Notes, Chapter 1

  1  For a much fuller defense of God's sovereignty in all that he does see John Piper, The Pleasures of God: Meditations on God's delight in Being God, (Sisters, OR: Multnomah Books, 1991), pp. 47-78, 123-160; and The Justification of God: An Exegetical and Theological Study of Romans 9:1-23, (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1993).

  2  Proverbs 16:33.

  3  "Personal Narrative," Jonathan Edwards: Representative Selections, eds. C. H. Faust, T H. Johnson (New York: Hill and Wang, 1962), pp. 58-59.

  4  Edwards treats this problem by distinguishing two kinds of willing in God (which is implied in what I have said). God's "will of command" (or revealed will) is what he commands in Scripture (Thou shalt not kill, etc. ). His "will of decree" (or secret will, or sovereign will) is what he infallibly brings to pass in the world. Edwards' words are complex, but they are worth the effort if you love the deep things of God:

When a distinction is made between God's revealed will and his secret will, or his will of command and decree, "will" is certainly in that distinction taken in two senses. His will of decree, is not his will in the same sense as his will of command is. Therefore, it is no difficulty at all to suppose, that the one may be otherwise than the other: his will in both senses is his inclination. But when we say he wills virtue, or loves virtue, or the happiness of his creature; thereby is intended, that virtue, or the creature's happiness, absolutely and simply considered, is agreeable to the inclination of his nature.

His will of decree is his inclination to a thing, not as to that thing absolutely and simply, but with respect to the universality of things, that have been, are or shall be. So God, though he hates a thing as it is simply, may incline to it with reference to the universality of things. Though he hates sin in itself, yet he may will to permit it, for the greater promotion of holiness in this universality, including all things, and at all times. So, though he has no inclination to a creature's misery, considered absolutely, yet he may will it, for the greater promotion of happiness in this universality.

"Concerning the Divine Decrees," The Works of Jonathan Edwards, Vol. 2 (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1974), pp. 527-28.

  5  The term "redemptive history" simply refers to the history of God's acts recorded in the Bible. It is called redemptive history not because it isn't real history, but because it is history viewed from the perspective of God's redeeming purpose.

  6  Quoted from The Four Loves, in A Mind Awake: An Anthology of C. S. Lewis, ed. Clyde Kilby (New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 1968), p.202.

  7  Hebrews 1:3.

  8  Psalm 19:1

  9  If one should ask what place the Holy Spirit has in this understanding of the Trinity, I would direct attention to two works of Jonathan Edwards: Treatise on Grace and An Essay on the Trinity. He sums up his understanding of the Trinity in these words:

And this I suppose to be that blessed Trinity that we read of in the Holy Scriptures. The Father is the deity subsisting in the prime, unoriginated and most absolute manner, or the deity in its direct existence. The Son is the deity generated by God's understanding, or having an idea of Himself and subsisting in that idea. The Holy Ghost is the deity subsisting in act, or the divine essence flowing out and breathed forth in God's infinite love to and delight in Himself. And I believe the whole Divine essence does truly and distinctly subsist both in the Divine idea and Divine love, and that each of them are properly distinct persons.

"Essay on the Trinity," Treatise on Grace and Other Posthumously Published Writings, ed. Paul Helm (Cambridge: James Clarke and Co., 1971), p.118.

In other words, the Holy Spirit is the delight that the Father and the Son have in each other.

So the Holy Spirit does in some ineffable and inconceivable manner proceed, and is breathed forth both from the Father and the Son, by the Divine essence being wholly poured and flowing out in that infinitely intense, holy, and pure love and delight that continually and unchangeably breathes forth from the Father and the Son, primarily towards each other, and secondarily towards the creature, and so flowing forth in a different subsistence or person in a manner to us utterly inexplicable and inconceivable, and that this is that person that is poured forth into the hearts of angels and saints.

"Treatise on Grace," Treatise on Grace and Other Posthumously Published Writings , p. 63.

  10 I borrow this phrase from Daniel Fuller whose Book, The Unity of the Bible: Unfolding God's Plan for Humanity, (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1992).  See especially chapters 8 and 9.

  11 "Dissertation Concerning the End for Which God Created the World," The Works of Jonathan Edwards, vol. 1, p. 102. This "Dissertation" is of immense value in handling the whole question of God's goal in history.

  12 Isaiah 48:11

  13 C. S. Lewis, Reflections on the Psalms, (New York: Harcourt, Brace and World 1958), pp. 93-95.