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All activities and events are, if
the Lord will and if we are not as yet caught up into the clouds
to meet Him in the air. |
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If
predestination is true why pray? |
An objection has been raised
which is very ancient indeed, and has a great appearance
of force. It is raised not so much by sceptics, as by
those who hold a part of the truth; it is this? that
prayer can certainly produce no result, because of the
decrees of God have settled everything, and those
decrees are immutable. Now we have no desire to deny the
assertion that the decrees of God have settled all
events. It is our full belief that God has foreknown and
predestinated everything that happened in heaven above
or in the earth beneath, and that the foreknown station
of a reed by the river is fixed as the station of a
king, and "the chaff from the hand of the winnower is
steered as the stars in their courses."
Predestination embraceth the great and the little, and
reacheth unto all things; the question is, wherefore
pray? Might it not as logically be asked, wherefore
breathe, eat, move, or do anything? We have an answer
which satisfies us, namely, that our prayers are in the
predestination, and that God has as much ordained his
people's prayers as anything else, and when we pray we
are producing links in the chain of ordained facts.
Destiny decrees that I should pray?I pray; destiny
decrees that I shall be answered, and the answer comes
to me.
Moreover, in other matters we never regulate our actions
by the unknown decrees of God; as for instance, a man
never questions whether he shall eat or drink, because
it may or may not be decreed that he shall eat or drink;
a man never enquires whether he shall work or not on the
ground that it is decreed how much he shall do or how
little; as it is inconsistent with common sense to make
the secret decrees of God a guide to us in our general
conduct, so we feel it would be in reference to prayer,
and therefore still we pray. But we have a better answer
than all this. Our Lord Jesus Christ comes forward, and
he says to us this morning, "My dear children, the
decrees of God need not trouble you, there is nothing in
them inconsistent with your prayers being heard. 'I say
unto you, ask, and it shall be given you.' " Now, who is
he that says this? Why it is he that has been with the
Father from the beginning?"the same was in the beginning
with God" and he knows what the purposes of the Father
are and what the heart of God is, for he has told us in
another place, "the Father himself loveth you."
Now since he knows the decrees of the Father, and the
heart of the Father, he can tell us with the absolute
certainty of an eye-witness that there is nothing in the
eternal purposes in conflict with this truth, that he
that asketh receiveth, and he that seeketh findeth. He
has read the decrees from the beginning to end: hath he
not taken the book, and loosed the seven seals thereof,
and declared the ordinances of heaven? He tells you
there is nothing there inconsistent with your bended
knee and streaming eye, and with the Father's opening
the windows of heaven to shower upon you the blessings
which you seek. Moreover, he is himself God: the
purposes of heaven are his own purposes, and he who
ordained the purpose here gives the assurance that there
is nothing in it to prevent the efficacy of prayer. "I
say unto you." O ye that believe in him, your doubts are
scattered to the winds, ye know that he heareth your
prayer.
http://www.sovereign-grace.com/286.htm
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