“Thy People Shall Be Willing In The Day Of Thy Power”

 

          We must not think of God as a helpless spectator of the events of creation and providence. Yet, many so picture him. They think that God, having created man and given him the power of volition, has created another sovereign. Many think that all God can do now is to appeal to man to act righteously and accept his Son as their Substitute and Savior. God is pictured as passively awaiting the sinner's imperial decision, as though doing anything more would be a violation of the creature's moral freedom. If this were correct, then God could do no more than his creature.

          But this is not the God of Ho1y Scripture. The God of the Bible can induce even the will of a sinner to choose what he wills. In thus disposing, inclining, bending, and influencing the sinner's will, God, in no way forces it; he simply changes it. Being thus changed, it acts as freely as before.

This sovereign power of God over the will of wicked men is repeatedly illustrated in the Scriptures. God kept Abimelech from sinning against him (Gen.20:6).The Lord stirred up Cyrus the king of Persia to build his house, fulfilling the "word of the Lord b the mouth of Jeremiah (Ezra 1:1). And, inorder to bring about the birth of Christ in Bethlehem, God caused Caesar to make an unheard of decree, so that Mary would be in Bethlehem at the end of her ninth month (Luke 2:1-7).

Now as God, by an internal act of sovereign power, disposes heathen monarchs to do his will, so he disposes sinners to repent and believe. God so graciously and sovereignly changes the hearts of sinners, that in the day of his power. We were perfectly willing to have Christ as our Savior and Lord. Else it would be vain for us to pray to God for the conversion of anyone.

Don Fortner