The Certainty of God’s Providential Goodness

Eventually, everything that exists and all that occurs contributes to the Christian’s benefit and blessing. As has been written: ‘The doctrine of providence teaches Christians that they are never in the grip of blind forces (fortune, chance, luck, fate); all that happens to them is divinely planned, and each event comes as a new summons to trust, obey and rejoice, knowing that all is [ultimately] for one’s spiritual and eternal good (Rom 8:28).’¹J. I. Packer, Concise Theology (Tyndale House, 1993), 56. That fundamental passage of Scripture has these powerful and beautiful words as its centerpiece: ‘And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good’ (Rom 8:28).

The Nature of the Good and the Role of Suffering

The ultimate ‘good’ toward which ‘all things work together’ is nothing less than our glorious transformation into conformity with the likeness of God’s Son (8:29). Yet this majestic promise has to be understood in its own proper context: ‘of deliverance from suffering.’²Paul Barnett, Romans: The Revelation of God’s Righteousness (Christian Focus Publications, 2014), 194. The difficulties, terrors, annoyances, and agonies of the present are exactly what Paul has in mind. His conviction is that ‘those sufferings of this present evil age … despite their negative character, nonetheless “co-operate” together for the ultimate “good” of the children of God in the coming age.’³Barnett, Romans, 194.

This confidence is not confined to the New Testament. A similar assurance is present in the Psalms: ‘Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you preserve my life … The LORD will fulfill his purpose for me; your steadfast love, O LORD, endures forever’ (Psa 138:7-8). Thus, ‘Confidence in the sovereignty of God in dire circumstances is one of the fundamentals of the faith. … confidence in God’s sovereign goodness in the midst of a baffling and painful providence is equally important, if not more so. Yet as we actively trust him in those circumstances we share in his kingly rule during the “not yet” times ahead of the Last Day.’⁴Barnett, Romans, 194.

The Ground of Providence in God’s Eternal Saving Purpose

It is not only that, by God’s ongoing care and involvement, life’s troubles do not hinder our salvation; they actually assist it. For ‘by a wonderful contrivance,’⁵Calvin, Comm Romans 8:28; trans. Mackenzie, 179. he turns sorrow and seeming losses to final good. Afflictions, whilst not good themselves, contribute to lasting true good because they are an integral part of the way sinful human beings are conformed to the image of Christ.⁶Calvin, Comm Romans 8:28; trans. Mackenzie, 180-81. Accordingly, the claim — ‘all things work together for good’ — is based on an underlying assumption: ‘Because those whom he [God] foreknew he also predestined [the word proōrizo means “marked out before”] to be conformed to the image of his Son that he might be the firstborn among many brothers’ (Rom 8:29).⁷Following Barnett, Romans, 195.

As has been observed: ‘Paul uses the language of predestination to speak both of our genesis and our ongoing relation to this God: “even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love, he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will” (Eph 1:4-5). And then he places this gracious choice and act of God in the context of the whole creation being brought back to its right, its righteous order, with respect to God, in Christ: “as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth” (v. 10).’⁸Robert Doyle, The Evangelical Doctrine of the Church: The Church and Kingdom Communities of Those Who Belong to the Lord (Lexham Press, 2022), 253. Each individual believer, created by God, is identified and known by him in advance. His intended purpose is to call, to justify, and to glorify, so that together with Jesus Christ — and with one another — we share in the fullness of his saving life (Rom 8:30).

Living by Faith in the Mystery of Providence

Yet we do not know why the circumstances and experiences and details of our lives unfold the way they do. We cannot fully explain the events of history or understand the causes of our deepest and most distressing personal heartaches. God knows, but these things remain hidden from us. Indeed, ‘God has chosen to conceal all future events from us, that we may prepare for them in uncertainty.’⁹Calvin, Institutes, 1.17.4; trans. Osborne, 78 [Battles trans., 216]. Osborne’s translation is an abridged version based on the Beveridge translation: John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, eds. Anthony N. S. Lane and Hilary Osborne (Hodder & Stoughton, 1986). Still this much is clear: God is God, and God is good; ‘he will have his way in his world with and for his people … despite the evils of the age.’ He cannot be ‘deflected from his good purposes for them.’¹⁰Barnett, Romans, 197. Despite being ignorant of so much, ‘we can rest assured that everything is safe with him.’¹¹Calvin, Institutes, 1.17.4; trans. Osborne, 76 [Battles trans., 215-16].

‘God always has the best reason for his plan: either to instruct his own people in patience, or to correct their wicked affections and tame their lust, or to subjugate them to self-denial, or to arouse them from sluggishness; again, to bring low the proud, to shatter the cunning of the impious and to overthrow their devices. Yet however hidden and fugitive from our point of view the causes may be, we must hold that they are surely laid up with him.’¹²Calvin, Institutes, 1.17.1 Battles ed., 211. As the well-known hymn has it, ‘From life’s first cry to final breath, Jesus commands my destiny.’¹³In Christ Alone, by Stuart Townsend and Keith Getty. Thankyou Music, 2001. Available at https://www.stuarttownend.co.uk/song/in-christ-alone/ Above all, best of all, nothing can ‘separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord’ (Rom 8:39).

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• 1
  J. I. Packer, Concise Theology (Tyndale House, 1993), 56.
• 2
  Paul Barnett, Romans: The Revelation of God’s Righteousness (Christian Focus Publications, 2014), 194.
• 3
  Barnett, Romans, 194.
• 4
  Barnett, Romans, 194.
• 5
  Calvin, Comm Romans 8:28; trans. Mackenzie, 179.
• 6
  Calvin, Comm Romans 8:28; trans. Mackenzie, 180-81.
• 7
  Following Barnett, Romans, 195.
• 8
  Robert Doyle, The Evangelical Doctrine of the Church: The Church and Kingdom Communities of Those Who Belong to the Lord (Lexham Press, 2022), 253.
• 9
  Calvin, Institutes, 1.17.4; trans. Osborne, 78 [Battles trans., 216]. Osborne’s translation is an abridged version based on the Beveridge translation: John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, eds. Anthony N. S. Lane and Hilary Osborne (Hodder & Stoughton, 1986).
• 10
  Barnett, Romans, 197.
• 11
  Calvin, Institutes, 1.17.4; trans. Osborne, 76 [Battles trans., 215-16].
• 12
  Calvin, Institutes, 1.17.1 Battles ed., 211.
• 13
  In Christ Alone, by Stuart Townsend and Keith Getty. Thankyou Music, 2001. Available at https://www.stuarttownend.co.uk/song/in-christ-alone/