And this more important theological question is this: Which order of grace – common or special – governs the world outside the church and the individual soul of man? Yes, we know that God sustains His elect through special grace, and He sustains the reprobates through His common grace. But what about the world? When God looks at the world outside the church and the souls of men, when He looks at the creation, or at the societies of man, or at the social institutions, or scientific endeavors, technological discoveries, at art and music and literature, at the total of our civilization today, does God look at it as something that just needs to be maintained and estrained (common grace), or does He look at it as something to be redeemed and saved (special grace)?