Common grace continues to operate in the whole of life but in different ways. It operates in our internal life in civic righteousness, family loyalty, natural love and faithfulness, and our external life when human power over nature increases and in artistic and technological flourishing. The latter (external) working of common grace will increase at the expense of the former (internal) working and this will be the form of the coming Babylon.
Sin is equally wicked in both spheres but wealth increases turpitude. “Actually it must be admitted consequently that the common grace of the one side assists the development of the world’s sinful power, and thus also the power of Satan… In his kingdom Satan has indeed been enriched by common grace.” This stark news is tempered by considering that “the end will consist of having the outcome of world history provide a single testimony for the indispensability of particular grace, and the culmination of things will glorify the Christ of God as the only true Saviour of the world.”
In the final section of his Biblical theology of Common Grace, Kuyper asks what of this creation will endure into the eternal age. He summarises: “Common grace produces three kinds of fruit for the kingdom of glory.
1. We find such fruit in the development of our human race and of the gifts God embedded within this human race (the honour and glory of the nations).
2. We find such fruit in the development of character and personality among the individual elect (their works that follow them).
3. We find such fruit in the continued existence of this world so that it could be renewed (the new vine in the kingdom of the Father).”