by Eugene Higgins
Providence (Part 1)
These are, without question, among the strangest days in my lifetime (at least so far). Perhaps you feel the same. Few, if any, of us could have foreseen all these events, but I suppose that’s to be expected. After all, as Peter Drucker said, “Trying to predict the future is like trying to drive down a country road at night with no lights while looking out the back window.” Yogi Berra, whose convoluted malapropisms made them all the more memorable, said, “It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future.” So, having been blindsided by this virus, by its effects, and by the shocking power-grab attempted by so many, we may find it helpful to revisit one of the (sadly) forgotten words of the English language: Providence.
A bit of American history: (Please skip to the next paragraph if you dislike history or suffer from Ameriphobia. No offense will be taken). On September 6, 1620, with Master Christopher Jones as the experienced skipper of the ship, a group of about 100 people sailed from Plymouth, England, for the “New World.” Originally, they were members of a Separatist congregation from Scrooby, Nottinghamshire, England, who had relocated to Leiden, Holland, and finally headed for North America, landing in November of 1620. Two hundred and twenty years later they would be given the sobriquet, “The Pilgrims.” Their community was actually very small compared to the next wave – the Puritans – who would arrive in the 1630s, in what historians call, “The Great Migration.” That is when the population of Massachusetts Bay soared to nearly 9,000. As 21st-century Americans move ever-farther away from the Nation’s roots, fewer and fewer people realize the huge debt this country owes to these hardy – and hearty – settlers. The Puritans founded Harvard college (whose original logo was “Veritas Christo et Ecclesiae,” – “Truth for Christ and Church”), produced an amazing number of stirring Gospel preachers, and exerted an influence on American history dramatically disproportionate to their numbers. Believing deeply in the importance of knowledge and education, (and not wanting their preachers to be what they called “Dumme Doggs”) they and their immediate descendants were responsible for the founding, not only of Harvard, but of most of the other Ivy League Colleges: Yale, Princeton, Dartmouth, Columbia, William and Mary, Queen’s College (Rutgers University), and Brown. In 1663, a Puritan missionary named John Eliot somehow mastered the abstruse Algonquin Indian language and translated God’s Word for the native Americans. This became the first Bible ever printed in America, nearly 120 years before the first English-language Bible was printed in the Colonies. Modeling their community after the Theocracy of the Old Testament, the Puritans never intended to set up a religiously-neutral society, open to people of all faiths or with none. They intended to build “a city on a hill,” a Christian community made up of people who believed as they did. That is why, when a man named Roger Williams disagreed with some of their teaching, he was expelled from the Massachusetts Bay Colony. He went to an area now known as Rhode Island and established the “Providence Plantations” in 1636 as a haven of religious freedom. He chose that name in honor of “God’s merciful Providence,” in leading him and his followers there. Today, the city of Providence is the capital of, and most populous city in, Rhode Island.
Previous generations, not only of believers but of the general public, frequently spoke about “Providence.” They understood the word as a synonym for God (when capitalized as “Providence”) and as a reference to His gracious activity (when in a lower case “providence”). The great British politician (and Christian) William Wilberforce spoke of “the post which Providence seems to have assigned me.” The Irish writer Laurence Sterne wrote of Providence as the “next-door neighbor” to an Italian man he met. The French mathematician, Blaise Pascal said, “He that takes truth for his guide, and duty for his end, may safely trust to God’s providence to lead him aright.” Most of the US colonies included the word in their original constitutions. It is almost ubiquitous in the speeches and writings of the Founding Fathers of this country. Today, though, we have sadly lost the theological significance of the word and speak about something as having been “providential” merely in the sense of “good,” or “lucky,” or “serendipitous.”
“Providence” is a word that comes from the Latin, “providentia” (“Pro” meaning “before” or “ahead of time” and “videntia” from videre, meaning “to see.”). Providence is literally “seeing ahead of time.” God sees events before they happen.
God is so great – so superlative, supernal, ineffable and infinite – that even the words we use to describe Him are, perforce, insufficient for the task. To the best of our ability, we have cobbled together compound words (like, Al-mighty and omni-present) to try to explain things about Him that are inexplicable. Even at that, all we are describing – and very weakly – are the things He has been pleased to reveal to us. There is so much more that we, at least now in physical bodies, are incapable of grasping. And there is so much more that created beings likely will never grasp or comprehend about uncreated Divine Persons. (Thought for the day: Maybe we need to recover something of the awe and reverence with which Christians in a past day thought of God.) “All nations before Him are as nothing; and they are counted to Him less than nothing, and vanity. To whom then will ye liken God? or what likeness will ye compare unto Him?” (Isa 40:17, 18).
This is true also when we speak about God’s providence. Since there really is no past or future with God, we again need to make a concession to our limitations and speak of God’s having foreseen something. It’s the best we can do in expressing that God “sees” something before it transpires here on earth, in what we call “time.” Think of your standing on a high mountain, commanding a view of the entire tortuous road leading up. You see the accident partway up; you see the fallen tree halfway up. To the driver of a car just starting up the mountain road, those things are all “future,” he doesn’t see them yet. To you, it is all seen “ahead of time.” That is a poor analogy, but limited languages cannot begin to properly communicate the attributes of the Eternal God.
With those limitations in mind, we can infer (correctly) that God’s providence means God saw ahead of time the origin, character, and results of this virus and of those who would utilize it for their own ends. He allowed it. But, what the Word of God makes abundantly clear, and what history must bow to in acquiescence, is that when we are stung by the effects of evil in the world, a gracious God often works to bring blessing out of the misery caused by sin. He turned Joseph’s captivity into blessing for his family and for the nation. He turned David’s anguished cries into psalms that have sung their way into the hearts of millions. And He turned the greatest crime and darkest hour in the history of the world – the slaying of His Son – into incalculable blessing for the human race, for the world, and for the entire universe. If God is able to turn the curses of Balaam into blessing and change a perfervid Saul into a devoted Paul, then, surely, He is capable of bringing some blessing out of all this sorrow, death, and grief! What if …
- all this led to a revival in our hearts, as we realized afresh the importance of eternal things?
- all this led to a revival in our respective nations as people searched for answers to their problems and security for their future?
- all this led us to a deeper love for His people and the place of His name?
- all this led to a rekindling in our spirits of a desire for the Lord to come and for us to be with Him?
Since the English word is defined as God’s “wise benevolence and omniscient care,” we have a wonderful encapsulation of that in the words of a maligned and mistreated man. His words resonant with us because they are so like the graciousness of the Christ Who would one day come for Joseph’s salvation: “But as for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive” (Gen 50:20).
Our times are in Thy hand; why should we doubt or fear?Our Father’s hand will never cause His child a needless tear.Our times are in Thy hand; we’ll always trust in Thee,Till we have left this weary land and all Thy glory see.