's the beginning, where's the middle, where's the end? Where? So? Okay, now I found a sandbar. Okay, I can stand here for a minute. Okay, all right, I'll just do a I'll do a little bit more sermon reviews. That's easy. But like, so, now, how do we get back? And is there a way back? And am I going to get eaten by a shark trying to get back? And are we going to drown?

16:33 I don't know. So in some ways it's kind of illustrative of this how I feel right now. It's just kind of like, maybe if I just don't say another word about it and just leave it alone, nobody's even gonna notice and everyone will just move on because there is a little bit of truth to that, right. I mean, come on, as many people who may listen to this podcast, they've got a million other things to listen to. So you can do a couple of you can tell people you're gonna do a thirty part series. You can do five of them and just stop, and for the most part, nobody cares. Nobody cares. I mean, you won't get a few people go, are you not going to finish that? Everyone else like, I don't really care if he's done five fifteen twenty, I don't even know. I don't care. And I can understand why.

17:15 They've got a million other things to listen to. They can't keep up with who's doing what. I understand that. But then that can make you just feel like, then what's the point, or it can make you feel like I've got a good I can get out of this. I can escape, I can escape God's providence and God's eternal degres well. I know that sounds foolish right from a theological perspective, but from a practical perspective, I can escape the study because nobody's even going to pay attention, but I will be paying attention. So I feel like I've got to find a way to get us somewhere. So we're gonna utilize this sermon that we were already reviewing. Just jump back into the middle of it, literally back into the middle of it, and just see where he goes and see if we get anywhere.

17:57 Sounds good, But what I really want to take. I guess the practical point I want to give you in that seventeen minute long introduction is this, Today, there is a global IT outage. There are thousands upon thousands of people who are completely stranded. They're trying to get home, They're trying to get to maybe an important job or whatever. They've got responsibilities, they've got things they're trying to do. There may be families sitting in the airport, stuck trying to get home from their summer vacation, or they're trying to go on a summer vacation. There's people right now mad, There's people angry. There's people frustrated, their husbands and wives fighting. There's parents gripping at their kids, the kids gripping at their parents. Everyone yelling at the airline employees. People are probably at hospitals right now, frustrated, yelling at doctors and nurses and front desk personnel because their surgery had to be canceled whatever.

18:55 It's just probably not good. And so many locations right now. And I can understand that frustration. But if we are really going to take this concept of God's providence and eternal decree and say, okay, this has some kind of practical implication, not just this great theoretical thing that we only talk about in certain circumstances. But if we bring it down to the most smallest details of your life, what do you do with that? Shouldn't we in some ways if you just think about it, like from a very practical standpoint.

19:37 Shouldn't Christians if we truly believe in God's sovereignty, his decrees, his providence, if we truly believe that in any meaningful way, shouldn't we be the most patient people on the face of the earth when negative things happen. We're just kind of like whatever. We don't gripe it anybody, we don't yell at anybody, we don't fight with each other. We're like, just just as the way life works. It's just this is how God decreed it. Dapen. Now, I know we'd be like, but people have personal responsibility. I know, I know we can scream that, but I know the one thing nobody's yet being able to come up even with them even a look.

20:22 I know all the different ways people have tried to reconcile Man's responsibility with God's sovereignty throughout church history. I'm telling you all their attempts are just to joke. You ultimately either destroy God's sovereignty or you, I guess you in some ways you do. You ultimately destroy man's responsibility. He said, Well, and people say, look, look, they don't have to be reconciled. There are two sides of the same coin. I know all the little things you can say, and people in the pew are like, oh, amen, that makes so much sense until someone says, what in the world does that even mean? Well, I don't really know. What does that mean? Practically? Well I don't really know. Well, then why were you saying amen? Okay started saying amen. Well, you don't even know what you're saying amen to. But let's see where this sermon goes. Because right now we've left the beach. We're somewhere in the middle of the ocean.

21:11 We desperately need to find a sand bars where we can stand up and try to figure out where we're gonna go. Here we go. The word providence was once very commonly used in English. If you're familiar with Providence, Rhode Island, you might know this word. If you might see it on a number of streets or churches throughout the country Providence Street, Providence Church. People today talk about luck in the same way that previous generations talked about Providence. You might be struck if you read or watch Anne of Green Gables book from about one hundred years ago, how many times when there's a happy turn of events that people say Providence. Christian people used to have more of an awareness that God was intimately involved in our daily lives, and that was reflected in their vocabulary. Now, to be clear, God intimately involved in your daily life, your daily activities. God intimately involved. Now, how how far do I take that? If I do a podcast and I stumble over my words, which I did in my introduction, If I stumbled over my words with a couple of times, right, if I stumble over my words, if I say something, well, you know God has got intimately involved, decreeing it, guiding it, directing it. Or do I just like, well, do I slap myself in the face and go come on,

22:42 do better, work harder, focus on how to say these words correctly. Look, I was looking at Judges. I think chapter four. I think chapter four. I'd have to look at the referencey I don't remember the reference. But because i'm we're you know, we're in Saw eighty three three Baptist Church and we have we have to go to the Book of Judges to look at some of these situations, which is being referenced in Psalm eighty three. Well, when you look in some of those sections and Judges, there's lots of names there. You're like, Jerabel, there's uh, oh, I can't remember. I don't have them in front of me, but there's many and some of the names that are like, Okay, I think I have that figured out. I think I know how to say that, And then you'll go listen to other being're like, wait a minute, they're saying it that way, this way. Who's saying it the correct way? And then you'll think, okay, I think I got it down. And then you'll get at least for me, you'll stand behind the pulpit and then you'll get ready to read it and you're like, wait a minute, I don't even remember how to say this right. And then you say it, and then you get done and you go back and listen to your recording and you're like, oh, I did not say that correctly or wait, I read that way too fast, and then you can find everything that you did wrong.

