CRPC Podcast ​WCF 5:3-5, Providence: Sin, Pride, and God's Fatherly Purposes

III. God, in his ordinary providence, maketh use of means (Acts 27:31, 44; Isa. 55:10-11; Hos. 2:21-22), yet is free to work without (Hos. 1:7; Matt. 4:4; Job 34:10), above (Rom. 4:19-21), and against them (2 Kings 6:6; Dan. 3:27), at His pleasure.

IV. The almighty power, unsearchable wisdom, and infinite goodness of God so far manifest themselves in His providence, that it extendeth itself even to the first fall, and all other sins of angels and men (Rom. 11:32-34; 2 Sam. 24:1; 1 Chron. 21:1; 1 Kings 22:22-23; 1 Chron. 10:4, 13-14; 2 Sam. 16:10; Acts 2:23; 4:27-28); and that not by a bare permission (Acts 14:16), but such as hath joined with it a most wise and powerful bounding (Ps. 76:10; 2 Kings 19:28), and otherwise ordering, and governing of them, in a manifold dispensation, to His own holy ends (Gen. 1:20; Isa. 10:6-7, 12); yet so, as the sinfulness thereof proceedeth only from the creature, and not from God, who, being most holy and righteous, neither is nor can be the author or approver of sin (James 1:13-14, 17; 1 John 2:16; Ps. 50:21).

V. The most wise, righteous, and gracious God doth oftentimes leave, for a season, His own children to manifold temptations, and the corruption of their own hearts, to chastise them for their former sins, or to discover unto them the hidden strength of corruption and deceitfulness of their hearts, that they may be humbled (2 Chron. 32:25-26, 31; 2 Sam. 24:1); and, to raise them to a more close and constant dependence for their support upon Himself, and to make them more watchful against all future occasions of sin, and for sundry other just and holy ends (2 Cor. 12:7-9; Ps. 73; 77:1, 10, 12; Mark 14:66-72; John 21:15-17).