Sermon Title: Westminster Shorter Catechism Q11
Text: WSC Q11
Date: 11/3/2024 (Evening)
Speaker: Justin Stiles
Good evening, Gateway Church! It is great to be here with you this evening at our combined service, worshipping Jesus with you and gathering as a church family as we welcome new members, celebrate baptisms and child dedications, and take communion as a church! It is a pleasure to share God’s Word with you this evening. For those I don’t know, I’m Justin Stiles, one of the elders of Gateway Church. I’m married to Anne, and we have five children: Easton, Elyse, Robert, Chandler, and Randy. Our family serves as greeters monthly here at County Road 9, so you may have had the opportunity to walk through many of the doors we open as a family! In addition, Anne and I both serve in Kidway – Anne currently serves in the Diverse Needs space, and I serve as a Large Group leader.
This year, we started a series on the Westminster Shorter Catechism, which will take us a few years to get through. The Westminster Shorter Catechism is one of two catechisms found in the Westminster Confession of Faith. Catechisms contain a list of questions and answers designed to help and teach people the fundamentals of the Christian faith. You heard from fellow elder Jeremy Sickmiller last week talk about Questions 9 and 10, and today, I’ll be talking about Question 11. Let’s see what Question 11 says and dig in:
Question 11: What is God’s Providence?
Answer: God’s providence is his completely holy, wise, and powerful preserving and governing every creature and every action.
Providence can be a tricky concept for believers and non-believers alike, as it relates to God governing and reigning over all creation. This can push us toward thinking about questions such as:
Is God in control of everything?
Does God control everything everything, or does he just kind of watch it unfold and step in when He needs to?
If God is in control, do I have a say in anything? Do my actions even matter?
How does God control everything going on, all at once, all the time?
If God is in control and he is so wise and so good, why do we have tragedies and suffering?
Again, whether you follow Jesus or not, these are tough questions that can get the best of all of us. Before we get to God’s persevering and governing, let’s go through the first part of the question, which will help us understand the second part.
The God we serve is holy, that’s what one of his attributes. What does being holy mean? And what does it mean to serve and worship a holy God? Holiness is often described as God being set apart, completely pure and unvarnished by sin and corruption. One theologian describes God’s holiness meaning that “he is separated from sin and devoted to seeking his own honor…both a relational quality (separation from) and moral quality (the separation is from sin or evil, and the devotion is the good of God’s own honor or glory) (Grudem, Systematic Theology, 202). Holiness translates as God’s total purity, and it separates him from his fallen and broken creation. We can explore and be reminded of God’s holiness in a few different passages.
Psalm 145 is one of David’s psalms, and it is one of praise. The whole psalm is a good one to pray out loud if you want to spend time praising God. The verse I want to point out when we talk about God’s holiness is v. 17:
The Lord is righteous in everything he does; he is filled with kindness.
Throughout this psalm, David is praising God for His power, greatness, glorious splendor, and wonderful miracles. He talks about how God’s deeds will be talked about by everyone. David praises God for his mercy and compassion, and his goodness. He talks about his faithfulness in keeping all his promises. He gives God praise for his righteousness and kindness. God cares for his creation. God beneficially provides for life on earth, his creation, and especially us, his human creation. God is also acting according to himself, his holy self, when he “justly punishes the wicked and mercifully examines by the cross” (Geneva Bible Study Notes. Psalm 145:17.).
Let’s look at Exodus 3, where the stage is being set for God to put into motion plans to rescue his people, the Israelites, from slavery in Egypt at the hands of Pharaoh.
In Exodus 3:1-6, we read:
One day Moses was tending the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro, the priest of Midian. He led the flock far into the wilderness and came to Sinai, the mountain of God. There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a blazing fire from the middle of a bush. Moses stared in amazement. Though the bush was engulfed in flames, it didn’t burn up. “This is amazing,” Moses said to himself. “Why isn’t that bush burning up? I must go see it.” When the Lord saw Moses coming to take a closer look, God called to him from the middle of the bush, “Moses! Moses!” “Here I am!” Moses replied. “Do not come any closer,” the Lord warned. “Take off your sandals, for you are standing on holy ground. I am the God of your father —the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” When Moses heard this, he covered his face because he was afraid to look at God.
