Young people, feel free to send your questions to Dr. G. Van Groningen at Reformed Theological Seminary, Jackson, Mississippi (formerly of Dordt College). You may send questions with or without identification. Names of those asking questions will not be published. Don’t hesitate. Send your questions now.
“The Bible does not teach it.”
“Most Reformed theologians do not even mention sphere sovereignty when they discuss Reformed theology or present a review of distinctive Reformed doctrines.”
“It is a human doctrine developed in some Dutch circles in the last one hundred years.”
It could be that you have heard these answers, or others like them, to the question before us. You, as some have spoken to me, may have been quite disturbed about such comments, especially when they come from teachers, ministers, or parents who insist they are Reformed.
Some of you may not pay much attention to the issues raised and the truths challenged by these comments. If this is true, it is to be regretted very much, because in so doing you are indicating a lack of concern about some very important Biblical teachings. To ignore is really not too different from verbally denying Biblical teachings.
But, I am sure, you want me to get down to a discussion of the main problems and questions.
To begin with—does the Bible teach sphere sovereignty? Look in a concordance (even in a large one like Strong’s Exhaustive C0ncordance) and you will not find the words sphere, sovereign, or sovereignty in it. Does this mean that since the words themselves are not in the Bible, the Bible does not teach anything about sphere sovereignty? You know you have to be careful in answering this. For example, you are aware, of course, that you could get into trouble with the Biblical teachings concerning the Trinity and Infant Baptism if you should insist that the Bible has to use these specific words before you will believe these doctrine. Neither “Trinity” nor “Infant Baptism” are found in the Bible. Would you say it follows that what the terms refer to are not taught either? We all know, or should know, better than to use the argument, “I can’t find the words in the Bible.”
Does the Bible teach anything about sphere sovereignty? Or is the idea of sphere sovereignty one that arose among the Dutch to help them out of a local problem about a hundred years ago? And does it really not have much meaning or relevance for us today in our modern world?
In one article I cannot write all I feel I have to say about this matter. So, I will write more later. But it may be helpful if in this article I quote from a book published in 1940, entitled The Sovereignty of God. Rev. John Murray was professor of Reformed Theology at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, when he wrote the following:
“Divine sovereignty and human responsibility are often placed in sharp antithesis to each other. It is true that we are not able to comprehend how divine · sovereignty as it comes to expression in the absolute foreordination of all events works harmoniously and consistently with the exercise of our responsibility. We have simply to recognize and accept both and believe that divine forordination embraces our responsibility but does not in the least nullify its reality or exercise.
“The divine sovereignty, moreover, has a manifoldness of aspect or expression, and the aspect with which we are now mainly concerned is that the sovereignty of God as absolute authority demands total subjection to His will in every sphere and activity of life. If God should require less it would be a denial of Himself and it is His glory that this one thing He cannot do. When man yields less than total subjection this is a denial of Cod’s supreme Lordship, repudiation of His authority, and contradiction of His glory. It comes, then, to this that the correlate in man of sovereignty in God is subjection wholehearted, undeviating and unceasing. It is the irreducible obligation of all men in all departments of life to bring the whole of life into subservience to the totality of God’s revealed will.
“The implications of this truth are too frequently overlooked, if not virtually denied, by many Christians. By too many the revelation of God’s will, particularly His will as revealed in Holy Scripture, is regarded as having application merely to the private or, at least, religious relations of men. It is true that we may use the distinction between the private and the public as also the distinction between the religious and the secular. But these distinctions do not in the least imply that the public any more than the private or the secular any more than the religious can ever be removed from the domain of the divine sovereignty. No sphere is independent of religious demands.
“It is this principle that is asserted in the word of the apostle, ‘Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God’ (I Cor. 10:31). And it is expressed in its application to the mediatorial headship of Christ in the word of the same apostle when he describes the Christian warfare as, ‘Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ’ (II Cor. 10:5).
“In the discharge of every function and in every detail of that discharge the will of Cod is supreme and obedience to it the controlling principle. The state, the school, industry, agriculture, science, and art come within the domain of responsibility to God, and therefore the statesman in the discharge of statecraft, the industrialist and mechanic in the promotion of industrial production, the farmer at his plough, the teacher in the school, and the scientist in his laboratory have no less an obligation to apply the revealed will of God to every detail of their respective vocations than the preacher in the pulpit or the mother in the home.
“It should, of course, be obvious that the scientist in his laboratory is not to discharge the same function as the preacher in the pulpit, nor the legislator the same function as the mother in the home. There are distinct spheres, and one sphere must not trespass upon the prerogatives of another. But all spheres come within one domain—the supreme government of God. And so, in the way appropriate to each sphere and to the full extent of the bearing of the divine will upon it, each sphere must bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.
“God’s kingdom is over all and Christ’s mediatorial kingdom is over all, too. It is the eternal Father, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who speaks in the words of the second Psalm, ‘Thou are my Son, this day have I begotten thee. Ask of me and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession’ (Ps. 2:7, 8). And the sequel to this declaration and investiture is, ‘Be wise therefore, O ye kings: be instructed, ye judges of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in him’ (vss. 10-12).
“The goal or aim that the sovereignty of God has set for us is nothing less than complete subordination to, and fulfillment of, the whole will of God in the whole domain of the divine sovereignty, and the domain of the divine sovereignty as it concerns us in life in its broadest extent and minutest detail. It is this goal as the irreducible implication of the divine sovereignty that is epitomized in the prayer our Lord taught us to pray, ‘Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is heaven’ (Matt. 6:10).”
