-09 Chapter 9. Of Providence.

1-09 Chapter 9. Of Providence.

1. The Providence of God is that Efficiency whereby he provides for his Creatures now made, in all things, according to the counsel of his own Will.148
2. This Providence is extended to all things, not only common things, but proper, Psalms 145:15-16; Proverbs 16:9; Proverbs 16:33, Exodus 21:13.149
3. The Providence of God is either immediate, whereby God by himself, as the absolute sole cause, provides for things; or it is mediate whereby he provides by the use of means.
4. God does all things that come to pass, IMMEDIATELY; this is both by reason of his power in respect to all being, which is found in the effect (for the power of God attains to every effect, Deuteronomy 8:3; Isaiah 28:26);150 and also by reason of the subject, in respect to that being which it has as a being. For God himself, who is always and everywhere present, immediately and inwardly works that being in all things also.151
5. Yet in respect to those things upon which second causes have their influence by force of their own proper form, God is not said to work immediately, but MEDIATELY; because he works by the means of subjects and virtues of second causes.
6. God therefore uses means, not for lack of power, but through the abundance of his goodness; that namely, he might communicate a certain dignity of working to his Creatures also, and might make his Efficiency more perceivable in them. 1 Samuel 14:6,152 ‘Tis all one to Jehovah to save with many, or with few. Hence God often uses those means to produce the most noble effects, which of themselves have no aptness to bring forth such effects, 1 Corinthians 1:27-28; Amos 5:9; 2 Chronicles 24:24.153 Also, he often makes the most fit means ineffectual, Psalms 33:16; Psalms 127:1-2; Hosea 4:10.154
7. Hence our Faith does not properly respect those means which God uses, nor does it depend on them, but on God only, who can relieve all our necessities either with means or without means, as it seems good to him. Daniel 3:17, Our God whom we worship is able to deliver us out of the hot fiery Furnace, and out of your hand, O king.
8. The Providence of God is either Ordinary and usual, or Extraordinary and unusual.
9. ORDINARY providence is where God observes that order in things which was appointed from the beginning. The reason of which order requires that some certain thing go before, and from that being done, some certain thing follows after. Hosea 2:21-22, I will hear the Heavens, and they shall hear the Earth, and the Earth shall hear the Corn, and the Wine, and the Oil; and they shall hear Israel.155
10. That order in natural things is the Law of Nature, common to all things or to the very nature of things, as it is established in a certain order; it arises from the force and efficacy of that never-to-be-revoked Word of God given in the beginning: Let it be made, let it be, be it so; which, by expressing the respect of a thing to come, signifies perpetuity and constancy; and by its virtue, it effects all things which usually come to pass from the same things. Jeremiah 31:1-40; Jeremiah 35:1-19; Jeremiah 36:1-32. The statutes of the Moon and of the Stars, etc.; and Jeremiah 33:20, My Covenant of the day and my Covenant of the night.
11. EXTRAORDINARY providence is that by which God provides for things beyond the usual and appointed order of them, in which manner whatever is effected, is effected by a metonymy of the effect, called a Miracle.
12. A MIRACLE is an operation above the order appointed, which is why true Miracles always give evidence of the omnipotence of the doer. Hence God alone is the Author of true Miracles.156
13. Men may be moral causes of Miracles, as they obtain this from God: that he would do them, or as God uses their help as a sign or a token of a Miracle to be done by him; yet they cannot be really efficient causes, nor indeed instrumental much less principal causes.
14. The Providence of God is either conservation157 or gubernation.158
15. CONSERVATION is that whereby God makes all things, both universal and singular, both in their Essence and existence, and in their strength, to persist and continue, Psalms 104:19-20; Acts 17:28; Hebrews 1:3.159 The Schoolmen not unfitly called this Manutenentia Dei, God’s holding in his hand, because by this conservation God sustains all things as with his Hand.
16. This conservation necessarily comes between the Creation and Government of created things; because whatever is created, is created to some end and use to which it also ought to be directed and governed. But it cannot attain that end, nor be directed to it, unless it is continued and conserved in its being.