23:47 Now, on one hand, again, how intimately has got involved in all of that? And how much is just because you didn't study enough, you didn't focus enough, you didn't think about that, you didn't read this slowly? You why did you learned? You need to get better at fanatics? Over like, how do you understand that? In many cases we almost just disenge, We just kind of dismiss God, like God is not involved in those smaller details? Is it? Providence? Providence? Providence providence? Meaning God is involved in those intimate, small details of your life. Sometimes people only call happy coincidences God's providence, but that's actually not correct. Again, it says God works all things according to the counsel of his will. That is to say, he's his providence rules over all things. That's true of great matters and history and small details of everyday life. Jesus says it beautifully.

24:52 Now, I appreciate that he says, it's not just a good things. Right when it's good things providence, When it's good things, God, God is involved. God did this, God did that. Now he said, it's not just the good things. Now he did not then articulate some of the bad things. See, this is where sometimes I get frustrated in church, right, Church is always the disneyfied version of theology. And I can't stand that, right because I'm sick of the disneyfied version of theology. If we're gonna deal with this, let's face the horrors of this. Hey, when it's good, God's providence, God's intervention, God's decrees, God's power, God's provision. But I want to just I cannot stress this enough.

25:42 If we're going to see, God is decrees everything, and he guides and upholds and directs everything. Ladies and gentlemen, that includes the bad. And when we say the bad, I mean the bad. In the case of the assassination attempt against Donald Trump, well, Corey was shot and killed. As the name of the man who was shot and killed, the firefighter, his death was just as much a part of God's eternal degrees in God's provision as Donald Trump's being spared and not killed on that very same day when that occurred. Or let's go to October the seventh, when over a thousand Israelis were killed and many and hundreds taken hostage God, with God's providence, God's decree. Let's talk about just look at the from just you can look up some crime statistics today. Just look them up. Look up today crime statistics. How many women have been sexually assaulted in raped since January one, twenty twenty four, children have been sexually molested or assaulted or abused. How many murders have taken place? How many kidnappings have taken place? How many women and young girls right now at this moment are suffering because of human trafficking.

27:14 I mean, we can go on and on and on and on and on and on. How many people have starved to death since January one, twenty twenty four. The numbers will probably be staggering. How many people have died of cancer? How many just name the diseases you start wrap, you just make a chart of all of that, and you're like, oh, happy, Providence, God's sovereignty, God's decree, God's provision. No, you won't be saying any of that. You won't be singing praise songs for all of that, will you. No, it's always you don't be hearing. You don't hear. Hey, I got a praise report this morning, my child just died of cancer. Praise God, he's sovereign. His providence and decree was at work. No, you only do that and something good happens. It's amazing. We take these theological concepts and what we simply do is we utilize them to when things go well, and then we kind of forget them when everything falls completely and utterly apart. I am glad he admits it. Now. Maybe later on he will then articulate some of these negatives, but right there he felt like he moved on relatively quick. But remember, he may add them later on. That's one of the things when I review sermons. I don't listen to him in advance, so I may cut him off a little too early. But that's the first thing that comes to my mind whenever I hear and even he admits it, though typically we say this in regards to the good. This way, as he sends his disciples

28:49 out to preach as sheep among wolves, that is to say, in the midst of a dangerous and hostile audience that will not receive them well, he strengthens them with these words. He says, are not two sparrows sold for one copper coin? And not one of them falls to the ground apart from your father's will. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Do not fear. Therefore you are of more value than many sparrows. Paul reminds us that this is the God who works in us, both to will and to do. He says, for his good pleasure. Not only the doing, but the very willing are those things that God is working in us according to his purpose. Now do you do you understand the applications of that?

30:10 If God is the one in a sense creating the willing, the willing, and the doing, like God is working in you for the willing and the doing of his good will, then when when you do when you will to do something or don't will to do something, when you do something, when you fail to do something, is that God? Do you do? Now? What we do is like no, no, no no no. You see, if you do good, God was working in you. How you today? You were so loving and and and and you did so good with your children and and as as as a godly wife. You were submissive to your husband, and you did and you were so great with everything you did. Wow, God is working in you. But what if you were completely the opposite of good. Well, no, that's not God. No, no, no, no, no no. God is not involved in not in any way shape or Get God out of your mouth. You can't even say his name. Well wait a man, wait a man, wait a minute. If they if God is the one who gets, who is the guiding, directing, empowering and guiding all of my good in my Christian life? Then is God not involved in the bad. See, all I'm saying is when you argue for one you by by implication, you're at least can't ignore the other. You can't. You can't just say, well, all the good God, all the bad not God. Okay, Well, then if it's not God, then you have to ask yourself some questions.

31:45 Did God allow it? If God allowed it, it's still God because that means God did nothing to stop it. So then you have to argue that it somehow a part of his will. Right, Well, God wanted to stop it, but he can't stop it. Okay, he can't because why oh, he's not sovereign over it. Well, because he has to allow you to do it, but he knows what you're going to do when you do it, and you're saying God never intervenes at any point over man's will, because I think I can find plenty of scriptures where God steps in and does what he wants right your God rules over apparently random events, just the fluttering of a sparrow to the ground. But Proverbs chapter sixteen, the lot is cast into the lap, but it's every decision is from the Lord.

