Welcome to a reading of Historical Theology by Willingham Cunningham, Volume 1. This Reformation MP3 audio resource is a production of Stillwater's Revival Books. Many free Reformation resources, as well as our complete online catalogue, containing classic and contemporary Puritan and Reformed books, the Puritan hard drive, digital downloads, MP3s, DVDs and much more at great discounts are on the web at www.puretandownloads.com. Also please consider, pray and act upon the important truths found in the following quotation by Charles Spurgeon. As the apostle says to Timothy, so also he says to everyone, give yourself to reading. He who will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves that he has no brains of his own. You need to read. Renounce as much as you will all like literature, but study as much as possible sound theological works, especially the Puritanic writers and expositions of the Bible. The best way for you to spend your leisure is to be either reading or praying. And now to SWRB's reading of Historical Theology by William Cunningham, Volume 1, which we hope you find to be a great blessing, and which we pray draws you nearer to the Lord Jesus Christ, for he is the way, the truth and the life, and no man cometh unto the Father, but by him." John 14, verse 6. This is the concluding recording of Volume 1, beginning on page 634. But perhaps it may be asked, why maintaining anything doctrinally beyond permission? when it seems so difficult practically to explain and develop it with precision and date safety? And the answer to this question is just that which was given by Calvin, namely that no man can believe in mere permission, because he'd be entirely ignorant of the whole doctrine of scripture on the subject of the providential agents of God with respect to the sinful actions of his creatures. and that therefore anyone who professes to give the sum and substance of what Scripture teaches upon the point must deny the doctrine of mere permission, and assert that God, in His providence, does something more in regard to men's sinful actions than merely resolving to abstain from interfering to prevent what He has certainly prohibited. The evidence to this effect may be set to pervade the Word of God, It is found not only in general statements as to the character and results of the providence which God is constantly exercising over all his creatures and all their actions, and more especially his agency and operation in connection with the motives and conducts of wicked men, but also in the views unfolded to us there with respect to the connection that exists in fact between the sinful actions which men perform and the actual accomplishments of some of God's purposes or designs of justice or of mercy, and perhaps still more directly, in statements which explicitly ascribe to God a very direct connection with certain specific wicked actions, as well as those who perform them. We may select an instance from this last department of scriptural evidence and illustrate it by an observation or two, merely to indicate the nature of the proof. It is said the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel and he moved David against them to say, go number Israel and Judah with respect to the same transaction it is said in the first book of Chronicles Satan stood up against Israel and provoked David to number Israel now this numbering of Israel was undoubtedly a sinful action of David's done by him freely and spontaneously without any compulsion in the cherished indulgence of a sinful state of mind or motive. It stood, in this respect, on the same footing as any other sin which David himself or any other man ever committed. And it would be quite just to apply it to the Apostle James description of the generation of sin. Every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust or evil desire and enticed than when lust or evil desire have conceived it brings forth sin and yet this action of David in which he was doing what God had forbidden transgressing God's law and incurring guilt and divine displeasure is expressly ascribed in scripture also to God and to Satan in terms which in all fair construction imply that Satan had some share exerted some efficiency in bringing it about and that God also contributed in some sense, and to some extent, to bring it about, intending to employ it as a means of executing His just and righteous purpose or design of punishing Israel for their sins. It seems scarcely possible for any man to receive as true the statement of Scripture upon this point, without being constrained to admit that there was, and must have been, a sense in which God willed that David should number the people and accordingly did something or exerted some efficiency in order to bring about this result. If then we would fully bring out the substance of what scripture teaches us upon this point, we must say that God, Satan and David were all in some way or other concerned or combined in the production of this sinful action. We are bound indeed to believe, for so the word of God teaches that the sinfulness of the action proceeded only from the creature, that is, from Satan and David, Satan incurring guilt by what he did in the matter in provoking David to number Israel, but not thereby diminishing in the least David's guilt in yielding to the temptation, and that God was not the author or approver of what was sinful in the action, but we are also bound to believe, if we submit submissively, implicitly, as we ought to do, to the fair impression of what Scripture says, that in regard to the action itself, which was sinful, as produced or performed by Satan and David, God did more than merely permit it, or abstain, even in a positive sense, from interfering to prevent it. And that in some sense, and in some manner, He did do something in the way of its being brought about. from the difficulty, indeed, of conceiving and explaining how God could have moved David to say, Go, number Israel and Judah, while yet the sinfulness of the action was David's only, not God's, we might be tempted to make a violent effort to explain away the statement when there's nothing else in scripture to lead us to ascribe to God anything more in regard to men's sinful actions than a mere permission. But the inference to which these passages so plainly point, is in entire accordance with what Scripture teaches in many places, and indeed with all it teaches us generally in regard to God's providence in men's sins. There are not, indeed, many instances in Scripture in which, with respect to specific acts of sin, we have an explicit prescription of some sharing bringing them about to God, to Satan, and to man. But we have other instances of a precisely similar kind, as in the robberies committed upon Job's property, and in that which