Welcome to the Further the Gospel Podcast, where we provide sound doctrine for everyday people. I'm your host, Costi Hinn, and today we continue with our summer sermon series, John Piper, The Sovereignty of God. I don't know if there is a more important topic for the growing, maturing, hungry Christian to understand that the sovereignty of God. God is all of his attributes all of the time, and yet we need to understand his individual attributes. God doesn't consist of parts, of course. He's not a little bit of love and then, you know, a lot of mercy, and then he's kind of a little holy over here, and he just kind of switches between each one. He's all of his attributes all of the time. And part of understanding who God is, at least what we can know about him, he's made himself knowable to a degree, is the sovereignty of God. This is a challenge. It is even a paradox at times how man's responsibility and God's sovereignty work in tandem. Many theologians have offered sound wisdom on this. One thing we don't want to do is view God as this, you know, pie in the sky, set it and forget it, sort of open theism, like he just sort of sent the world going and goes, Well, hope it works out and I'll leave it with them. He's not a hands-off God. And yet at the same time, we aren't robots. God has given us a volition, a will. We actually reflect him in that as image bearers. And so we make decisions and we have the ability to pursue something or not pursue something. And yet God is sovereign, he is the ruler, he is supreme and in control over all of that. How does that work? And what of evil? And what of sin? And what of trials and challenges? And what about plans in your life and all of these things? John Piper does what very few pastors have done well over the years. He breaks down the sovereignty of God in a way that I believe every Christian should wrestle with. Piper, of course, the faithful pastor of Bethlehem Baptist for decades, the founder and leader of Desiring God, an excellent ministry that I cannot recommend to you enough. This is from one of his most helpful sermons, John Piper, The Sovereignty of God.
SPEAKER_01One of the most foundational of the 30-year theological trademarks, which is what we're working through, is the sovereignty of God. So let's go to the text, lest I say too much even from the beginning, and import something into the meaning of that word, phrase, sovereignty of God, that's not from the Bible. It is so loaded, it is so serious, it is so touching on so many painful things in life that we dare not trust ourselves with this definition. You dare not bring your ideas to this. We must simply listen to God when it comes to the sovereignty of God. We must have God tell us what it means for him to be sovereign, lest we import limitations or possibilities into God that he doesn't find in himself. Isaiah chapter 46, verse 9. I am God, and there is no other. So the issue here is the uniqueness of God. I am God, there's nobody else like me, one of a kind in a class by myself. That's the point here. The issue here is the godness of God, the uniqueness of God. When something is happening, or something is being said or thought, to which God responds, I'm God, then you know that what was happening or what was being said or what was being thought is happening, or is being said, or being thought as though we didn't know what it was like for him to be God. And so he's responding by saying, I'm God. Meaning, you're not acting as though you understood what it meant for me to be God. And now he's going to tell us what it means for him to be God in this text. That's the spirit of this text is I am God, verse 9. There is no other. No one like me, and you're acting like I'm not, and or that you don't know what it means for me to be God. Now, verse 10 is where he does that. What does it mean for God to be God? I declare the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things not yet done. So two statements. I declare how things are going to turn out way before they happen. That's the first statement. And the second statement at the front of verse 10 is I not only declare how natural events are going to turn out, I declare how doings, doings are going to turn out long before the doings are done. I declare from ancient times things not yet done. So events in nature, I've got all that predicted, and doings by beings that do. I declare that ahead of time as well. So that's what it means for me to be God. To which you should respond, I thought this was a sermon about the sovereignty of God. And all you've done is show us that he has foreknowledge. And that's right. That is all I've done so far. Now, what does he do next in verse 10? The next half of verse 10, God tells us how he knows what is going to be before it happens and what is going to be done before it happens. And here's his way of knowing. I declare the end from the beginning, from ancient times, things not yet done, saying, so when I declare that, this is what I say. Saying, my counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose. So when he declares the end from the beginning, when he declares