32:42 If God is controlling even the most random events, the smallest events, He's controlling everything, even the results of casting a lot. If He's in charge of every little detail, Ladies and gentlemen, that has profound implications. That is not something to misunderstand or to use in the wrong way. But it is something, as we will see, that makes a very strong statement of God's control, the invisible hand by which he directs the things in his world. God rules over nature Sam one hundred and four. He causes the grass to grow for cattle and vegetation for the service of man. God rules over the nations. The Lord says to the Babylonian emperor nebukan Azer, the most high rules in the Kingdom of Men, and he gives it to whomever he chooses. This evening, we'll be reading from Romans chapter thirteen, which says there is no authority except for God, and the powers that be, or the authorities that exist, are appointed by God. Now this is where things again, this gets way complicated. He's going through these things relatively fast, but each one of these you could spend a couple of years trying to process.

34:02 God is in charge of nature. Do you understand the implications of that? Oh? See, see it in a positive God causes it to rain so that the crops can grow, so that we can eat. That's how you'll do it in vacation Bible school or in Sunday school. You'll teach it in the most positive way. But hey, you know what this also means. Kids, See this, there's certain places on this earth right now and there's no rain. There's drought, and there's famine. And five thousand children died today because God didn't do anything to provide anything for them. Because the God controls nature, he could have sent rain, he could have caused the crops to grow. Oh oh, there were fifty people killed yesterday because of a flood, or because of a hurricane, or because of a tornado, or because of lightning strikes. God's in control of nature. No, See, we're not gonna do that. We're not gonna say that in church to talk about God's in control of nature in a positive way. But the positive necessitates that God's also in control of the negative. Right. See, it's all great to be sitting in church on Sunday saying praise God for his providence, Praise God for his sovereignty, Praise God. And you're just like, oh, you got your hands raised in the air, you're singing the praise song. His power rules over everything. He is mighty, he is the

35:35 God of armies, He's he's the most powerful God. Oh wow, what a great praise service, Thank you, pastor. And then you go to your house and you're like, wait, what just happened. Well, storm came through the area while you were in church and your house is now destroyed. Now do you sit there and sing those same songs? Oh, and you the childhood decided didn't go to church. Your child died in the storm. Hey, hey, but praise God. He's all powerful. See now it's going to be a little bit more difficult, right See, if we always want to spend this in the positive. And what I'm trying to challenge us is that we can't just do it that way. He's arguing, God is in control of even the smallest details. All right, praise God.

36:21 That makes sense since he's all knowing, present everywhere at all times, all powerful, sovereign ruler. Okay, all right, that all makes sense. Now, how do we understand it? Not just by preaching this as the positive? The positive, the positive. God rules over the nations, He rules over nature, he rules over random events. God rules over the hearts of Also, one of the things that really frustrated me is we preach this so much. God knows. God's even in control of the government. He all government is put there by God. Well, Christians say that until we then start getting upset with the government. Then we start saying all kinds of negative things about it. Then we don't want to listen to it. And now we're not gonna follow their dumb rules. And then, I mean, we saw this with COVID. We're not gonna do that. And then of course everyone runs to acts where the apostles are like, hey, they were prohibited from speaking preaching in the name of Christ anymore, or preaching Jesus anymore.

37:30 And they said, well, who do we obey? Do we obey God or man. Well, guess what the people they were disobeying, and that were the religious rulers. The religious rulers were prohibiting them from preaching in the name of Jesus. But if the government then puts forth But we're told that all governmental power is put there by God. But all of a sudden, everybody wanted to quote Romans challenge Roman thirteen during the pandemic, like, well, this is only speaking of a good government. See, you only submit to good government. But if the government is ungodly, then we just don't have to submit, Like wait a minute, wait a minute, And so then, once again, how do we understand sovereignty? At what point can we just say, you know what, God may have put the power there, but I don't have to listen to it. Where do we find where do we find that? Now? Of course scripture, we just make it very very limited, right, I mean, basically is that they prevent you to preach in the name of Jesus, to preach about Jesus. Okay, then okay, but then like but wait a minute, like so then you can get into all like if they give mandatory evacuation because of a wildfire, do you say, well, no, we're staying right here because we don't listen to you. You're preventing us from preaching in Jesus. Or are they saying, well, look, we're saying you can preach it in the name of Jesus, but we can't. You can't do it in this building at this time because there's a possible fire, or you can't do it in this building at this time unless you follow these restrictions because of COVID. I'm not gonna listen. Like, at what point do we really say, God

39:04 put that power there and we have to submit to it. These became issues that I don't think anyone really wanted to have deep conversations about, and during COVID, everybody just wanted to argue and fight and protest and do their own thing. Well wait a minute, did God was God? If God's intimately involved in every detail and he intimately involved in the very thing of COVID, Like how see on one end, sometimes we act like God is so in charge, and then five seconds later we act like we're the ones making the rules. It's we're very inconsistent. Proverbs Verse chapter twenty one. The king's heart is in the hand of the Lord with the rivers of water, He turns it wherever he wishes. God rules it, over rules over the deeds of men Proverbs sixteen. A man's heart plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps. If God rules or or can overrule man's will man's desires, well, then any when then why? God can override your will and your desire at any time? You have wrong will, wrong desire, boom.