The Lord told Moses not to come any closer and that the ground he was standing on was holy, due to the Lord’s presence. This idea was made clearer to me when holiness was described this way by the creators of The Bible Project. The illustration they use is God being like the sun. The sun is an extremely powerful star – it’s bright, radiant, magnificent. And it sustains life here on Earth. It also burns far more brightly and hotly than we can even fathom – it’s downright dangerous to approach too close to the sun. Anything that does get too close to the sun is destroyed. (Bible Project. Holiness.). In the same way, because of our sinful nature, our impurity, it’s dangerous to be in God’s presence, or we would be destroyed. That’s why God told Moses to remove his sandals, and why Moses had to shield his eyes. We see also another glimpse of God’s holiness in Isaiah 6:1-7:
It was in the year King Uzziah died that I saw the Lord. He was sitting on a lofty throne, and the train of his robe filled the Temple. Attending him were mighty seraphim, each having six wings. With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew. They were calling out to each other, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of Heaven’s Armies! The whole earth is filled with his glory!” Their voices shook the Temple to its foundations, and the entire building was filled with smoke. Then I said, “It’s all over! I am doomed, for I am a sinful man. I have filthy lips, and I live among a people with filthy lips. Yet I have seen the King, the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.” Then one of the seraphim flew to me with a burning coal he had taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. He touched my lips with it and said, “See, this coal has touched your lips. Now your guilt is removed, and your sins are forgiven.”
Isaiah himself was aware of God’s holiness and saw the seraphim calling out and describing God as “holy, holy, holy.” Isaiah was also aware of his sin and feared his destruction. God showed mercy through one of his seraphim using a burning coal, forgiving his sin and removing his guilt.
But what does God’s holiness mean for us? You’ve heard me say that we are sinful, which goes against the idea in our culture that most people have a basic level of goodness, and don’t need to be rescued, much less by God. As I’ve said, God is holy. We, God’s creation, are not. We are separated from God by our sin. Again, for those that don’t believe in God, sin is not something you may acknowledge. You might say some really bad things fall into the sin category, like adultery, or murder, or scamming and stealing someone’s life savings. But, in establishing his law for us, God meant for us to uphold his law of righteousness perfectly, all the time. While we may not engage in the “big sins,” Paul points out many of the problems in our hearts and actions that make us sinful and unholy.
In Galatians 5:19-24, we read:
When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God. But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things! Those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there.
This passage isn’t the only one that talks about all the sinful things that go on in our minds and hearts and actions, but it gives us a short list of things in which we all can certainly find one with which we identify as committing or experiencing. What is God’s response to our unholiness? We all deserve to be brought to justice for our sinfulness, but God, from before the beginning of time, had a plan to rescue us as he loves us so.
In John 3:16-21, we read:
For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through him. “There is no judgment against anyone who believes in him. But anyone who does not believe in him has already been judged for not believing in God’s one and only Son. And the judgment is based on this fact: God’s light came into the world, but people loved the darkness more than the light, for their actions were evil. All who do evil hate the light and refuse to go near it for fear their sins will be exposed. But those who do what is right come to the light so others can see that they are doing what God wants.
So, if we would only place our faith in Jesus for our salvation and believe that he died and was resurrected for our sins, Jesus’ holiness and righteousness becomes ours in God’s view. What a gift!
Now that we’ve talked about God’s holiness, let’s remind ourselves of our catechism question:
Question 11: What is God’s Providence?
Answer: God’s providence is his completely holy, wise, and powerful preserving and governing every creature and every action.
Let’s talk about God being wise or having wisdom. Wisdom is something we generally can think through a little more easily than God’s holiness, whether we follow Jesus or not. First, we can normally catch someone in an unwise act, and, if we are kind, we try to stop him before it becomes a problem. You’ve probably seen extreme examples of this online:
…a bunch of guys putting ladders on top of ladders on top of ladders to work on something overhead…
…or the guy trying to jam in a bunch of branches into a woodchipper... with his leg…
Or, if you know the Stiles children long enough, you can learn from them all sorts of unwise ways to go about your day that will result in one or more of your bones getting broken, whether it be dancing, biking, jumping off playground equipment, or just attending an outdoor communion service! However, God’s wisdom is more than just avoiding a silly or ill-planned move. We read in Psalm 104:24:
O Lord, what a variety of things you have made! In wisdom you have made them all. The earth is full of your creatures.
