by Thomas Boston.
Thomas
Boston
(1676-1732) was a pastor of God's
flock in
Ettrick,
Scotland, whose
preaching God abundantly blessed in the saving of many souls. The son of a
Presbyterian who knew the Lord and was imprisoned for non-conformity,
Boston was raised in times of murderous persecution. Nevertheless, he lived to see
God’s people flourish and multiply, as “the Lord added to the church daily
such as should be saved” (Acts
2:47). He is perhaps best known for his part in the reprinting of “The Marrow
of Modern Divinity”, a book which distinguishes the Covenant of Works from the
Covenant of Grace.
God alone created the World.
This will be
evident from the following particulars:
1. The world
could not make itself; for this would imply a horrid contradiction, namely,
that the world was before it was; for the cause must always be before its
effect. That which is not in being, can have no production; for nothing can
act before it exists. As nothing hath no existence, so it hath no operation.
There must therefore be something of real existence, to give a being to those
things that are; and every second cause must be an effect of some other before
it be a cause. To be and not to be at the same time, is a manifest
contradiction, which would infallibly take place if any thing made itself.
That which makes is always before that which is made, as is obvious to the
most illiterate peasant. If the world were a creator, it must be before itself
as a creature.
2. The
production of the world could not be by chance. It was indeed the extravagant
fancy of some ancient philosophers, that the original of the world was from a
fortuitous concourse of atoms, which were in perpetual motion in an immense
space, till at last a sufficient number of them met in such a happy
conjunction as formed the universe in the beautiful order in which we now
behold it. But it is amazingly strange how such a wild opinion, which can
never be reconciled with reason, could ever find any entertainment in a human
mind. Can any man rationally conceive, that a confused rout of atoms, of
diverse natures and forms, and some so far distant from others, should ever
meet in such a fortunate manner, as to form an entire world, so vast in the
bigness, so distinct in the order, so united in the diversities of natures, so
regular in the variety of changes, and so beautiful in the whole composure?
Such an extravagant fancy as this can only possess the thoughts of a
disordered brain.
3. God created
all things, the world, and all the creatures that belong to it. He attributes
this work to himself, as one of the peculiar glories of his Deity, exclusive
of all the creatures. So we read, Isa. xliv. 24. 'I am the Lord that maketh
all things; that stretcheth forth the heavens alone; that spreadeth abroad the
earth by myself.' Chap. xlv. 12. 'I have made the earth, and created man upon
it; I, even my hands, have stretched out the heavens, and all their host have
I commanded. Chap. xl. 12, 13. 'Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of
his hand? and meted out heaven with the span, and comprehended the dust of the
earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a
balance? Who hath directed the Spirit of the Lord, or being his counsellor
hath taught him? Job ix. 8. 'Which alone spreadeth out the heavens, and
treadeth upon the waves of the sea. These are magnificent descriptions of the
creating power of God, and exceed every thing of the kind that hath been
attempted by the pens of the greatest sages of antiquity. By this operation
God is distinguished from all the false gods and fictitious deities which the
blinded nations adored, and shows himself to be the true God. Jer. x. 11, 12.
' The gods that have not made the heavens and the earth, even they shall
perish from the earth, and from under these heavens. He hath made the earth by
his power, he hath established the world by his wisdom, and hath stretched out
the heavens by his discretion.' Psal. xcvi. 5. 'All the gods of the nations
are idols: but the Lord made the heavens.' Isa. xxxvii. 19. 'Thou art the God,
even thou alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth: thou hast made heaven and
earth.' None could make the world but God, because creation is a work of
infinite power, and could not be produced by any finite cause: For the
distance between being and not being is truly infinite, which could not be
removed by any finite agent, or the activity of all finite
agents united.
This work of
creation is common to all the three persons in the adorable Trinity. The
Father is described in scripture as the Creator, 1 Cor. viii. 6. –
'The Father, of whom are all things.' The same prerogative belongs to the Son,
John i. 3. 'All things were made by him' the Word, the Son; 'and without him
was not any thing made that was made.' The same honour belongs to the Holy
Ghost, as Job xxvi. 13. 'By his Spirit he hath garnished the heavens.' Chap.
xxxiii. 4. 'The Spirit of God hath made me, says Elihu, and the breath of the
Almighty hath given me life.' All the three persons are one God; God is the
Creator; and therefore all the external works and acts of the one God must be
common to the three persons. Hence, when the work of creation is ascribed to
the Father, neither the Son nor the Holy Spirit are excluded; but because, as
the Father is the fountain of the Deity, so he is the fountain of divine
works. The Father created from himself by the Son and the Spirit; the Son from
the Father by the Spirit; and the Spirit from the Father and the Son; the
manner or order of their working being according to the order of their
subsisting. The matter may be conceived as thus: All the three persons being
one God, possessed of the same infinite perfections; the Father, the first in
subsistence, willed the work of creation to be done by his authority: 'He
spake, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast.' – In respect of
immediate operation, it peculiarly belonged to the Son. For 'the Father
created all things by Jesus Christ,' Eph. iii. 9. And we are told, that 'all
things were made by him,' John iii. 3. This work in regard of disposition and
ornament, doth particularly belong to the Holy Ghost. So it is said, Gen. i.
2. 'The Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters,' to garnish and adorn
the world, after the matter of it was formed. Thus it is also said, Job xxvi.
13. above cited, 'By his Spirit he hath garnished the heavens.'
Reference
“The
Beauties of Thomas Boston,” edited by Samuel McMillan. First published
1831. This edition reprinted by Christian Focus Publications, 1979. pp 40-44.