40:19 God can fix it at any time. What does it imply if God doesn't change your will, if God doesn't change your desire, what does that imply? By no means am I excusing anything. I'm trying to deal with the both sides of this, both sides of this. I won't be able to prove everything to you. Perhaps some of you are skeptical about the limits of God's power. I will take that up next time. I will simply say that this is the doctrine, and in God's providence, he is able to use and direct even the sinful deeds of people like Saul, which they freely and willingly choose to do, in order to bring about His good and holy purposes. He does according to his will in the army of Heaven.

41:22 And we read among the inhabitants of the earth as well. Now, and I know that I just have a hard time even read my mind. Right, Okay, God uses in a sense, controls and guides Sauls decisions. But Saul's decisions are free, They're free. They're completely free. Well there are they completely free? It solves decisions completely free. One. If God knew them before Saul exists, then Saul has to do exactly what God knew because his knowledge comes before Saul's actions. If God knows the action, then Saul has no choice but to do the action because God knew it before it happened. And God's knowledge is perfect, so it perfectly has to go the way God knew it. And if since God knew it, God could do it anything at any point to change his will, change his desire, or even prevent an action from occurring. So if God doesn't change it and God doesn't prevent it, you can't say well, then well then then obviously it's working out the way God want was. And if you say well, Saul is completely free, well wait a minute, and what do you mean by completely free? Because if you believe in human depravity, it does human depravity impact man's will. If human depravity impacts man's will, then the will is not completely free unless you say, man's depravity doesn't impact man's will. And if depravity doesn't impact man's will, then men and even apart from salvation, can choose to be absolutely perfect because their will is not impacted by sin.

42:52 But that's pelagianism or semi pelagianism. Well, we don't even believe if you're if you're smart, you don't even believe that Christians can just freely choose to be perfect because nobody can be perfect, Meaning then our will is still impacted by sin even after conversion, So then your will is not completely free. So but it's it's this weird thing. God is involved in the He controls even the most smallest details, the most random details. God's guiding it, controlling it, decreing it. But wait, wait, wait, man's free man, Man's decisions are free because we can't have God responsible for man's sinful decisions. Okay, but how do you reconcile that? Now? I know what people say. I don't have to reconcile it. I just will accept both. Well, I guess you can do that, and I guess it will make you feel better, But that's the implications are insane when you start thinking about it and none can restrain his hand or say to him, what have you done? That means that history itself is not a tale told by an idiot full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. It is his story, a story that he is writing throughout the history of the world to glorify him and to save you. And when Jesus says that not a sparrow falls

44:27 to the ground apart from his will, he is assuring you that nothing, know, nothing, know nothing is outside of his control. Do not fear. Nothing is outside of his control. Do not fear unless you're one of the six million Jews he gets exterminated by Hitler. Hey, do not fear well unless you're the person kidnapped by someone and abused and then murdered. Hey, do not fear well unless you're the one diagnose with the terminal disease and you suffer for fifteen years. Do not fear, because nothing is outside of God's control. Do not fear well. You were the one paralyzed because you were hit by a drunk driver, But do not fear. God is in control of everything, do not fear unless you're one of the thousands of people who'll starve to death today. See it's always it's always spun and the positive.

45:31 Everyone wants to ignore the negative. Now, you could make an argument, well, is anything truly negative if God's guiding controlling every aspect. Now, the more you try to pull God back from being in control of every aspect, you will feel a little better. Well, God's not controlling that. God's not involved in that. God, God's not involved in Because what some Christians will try to do to reconcile this their own brain, they remove God from any of the negative and they say, oh, that's Satan, that's sin, that's man, all right, So yeah, but who created satan? God? Who can destroy Satan? God who can intervene and override man's will? God? Because the Bible is filled with that. So even if you say, well, God's not gonna do anything here and you want to remove God, God is still the one who control created the entire situation in the first place and is controlling or allowing it to happen. So even if you say God's not doing it, God's allowing it. Still under the control of God. But Christians do everything. We almost like, if it's bad, we get hey, God, go get out of town, get go. Come on, God, you gotta move, you gotta go.

46:45 People gotta blame you, they're gonna blame you. Go God. And then we say and when people walk up and go what happened, You're like, oh, look, I know this situation looks horrible. I know there's a lot of death. I know there's a lot of destruction. I know there's a lot of pain. But let me rest assured. Let me just tell you you can be rest assured that God was not involved in any way, shape or form. Here are the people. We're going to blame Satan or we're gonna blame the victims that that's their fault, there's somehow their fault. We're gonna blame We're gonna blame ourselves, We're gonna we're gonna blame everything. But God is not involved in this in any way, shape or form. Well, how many times do you say God is not involved before then you begin to ultimately destroy God's sovereignty, or at best, or at least you'd begin to question his involvement in anything. He's got the whole world in his hands, he's got the wind and the rain. He's got you and me, sister, the bit bitty biddy babies. He's got it all. Everything comes to pass according to his eternal purpose, not merely by his permission, but by his holy, wise and powerful government of all his creatures in all their actions. And I'll give you many specific examples next time, which I think, And let me just say I was. I don't know. I ended up in I don't know, with some kind of vacation Bible school.

