Bible Study
Chapter 5:
Section 6:
God handed them over…
By: Moses Flores
Our last study in the Westminster Confession revealed a great truth for Christians: that God will often appear to leave us so as to discipline us for our sins and to cause us to seek Him, and rely on Him all the more for His continual grace. In our last study, we were able to see the relationship of sin and Christians, and to try to understand why God, in His providential control still allows Christians to be involved in sin.
While the last study was hopeful for Christians in that though God disciplines us for our sins, He never will fully forsake us, but rather uses sin in our lives to ultimately lead to our sanctification. In this next section, however, the picture is not so hopeful as we deal with God’s providential relationship with sin and that unbeliever and the reprobate especially. In this section, the Confession teaches that
“It is different for the wicked and the ungodly. As punishment for their previous sins, God, the righteous judge, spiritually blinds and hardens them in their own sinfulness. From them God not only withdraws His grace, by which they might have been spiritually enlightened, but sometimes He also withdraws whatever gift of spiritual understanding they already had and deliberately exposes them to the opportunities for sinning which their corrupt natures naturally seek. He thereby gives them over to their own desires, to the temptations of the world, and to the power of Satan, and so it happens that they harden themselves even under those circumstances which God uses to soften others.”
As we approach this part of the Westminster Confession, we must proceed understand what we have previously learned about the decrees of God as well as something about the natural tendency of sinners to sin. That is, sin comes naturally to sinners because by nature, that is what they love. We must also be in reverence and awe of God as He engages in this act of judgment, knowing that it is only by His grace, which no one deserves nor can anyone merit in anyway, and not anything in us or that we could do, that Christians do not partake of this judgment of God.
The ones handed over
The Confession starts by first asserting what manner of men and women God hands over to their own sinfulness in judgment. The Confession begins with the words, “As for those wicked and ungodly men…” For some reason, it is often the case that when God executes a righteous and just act of punishment, we tend to side with the “victim” of the punishment. Our minds, for some reason, attribute unfairness and harshness to the punishment and the one dealing it.
As sinners, it is very difficult for us to see ourselves as we really are. We tend to excuse our own sinfulness and compare ourselves to people who are often appear to be much worse sinners than we are. Hence, when we compare the average many to Hitler, it would be easy to conclude that Hitler, without a doubt, deserves to be in the eternal fires of hell. For the extermination of six million Jews, not to mention the countless numbers of other peoples he plunged into world war, surely he deserves hell. But what of the “nice person” whom we have no for many years, who seems to do good, professes to be a Buddhist and gets along with all peoples, including Christians? Does that person deserve to go to hell as much as Hitler does?
The problem with our initial method is that, first, we have dropped our standard of righteousness. Our standard of righteousness seems to be that as long as the good outweighs the bad, then surely there is some intrinsic goodness in the person that does not deserve to be cast away. Does God measure righteousness the way we do? Obviously not! To “sin” means to “miss the mark”, “to fall short”. The meaning of sin presupposes a standard that one is to be conformed to. This standard is set by none other than God Himself. God reveals this perfect standard, which is an expression of His own nature, person and character, through the Law, especially the Ten Commandments as given to Moses. We, as sinners, continually fall short of God’s obligations imposed on us as creatures created in His image.
When Adam fell, he plunged the entire human race that would come from Him into ruin. In Adam, we have become altogether ruined. For humans, sin is inevitable now. As sinners, we sin. Period. Even our best works, “our righteousness” is like filthy rags before God’s pure and holy sight (Isa. 64:6). The Apostles and Prophets testify. Paul, using the OT summed up humanities guilt before God in Romans 3:10-18
None is righteous, no, not one;
no one understands;
no one seeks for God.
All have turned aside; together they have become worthless;
no one does good,
not even one.
Their throat is an open grave;
they use their tongues to deceive.
The venom of asps is under their lips.
Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness.
Their feet are swift to shed blood;
in their paths are ruin and misery,
and the way of peace they have not known.
There is no fear of God before their eyes.
Clearly, we are not dealing with “little innocent” boys and girls when we talk about the unsaved. The Bible elsewhere says that “men loved the darkness” and thus refused the truth (John 3:18-21). Romans 8:7-8 describes the carnally minded as having hatred and enmity toward God. So much that they do not submit to the law of God nor do they have the ability to do so!
So as we proceed through this section, it is important that we remember that the unsaved, even when we were unsaved, were “wicked” and “ungodly” at some point. This point will be developed further in the sections dealing with original sin and the fall.