Think about God’s creation, its beauty, intricacies, and complexities. The way God made snow to collect on mountaintops throughout the winter, and then the snow melts and replenishes rivers and reservoirs the following spring. The way God made squirrels to gather food for the winter, and scatter it among many hiding places, so they have food for the season…not to mention how some squirrels know how to shake an acorn and listen for beetles first so those acorns can be eaten for food now. The way God made the moon to cause low and high tides for the earth’s oceans, which allows nutrients to circulate for different marine species and for pollutants and toxins to dissipate. Think about the ingenuity and creativity that God gifted humans when he created us. God told us to in Genesis 1:28:
…Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”
If you look back at human history, the ways in which we create, invent, and cultivate to physically care for our communities or to bring joy to our communities is astonishing. Just when we think God couldn’t gift us any further, God allows us to reach new advances and heights. I’m sure that we all appreciate the abilities to move about how and when we want in various modes of transportation, that we can have cooling and heating on demand to suit our comfort, and that we can illuminate or darken a room to our liking. God granted us the ability to see his creation and figure out ways to mix materials, or to alter or combine materials through chemical reactions or manufacturing, to create things that would help sustain, improve, or enrich our lives for good.
We find wisdom not just in the act of creation and invention, but we can ask God for wisdom in how we speak, act, or respond. In James 1:5:
If you need wisdom, ask our generous God, and he will give it to you. He will not rebuke you for asking.
When do we need wisdom? In the passage I just read, James is encouraging us to ask for wisdom in the context of facing tough situations. Really, we should ask for it always! We learn from Deuteronomy and Isaiah that when we are wise to follow God’s ways, our lives go better for us. I’m certainly not promising prosperity, as that would be foolish of me, but when we follow the Lord’s ways for going about our lives, more glory is brought to him and more hearts can be drawn to him.
In Isaiah 28:29: The Lord of Heaven’s Armies is a wonderful teacher, and he gives the farmer great wisdom.
Earlier in this passage, Isaiah had talked about the ways a farmer knows how to care for his land to produce crops. Where does that wisdom come from – the Lord.
We see elsewhere in Isaiah 55:8-11:
For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts. “My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts,” says the Lord. “And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine. “The rain and snow come down from the heavens and stay on the ground to water the earth. They cause the grain to grow, producing seed for the farmer and bread for the hungry. It is the same with my word. I send it out, and it always produces fruit. It will accomplish all I want it to, and it will prosper everywhere I send it.
If we choose to follow God’s instructions, our lives generally go better here. Think about it. If we listen and obey God, our Creator, the one who created us, the earth, and everything in it, it just makes sense that our lives would generally go better than if we chose to rebel against his instruction. We are told in 1 Timothy 6:17-19:
They should be rich in good works and generous to those in need, always being ready to share with others. By doing this they will be storing up their treasure as a good foundation for the future so that they may experience true life.
What wisdom is found here – that we are to be generous and to share with others. At Gateway, we want our disciples of Jesus to be generous. We’ve shown in many ways just in the last year how willing we are to be generous to our church family and our community here and around the world…whether it’s with food drives, responding to areas impacted by natural disasters, or giving life lines when political unrest has turned to violence and destruction for our missions partners overseas.
Now, we get to what I think is the tougher part of providence. Let’s read the Shorter Catechism #11 again.
Question 11: What is God’s Providence?
Answer: God’s providence is his completely holy, wise, and powerful preserving and governing every creature and every action.
So, God’s powerful preserving and governing every creature and action. There are some really, bright and insightful pastors and theologians that have authored sermons and books on this topic, and it’s still tough to understand. And I only get a few minutes to try to break it down for us just a little bit!
When we hear about God preserving and governing every creature and action, that can sound a lot like stories or movies like 1984, The Truman Show, The Matrix, or The Handmaid’s Tale, where folks are either controlled, oppressed, or their choices are very limited. And yes, I acknowledge that if we get stuck on this, we can go down some deep rabbit holes with Alice to Wonderland. But, if we look at what the Bible says and reflect on what God says, we can see that God’s preserving and governing is really beautiful and full of freedom. In Hebrews 1:3 we read:
The Son radiates God’s own glory and expresses the very character of God, and he sustains everything by the mighty power of his command. When he had cleansed us from our sins, he sat down in the place of honor at the right hand of the majestic God in heaven.
Jesus is God’s Son, and we see here that He sustains everything by His command. He is seated at the right hand of God the Father in Heaven, after he died on the cross and was resurrected. We should have a peace knowing that God rules over creation actively – he’s not just sitting back and letting things just happen. Our finite minds have a hard time grasping that God’s command over everything means everything. He is the author over everything, both the big picture and the details, something we talked about in our Exile series when we were studying Daniel. I don’t know about you, but when I start to think about everything that has to happen for the Earth to spin, rotate around the sun, and everything on it to just happen the way it does so that life goes on, I can’t help but praise the Lord that He is making it happen – it’s out of my control and beyond my understanding. I came across an example just a couple weeks ago that I attributed to God’s wisdom and preservation. Think about freshwater mussels. You can generally find clusters of these aquatic creatures in different areas of lakes or riverbanks – but how do they get there? They can only move a little bit on their own. To reproduce and move to new areas of rivers or lakes, the female mussel shows off a lure that looks like the fish it is trying to lure. When that fish gets too close, the mussel clamps down on the fish and squirts mussel larvae into the fish, and the larvae attach themselves to the fish’s gills. The larvae later fall off the fish after their free ride to another part of the river or lake, thus completing the moving process! How about that for an example of natural preservation and governance for God’s creation!