48:08 I don't know. Maybe I don't remember how old I was. And they taught us that song He's got the whole world in his hands, like you know, He's got the whole world, and I don't you know, and everybody was singing it, and I remember sitting there going, God's got the whole world in his hands. And this morning I was beaten, burned with a curling iron and whipped with an electric cord. God's got the whole world in his hands. He's got you and me. See, the song is not so comforting when you're the little kid sitting there with the actual physical marks on your body from abuse. When you're young and you're standing at your mother's bedside, and you're like, she's dead for all practical purposes. When you're standing at her grave and you're like, I'm I haven't even graduated high school and my mom's gone. When you're watching your father die of cancer and you're like, he's not that old. When you're sitting in church watching two young

49:46 kids sitting next to their father and they're all weeping because their mother, who is very young, I don't, maybe barely into her thirties. He was diagnosed and was dead because of a cancer, and I think it took a total of about four months. Hey, hey, little kids, don't worry. God's got the whole world in his hands. He's got you and your brother. It's all gonna be okay. Because God's all powerful, he'll take care of you. I mean, your mom's dead, but hey, hey, on the good side, is sing this little song and you'll feel so much better. I think we'll settle the matter in your mind. But before we go on, I would like to give you three great cautions lest you misunderstand what I'm saying. In fact, I would like to tell you just a little bit more about the story. Like Paul Harvey, Let's get the rest of the story, so that I could best illustrate to you the matter of God's providence and what we should and should not conclude. This event of David being trapped in the cave and what happens as a result of this is found in First Samuel, chapter twenty four. I'm turning there right now,

51:20 if you'd like to go and for Samuel twenty four, I'd like to read to you the rest of the story and then make some cautions to you lest you jump to the wrong conclusion about God's providence. Here now, for Samuel twenty four, the rest of the story we read now. It happened when Saul had returned from following the Philistines, that it was told him saying, take note, David is in the wilderness of Ngetti. And Saul took three thousand chosen men from all Israel and went to seek David and his men on the rocks of the wild goats. So he came to the sheep folds by the road, where there was a cave, and Saul went in and went in to attend to his needs, and David and his men were staying in the recesses of the cave. Then the men of David said to him, this is the day which the Lord has said to you. Behold, I will deliver your enemy into your hand, that you may do to him as it seems good to you. And David arose and secretly cut off a corner of Saul's robe. Now it happened afterward that David's heart troubled him because he had cut Saul's robe. And he said to his men, the Lord forbid that I should do this thing to my master, the Lord's anointed, to stretch out my hand against him, seeing that he is the aint anointed of the Lord. So David restrained his servants with these words and did not allow

52:50 them to rise against Saul. And Saul got up from the cave and went on his way. David also arose afterward and went out of the cave and out to Saul, saying, my Lord the King. And when Saul looked behind him, David stooped with his face to the earth and bow down. And David said to Saul, why do you listen to the words of men who say, indeed, David seeks your harm. Look this day your eyes have seen that the Lord has delivered you today into my hand. In the cave, and someone urged me to kill you. But my eye has spared you, and I said, I will not stretch out my hand against my Lord, for he is the Lord's anointed. Moreover, my father, see the corner of your robe in my hand, for in that I cut off the corner of your robe and did not kill you. Know and see that there is neither evil nor rebellion in my hand. And I have not sinned against you. Yet you hunt my life to take it. Let the Lord judge between you and me, and let the Lord avenge me on you.

54:00 But my hand shall not be against you, As the proverbs of the Ancient says, wickedness proceeds from the wicked, But my hand shall not be against you. After whom is the King of Israel? Come out whom we pursue a dead dog a flee. Therefore, let the Lord be judge, and judge between you and me, and see and plead my case, and deliver me out of your hand. So it was when David had finished speaking these words to Saul, that Saul said, is that your voice, my son, David? And Saul lifted up his voice and wept. That he said to David, you are more righteous than I, for you have rewarded me with good, whereas I have rewarded you with evil. And you have shown this day how you have dealt well with me, For when the Lord delivered me into your hand, you did not kill me me. For if a man finds his enemy, will he let him get away safely? Therefore, may the Lord reward you with good for what you have done to me this day. And now I know indeed that youth shall surely be king, and that the Kingdom of Israel shall be established in your hand. Therefore, swear now to me by the Lord that you will not cut off my descendants after me, and that you will not destroy my name from my father's house.

55:28 So David swore to Saul, and Saul went home, but David and his men went up to the stronghold. What I love about that story is it's so contrary to the way even Christians acted in COVID. Here's David's like, I'm going to submit to the king, even if he's trying to kill me. I'm going to show submission, and I'm going to honor his authority, and I'm not going to rebel against him, even in this very even with my life is at risk. And yet when Christians in America don't like certain things the government does, we want to overthrow it. We want to get rid of it, we want them removed. We'll start praying in precatory psalms that they'll be killed. All kinds of craziness. We don't have to follow this rule. We don't have to obey this, and we don't have to obey this. Who do these people think they are liberals and start calling them names. That's not how David acted. And I think the Bible overall tells us how that all authority was put there by God and we are to submit to it. And now everybody wants to say and start looking for all the ways when they don't have to. You should be focusing all the ways in which you should and doing everything in your power too. So in this case, it shows David understands who put Saul there and at his submission to it, that is, in a sense, taking the idea of God's involvement even in the smaller details, and trusting God. Right, so all right now

57:00 he says he's going to give the rest of the story. Let's see where he's going to take this here are three important cautions so that we should not misunderstand the meaning and significance to us of God's providence. Three incorrect conclusions we must not draw. First, God is not the author or approver of sin. God is not the author nor the approver of sin. David rightly quotes this proverb Tosaul in verse thirteen, Wickedness proceeds from the wicked. That proverb is true. Although the Bible says that the Lord does govern and uphold, and appoint and constrain all things, and uses a variety of words to describe providence, it also is very clear and emphatic that the sins in this world come entirely from us, us from our desires, and not from him.

