Online Bible 1995 March/ROM-1025.iso/olb/gill/d_000.lzh/D_038.TXT

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-38                                      OF THE OMNIPOTENCE OF GOD.                                                            Book I.
life, as we say, but they cannot give life: no man can EI-Shaddai, which latter is always rendered almighty,

make a living fly; he may as soon make a world.
The spiritual life that is in any of the sons of men, is
from God. Men, in a state of unregeneracy, are dead,
dead in a moral and spiritual .sense: and whilst they are
corporally alive, they are dead in trespasses and sins;
and because of them dead as to their understanding of,
will to, affection for what is morally and spiritually good;
and their very living in sin is no other than death: nor
can they quicken themselves; nothing can give what it
has not; the resurrection of the dead, in a corporal sense,
requires almighty power; and, in a spiritual sense, the
exceeding greatness of God's power; so that it is not by
might or power of man, but by the Spirit and Power of
the living God. It is God, that of his rich' mercy, and
because of his great love, and by his almighty power,
quickens men dead in sin, dead in law, and exposed unto
eternal death; he speaks life into them, when he calls
them by his grace, breathes into the dry bones the breath
of life, and they live spiritually; a life of justification,
through the righteousness of Christ, which is the justifi-
cation of life, or adjudges and intitles them to eternal
life; and a life of faith on Christ, and of' holiness from
him; they live in newness of life, soberly, righteously,
and godly; which life is preserved in them, it springs up
to everlasting life; it is hid and secured. with Christ in
God, is a never-dying one, and shall issue in eternal life;
in which all the three Persons in the Godhead are con-
cerned, John v. 21, '25. and xi. 25. Rom. viii. 2.
Eternal life, so often spoken of in scripture, as what
the saints shall enjoy for evermore, is of God; it is what
he has provided and prepared for them in his council and
covenant: what they are fore-ordained unto in his pur-
poses and decrees, and do most certainly enjoy; what
he who cannot lie has promised to them before the world
began, and which is his free gift, and flows from his free
fayour and good will, through Christ, Acts xiii. 48.
Tit. i. ¢. Rom. vi. 23. and in which the Son and Spirit
have a concern;' Christ came that his people might have
it, and he gave his flesh for the life of them; it is put
into his hands, and he has a power to dispose of it, and
give it to his sheep; so that none of them shall perish,
but have it, 1 John v. 12. John xvii. 2. and x. 28. And
the Spirit, whose grace springs up to it, and issues in it;
and he dwells in his people, as the earnest of it, and
works them up for it, and brings them into the full en-
joyment of it. Now God must have life in the highest
degree of it, as explained; even essentially, originally,
infinitely, and perfectly; or he could never give life in
every sense unto his creatures; and he must live for ever,
to continue eternal life, particularly to his people, and
preserve them in it.

CHAP. VIII.

or Tttn OMNXPOTv. NCR OF OOB.
SOME of the names of God, in the Hebrew language,
are thought to be derived from words which signify firm-
ness and stability, strength and power; as Adonai, El,

Gen. xvii. 1. Exod. vi. 3. and very frequently in the book
of J oh; and the Greek word \~pantokratwr\~ is used of God
in the New Testament, and is translated almighty and
omnipotent, Rev. i. 8. and iv. 8. and xix. 6. and power is
one of the names of God, Matt. xxvi. 64. compared with
.Heb. i. 3. the angel said to the Virgin Mary, with God
nothing shall be impossible, Luke i. 37. and Epicharmus,
the heathen, has the same expression {1}; and so Linus {2}:
Omnipotence is essential to God, it is his nature; a weak
Deity is an absurdity to the human mind: the very
heathens suppose their gods to be omnipotent, though
without reason; but we have reason sufficient to believe
that the Lord our God, who is the true God, is Almighty;
his operations abundantly prove it; though if he had never
exerted his almigh.ty power, nor declared it by an.y exter-
nal visible works, it would have been the same m him-
self; for it being his nature and essence, was from eternity,
before any such works were wrought, and will be when
they shall be no more; and hence it is called, his eternal
Rom. i. 20. and may be concluded from his being
an nncreated eternal Spirit. All spirits are powerful, as
their operations shew; we learn somewhat of their power
from our own spirits or souls, which are endowed with
the power and faculties of understanding, willing, reason-
ing, choosing and refusing, loving and hating, &c. and
not only so, but are able to operate upon the body; and
to quicken, move, direct and guide it to do whatever they
please, and that that is capable of; and angelic spirits are
more powerful still, they excel in strength, and are called
mighty angels, Psalm ciii. 20. 2 Thess. i. 7. and have
done very strange and surprising things; one of them
slew in one night one hundred and eighty-five thousand
men, in the Assyrian camp, 2 Kings xix. 35. and what
then cannot God, the uncreated and infinite Spirit, do;
who has endowed these with all their power, might, and
strength? can less than omnipotence be ascribed to him?
This may be inferred from his infinity. God is an infi-
nite Being, and so is every perfection of his; his under-
.standing is infinite, and such is his power; for, as a
Jewish writera argues, since power is attributed to God,
it must be understood that it is infinite; for if it was
finite, it might be conceived that there was a greater
power than his; and so privation would fall on God; as.
if there was not in him the greater power that is to be
conceived of. He is unlimited and unbounded, as to
space, and so is omnipresent; and he is unlimited and
unbounded as to time, and so is is eternal; and he is un-
limited and unbounded as to power, and so is omnipotent:
to deny, or to call in question, his omnipotence, is to
limit the holy one of Israel, which ought not to be done;
this the Israelites are charged with, for distrusting his
power to provide for them in the wilderness,. Psalm lxxviii.
19, 20, 41. The omnipotence of God may be argued
from his independency; all creatures depend on him, but
he depends on none; there is no cause prior to him, nor
any superior to him, or above him, that can control
him; none, who, if his hand is stretched out, can turn it
back, or stop it from proceeding to do what he will;
none can stay his hand, or say unto him,- what dost thou ?

Joseph Albo in Sepher Ikkaritn., rid. 68. ~o.