The divine decree is the necessary
condition of divine foreknowledge. If God does not first decide what shall come
to pass, he cannot know what will come to pass. An event must be made certain
before it can be known as a certain event. . . . 3. The divine decree is
universal. It includes “whatsoever comes to pass,” be it physical or moral,
good or evil: “He works all things after the counsel of his own will” (Eph
1:10-11); . . . . (a) the good actions of men: “Created unto good works, which
God has before ordained that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2:10); (b) the
wicked actions of men . . . The same divine purpose which determines any event as
produced by its causes, promised by its means, depending on its conditions, and
followed by its results. Things do not come to pass in a state of isolation;
neither were they predetermined so to come to pass. In other words, God’s
purpose embraces the means along with the end, the cause along with the effect,
the condition along with the result or issue suspended upon it; the order,
relations, and dependence of all events, as no less essential to the divine
plan than the events themselves. With reference to the salvation of the elect,
the purpose of God is not only that they shall be saved, but they shall
believe, repent, and persevere in faith and holiness in order to salvation.
--Crawford, Father of God, 426
(c) the time of every man’s death:
“his days are determined” (Job 14:5); . . . “Set your house in order, for you
shall die and not live” (Isa. 38:15). But this assertion of the prophet was not
a statement of the divine decree, but of the nature of his disease, which was
mortal had not God miraculously interposed.
4. The divine decree is immutable.
There is no defect God’s knowledge, power, and veracity. His decree cannot
therefore be changed because of a mistake of ignorance or of inability to carry
out his decree or of unfaithfulness to his purpose . . . . The predestinarian
maintains that the certainty of all events has a relation to divine omnipotence
as well as to divine omniscience. God not only knows all events, but he decrees
them. (William G. T. Shedd, Dogmatic Theology: Complete and Unabridged,
Volumes 1-3 [Reformed Retrieval, 2021], 251, 253, 254, emphasis added)