58:02 Wickedness does proceed from the wicked. Saul is at this moment in a wicked pursuit of David, as he himself confesses, the sins involved in such a pursuit are entirely souls, ladies and gentlemen. I struggle with this. I'm just gonna be honest with you. I understand we're not to say God is the author of sin, But man, this I get so frustrated with this point. It drives me insane, because even if you say God is not the author of sin, ladies and gentlemen, he's the architect and he's in a sense the engineer. What do I mean by that? Well, God is the one who created an angelic being by the name of Satan, knowing Satan was going to fall and be the one to bring sin into the world.

58:53 He knew that before he created him, He creates him, lets him fall. Now at this point, God could immediately destroy him, immediately destroy him and stop sin from going anywhere else. He could have just taken out the entire rebellion, the end, no more. But no, no, no, no. Not only does he not destroy him, he gives him access to Earth, not only access to Earth, to a specific garden where there is Adam and Eve, whom he created knowing that they too are going to fall. But see, since God is not the author of sin, this is what we call he's using secondary causes. See God, God's hands are clean on this. Okay, all right, so you can't blame God. Well you know, yeah, you can say that, but you can't.

59:36 You can't tell me God is not the architect here. You can't say he's not engineering this because at any point. He could stop it, he could prevent it, but he lets Satan go right into the garden. Does he stop him? No, no, no, no, no, Then Adam and Eve sins. Now at this point he's got, in a sense, you could say, a choice to make, but it's not really a choice because he already preordained this before the foundations of the world. But okay, so what could he do? Well, he could get rid of Satan boom, He doesn't. He doesn't get rid of Satan. In fact, he let Satan rome about the earth, seeking whom he may devour. He doesn't even get rid of him. Okay, or that's problematic. Why not just destroy him right there? He's already rebelled against you. Now he's attacking your creation, the end and him. But no, no, he doesn't. And then Adam and Eve, Hey, if you eat of this, you're going to die. He could have killed them immediately, stops it.

1:00:22 Sin would have never left the garden. It would have been contained within the garden. And then he could have destroyed the garden, and then then the earth would be free of sin, a creation free of sin. But no, not only does he doesn't contain it in the garden. He lets them. In fact, he himself puts them out of the garden. Now he knows Mommy sinner and daddy sinner is going to produce baby sinner. And guess what happened Outam and Eve produced sinners, and you got a brother killing a brother, and then it just spreads and spreads and gets so bad that God's like, Okay, I'm going to wipe out everything on the earth, but I'm gonna put eight people in an arc. Oh, but those eight people have the very disease that caused all the problems prior to the flood, and that's sin. And then they get out of the arc, and then what do they do? They sin sins and then it just continues and it continues, and it continues and it continues. He said, well, God's not the author of it. Well, God created people knowing that they were gonna end up sinning, and then knowing that they were infected with a sinful desire, a sinful nature. He doesn't eradicate the nature. He could get rid of the nature today, All sinful nature could be eradicated right now, boom gone. Nobody has a sinful nature, nobody. But no, he doesn't do that. You could say, well, he's not the author of it.

1:01:44 Lady, you can't. I don't care what you try to do. You go far enough back, you're gonna get to Genesis one in the beginning. God, God's there before anything else. He creates, knowing every single thing that's going to happen. Not only does he allow it, he doesn't prevented. And you can't say that he's not the architect of it. And you can't say that he's not guiding it and directing it unless you destroy your sovereignty sins, which is increasingly putting him under judgment. You see now you say God is allowing it for a time, Yes, and he is constraining the whole matter in every way to serve God's purposes. See, God's not the author, but he's allowing it, and he's constraining it. Well, if he constrains it just a little bit, then he can constrain it completely.

1:02:47 If he doesn't constrain it completely, and if he's the one who can control your will and your heart and guide it and directed, he could literally constrain it by removing the sinful nature, or so constraining it that you and I stop sinning, thus to overcome evil with good. You notice that solves evil pursuit not only is failing at every turn if you know the story, but here it even publicly humiliates him and demonstrates David's godliness and integrity as Israel's future king. David describes it this way in the Psalm verse six. They have dug a pit before me, and into the midst of it they themselves have fallen. This is how it works out, however darkly and difficult it is for us to see. The sins proceed from the creature, the answer of their desires from the creator. The sins proceed from the creature because the creature was born with a sinful name. Sure that they did not ask for and did not do anything to obtain. That sinful nature was obtained by the original Adam and Eve, whom God created. But when they sinned, God could have gotten rid of them so that future creatures were not born with the sinful nature. But Adam and Eve ultimately ended up sinning because of a satanic

1:04:21 because of a spiritual angelic being whom God created, who rebelled, whom God allowed to tipt Adam and Eve. So even if you say God is not the the author of it. Come on, He's guided, He's he's the architect of it. There's no way to get around this. There's just no You can. You can, you can, you can do everything in your power to separate God from it. You come on in the beginning, God, He's already there, He already knows. Yet the very next word in the beginning, God, even though he knows, he creates. And not only does he create, there's clear specific points where all God needed to do was to destroy, to remove, or to prevent, and he does none of it and lets it all run its course. And he only does good even when men only mean evil. God may, for a time, He does, for a time, allow evil men to have their day, to make progress in their evil plans, to inflict even a great deal of pain.