17. God’s conservation is necessary for the Creature, because the Creature in every way depends upon the Creator, not only as touching its Fieri, i.e. being made, but also touching its Esse, existero, permanere, & operari. i.e. Being, Existence, Continuance, and operation. So that every Creature would return into that nothing from which it was made, if God were not to uphold it; and the very cessation of Divine conservation would, without any other operation, shortly reduce every Creature into nothing. Psalms 104:29, If you hide your face, they are troubled; if you take away their breath they die, and return to their dust.
18. Some things are conserved immediately; namely, those which are subjected to God only. This conservation is indeed the same as Creation, differing only in reason, in that Creation includes a certain newness which Conservation excludes; and Creation excludes a precedent existence which Conservation includes. So that Conservation is nothing else than as it were, a continued Creation; and therefore it is joined with Creation. Nehemiah 9:6, You have made and you preserved all these things.
19. GUBERNATION is that whereby God directs and leads all his Creatures to their proper ends. Psalms 29:10, Jehovah sits as King forever.
20. The government of all things ought to be by God. For they would never certainly attain the end to which they were created unless they were governed by the same power by which they were created. And it proceeds from imperfection, when he leaves the work that he has made, to be directed by another afterward.
21. This Gubernation intrinsically includes not only means that are convenient and fitting to the end, but also their certain efficacy, or the attainment itself. The order therefore of this government is certain, immoveable, and indissoluble; so that the Creature cannot wholly withdraw itself from all order of government, even though it may decline from its particular order, Genesis 50:20.160
22. This government is either common, or special [chap. 10].
23. COMMON government is that whereby God governs all things in a like manner. To this government belongs, First, The Law of nature common to all things, which is a certain participation of the Law and Will of God, put into all things from the beginning. Job 38:12, Have you commanded the morning, and made known to the Dayspring his place? And Secondly, a natural inclination which is a principle of working according to that law in Job 5:7, The sparks fly upward. Thirdly, a natural instinct which is a peculiar stirring up of the living Creatures to some more noble acts, with a certain show and print of reason. Proverbs 6:6, Go to the Ant, O sluggard; behold her ways and be wise. And Proverbs 30:24-28, These four are small upon the Earth, but they are exceedingly wise: the Ants, the Mice,161 the Locusts, the Spiders. Jeremiah 8:7, The Stork, the Turtle, the Crane, and Swallow observe the times of their coming. Fourthly, A certain obediential power, whereby all Creatures are apt to obey the command of God. Psalms 103:21; Psalms 148:8, Doing his pleasure, fulfilling his Word.
24. This government shines forth in the operation of all things, FIRST in that they always look to some certain end, and so it is necessary that they be acted and governed by an intelligence that is everywhere present and omnipotent; that is, God himself. Job 38:27, In sending down rain to satisfy the waste place, and bringing forth the bud of the tender Herb. Isaiah 55:10, The rain causes the Earth to bring forth seed to the sower, and bread for the one that eats. SECONDLY, in that the works of nature are ordained so accurately, and so agreeable to reason, that they can only proceed from highest reason. Proverbs 30:25-28.162 THIRDLY, in that besides ordination properly, whereby each thing seeks its own perfection, they keep as it were a common society; all desire the conservation of the whole more than of themselves, as seen in heavy things which are carried upward to avoid an emptiness.
25. By force of this Gubernation, all second causes are in a certain manner determined before; that is, FIRST, they are stirred up to works by an influence or previous motion. Besides communicating strength and sustenance in that regard, there is some such thing necessarily required to bring forth into act, that which before was in the power of the Creature. SECONDLY, they are applied to a certain object about which they are exercised in working, Ezekiel 21:21-22, etc.; 2 Samuel 16:10.163 Also by force of the same government, they are ordered; that is, 1. Limits and bounds are set to their actions, Job 1:12; Job 2:6; Job 38:10.164 2. Some good is drawn out of their action, Genesis 50:20.165
26. Because the exercise of that strength which is in the Creatures depends upon the Will of God; hence it is that we trust in God alone, and not in those Creatures by which the kindness of God is derived to us.