God’s Just Judgment
So what does a holy God have the right to do to such people who, by their fallen nature, do not seek to honor or worship Him as God? Does He owe them mercy or grace? Obviously not. Thus, it is good and right for God to express His wrath and retribution on such individuals. Romans 1:18-32 helps us to sum up the history of the revelation of God’s wrath, His handing over of the wicked and the ungodly over to their own hearts.
For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.
We note first the character of the objects of God’s wrath. They are those who exhibit “ungodliness” and “unrighteousness”. They “suppress the truth” with an unrighteous motive. They are those who know that God is, for God Himself, with clarity has revealed Himself. Since the creation of the world He has been “clearly perceived.” They did not honor God. They did not give thanks to God. Rather, in their sinfulness, they revealed their futility and darkened, and foolish heart in worshipping idols. So what does God do?
Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen. For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God's decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.
God “gave them up”. We have already covered this concept in chapter three of the Westminster Confession so we need not belabor the point here. God “hands over” these sinners. Now, normally when we think of “wrath” and we hear the expressions in Scripture “the anger of the LORD waxed hot”, etc…we probably have this image of God in a raging and flaming fury “doing his worst” to sinners. However, that is often not the case of God’s wrath. Three times in this portion of Scripture we are faced with the reality that God “gives up” these people; He hands them over.
This image of God’s wrath is actually quite calm compared to other expression of His judgments. What we see here is essentially a Judge handing over the guilty law-breaker to the jailer for their punishment.
Now, that God “gave them up” shouldn’t mean that God forced them to sin in any way. We have already precluded any relationship between God and sin where God is the one committing sin or forcing anyone to sin contrary to their own will. Rather, God allows the sinner to be handed over to what they really want: more sin!!! We note this in what God gives them up to. He doesn’t hand them over necessarily to be punished or some sort of torturer. They are handed over “to the lust of their hearts” which are “dishonorable passions” and a “debased mind”. God allows the wicked, the reprobate, to be what they desire to be. He gives them a more “free will” to act out their desires and nature. This goes for the rank sinner and for the religiously informed sinner as well.
Some people might not agree with this assessment of God. Many argue that God loves all people universally and individually and died for all so that all might be redeemed. Hence, for God to “give up” some with no chance of redemption sounds extremely harsh and, truth be told, not the familiar God of modern Evangelicalism. However, the truth of this is in the Scriptures from the beginning to end. The clearest example of God first “handing over” a sinner to their own desires is the example of Pharaoh.
Well before Moses would talk to
Pharaoh it was told to him by God that He would “harden his heart.” How did God do this? God essentially gave Pharaoh an opportunity
to act out of his debased mind. Remember
that in Egyptian culture at that time, Pharaoh was like God incarnate. He considered himself and was considered by
the people to be the supreme ruler of the kingdom. Hence, being puffed up with that knowledge,
when Moses commanded him in the name of the LORD to let His people go,
Pharaoh’s heart was already filled with pride from his position in
Even after the Exodus, Moses prophesied that God would one day “give them up” to idolatry in order to prove that God alone was the true God and that all others were false. Deuteronomy 32:28-39 says,
“For they are a nation void of
counsel,
and there is no understanding in them.
If they were wise, they would understand this;
they would discern their latter end!
How could one have chased a thousand,
and two have put ten thousand to flight,
unless their Rock had sold them,
and the Lord had given them
up?
For their rock is not as our Rock;
our enemies are by themselves.
For their vine comes from the vine of
and from the fields of
their grapes are grapes of poison;
their clusters are bitter;
their wine is the poison of serpents
and the cruel venom of asps.
“‘Is not this laid up in store
with me,
sealed up in my treasuries?
Vengeance is mine, and recompense,
for the time when their foot shall slip;
for the day of their calamity is at hand,
and their doom comes swiftly.’
For the Lord will vindicate
his people
and have compassion on his servants,
when he sees that their power is gone
and there is none remaining, bond or free.
Then he will say, ‘Where are their gods,
the rock in which they took refuge,
who ate the fat of their sacrifices
and drank the wine of their drink offering?
Let them rise up and help you;
let them be your protection!
“‘See now that I, even I, am he,
and there is no god beside me;
I kill and I make alive;
I wound and I heal;
and there is none that can deliver out of my hand.”
Ultimately, God’s would never fully
reject
And he said, “Go, and say to this people:
‘Keep on hearing, but do not
understand;
keep on seeing, but
do not perceive.’
