(d) In respect to the good acts of men, providence embraces all those natural influences of birth and surroundings which prepare men for the operation of God's word and Spirit, and which constitute motives to obedience.
(e) In respect to the evil acts of men, providence is never the efficient cause of sin, but is by turns preventive, permissive, directive, and determinative.
(f) Since Christ is the only revealer of God, and he is the medium of every divine activity, providence is to be regarded as the work of Christ; see 1 Cor. 8:6—“one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things”; cf. John 5:17—“My Father worketh even until now, and I work.”
The Germans have the word Fürsehung, forseeing, looking out for, as well as the word Vorsehung, foreseeing, seeing beforehand. Our word “providence” embraces the meanings of both these words. On the general subject of providence, see Philippi, [pg 420]Glaubenslehre, 2:272-284; Calvin, Institutes, 1:182-219; Dick, Theology, 1:416-446; Hodge, Syst. Theol., 1:581-616; Bib. Sac., 12:179; 21:584; 26:315; 30:593; N. W. Taylor, Moral Government, 2:294-326.
Providence is God's attention concentrated everywhere. His care is microscopic as well as telescopic. Robert Browning, Pippa Passes, ad finem: “All service is the same with God—With God, whose puppets, best and worst, Are we: there is no last nor first.” Canon Farrar: “In one chapter of the Koran is the story how Gabriel, as he waited by the gates of gold, was sent by God to earth to do two things. One was to prevent king Solomon from the sin of forgetting the hour of prayer in exultation over his royal steeds; the other to help a little yellow ant on the slope of Ararat, which had grown weary in getting food for its nest, and which would otherwise perish in the rain. To Gabriel the one behest seemed just as kingly as the other, since God had ordered it. ‘Silently he left The Presence, and prevented the king's sin, And holp the little ant at entering in.’ ‘Nothing is too high or low, Too mean or mighty, if God wills it so.’ ” Yet a preacher began his sermon on Mat. 10:30—“The very hairs of your head are are all numbered”—by saying: “Why, some of you, my hearers, do not believe that even your heads are all numbered!”
A modern prophet of unbelief in God's providence is William Watson. In his poem entitled The Unknown God, we read: “When overarched by gorgeous night, I wave my trivial self away; When all I was to all men's sight Shares the erasure of the day: Then do I cast my cumbering load, Then do I gain a sense of God.” Then he likens the God of the Old Testament to Odin and Zeus, and continues: “O streaming worlds, O crowded sky, O life, and mine own soul's abyss, Myself am scarce so small that I Should bow to Deity like this! This my Begetter? This was what Man in his violent youth begot. The God I know of I shall ne'er Know, though he dwells exceeding nigh. Raise thou the stone and find me there. Cleave thou the wood and there am I. Yea, in my flesh his Spirit doth flow, Too near, too far, for me to know. Whate'er my deeds, I am not sure That I can pleasure him or vex: I, that must use a speech so poor It narrows the Supreme with sex. Notes he the good or ill in man? To hope he cares is all I can. I hope with fear. For did I trust This vision granted me at birth, The sire of heaven would seem less just Than many a faulty son of earth. And so he seems indeed! But then, I trust it not, this bounded ken. And dreaming much, I never dare To dream that in my prisoned soul The flutter of a trembling prayer Can move the Mind that is the Whole. Though kneeling nations watch and yearn, Does the primeval Purpose turn? Best by remembering God, say some. We keep our high imperial lot. Fortune, I fear, hath oftenest come When we forgot—when we forgot! A lovelier faith their happier crown, But history laughs and weeps it down: Know they not well how seven times seven, Wronging our mighty arms with rust, We dared not do the work of heaven, Lest heaven should hurl us in the dust? The work of heaven! 'Tis waiting still The sanction of the heavenly will. Unmeet to be profaned by praise Is he whose coils the world enfold; The God on whom I ever gaze, The God I never once behold: Above the cloud, above the clod, The unknown God, the unknown God.”
In pleasing contrast to William Watson's Unknown God, is the God of Rudyard Kipling's Recessional: “God of our fathers, known of old—Lord of our far-flung battle-line—Beneath whose awful hand we hold Dominion over palm and pine—Lord God of hosts, be with us yet, Lest we forget—lest we forget! The tumult and the shouting dies—The captains and the kings depart—Still stands thine ancient Sacrifice, An humble and a contrite heart. Lord God of hosts, be with us yet. Lest we forget—lest we forget! Far-called our navies melt away—On dune and headland sinks the fire—So, all our pomp of yesterday Is one with Nineveh and Tyre! Judge of the nations, spare us yet, Lest we forget—lest we forget! If, drunk with sight of power, we loose Wild tongues that have not thee in awe—Such boasting as the Gentiles use, Or lesser breeds without the Law—Lord God of hosts, be with us yet, Lest we forget—lest we forget! For heathen heart that puts her trust In reeking tube and iron shard—All valiant dust that builds on dust, And guarding calls not thee to guard—For frantic boast and foolish word, Thy mercy on thy people, Lord!”
These problems of God's providential dealings are intelligible only when we consider that Christ is the revealer of God, and that his suffering for sin opens to us the heart of God. All history is the progressive manifestation of Christ's holiness and love, and in the cross we have the key that unlocks the secret of the universe. With the cross in view, we can believe that Love rules over all, and that “all things work together for good to them that love God.” (Rom. 8:28).