was at once the most important event that ever took place, and the greatest crime that ever was committed, the crucifixion of the Lord of Glory. In these cases, the agency of God, the agency of Satan, and the agency of wicked men are distinctly recognized and asserted. And it is, therefore, our duty to acknowledge, as a general truth, that all these parties were concerned in them, and to beware of excluding the agency of any of them, or perverting its true character, because we cannot fully conceive or explain how these parties could, in conformity with the general representations given us in Scripture of their respective characters and principles of procedure, concur in that arrangement by which the actions were brought about. It is our part to receive each portion of the information which the scripture gives us concerning the origin of men's sinful actions, and to allow each truth regarding it to exert its own distinct and appropriate influence upon our minds, undisturbed by other truths, kept also in their proper place, and applied according to their true import, and real bearing, not allowing the scriptural truth concerning God's agency and Satan's agency with respect to sinful actions to diminish in the least our sense of man's responsibility and guilt, and not allowing the conviction which Scripture most fully warrants that God's agency is connected in some way with men's sins, to lead us to doubt or to fail in realizing His immaculate holiness an irreconcilable hatred of all sin and employing it only to deepen our impression of his almighty power and searchable wisdom and infinite goodness. We cannot dwell longer upon the scriptural proof in support of the doctrine of the Reformers and our confession of faith and in opposition to that of the Council of Trent upon this subject. As to any further attempts to explain the kind and degree of God's agency in connection with men's sinful actions and to unfold precisely what it is that he does in contributing in some way and in some sense to bring them about. The reformers usually confined themselves to the expressions which Scripture itself employs, being aware that upon a subject so difficult and mysterious it became then to abstain from merely human speculations and to take care to assert nothing about God's hidden and unseen agency but what he himself had clearly warranted. But while they did not, in general, profess directly to explain, except in scriptural language, the way and manner in which God acted in respect to men's sinful actions, they were sometimes tempted to engage in very intricate discussions upon this subject, in answering the allegation of their opponents, that by ascribing to God anything more than a mere permission in regard to men's sins, they made him the author of sin, discussions which too often resulted in some attempt to explain more fully and minutely than Scripture affords us materials for doing, what it was that God really did in connection with men's sinful actions, and what were the principles by which his procedure in this matter was regulated and might be accounted for. it would have been much better if the defenders of the truth upon this subject had, after bringing out the meaning and import of scripture, confined themselves simply to the object of proving what was all that in strict argument they were under any obligation to establish, namely that their opponents had not produced any solid proof that the doctrine apparently taught in scripture concerning God's agency in regard to sinful actions extending to something beyond mere omission, warranted the conclusion that he was thus made the author of sin. It is easy enough to prove, by general considerations drawn from the nature of the subject, its mysterious and incomprehensible character, its elevation above the reach of our faculties, its intimate connection with right conceptions of the operations of the divine mind, that this conclusion cannot be established. And with the proof of this, which is all that the conditions of the argument require them to prove, men ought to be satisfied, as this is all that is needful to enable them to fall back again upon the simple belief of what the Word of God so plainly teaches as a reality, while it affords us scarcely any materials for explaining or developing it. the objections and cavils, and the enemies of truth should be disposed of in some way. But the conduct of the apostle, when he contended himself with disposing of an objection which was in substance and principle the same as this, merely by saying, Nay, but O man, who art thou that replies against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? combines with the unsatisfactory character of many of the statements of those who have attempted directly to answer such objections in much greater detail, in impressing upon us the necessity of guarding against being led by the objections of adversaries into the minute discussion of matters which lie beyond the reach of our faculties, with respect to which scripture gives us little or no information. and in the investigation of which, therefore, we can have no very firm ground to stand upon. Let us believe firmly, because Scripture and reason concur in assuring us that every sinful action is a transgression of God's law, justly involving him that performs it in guilt and liability to punishment, and that its sinfulness proceeds wholly from the creature, and not from God, who cannot be the author or approver of sin, But let us also believe, because scripture and reason likewise concur in teaching us this, that God's providence extends to and comprehends the sins of men, and is concerned in them by something more than mere permission, and especially in directing and overruling them for accomplishing his own purposes of justice or of mercy. And let us become the less concerned about our inability to explain fully how it is that these doctrines can be shown to harmonise with each other by remembering what is very manifest that the one grand difficulty into which all the difficulties attending our speculations upon religious subjects often run up or resolve themselves and which attaches to every system except atheism is just to explain how it is that God and man in consistency with their respective attributes, capacities, and circumstances, do, in fact, concur, combine, and cooperate in producing men's actions and determining men's fate. This recording ends on page 639, and this is the end of Volume 1 The Puritan Hard Drive and the free online Puritan Hard Drive videos are available at PuritanDownloads.com along with many other Puritan and Reformed books for as little as 99 cents each. Hello and welcome to this introductory video for the Puritan Hard Drive by Stillwater's Revival Books. 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