It may be a little easier for us to comprehend God bringing order and governing the natural order of the world. But what about us? Thinking about our lives, what about God’s preservation and governance for us? Are we just some robots or puppets being strung about by God? If God already knows what we’re going to do, do our actions even matter?
When we think about God’s sovereignty, his power, his providence, and human freedom – there’s no way around the messiness and mystery here. Our finite minds can’t stack up to God’s unknowable wisdom. We sometimes think we are all-knowing, but we don’t even begin to comprehend what it means for God to know all. God’s purposes and plans will always come to pass – as the Creator, He will do what He will do to accomplish his purposes and plans. And further, the Bible tells us in Romans 8:28:
And we know that God causes everything for the good who love God and are called according to his purpose for them
This also includes the good and the bad for those that love him. God gave Adam and Eve the choice to heed his command in the Garden of Eden. They disobeyed and introduced sin and brokenness to His creation. But God, in his wisdom, in unity with the Holy Spirit and Jesus, already had a plan to rescue humanity from the consequences of sin and death so that we could spend eternity in Heaven with Him. God himself does not sin and does not cause us to sin, but our sin is bound, ordered, and governed by Him in His wisdom so that the sin can fulfill God’s holy and good purposes (Gateway Podcast Ep. 181). So, when we say that God uses all things for His good, that means even the awful choices we make or the terrible things that happen to us. Can God use a conflict at work for our good? Yes! Can God use years of down-in-the-trenches parenting for our good? Yes! Can God use cancer for our good? Yes! Can God cause the loss of a family member or friend for good? Yes! We may not understand how or why, but we can be assured, due to God’s faithfulness, that He uses all things for our good. In my own life, I can tell you, that I did not relish one bit the abominable things that occurred to my siblings and me growing up. I often wondered why they were happening. And I feared someday becoming a parent, because I was fearful that I would become the monster that my dad or my stepdad were to us. But God….those wonderful words…..But God…..He used that dreadful time to show me what not to do. But He didn’t just leave it there. He drew me close to Him, he drew me into His Word, He drew me into church, He drew me into relationships with people that would help me and love me and encourage me on how to go about life God’s way. And even further, God put a desire in my heart that I would someday have the opportunity to foster and adopt kids who had not been loved the way they should’ve been loved. And several years later, after I married and had three kids with my wife, Anne, along came our foster and later adopted sons into our family. Thus, allowing me to see the truth of Genesis 50:20:
You intended to harm me, but God intended it all for good. He brought me to this position so I could save the lives of many people.
So, what my dad and stepdad meant for evil, God meant for good. He used the suffering and drew from it years later something that was good! God molded me into a parent. He allowed me to see how fallen a parent can be if he does not know God, and He drew me to Him so that I could learn how I should be a dad instead, learning what the Bible says about parenting and raising children. And, learning from God’s example as a Heavenly Father to us. And because I experienced what I did, I had a tender heart for others who may have experienced abuse, and this gives me perspective that I can use at the appropriate time to help our new sons grapple with questions about their past and point them to Jesus.
I know that I can look back at least parts of my life and see God’s powerful preserving and governing. How different aspects of my life God were pointing to both my eternal good.
But even here, I can see how God used the messiness to give me faith and grow it into what is today. And I was active throughout all of it. It was authentically me living the life that God granted me. I had the freedom to choose obedience to God’s Word or to choose rebellion. And I’m sure God rejoiced when I chose obedience and grieved when I chose rebellion.
