OBJECTIONS RAISED AGAINST THE DIVINE PROVIDENCE
As an argument against divine providence extending over all things, men have contended that such activity would burden Cod too heavily and would give the trivial things of life undue prominence over against the great things. It is apparent that this argument does away with the true concept of God. It measures the almighty and omniscient God with a human yardstick. It changes the glory (
) of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man (Rom. 1:23). It need not surprise us that atheistic pagans like Democritus, Epicurus, and others have derided divine providence and called it an old wives’ fable.1 But it jars us that a Christian, like Jerome, could write the following: “As for the rest, it is an absurd detraction of the majesty of God to say that God knows every moment how many gnats are born and how many die; how many bedbugs, fleas, and flies there are on earth, what number of fishes live in the water. We are not such fatuous sycophants of God that while we make His power concern itself with most insignificant creatures, we are unfair to ourselves by assuming a like providence extending over rational and irrational creatures.” 2 Gerhard tries in vain to put a good construction on Jerome’s words.3 Jerome was nodding here, as has happened to him on other occasions. But who are we to pass harsh judgment on him? He only expressed in words the thoughts which we only too often harbor in our hearts. Our natural, God-estranged mind does not realize that God provides for us, His children. The Savior needs to remind us continually: “Take no thought for your life… . O ye of little faith!” (Matt.6:25-32.) “But the very hairs of your head are all numbered” (Matt. 10:30). The entire question whether divine providence extends even to the minutest creatures, the Church Fathers and orthodox theologians settled with the Scriptural axiom: “If it was not unworthy of, and improper for, God to create even the minutest creatures, much less can it be improper for Him to rule what He created.”4