{"id":11006,"date":"2016-08-17T01:24:15","date_gmt":"2016-08-17T06:24:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/gods-absolute-sovereignty\/"},"modified":"2016-08-17T01:24:15","modified_gmt":"2016-08-17T06:24:15","slug":"gods-absolute-sovereignty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/gods-absolute-sovereignty\/","title":{"rendered":"GOD\u2019S ABSOLUTE SOVEREIGNTY"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt; text-align:center;line-height:normal'><b>JOB 38:1\u20137<\/b><\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt; text-align:center;line-height:normal'><i>\u201cWhere were you when I laid the earth\u2019s foundation?\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt; text-align:center;line-height:normal'><i>(Job 38:4)<\/i>.<\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: 18.0pt;line-height:normal'>All Christians agree that God is absolutely sovereign. A good statement of God\u2019s sovereignty is found in the <i>Westminster Confession of Faith<\/i> (3:1), which begins, \u201cGod from all eternity did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: 18.0pt;line-height:normal'>Christians don\u2019t always realize that they believe this, though. I like to read this statement to my seminary students and then ask for a show of hands: \u201cHow many of you believe this statement?\u201d There is always a sizeable minority who say that they don\u2019t believe it. Then I explain to them that there is nothing distinctively Calvinistic about this statement. No branch of the church would deny this statement.<\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: 18.0pt;line-height:normal'>In fact, if we don\u2019t accept what this statement is saying, we will wind up being atheists. If there is anything that happens in this world outside of the foreordination of God, then whatever that thing is, it is happening outside of God\u2019s sovereignty. It must be something over which He has no control.<\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal'><b><i>Is There One Maverick Molecule?<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: 18.0pt;line-height:normal'>Everything that happens in this world happens with God\u2019s permission. God always has the power to prevent something from happening. And if God allows it to happen, then that means He has decided beforehand (\u201cforeordained\u201d) to allow it to happen. If things were to happen outside of God\u2019s control, that would meant that God is not sovereign. And if God is not sovereign, God is not God. He is just a big man, with limited control over things. If there is one molecule in the universe running loose outside of the control of God\u2019s sovereignty, then practically that means we have no guarantee that any promise made by God will come to pass. That one maverick molecule may be one grain of sand that trips up God\u2019s plan. It may prevent Christ from coming back. It may destroy the kingdom of God. But is this possible? Of course not. God is completely sovereign.<\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal'><b>CORAM DEO<\/b><\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal'>Take a look at the headlines in today\u2019s newspaper, and glance over all the other news. Do you see anything going on that could possibly thwart God\u2019s plan? Meditate on the fact that God has total control over all these events, threatening as some of them may appear. Consider how this fact affects you.<\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal'><i>For further study: Exodus 9:1\u201335; John 19:1\u201311; Acts 4:23\u201331<\/i><\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt; text-align:center;line-height:normal'>friday<\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt; text-align:center;line-height:normal'>september<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>JOB 38:1\u20137 \u201cWhere were you when I laid the earth\u2019s foundation?\u201d (Job 38:4). All Christians agree that God is absolutely sovereign. A good statement of God\u2019s sovereignty is found in the Westminster Confession of Faith (3:1), which begins, \u201cGod from all eternity did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/gods-absolute-sovereignty\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;GOD\u2019S ABSOLUTE SOVEREIGNTY&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11006","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11006","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11006"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11006\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11006"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11006"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11006"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}