And I’m sure you’ve experienced this too – when you experience events or meet people that seem too good to be true or improbable. Maybe you don’t know or realize it at the time, but you can look back and see God at work in your life. We’ve talked about this in our Finding Jesus series, with the sermon on Esther – I’d encourage you to read or watch that for more on the topic of providence. One of the examples of God’s providence in my life is Taco Bell. I know I know…but stick with me. I worked at Taco Bell in high school and continued working at the Taco Bell in Ada when I was attending Ohio Northern University. When it came time to apply for co-ops and internships, it can be difficult for freshmen or sophomores, because they haven’t yet gotten into major engineering classes yet. I interviewed for a co-op position with Kokosing Construction, and all my answers to the manager’s questions were based on the experiences I had at Taco Bell. As we were nearing the end of the interview, I was sure that I was going to get a “thank you for your time, bye now” and we’d be on our merry way. Instead, I got a “Justin, I can’t wait for you to start!” I was shocked. Lori explained that it was tremendous that I was holding a part-time job while going to college. And I was showing a lot of leadership in how I interacted with teammates and customers, so she had no choice – she had to hire me! I was elated, and praise God for Taco Bell! Even this mundane choice like a high school and college job at Taco Bell paved the way for some crucial experiences later in life! God was caring for me, even if I didn’t view it that way!
So, this is tough right? And it’s good to wrestle with the tougher-to-understand elements of God’s attributes and who He is. But don’t let that wrestling turn into a defiance like it nearly did for Job. If you are not familiar with Job, Job was considered righteous by God. Satan told God that of course Job was blameless because God had only blessed him. God permitted Satan to cause suffering for Job by taking away his wealth and inflicting him with extremely painful sores all over his body. Job’s friends then debate and offer explanations of Job’s suffering. Job’s friends contend that blessing and suffering are doled out according to a person’s righteousness. If a person is really good, he will have really good blessing. By contrast, if a person has been really bad, he will be punished accordingly. Job, all the while, defends his integrity and righteousness, almost to a point of defying God. God, however, when he answers Job, shows that he is more complex than we can imagine, rejecting any simple explanation for suffering (Notes on Job. ESV Study Bible.) Let’s read a few of the passages in Job when God answers Job.
Job 38:3-7: Brace yourself like a man, because I have some questions for you, and you must answer them. “Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell me, if you know so much. Who determined its dimensions and stretched out the surveying line? What supports its foundations, and who laid its cornerstone as the morning stars sang together and all the angels shouted for joy?
Job 38:31-35: Can you direct the movement of the stars— binding the cluster of the Pleiades or loosening the cords of Orion? Can you direct the constellations through the seasons or guide the Bear with her cubs across the heavens? Do you know the laws of the universe? Can you use them to regulate the earth? Can you shout to the clouds and make it rain? Can you make lightning appear and cause it to strike as you direct?
Job 40:8-14: “Will you discredit my justice and condemn me just to prove you are right? Are you as strong as God? Can you thunder with a voice like his? All right, put on your glory and splendor, your honor and majesty. Give vent to your anger. Let it overflow against the proud. Humiliate the proud with a glance; walk on the wicked where they stand. Bury them in the dust. Imprison them in the world of the dead. Then even I would praise you, for your own strength would save you.
Job 41:11: Who has given me anything that I need to pay back? Everything under heaven is mine.
As we’ve talked about before, we cannot know how or why God works out his plan in our lives. When tragedies appear, we must still worship God for who He is and trust that what he is doing is for our good. It does not mean that we ought not have emotion – look at the lament, the anguish, the despair that David expressed in several psalms! We can praise God with tears running down our face. We can praise God for his wisdom, his holiness, his power, his care for our lives, even if our conditions are harsh and painful.
So, what is God’s Providence? God’s providence is his holy, wise, and powerful preserving and governing every creature and every action. I hope that you’ve been able to see how God’s holiness and wisdom and preserving and governing are part of his providence, and I hope that we can all recognize how good our lives are because of God’s providence. We are far better with God involved in our lives and in our world. God is involved with the smallest details and with the big picture. And we can also recognize that the God of the universe, that He cares for all of us more deeply than we can fathom. And He loves us so much that in his providence that he sent His Son Jesus to die for us, that we might have life if we choose to follow Him. Let’s pray.
God, thank you for your providence. You are holy and wise, and in your holiness and wisdom, you create and rule over everything. From the colossal things like keeping the planets in orbit around the sun, so the little things like ants knowing when to retreat into the ground for winter, you have woven together the most beautiful universe and earth for us to inhabit. Lord, in your wisdom and your mercy and goodness, you created each one of us. And you’ve given us the opportunity to choose life with you. In your wisdom, you sent your Son Jesus to be our Savior. Thank you that we do not have to worry about sustaining life, as you sustain it for us. Thank you for ordaining and ordering everything for us so that we may have peace. Please increase our faith in your complete sovereignty and providence our lives. Amen.
May you go knowing that Jesus sits on the throne ruling over the earth and heavens, and that he cares for your every need. God bless you, Gateway Church. You are sent.
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