EVENTS MADE CERTAIN

By Curtis Pugh

            Francis Turretin (1623 – 1687) said, “An event must be made certain, before it can be known as a certain event.” We quote this old Protestant because his words are simple, but deep in meaning. Let us relate Turretin's words to Bible prophecy. No one can know that a future thing is certain until it is made certain. The Bible teaches that God knows all things. The fact that God knows an event to be certain to happen is not what makes the event certain. Therefore, God, having decreed events aforetime, He knows them to be certain because they are certain: He fixed them to be so.

            The Bible says, “Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world,” (Acts 15:18). Since God knows all His works from the beginning of the world, they must be certain. For if He knows a thing is going to happen, it is going to happen. It is not going to happen because He knows that it is, but rather because He fixed it – He made it certain. The fact that He made it certain is the reason that He knows it to be certain. Since God has known all His works from the beginning of creation, we must conclude that all God's works are certain and have been from the beginning of the world. This view is consistent with both logic and the Bible.

            Thus, when Jesus prophesied the words, “All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out,” (John 6:37) He spoke of a certainty. He spoke of certain individuals whom the Father had given Him. The Father's giving of some people to the Son is a work of God. The fact that Jesus knew that all given to Him by the Father would come to Him is certain. It is certain because God fixed it from the beginning of the world. He fixed it that each individual whom He gave to the Son would come. God's work involved specific individuals doing a specific thing – coming to Christ. Since God knew with an absolute certainty that these would come, it was fixed and absolutely certain from the beginning of the world.

            So it is when the Bible speaks of certain Gentiles, saying, “...as many as were ordained to eternal life believed,” (Acts 13:48), it speaks of God making certain events yet future. We know this because “Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world.” Since He knew from the beginning what He was going to do to and in these Gentiles in ordaining them to eternal life, He made it certain that they would believe from the beginning of the world also. Why? Because a thing must be made certain before it can be known to be certain. Because God made it certain, a believer may with certainty sing, “When His chosen ones shall gather over on the other shore, And the roll is called up yonder, I'll be there.”