“The Bible does not teach it.”
“Most Reformed theologians do not even mention sphere sovereignty when they discuss Reformed theology or present a review of distinctive Reformed doctrines.”
“It is a human doctrine developed in some Dutch circles in the last one hundred years.”
It could be that you have heard these answers, or others like them, to the question before us. You, as some have spoken to me, may have been quite disturbed about such comments, especially when they come from teachers, ministers, or parents who insist they are Reformed.
Some of you may not pay much attention to the issues raised and the truths challenged by these comments. If this is true, it is to be regretted very much, because in so doing you are indicating a lack of concern about some very important Biblical teachings. To ignore is really not too different from verbally denying Biblical teachings.
But, I am sure, you want me to get down to a discussion of the main problems and questions.
To begin with—does the Bible teach sphere sovereignty? Look in a concordance (even in a large one like Strong’s Exhaustive C0ncordance) and you will not find the words sphere, sovereign, or sovereignty in it. Does this mean that since the words themselves are not in the Bible, the Bible does not teach anything about sphere sovereignty? You know you have to be careful in answering this. For example, you are aware, of course, that you could get into trouble with the Biblical teachings concerning the Trinity and Infant Baptism if you should insist that the Bible has to use these specific words before you will believe these doctrine. Neither “Trinity” nor “Infant Baptism” are found in the Bible. Would you say it follows that what the terms refer to are not taught either? We all know, or should know, better than to use the argument, “I can’t find the words in the Bible.”
Does the Bible teach anything about sphere sovereignty? Or is the idea of sphere sovereignty one that arose among the Dutch to help them out of a local problem about a hundred years ago? And does it really not have much meaning or relevance for us today in our modern world?
In one article I cannot write all I feel I have to say about this matter. So, I will write more later. But it may be helpful if in this article I quote from a book published in 1940, entitled The Sovereignty of God. Rev. John Murray was professor of Reformed Theology at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, when he wrote the following:
“Divine sovereignty and human responsibility are often placed in sharp antithesis to each other. It is true that we are not able to comprehend how divine · sovereignty as it comes to expression in the absolute foreordination of all events works harmoniously and consistently with the exercise of our responsibility. We have simply to recognize and accept both and believe that divine forordination embraces our responsibility but does not in the least nullify its reality or exercise.
“The divine sovereignty, moreover, has a manifoldness of aspect or expression, and the aspect with which we are now mainly concerned is that the sovereignty of God as absolute authority demands total subjection to His will in every sphere and activity of life. If God should require less it would be a denial of Himself and it is His glory that this one thing He cannot do. When man yields less than total subjection this is a denial of Cod’s supreme Lordship, repudiation of His authority, and contradiction of His glory. It comes, then, to this that the correlate in man of sovereignty in God is subjection wholehearted, undeviating and unceasing. It is the irreducible obligation of all men in all departments of life to bring the whole of life into subservience to the totality of God’s revealed will.
“The implications of this truth are too frequently overlooked, if not virtually denied, by many Christians. By too many the revelation of God’s will, particularly His will as revealed in Holy Scripture, is regarded as having application merely to the private or, at least, religious relations of men. It is true that we may use the distinction between the private and the public as also the distinction between the religious and the secular. But these distinctions do not in the least imply that the public any more than the private or the secular any more than the religious can ever be removed from the domain of the divine sovereignty. No sphere is independent of religious demands.
“It is this principle that is asserted in the word of the apostle, ‘Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God’ (I Cor. 10:31). And it is expressed in its application to the mediatorial headship of Christ in the word of the same apostle when he describes the Christian warfare as, ‘Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ’ (II Cor. 10:5).
“In the discharge of every function and in every detail of that discharge the will of Cod is supreme and obedience to it the controlling principle. The state, the school, industry, agriculture, science, and art come within the domain of responsibility to God, and therefore the statesman in the discharge of statecraft, the industrialist and mechanic in the promotion of industrial production, the farmer at his plough, the teacher in the school, and the scientist in his laboratory have no less an obligation to apply the revealed will of God to every detail of their respective vocations than the preacher in the pulpit or the mother in the home.
“It should, of course, be obvious that the scientist in his laboratory is not to discharge the same function as the preacher in the pulpit, nor the legislator the same function as the mother in the home. There are distinct spheres, and one sphere must not trespass upon the prerogatives of another. But all spheres come within one domain—the supreme government of God. And so, in the way appropriate to each sphere and to the full extent of the bearing of the divine will upon it, each sphere must bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.
“God’s kingdom is over all and Christ’s mediatorial kingdom is over all, too. It is the eternal Father, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who speaks in the words of the second Psalm, ‘Thou are my Son, this day have I begotten thee. Ask of me and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession’ (Ps. 2:7, 8). And the sequel to this declaration and investiture is, ‘Be wise therefore, O ye kings: be instructed, ye judges of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in him’ (vss. 10-12).
“The goal or aim that the sovereignty of God has set for us is nothing less than complete subordination to, and fulfillment of, the whole will of God in the whole domain of the divine sovereignty, and the domain of the divine sovereignty as it concerns us in life in its broadest extent and minutest detail. It is this goal as the irreducible implication of the divine sovereignty that is epitomized in the prayer our Lord taught us to pray, ‘Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is heaven’ (Matt. 6:10).”