things not yet done, he says something. What does he say? He says, My counsel shall stand, and he says, I will accomplish all my purpose. So the way he declares his foreknowledge is by declaring his for counsel and his for purpose. Not only that, he declares, my counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish my purpose. So the reason God knows the future is because he plans the future and accomplishes the future. That's what it means to be God. The future is the counsel of God being established by God. The future is the purpose of God being accomplished by God. That's what the text says. And now he confirms it even more clearly at the end of verse 11. I have spoken, I will bring it to pass. I have purposed, I will do it. So the reason he makes predictions is because he controls the future. He accomplishes the future. God is not a fortune teller. God is not a zoothsayer. God does not have a crystal ball. He doesn't just know the future. And thus he knows the future because he knows what he's going to do in the future. That's what the end of verse 11 says with crystal clarity. So verse 10 at the end, my counsel shall stand. So I have counsel. I'm advising the future what to be. And it will stand because my counsel stands. And I will accomplish all my purpose. I have a purpose for the future, then I go up there and I do it in the future. And I know what I'm going to do, and that's how I know the future. So here's my definition of the sovereignty of God on the basis of those verses. The sovereignty of God is God, God has the rightful authority and the freedom and the wisdom and the power to bring about everything he intends to happen. He has the authority and the freedom and the wisdom and the power to bring about everything he intends to happen. And therefore, everything he intends to happen happens. Or, say it another way, whatever comes about, he intended to come about. That's why it came about. That's what it means for God to be sovereign. Press on that for just a minute. When he says, I will accomplish my purpose, I will accomplish, I will accomplish, I will do it, I will do my purpose, he means nothing happens except what I purpose. If something happened that God did not purpose to happen, he would say, I didn't intend for that to happen. And we would say back to him, Well, what did you intend to happen? And he would say, Well, not that, that. And we would say, Well, so that didn't happen? And you just said, I accomplished all my purpose, and that one didn't happen? And he would say, No. That would happen if it were my purpose, and anything that happened is my purpose. Otherwise, I couldn't say I will accomplish all my purpose. I would only say I will accomplish some of my purposes. And the rest, they fall down. My word falls down. And that's not what it is for God to be God. Everything that happens, has happened, is happening at this moment, will happen, is purposed by God to happen. Now that's complicated, what I just said, so let me let me make it simpler. Let's go to the Bible. Let's go all over the Bible and just quote Bible. Let's not reason out this. Let's just listen. That would be the simpler thing to do, right? Instead of taking a sentence and trying to work out the logic of its implications and get all mixed up, let's just listen. Now, before I do that, two preliminary observations. Number one, or maybe three, I want you to hear the elder affirmation of faith. Because I'm I'm not intending to preach these sermons to say, that's the way it's been. I don't have any idea what's coming next. That's not my mindset in this series. My mindset in this series is to preach things that we as elders believe. So I'm going to read you the doctrine of the sovereignty of God from the elder affirmation of faith so that you know that at least 44 people in this church give heartfelt assent to what I'm saying, and probably a few thousand more. Section three. We believe that God from all eternity, in order to display the full extent of his glory, for the eternal and ever-increasing enjoyment of those who love him, did by the most wise and holy counsel of his will freely and unchangeably ordain and foreknow whatever comes to pass. We believe that God upholds and governs all things, from galaxies to some atomic par subatomic particles, from forces of nature to movements of nations, from public plans of politicians to the secret acts of solitary persons, all in accord with his eternal, all-wise purposes to glorify himself, yet in such a way that he never sins nor ever condemns a person unjustly, but that his ordaining and governing all things is compatible with the moral accountability of all persons created in his image. We believe that God's election is unconditional, an act of free grace which was given through his son, Jesus Christ, before the world began. By this act, God chose before the foundation of the world those who would be delivered from bondage to sin and brought to repentance and saving faith in his son, Jesus Christ. So the sovereignty of God is expressed like that in the elder affirmation of faith, which all of those who lead you and teach you in