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Ichabod Spencer on the Comfort of the Doctrine of Predestination

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Written By Tim Brister

Tim has a missionary heart for his hometown to love those close to him yet far from God. He is husband to Dusti and father to Nolan, Aiden, and Adelyn - fellow pilgrims to our celestial city.

In his book, A Pastor’s Sketches, Ichabod Smith Spencer (note to parents: please do not name your kids Ichabod!) shares how he dealt with a man inquiring about God’s election while refusing to come to Christ in repentance and faith. Spencer gives three purposes why the Bible presents the doctrine of predestination. The first purpose is to teach men the character of God; the second is to repress the audacity of the wicked; and the third is to comfort God’s people.

Spencer’s words about such a comfort is quite powerful, and thought the quote is a bit lengthy, let me encourage you to read it all. It is a good word we all need to hear.

The third man purpose of this doctrine [of predestination] is, as I suppose, to comfort God’s people. The grand trial of a life of religion is a trial of the heart. We have sins, we have weaknesses and temptations, which tend to a dreadful discouragement. Sin easily besets us. We easily wander from God. Holiness is an up-hill work. Our feet often stagger in the path of our pilgrimage, and tears of bitterness gush from our eyes, lest such weak, and tempted, and erring creatures should never reach heaven. Devils tempt us. The world presents its deceitful allurements, and more deceitful and dangerous claims. What shall cheer us when our heart sinks within us? Whither shall we fly for comfort, when our hearts are bleeding, when our sins are so many, when our gain in holiness is so little, when our light goes out, and the gloom of an impenetrable midnight settles down upon our poor and helpless soul? We cannot, indeed, mount up to the inner sanctuary of God, open the seven-sealed book, and read our names recorded in it by the pen of the Eternal. But we can know that such a book is there; and that the pen of our Father has filled it with his eternal decrees, not one of which shall fail of accomplishment, as surely as his own throne shall stand. And when we find in ourselves, amid our tearful struggles, even the feeble beginnings of holiness, we know that God has commenced his work for us,–a work which he planned before the world was; and that he who has ‘begun a good in work in us, will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ,’ carrying into effect his eternal plan. Just as well as we know our likeness to God, we know our election to God. We know that our holiness is his work, a work which he purposed from the beginning. If he had purposed it but just when he began it,–if it were a work undertaken from some recent impulse, then we should have good reason to fear that some other impulse would drive him to abandon it. But when we know it from a part of his eternal counsels, and is no sidework, no episode, no interlude, or sudden interposition not before provided for—then we are assured that God is not going to forsake us; and deep as is our home-bred depravity, and many and malignant as are our foes, we are cheered with the assurance, that God will bring us off victorious, and ‘the purpose according to election shall stand.’ We love to see our salvation embraced in the eternal plan of God; and we know it is embraced there, if we are his children by faith in Christ Jesus. We cannot read his secret counsels; but we can read his spiritual workings in us. We know the counsels by the evidence of the workings; and then we are cheered and encouraged amid our trials, by the idea that God will no more abandon us than he will abandon the eternal plan which his wisdom formed before the foundation of the world. ‘Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect?’ He had their names in his book before they had shed a tear, before a devil existed to tempt them.

– Ichabod Smith Spencer, A Pastor’s Sketches: Conversations with Anxious Souls Concerning the Way of Salvation vol. 1 (Vestavia Hills, AL: Solid Ground Books), 237-39.

4 thoughts on “Ichabod Spencer on the Comfort of the Doctrine of Predestination”

  1. Very motivating text by a person with a very strange name 🙂
    Thank you for posting this. I have some friends who express serious doubts about predestination, and with this post I shall try proving the truth of it to them.
    God bless You

  2. Wow, just what I needed this morning.

    One of the things that finally pushed me the whole way from Arminianism to Calvinism was this honest thought:

    “If it’s up to me to maintain my salvation, then I am lost, for I am exceedingly wicked. If there any small fraction of salvation that depends on my doing something right, I have no doubt but that I am capable of messing that up, and surely will.”

    In the light of this truth, it was the doctrine of God’s free election unto salvation that provided the only possible hope for my soul.

    Thank you for posting this cup of cool water, Timmy.

  3. Praise God that these words are encouraging to you. I have a couple of close friends struggling right now, and one of the reasons I posted it was because of its timeliness and pastoral sensitivity.

    As Christians chosen before the foundation of the world by grace alone, we should take comfort that God’s character, God’s decrees, and God’s commitment to perfecting us into His Son’s likeness should instill in us enduring hope and envigorate us with greater passion for holiness. Were our justification and sanctification left in our hands, life and joy as a Christian would be squelched by overcoming fear, doubt, and worry. Praise God for his marvellous grace!

  4. Thanks for turning me on to Ichabod Spencer. I never heard of him and I am from Brooklyn. I did some research bought a few books. He seemed like a real man of God with a real pastors heart for the people. Held firm to the doctrines of Grace. I think many people do not like him because of his sermon on the Slave Law. He was not condoning or for slavery but he was even more anti violence. Some see this has him supporting slavery which is not the case.

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