1:05:46 And yet, and let's not state God allows evil men like God allows those evil people to do evil things and to inflict pain. Let's make it personal. God allows evil people to do horrible things to you and your family. And not only this, God allows you to do evil things, meaning your daily continual sin, which is evil only so far as God's wisdom sees it to serve his glory and our good because by him all things work together for good to those who love him, to those who are the called according to his purpose. I'll give you several illustrations of that in our series.

1:06:43 But to be clear, God does not so much as tempt anyone to sin, and he brings sinners to a just judgment for the sins they choose to do. But in all this God is not the author nor the approver of sin. Second, God often uses means. God often uses means. It's not that the Lord is doing something or Saul is doing something. I mean we we look at the rest of the story here and we say, okay, uh uh, Saul's our army here, three thousand chosen men. Uh stops right in front of David's cave. Why did he stop there where David was? And why did Saul enter that particular cave? I mean, David didn't know at the beginning either, Right, Well, it's actually a rather humorous uh story here. Saul went in to attend to his needs. I mean, you gotta go, you gotta go. You know your parents are like here, yeah, here, gotta go. Okay, But of course there was another reason that's also given in the passage, which is in no way contradictory, there was a higher reason verse ten. This day your eyes have seen that the Lord delivered you today into my hand in the cave.

1:08:06 Yeah one. In the same event, are freely done by Saul for necessity and a purpose brought to pass by God in a certain way for another reason. And the Bible frequently maintains this double perspective on even these humbly events of life. And some people say have misunderstood, Like they say, oh, yeah, you know, we used to think that rain came from God, but now we know that it comes from clouds. What I mean, you know, science hasn't gotten rid of God. People got the ancients understood that rain comes from clouds. Plenty of verses talk about that. But what it says, what the Lord sends the rain. It's maintaining this double perspective that yeah, okay, yeah, in in physical terms, clouds bring the rain, but there's a higher reason, another purpose. And when it rains.

1:09:09 The Bible does say in one place that the heavens give rain, and it says in another place that God gives rain. But these are the same action from two different perspectives, and God's people understand that everything that happens, everything that takes place, therefore, is with his double perspective in mind, that there is a will and a purpose behind the events in this world, and that this rule of God over the things of the world doesn't eliminate what the philosophers call secondary causes. I don't know. God actually establishes those secondary causes, and he often uses means. Yeah, God establishes those secondary causes. He's the architect, He's the one driving. He's not the author of it.

1:09:54 He doesn't approve of it, but he's yet the one guiding it and directing it. Like, I don't know how you can like I understand this is somehow tries to make people feel better now, I but it I to me just drives me crazy, including our free choices. And this is the third caution unless we misunderstand. So to review again, God is not the author or approver of sin. God often uses means, and third, God does not take away our human freedom or accountability for our choices. God does not take away our human freedom or the accountability that we have to Him for our choices. Saul has freely chosen this wicked course and seeking to murder his rival. He okay, when when you say Saul freely chose this, let's make sure we remember, though, the choices that Saw is making rive arise from a sinful nature from which he did not freely choose to possess. None of us freely chose to possess a sinful nature from which all of our sinful actions arise. Our sinful actions arise from a sinful nature which you were given at conception. And you didn't ask for it. Your parents didn't ask for

1:11:26 it, nobody asked for it. It came from Adam and Eve, and God knew the minute that they said that everyone else was going to be born with a sinful nature. And God did nothing to prevent it, to stop it, And as of twenty twenty four July the nineteenth he's yet to remove anyone sinful nature. Even though Christians want to pretend that our sinful nature is gone, it's very much present. That's why none of us can never be well holy as God is holy, and we can never keep God's law perfectly because we have a nature that is still and rebellion and does nothing but promote self and self worship and self desire and self fulfillment. And that's why you constantly find yourself in conflict with what God says and what you think, what you desire, what you want, what you feel, how you act.

1:12:18 It all arises from a nature which you don't freely choose to have. So then if your nature impacts every aspect of your life, your emotions, your feelings, your desire, and your thinking, then how free can you? True to say? Free means then that your choices do not arise from a sinful nature, Because if your sinful nature is where your choices arise from, then you're not truly free. You're only free to act according to your nature, which is sinful, meaning you're not free to simply then be perfectly holy, because you can't be. You're literally in bondage to your nature. To some extent. Chose every faithful step of that journey. But here as it's clear where those steps have let him, Saul rightly confesses that all of those choices have now only served God's holy purposes, that the whole thing is of the Lord. Even Saul must confess verse seventeen. You are more righteous than I, for you have rewarded me with good, whereas I have rewarded you with evil. And you have shown this day how you have dealt well with me, For when the Lord delivered me into your hand, you didn't kill me. May the Lord therefore reward you with good the same action that was freely done well. Many choices multiplied by Saul, intending evil at every step

1:13:51 in his murderous rage, have all likewise been providentially appointed by God for good, only to go this far and no farther. And beloved friends, this is the great confidence that God's people have in all ages, that we cannot be robbed of God's power in providence, no matter how dark the horizon. Well, the wicked may have their day. And he picked a story here. Obviously that's all positive. Saul is broken and seems somewhat sorry. David's life is spared. Oh what a beautiful story. But let's remind ourselves. If we're going to talk about God's providence and God's power and the great comfort that comes with it, let me remind you of three important stories. Story number one, David sin with Bathsheba and he killed her husband. No providence, no sparing it. Hey, the husband dies, David. Not only David is spared, he gets the woman anyway. Oh, and a baby dies. David doesn't die. So a baby dies and husband dies. David is good to go, and he gets the woman anyway. Oh, let's talk about David lying straight up, lying to some priests who then eighty of them are slaughtered. And then not only are the eighties priests slaughtered, the city is put to the sword and men, women, and children and livestock