this church believe. Here's another preliminary observation before we do the texts. When I come to the end of this survey, some of you will may feel overwhelmed. Overwhelmed at the extent of God's sovereignty. It will take your breath away. At least it does mine. And you will face a choice. I'm just gonna get you ready for this so you're not caught off guard. You will face a choice, having heard so much Bible with regard to the sovereignty of God. Will I silence any objections that are rising in my heart and put my hand over my objecting mouth? Will I ascend in praise to God's wisdom and God's power and God's freedom and God's authority and God's grace? And will I bow with glad submission to his absolute sovereignty? Or will I stiffen my neck and say, I won't have it so? I won't let there be a God like that in this world. Will we see the sovereignty of God as our only hope for life in deadness? Will we see the sovereignty of God as our only hope for answers to prayers for the impossible? Got anybody you love? Will we see the sovereignty of God as our only hope for success in evangelism among the walking dead? Will we see the sovereignty of God as our only hope for meaning and suffering? Or will we just give way to chaos and absurdity? Or will we insist there's got to be a better hope than the sovereignty of God? Or no hope? That's the question you'll be facing. Last preliminary observation. Some of you will hear what I say, and you will conclude that cannot be compatible with my moral responsibility. If that's true, I'm not responsible. That's what some of you will feel. And I'm pleading with you in the outset, don't go there. We are attempting as a church to be more biblical than we are systematic. If the Bible says God is absolutely sovereign over your willing, and you think that that makes your willing negligible or meaningless, you're wrong. Just because the Bible says so, not because I say so. Your willing matters infinitely. Your eternity hangs on it. Choose ye this day whom ye shall serve. Christ or non-Christ. So I have said that, and therefore let it not be said that the rest of this sermon contradicts that. Which some of you will say it does. But it doesn't. And it doesn't matter whether you can see how it doesn't. That's what it means to submit to the Bible. We're going to divide the Bible up now on its address to the sovereignty of God into natural phenomena and human affairs. Okay? These involve God ruling natural processes, and these involve God ruling human choices. Okay, that's the two halves. And we'll just take texts and let him talk to us now for the rest of this message. And I'm going to close with seven reasons for why this is precious to us at Bethlehem. And I hope it's precious to you. And I'll turn those into exhortations. Sovereignty over nature. God is sovereign over the most random things you can imagine. Proverbs 16, 33. The lot is cast in the lap, and every decision is from the Lord. Now how would we say that today? We would say the dice is rolled in Vegas and every stopping of the dice with those numbers up is from God. All of them. Or if you're pro uh playing Scrabble at home and stick your hand into the bag and pull out your letters, God decides what letters you get. Play Uno, God decides. And lest you think that's trifling, try this. Are not two sparrows, this is Jesus talking, are not two sparrows sold for a penny? In other words, they are utterly insignificant. And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your father. Even the hairs of your head are all numbered. The roll of the dice in Vegas, every one of them, or in your board game at home, and the tiny bird dying in a thousand forests are governed by God. That's Jesus' way and the Proverbs' way of saying there aren't any details too small for his control. That's his way of saying it. If he were today, he'd talk in terms of molecules. He'd say with R. C. Sproul there's not one maverick molecule in the universe. From which Worms in the ground to stars in the galaxy, God governs. Take the book of Jonah. All right. You got a very big fish, and the Bible says that he commanded this fish to swallow Jonah, and the fish obeyed. So fish do God's bidding. If he says them to do this, they do it. And he commanded a plant to grow up to give Jonah some shade. Plant grow up. It obeyed. Plants do the bidding of God. Then he commanded a worm to kill the plant to make Jonah hot and scold him for his bad attitude about Nineveh. So the worm obeyed. I take this totally seriously. Bacteria, tetziflies, murderous viruses do God's bidding. They're not free. Any more than the worm or the whale or the plant just happen to grow up. God sees everything, and if anything is about to happen that he doesn't want to happen, he just says, stop. And it obeys. And if it didn't stop, he didn't tell it to stop, which means he's got a plan for it. Or the stars. Lift up your eyes and see who created these. He who brings out their host by number, calling them all by name, by the greatness of his might, and because he is strong in power, not one of them is missing. Why are stars where they are doing what they