What Are the Divine Decrees?

Hello, I'm Kevin D. Young, pastor at Christchurch in Matthew's North Carolina, and you are listening

to Doctrine Matters.

We want this podcast to equip Christians with a better understanding of the rich theology

that undergirds are faith.

And hopefully along the way we'll be looking at some that have even been misunderstood,

or maybe threatened in the church's history.

We'll point out the biblical evidence, the arguments, and work together to reshape our

thinking, be transformed by the renewal of our minds with Scripture and reason as we

think theologically together.

Because, as the title of the podcast tells you, Doctrine Matters.

We've been talking about the doctrine of God that is theology proper, talking about

attributes, and then talking about the Trinity.

And now, still staying within this larger category of theology proper, those systematic

theologies now turn to talk about the decrees of God, and then after that God as creator.

So that's what we're going to do today is look at this new topic of the divine decrees.

Let's talk about that word.

A decree in common usage is an official order, an edict, a command.

So when we speak about the divine decrees, we mean, here I'm quoting from the Westminster

Shorter Catechism, God's eternal purpose, according to the counsel of his will whereby

for his own glory, he had foreordained whatsoever comes to pass.

The divine decree in other words is an exercise of God's will and an expression of his nature.

That makes sense.

If you are decreeing something, it is an expression of your will, what you have decided is going

to take place, and it also is an expression of your nature, who you are.

When we will something to be, it is the overflow of our character.

And so the divine decrees mirror God's own attributes.

Number one, the decrees are simple.

The word decrees is often given in the plural, and that's what I've said here today.

But strictly speaking, there is only one decree.

We speak of many because the human mind cannot help but think of order and sequence that

God decided to do this and then that and then this other thing.

And yet that's just to accommodate our own human intellect.

When in reality, the divine decree is a single, all-comprehensive, simultaneous act.

That's a quote from Louis Burkhov.

So God is not composed of parts, and his sovereign ordering of all things is not composed

of parts, strictly speaking, which leads to a second point.

The decrees are eternal.

So we think of decrees, and often there's theological discussion about the order of

the decrees.

But again, we have to realize this is a logical order for our comprehension.

But it is not a temporal order.

These things take place in eternity.

And as we've talked about before, eternity is not some kind of time before time.

Before history begins, it is actually the way in which God experiences duration, which

is not time.

It is not temporal and successive.

So this stretches our comprehension, and we have to use concepts that can make sense

to us.

And yet, strictly speaking, we must be clear that these decrees are eternal.

The things that take place, take place in time, but the decree is issued outside of time,

before time, in eternity.

The decrees third are immutable.

So God is unchangeable, and his decrees are unchangeable.

He does, according to his will, none can stay his hand for the decrees are absolute.

That is to say, his will is not based on foreseen faith or foreseen good works.

It isn't that God can play the video that's going to happen a million, or 10,000 years

from now, and he plays it, and then he says, ah, here's what's going to happen there

for I'm going to decree it based on something else.

So his decrees are absolute.

They are not contingent upon his creatures.

Five, the decrees are wise.

The absolute nature of the defined decrees does not make God arbitrary or capricious, because

everything God does, he works after the council of his will, Ephesians 111, that language,

council suggests planning, prudence.

It also suggests an intraturinitarian deliberation.

All three persons, though possessing one will, are operative in the decrees as a council.

This is based on God's wisdom, and then finally, the decrees are good.

God has written all of our days in his book, before one of them comes to pass on 139-16.

But this doesn't mean God is the author of sin.

It's decrees certainly include wicked events that decrees themselves, however always good,

because even those wicked things which are decreed are for good ends.

There is no unrighteousness in God.

He cannot endure iniquity.

He is light, first on 15, and in him there is no darkness at all.

Let's then think a little bit more about the divine decrees and a couple of further

distinctions.

So we've looked at these six points, the decrees are eternal, immutable, absolute, wise,

good, simple, just like those are the attributes of God or the attributes of the decrees.

Now how do we think about the decrees related to the freedom of our own will?

So if everything happens according to God's will in this sense, and we must be clear

that the Bible talks about the will of God in at least a couple of different ways.

Sometimes it's the will of God that superintends all things, not a hair falls from our head,

not a sparrow to the ground, apart from the will of our Father and Heaven.

So in this sense, everything that takes place according to the will of God, and yet there

are other passages, we pray that thy will be done.

In that sense, God's commands can be disobeyed.

But we're talking here in this decreative sense, his will of decree, rather than what

some theologians call his will of desire, this will of decree must always come to pass.

It is never thwarted whatsoever God wills that will happen.

He works all things after the counsel of his will.

So then how do we think about, if that's God's will, the necessity of all things, Augustin

said, then what does it mean about our wills?

Do we have freedom of the will?

That question has a couple of different meanings in itself.