Make the heart of this people dull,
and their ears heavy,
and blind their eyes;
lest they see with their eyes,
and hear with their ears,
and understand with their hearts,
and turn and be healed.”
Isaiah was not being called to some glorious ministry where he was going to see many conversions and repentance of the people of God. Rather, he was going to have, what one might judge by today’s standards, a very unsuccessful ministry. Rather than bringing people to the light, by hearing the message he proclaimed, they would become hardened to God. But that is what God wanted! This hardening message of Isaiah finds its fullest expression in the Gospel of Jesus Christ even. In John 12:37-42 we read the fullest fulfillment of these words :
Though he had done so many signs before them, they still did not believe in him, so that the word spoken by the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled:
“Lord, who has believed what he
heard from us,
and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?”
Therefore they could not believe. For again Isaiah said,
“He has blinded their eyes
and hardened their heart,
lest they see with their eyes,
and understand with their heart, and turn,
and I would heal them.”
Isaiah said these things because he saw his glory and spoke of him.
Contrary to popular beliefs about Jesus attempting to save everybody, Jesus actually turned many away. In fact, that was even His explicit intention! We notice here that the same message that caused some to believe (John 12:42) was also used to harden some away from Christ. Recall his encounter with the mob in John 6 who followed Christ because He had just fed a multitude of people. When they finally catch up to Christ, what does He tell them? “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent me draws him…” (John 6:44). After that, he begins to speak to them using language that they find offensive, telling them that they must “eat his flesh” and “drink his blood”. At the end of the encounter there were some who left Him. John 6:60-69 says,
When many of his disciples heard it, they said, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?” But Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, said to them, “Do you take offense at this? Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe.” (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.) And he said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.” After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. So Jesus said to the Twelve, “Do you want to go away as well?” Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.”
Jesus himself even said that the reason why He spoke in parables was so that He could not be understood by many of His hearers. In Mark 4:10-12 we read,
And when he was
alone, those around him with the twelve asked him about the parables. And
he said to them, “To you has been given the secret of the
“they
may indeed see but not perceive,
and may indeed hear but not understand,
lest they should turn and be forgiven.”
Again, we note the
reference to Isaiah 6:9-10 here quoted by Christ. Paul also quotes this verse from Isaiah as
recorded in Acts 28:26-27 as the reason why the Jews rejected the Gospel which
made way for the preaching of the Gospel to the rest of the nations.
This is what the Westminster Confession means at the end of section six when it says, the wicked are hardened “even by those circumstances which God uses to soften others.” Obviously, Scripture teaches that the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes (Romans 1:16). Note the qualification. Also, in 2 Corinthians 4:3-4, the same thing is presented.
“And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled only to those who are perishing. In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.”
There are many other instances of God judicially hardening and “handing over” the wicked to their own depravity, lies and corruption or God withholding His grace and thus leaving the sinners to their own devices (see Romans 11:7-8, 2 Thess. 2:11-12, Deut. 29:4; 2:30; Psalm 81:11-12).
It is different
Truly it is different for the wicked. When God “hands over” His own children it is not for to exact His judicial and punitive wrath on them, but to chastise them that they may move along in their holiness. In Deuteronomy 32:28-39, God explicitly says through Moses that He will hand over Israel to idolatry that they may learn that the LORD is the one true God and that idols are nothing nor can they help them in their times of need like the LORD. While God may use “redemptive judgment” with His elect, it is different for the wicked. Theirs may well be the “nail in the coffin.”
One of the interesting things that should come out from this particular study, though not as fully developed, is the idea that God restrains a great amount of wickedness from actually coming to fruition in the hearts and minds of men. Were sinners to have their way, they would release the flood of sin that is chambered in their corrupted hearts. Were it not for the restraining grace of God that does not permit sin to have free reign, truly our world would be one of absolute moral darkness. As humans, we tend to blame God for evil when attempting to solve the “problem of evil”. However, knowing our own depravity and that it is our problem and not God’s, we actually God’s graciousness in not allowing evil to run rampant as it naturally would like to.
However, we must also note that though God restrains evil and the hearts
of men, God will one day fully give men over to their total corruption to the
just penalty that it deserves. The book
of Revelation gives a startling judgment in saying, “Let the evildoer still do
evil, and the filthy be filthy still…” (Rev. 22:11). The final state of the wicked will not simply
be a place of torment from the
Truly it is different for the wicked. We thank God for His mercy and graciousness in restraining evil and for His Fatherly discipline.