Does God know the future?

Balaam's voice has long since died away. There is an interval of thirty-five centuries between his days and ours, yet in his final utterance in Moab he spoke of things which are still to come. Who knows the future but God! With us there is a yesterday, to-day, and to-morrow, but with God the most distant future is as vivid and well known as the present. He is the great I am (Ex. 3:14), "who calls the things which be not as though they were" (Rom. 4:17). In His controversy with Israel concerning the idols of which they were so foolishly enamoured, Jehovah in Isa. 42:48 challenges the deities of the heathen to declare "things to come." Thus they would prove themselves to be gods indeed. "I am God, and there is none like Me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsels shall stand; and I will do all My pleasure" (Isa. 46:9-10).

The English word ‘providence’ has its origin in the Latin word pro video, which literally means to see in advance. It is obvious that no human being is able to see things before they take place. Solomon says: ‘for thou knowest not what a day (that is, the next day) will bring forth’ (Prov. 27:1). We may have a hope or expectation that certain things could possibly happen but we will never have pre-knowledge. Only our God is a ‘God of knowledge’ (1 Sam 2:3). He is the only one to really foresee things before they happen. He knows the future. In fact, He knows the end of all things, and has done so even before the created universe came into being.

Further, God is in control of everything and he will conduct and direct everything according to His perfect will. In Isaiah 46:10 He says: ‘declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure’. In addition to His foreknowledge, God’s providence means He directly influences things according to His purpose so that in the end His plans will always be realised.[1]

Like His wealth and wisdom, this is infinite. He both knows and fore-knows; He is both Prescient and Omniscient. His knowledge is linked with His Omnipresence as related to the dimensions of space — above; beneath; around; and with the three variants of time — past; present; and future. This also links with His Omnipotence, for to know what will take place at a future time necessitates that all is under His control. He telleth the number of the stars and numbers the hairs of our heads. "He that planted the ear, shall he not hear? he that formed the eye, shall he not see? He that chastiseth the heathen, shall not he correct? he that teacheth man knowledge shall he not know?" Ps. 94:9-10. "For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son." Rom. 8:29. "Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do." Heb. 4:13. But see how it works out in God incarnate — the Man of the Gospels. He saw Nathanael under the fig tree, John 1:48. "Lord thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee," John 21:17. He knew the movements of heaven, earth and hell. Luke 10:18; Luke 16:23-31. His eye was upon the fish in the sea and He sent one to Peter with the money in its mouth to meet the pressing need, Matt. 17:27. "For the LORD searcheth all hearts, and understandeth all the imaginations of the thoughts." 1 Chr. 28:9. "For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, etc." Matt. 15:19. He foreknows and foretells. He told them that Jerusalem would fall to the Romans in desolation, distress and wrath. Luke 21:20-24. This came to pass forty years after the Cross. Many other things did He foretell which are about to be fulfilled. Here again is a depth that knows no sounding.

Coming to omniscience, it is noticeable how the word infinite covers all these glorious attributes of God. Limitless as to time, power, and space, He is the same as to knowledge. There is a close link between omniscience and omnipotence, for, to compass the ages, and foretell what will come to pass in dim and distant times, God must have the hearts of all men under His direct control. Known unto God are all His ways from the beginning, and as we trace these ways, and see how He makes both sin and Satan to serve Him, we can understand how He works out His purposes of eternity in connection with the failure of the creature. This is a matter worthy of our deepest thought, concerning, as it does, His marvellous grace, in relation to us in all our helplessness and ruin. The great outstanding proof of this is the Cross, where our God has taken account of Man's darkest and worst crime in crucifying His Son, to bring in, for man, His own richest thoughts of blessing. He both knows and fore-knows; Prescience and omniscience are His, because He is GOD. "Behold the former things are come to pass, and new things do I declare: before they spring forth I tell you of them" (Isaiah 42:9). "For the Lord searcheth all hearts and understandeth all the imaginations of the thoughts" (1 Chron. 28:9). (See, for its action in our Lord, John 2:24-25; and compare Jer. 17:10). This wonderful feature of the divine majesty fills the heart with holy awe, and is productive of richest praise. The Bible is full of the all-knowing, all-pervading marks of the eternal God, and, when we reach the holy Gospels, we are filled with wonder, love, and praise, as we behold every characteristic feature of Godhead coming out in a Man — our Lord Jesus Christ.

I do not think that anyone who has made a study of the Word of God, and who has found the knowledge of Him who is the Author of the blessed things that are therein, is likely to suppose that anything that has taken place in the whole creation was unforeseen by the Creator. He knows the end from the beginning, and all else that lies between these two extremes. When He called the worlds into existence everything that He eventually brought forth was as clearly before His mind as it shall be in the hour in which His purposes are completed.

First is His foreknowledge. It is unthinkable that it could be otherwise with God. Before His creating word was spoken, He well knew “the end from the beginning.” Indeed, it is utterly impossible to find rest in any but such a God, and when my soul is saved I may look back and rejoice that God foreknew me as one whom He would save by the gospel of grace.

πρόγνωσις. A knowledge of persons and events before they exist. It is one of the divine attributes of God, by which persons were foreknown of Him and events determined. It is a capacity altogether beyond the mind of man to grasp. Acts 2:23; Rom. 8:29; Rom. 11:2; 1 Peter 1:2. The verb is also translated 'know before,' 2 Peter 3:17; and 'foreordain.' 1 Peter 1:20.

Our study of prophecy should impress our hearts deeply with a sense of the greatness and majesty of God, having sovereign right to form His own purposes and absolute power to bring them to pass, so as to announce thousands of years beforehand with absolute certainty to the minutest detail the end from the beginning. "For I am God and there is none else; I am God and there is none like Me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand and I will do all My pleasure" (Isa. 46:9-10). "Surely as I have thought, so shall it come to pass; and as I have purposed so shall it stand" (Isa. 14:24).

(Vv. 8, 9). In the light of all that God will do through His lowly Servant, Jehovah appeals to the nation as to their idolatry. They are reminded that their God is Jehovah, the eternal I AM; that His name, and His glory, He will not give to another, nor permit the praise that is due to Him to be given to idols. He alone can bring to pass things already foretold, and declare the things to come before they spring forth.

Every detail of our lives is known to God; every movement of the body, and the thought of the mind and heart at its inception. Every moment of the day of activity, the time of our rest; yea, all the ways that distinguish us down here are thoroughly known to Him. Before the word that has been conceived has left the tongue it is known to God. He knows it altogether: the motive and spirit of its conception, the object of its transmission. Others may be deceived by its sound; we may deceive ourselves regarding the motive for it, but He knows everything about it perfectly. How good it is to go through life in the consciousness of these things. O that we were constantly conscious that we have to do with God in everything. Sometimes God will not let us go forward; at other times He will not let us go back, for He besets behind and before. In His governmental ways with us He knows how to keep us from ways that would dishonour Him and bring shame and sorrow to our poor hearts; and betimes He puts, His hand upon us, so that we might feel that it is Himself that is dealing with us in wisdom and in love. Do we feel with the Psalmist that the knowledge of these things is too wonderful for us? How great God is! and yet to think He stoops to deal with puny mortals; with such insignificant individuals as we are. It is indeed wonderful that God should be so interested in the creatures of his hand. Yet it is so!