1:15:23 are slaughtered. Remember I told you about looking up that story where David lies to the priest and everyone gets killed. Hey, hey, all these people die. Hey, it's all good. Oh. And then David numbering of the people, and what seventy thousand of them die in the plague. Remember I told you to look at those three stories and consider God's providence. Three stories. Look at all the people who die. David is spared in all three stories. Oh, God's providence. This should give you great comfort, great comfort unless you're I don't know the man who who God's anointed kills for because he wants your wife and wants to cover up his sin. Hey, hey, God's anointed who God provides for. It's great unless you're one of the priests he lies to, and you get slaughtered, or you happen to live in the nearby city and your child gets killed. Hey, it's all great. The anointed is God's chosen and looked at. Oh, unless you're one of the seventy thousand to died because of a plague, Because you're chosen one that God's providence is working through happens to just number the people when he wasn't supposed to rage. Think of the terrible witness witn that wickedness done to Joseph. His brothers hated him, betrayed him, sold into slaves, slave traders who sold him into the House of Egypt, where he was falsely accused and thrown into prison. At every step they were only serving God's and Joseph

1:17:01 later explains to his brothers, you meant evil against me, will evil came. You meant evil against me, But God meant it for good in order to bring it about as it is this day, to save many people alive. The very same actions by wicked sins of the brothers were used as a glorious deliverance by God. So understand God does not take away human freedom or leave us at the accountability of our choices. No, no, no, these are misunderstandings of providence that greatly confuse the saints from time to time.

1:17:41 To review point one of the things, you should not conclude. God works all things according to sorry point one. God works all things according to the counsel of his holy andjust will, all things, but in such a way that he is not the author or approver of sin, that he often makes use of means, and that he establishes our human freedom and the accountability that we have for our choices. And you say that's not clear, well, especially in this age of despair, I will say to you, at least now, how great it is to remember that we have a great king who rules this world, who fulfills all of his great purposes with us in mind, and who gives us a future and a hope. That is what the Bible explains. It does not explain how God brings it to pass. Fact, it says it's past you're finding out. My first long point to view with these three caveats is that God performs all his purposes, all things serve his will. But now secondly, I'm going to make a personal and say that God performs all things for us. As the verse says, God performs all things. For us, God's providence is as powerful as it is personal

1:19:13 and practical. And maybe this is just what you need to hear, not a lecture of philosophy, for you understand. Perhaps something of David's tears, something of his anxious, difficult struggles. Maybe the circumstances of your life have come to pass because of the wicked sins of other people doing evil against you. How do we deal with that? Should you conclude that God isn't with you? Should you blame God? Should you be bitter? Oh? No?

1:20:09 What should you do? This passage gives us three practical directions, and I will stop there. You can go listen to the rest of that David's God and ours, Dave advance. I would like to listen to those three things, but we're already at eighty minutes. I don't know how you reconcile some of the Look. The bottom line is, look, there is no true Look. I can give you all the different school philological schools of thought, and all their ways of trying to reconcile these things, and maybe we'll cover it maybe Sunday at Victory Baptist Church we'll talk about some of these, but all of the ways to to try to reconcile it. Literally, it makes I'm just gonna I know. Look, people may argue with me all day. Any reasonable person looking at all the explanations will say, none of this makes any sense. It's circular reasoning, it's contradictory. It's ridiculous because no matter what you do, you can argue this, and argue this, and argue this. When it's all said and done, you keep going back, keep going back, keep going back, keep going back, and you're gonna end up with in the beginning God, He's already there. That God is all powerful and all knowing, knowing everything's going to happen, and yet he does the next thing, creates the heavens and the earth. Then we

1:21:40 see the all powerful God directing and controlling and as the architect designing everything that's going to take place. And we see when he intervenes, when he doesn't intervene, when he could have intervened, when he could stop something, doesn't stop something, and then how that all plays out from that point on luck trying to reconcile it all you can come up with there, and you can just pat yourself on the back thinking you're smarter than everyone else, and you've got it all figured out, and you may only want to see this from a positive and be like, oh, I'm so grateful for his providence and for his sovereignty and for his eternal decrees. Okay, just don't put your head in the sin and deny all the horrific, horrible, suffering, death, tragedy, even right there in the Bible God's guiding and controlling and directing.

1:22:38 Just take David. The stories about David could expand it. Look at what David did in regards to his sin and having a woman's husband killed and then the baby dying. Look at that whole story. Look at David lying to the priest and eighty of them are killed. And in the city, how many people in the city died, including children, and then David's numbering of the people, And I think I can think the numbers like seventy thousand, some crazy amount of people die. There's there are numbers. I always never remember them. But you look at those three stories and just consider them, because I want those three stories to be and then just consider it in light of you know, all the tragedy and death and suffering that happens every day on this planet, and again you can. You can blame this, you can blame this, you can blame this and blame this. But I'm just gonna take you all the way back in the beginning God, before everyone else existed, God did, and God knew everything that was going to transpire.

1:23:34 Unless you say God is not all knowing. And if you call into question God's all being, all knowing, call into question God being omnipresent, and call into question God being omnipotent, then you're not left with a God news. If Yahoo dot com that's news, I f a Yahoo dot com. All right, everyone, have a great day. Please continue to meditate on these things. I wish I could give you better answers. I don't have any. God bless