do? He is mighty in power. That's why. That's just not the biblical God. And therefore not our God. If the stars, how much more the weather, disasters, disease, disability, death. Psalm 147, verse 15. He sends out his command to the earth. His word runs swiftly. He gives snow like wool. That's 40 inches last week in the Smoky Mountains. God did that. He hurls down his crystals of ice like crumbs. Who can stand before his cold? I love living in Minnesota. Is that cold? That's God. You haven't felt cold yet, all you Californians. Just arrived. He sends out his word and he melts them. He makes his wind blow and waters flow. That's Psalm 47. Here's Job 37. He loads the thick clouds with moisture. The clouds scatter his lightning. They turn round and round by his guidance to accomplish all his commands. He commands them, and on the face of the inhabitable world, he does his bidding, whether for correction or for his land or for love, he causes it to happen. I love how clear the Bible is about the sovereignty of God over the natural world. Snow, rain, cold, heat, wind are the work of God. And when Jesus finds himself in the middle of a life-threatening, raging storm, he stands up and speaks two words. Be still. And the wind stops. And the waves go flat. And he could have done it last Monday in New York. And if you say he couldn't have, I don't know what kind of Jesus you have. Is he alive? Is he raining? Is he the same Jesus today? Of course he is, which means anytime, anywhere on the planet, any wind can be stopped with two words from heaven. Stop. And it would obey. And if he doesn't say it, he has purposes. There is no wind, there is no storm, there is no hurricane, there is no cyclone, there's no typhoon, there is no monsoon, there's no tornado over which Jesus cannot say, be still without getting off his throne, and it will obey him. And if it blows, he intends it to blow, and he has purposes for it that are better than avoiding it. That's what I'd preach if I were in the middle of New York right now, with the long six-hour lines at the gasoline and 98 plus people dead and new bodies being found everywhere. I wouldn't preach. I would not. I would not take away the hope of these people by saying you don't have a God who can help you because he's just too weak to stop a storm. How could he control the storms of your life? How could he help you at all if he can't speak what Jesus spoke? I wouldn't preach that way. I don't preach that way. We don't believe that way. And so it is with all the sufferings of life and all the losses and pains and groans of life. The Lord said to Moses, before I read this verse, I want to invite you to that conference on Thursday at the North Campus on disability. The works of God, God's good design and disability. And that kind of language gets you shot in some places. God's good design and disability. How dare we? How dare we have a conference with such a title? Come and find out. So here's the verse that the conference, one of them, is built on. The Lord said to Moses, this is Exodus chapter 4, verse 11, the Lord said to Moses, when Moses got all uppity about being unable to speak, good enough. The Lord said to Moses, Who made man's mouth? Who makes him mute or deaf or seeing or blind? Is it not I, the Lord? The person whom I've heard quote that verse most often is John Knight. Blessed John, who has a blind son, born blind, no eyes. That's not easy. It wasn't easy. It isn't easy. We're not saying disability is easy. Life is not easy. First Peter four, let those who suffer according to God's will and trust their souls to a faithful creator. 1 Peter 3, 17. It is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God's will, than for doing evil. Suffering for doing good, God's will, really. Yes. So whether we suffer from disability or whether we suffer from the evil of others, persecution, God ultimately decides whether we suffer or whether we live or whether we die. Listen to Deuteronomy 32, 39. There is no God besides me, says the Lord. I kill and I make alive, I wound and I heal, and none can deliver out of my hand. Or James 4.13. Come now, you who say, today or tomorrow, we will go to such and such a town and spend a year there and make a profit. You don't know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? You're a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, if the Lord wills, we will live. And do this or that. You got a plan to go to Duluth on Monday? You may not get there. And if you don't, it wasn't his plan. You may not live till Monday. And if you don't, that wasn't his plan. It was his plan for you to go home. If the Lord wills, we will live. I will finish this sermon if the Lord wills. If a wacko walks through the door, shoots me between the eyes, it was God's will. So be sure you don't say wrong things at the funeral. My wife will stand up and correct you. The roll of the dice, the fall of a bird, the crawl of a worm, the movement of the stars, the falling of snow, the blowing of wind, the loss of sight, the suffering of the saints, and the death of everybody. These are included in the word I will accomplish