Sometimes with theologians have asked about the freedom of the will, what they really

mean is our will free from the bondage to sin.

And that's a question that will come to later when we talk about the effects of depravity

and original sin that know our wills are born.

We are born as fallen human beings with a will that is in servitude to sin.

But this is a slightly different question, not about the moral depravity of the heart,

but rather the willing that we execute in all sorts of decisions.

So just human decisions, do we have free will?

Not in the moral sense of can't unoriginal persons please God, but can we make real decisions?

And it might not surprise you to learn that it depends on what we mean by this question.

So our sin, which the fallen will chooses by necessity and the decisions that we make

according to God's superintendents, can nevertheless be voluntary.

That is, we do will them.

Turretin, always helpful with distinctions, talked about six different kinds of necessity.

Now this is hard to to follow just listening to this while you're folding laundry or in the car.

But just try to get the basic concept, he calls these six kinds of necessity,

the necessity of co-action that arises from an external agent compelling us to do something

or physical necessity like the doctor hits your kneecap and your knee extends.

The necessity of dependence, meaning we cannot exist or do anything apart from God.

Rational necessity, meaning we choose what we believe is best.

Five, he called the necessity of event, which affirms that future events are fixed in certain,

according to God's decree, and then a moral necessity arising from habits and inclinations

good or bad.

Only the first two types of necessity, Turretin says, are incompatible with free choice

and human responsibility.

So when we ask this question, do we have free will?

The answer is, what do you mean by free will?

What we want to affirm is that we must affirm, even as reformed Calvinist Christians,

is that we do make choices.

We have a will.

So to say that the will of God is a necessity of all things and everything happens according

to God's decree does not say that we then do not have a will,

but rather that our wills act in accordance with a prior will.

So go back here to the two types of necessity that Turretin says are incompatible

with free choice and human responsibility.

The necessity of co-action and then a physical necessity.

So if let's just put these two together in an illustration we can understand,

you think about a puppet on a string.

Sometimes people say, well, if you have a sovereign God who superintends all things,

you are just a puppet on a string or you're a robot.

That would be like Turretin's necessity of co-action.

That means somebody is making you to do something or a physical necessity that just physically.

So if you enter into a brothel, you shouldn't do that.

But if somebody has you in chains and they physically drag you there,

you don't have a will that is able to act otherwise or go back to the puppet analogy.

If you are just a Marianette and somebody is pulling strings,

you don't actually have a will.

That's what we don't want to say.

That's why the charge that a high view of God's sovereignty is nothing more

than making us puppets on a string is not accurate because we do have a will.

A puppet does not have a will or think about, I give this illustration many times,

you think about what a big brother does to his younger brother grabs his arm and makes

a fist and he grabs that fist and starts taking his brother's fist and punching his brother's

face.

And he says, stop hitting yourself.

Stop punching yourself.

Stop punching yourself.

Well, why are you hitting yourself?

Well, no, that's a necessity of co-action.

It is physically exerting power over your physical self to make you do something.

So that's not what we're saying about the decree of God.

That's not what we're saying about the will of God.

We are not robots.

We are not puppets on a string.

Here's the important language.

Our wills are free in this sense that they are not subject to external coercion or compulsion.

External coercion or compulsion.

That is when when we come to Christ, God renews our will so that we come willingly.

When people rebel against Christ, it's not that they are saying, I want to be a Christian

and God says, well, I didn't decree for you to be a Christian and I'm sorry, you want

to come to Christ, but I don't let you know, he's not by external coercion or compulsion.

In other words, we do, unless we are constrained by those physical, you're actually in shackles

and you can't do what you want to do.

We are able to will and then act according to our wills.

So those wills are free in that they are not subject to external coercion or compulsion.

We do have a will.

We are not puppets.

We are not robots.

And yet if freedom of the will means the philosophical term here is a libertarian free will that

is the power to do otherwise than what God has decreed, then no, we do not have a will

that is free in that sense, but we want to be clear.

Reform theology says that we have wills that can choose canons of door with the high

points of reform theology, divine sovereignty, canons of door make clear, divine sovereignty

quote does not act in people as if they were blocks and stones, nor does it abolish

the will and its properties or coerce a reluctant will by force.

In short, there is a divine will prior to all human willing and the will of the unregulant

man is enslaved to sin, all of that is true.

At the same time, our wicked choices are really our choices and they really have real

world consequences because we have a will that can choose free in this sense that is not

subject to external coercion or compulsion.

That's not how God operates in the world.

And yet not free if by that we mean that we can run counter to God's absolute eternal

decree.

Thanks for listening to Doctrine Matters with me, Kevin D. Young, our hope and prayer

is that this has been helpful to you as you look at scripture and try to understand

the best of our theological tradition as Christians.

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Till next week, thanks for being with us.