all my purpose. Enough on natural phenomena. Let's go to human affairs. Vote on Tuesday. That's a pastoral exhortation. Not a demand from God, but a pretty strongly felt sense that that's God's will as I discern our role in a democratic order that you should do that. I know many of you, including myself, are not excited about the options in front of us. I don't care about whether or not they are ideal options. I just know somebody's going to be president. And you should not abdicate the impossibility of discerning who over the next four years would incrementally bring the greater blessing to this nation. Who can know? Well, God can know alone, but humans are being called upon to make that choice. And if all the people who pray most and think most biblically bow out of that decision-making process, then we have less cause to think that the best will come. So I say to you, vote on the candidates and vote on the amendments, and let there be no man-exalting illusion that you will be decisive in who becomes president. Nobody on the planet will be decisive in who becomes president. God will be decisive in who becomes president. Daniel chapter 2, verse 21. He changes times and seasons. He removes kings and sets up kings. The Most High rules the kingdom of men and gives it to whom he will. God will reign on Tuesday, as he has reigned every Tuesday and in all generations. And whoever the next president is, he will not be sovereign. He will be governed, he will be ruled. And we should pray for him that he would know that. And bow his neck under the sovereign hand of Jesus Christ, Lord of all, King of kings and Lord of Lords. Every president and every king on the planet should bow before Jesus. If you wonder what to pray politically, pray that. May Obama and Romney bow before King Jesus of the Bible. That's what they need more than anything. But they're not sovereign because the Bible says the king's heart is a stream of water in the hand of the Lord. He turns it wherever he will. And when the president engages in foreign affairs, he should have no illusion that he will be decisive in foreign affairs, because God said in Psalm 33, the Lord brings the counsels of the nations to nothing. He frustrates the plans of the peoples. The counsel of the Lord stands forever, the plans of his heart to all generations. Oh, that the rulers of the world would be humbled, lest they be made to eat grass like an ox and grow feathers like an eagle and nails like a claw of an osprey. When nations gathered together to do their absolute worst, namely murder the Son of God, had they slipped out of God's control, no, they were at their worst more firmly in God's control than anywhere. And God, in the moment of their greatest sin, thereby destroyed sin. I'll read this to you. I love these verses, and when people ask me, how important do you think believing in the sovereignty of God is, these are the verses that I read. This is Acts chapter 4, verses 27 and 28. Truly in this city, Jerusalem, were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, Herod. Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles, that'd probably be the soldiers and the peoples of Israel, crying, Crucify Him, crucify him. So Herod, Pontius Pilate, the Gentile soldiers and all the crowds to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place. All of it was sin. Killing the Son of God is the worst sin there is. It would not be. Because he said, I'll read it again, Herod, Pontius Pilate, the Gentiles, the peoples of Israel gathered together to do whatever your hand and your plan predestined to take place. If that had not been done according to God's perfect design prophesied in the Old Testament and worked out in its detail down to whether they tear this garment or don't tear this garment, I would not be saved. This is a big deal. And so our salvation was secured by the sovereignty of God. And if you're a Christian, if your heart has been humbled and you have loved Christ and trusted Christ and received Christ and banked on Christ and put your hope in Christ as your savior and your Lord, you have not only been secured through the blood of Jesus according to the perfect sovereign plan of God, but you have also been awakened by that plan. He has granted you repentance, 2 Timothy 2.24. He drew you to Christ, some of you kicking and screaming, John 6.44. He revealed the Son of God compellingly to you, Matthew 11, 27. He granted you the gift of faith. Ephesians 2, 8 and 9. By grace you have been saved through faith. This is not your own doing. It is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. God has saved us in a way to exclude all boasting. Boasting about how smart I am or how spiritually resolute I am or how discerning I am in spiritual things, blah, blah, blah. None of it. There will be no boasting. He did it. And you. And if today you are moved to treasure Christ as your Savior and Lord, you may write over all 100 of those horrible things that have come into your life to make life so horrible at times. You may write over it. Satan, this is Genesis 50, verse 20. Satan, you meant all that for evil. God meant all that for good. And I now from this day forward aim to see as much of what he's done in and through my life and all the horrible things that have happened to me. I aim no longer to devote myself to murmuring and criticism and anger and bitterness, but rather I aim to listen to his voice and learn, God, what do you want to make of this broken life? God meant it for good. So I close with Ephesians 1 11, which Brian quoted in his prayer. God works all things according to the counsel of his will. From the roll of the dice to the circuits of the stars, to the rise of presidents, to the death of Jesus, to the gift of repentance and faith. He accomplishes it. He accomplishes it according to his will. Which leaves me just these closing seven statements about why this is so precious to us. And I'm going to put them in terms of exhortations instead of just statements. Number one let us stand in awe of the sovereign. Authority, freedom, wisdom, and power of God. Let this be occasion, an occasion for worship. Number two. Let us never trifle with life as though it were a small or light affair. The sovereignty of God makes me serious. I mean, if every time you reach into the bag play and scrabble, you know he's going to decide what letters you get. Everything is ultimate. That's true. Three. Let us marvel at our own salvation. God bought it and God wrought it with sovereign power, and you are not your own. Number four, let us groan over the God-belittling man-centeredness of our culture and much of the church. Number five, let us be bold at the throne of grace in prayer, knowing that now, since we have a sovereign God, nothing is too hard for him, and we may ask for the impossible. I don't know how people pray who don't believe in the sovereignty of God to do the impossible because all the things I want to happen are impossible. If they're possible, I'll do them. I need help with what I can't do because no human can save the people I love. Number six, let us rejoice that our evangelism will not be in vain because there's no sinner so hard the sovereign grace of God can't break through. You want success in evangelism? Bank on the sovereignty of God. He's the only one who can save. Number seven, and finally, be thrilled. Let us be thrilled and let us be calm in these days of upheaval, knowing victory belongs to God, and none of the purposes that he intends to accomplish can be thwarted.
unknownLet's pray.
SPEAKER_01Father in heaven, I bow with my brothers and sisters here. I bow and submit to your sovereignty. You are God and I am not. I bow with gratitude that you have used your sovereignty to come into the world to save sinners. And that you haven't just come in Jesus to put him in our place, but you have come by the Holy Spirit to rip open our dead hearts and raise us from the dead and incline us to your testimonies. And you have taken out the heart of stone and put in the heart of flesh and made us to rejoice in you, and for this we are stunned with gratitude. We did not save ourselves. And I pray now that in this great confidence we would be calm in these days of upheaval. And in this calmness we would sow seeds of truth and love and righteousness throughout this city and throughout the world. And we would not be among the number who panic, but among the number who are peaceful, that our God is in control, and when everything is crashing down, we can still love people. Our leaves remain green, the fruit still grows on our branches when there's desert everywhere. Because you're sovereign and we praise you. In Jesus' name. Amen.
SPEAKER_00Wherever you are on the spectrum of understanding with the sovereignty of God, maybe some of that was a challenge for you to hear, and you thought, I don't know if I can wrap my mind around that. Maybe some of it was like drinking living water for the first time as you just were soaking in the scriptures and having a better and more clearer picture of the sovereignty of God. Wherever you're at, I pray that that sermon challenged you and encouraged you and gave you more to think about as you rest on and in the sovereignty of God. Grateful for all of your support, your prayers. Those of you who are partnered with our ministry, thank you so much for what you've been doing throughout the year and all summer long. If you want to partner with our ministry and jump on board as a gospel patron, you can do that at forthegospel.org and click give. All the information is there. And if you're looking for more free resources, you can find those on our website under the headers and look at media and you can read articles and you can watch videos or listen to podcasts. And of course, we have our YouTube channel and videos and resources we put out on social media every single day. We have a team and a dedicated staff that do that with excellence. And so those resources are there to help you and also to give you something to share online in a world inundated with polluted media. We want to be those who bring the salt and light of God's word and God's truth into the world around us. I'll be back next Monday with another episode. Keep on living for the gospel.