Fearnot wrote: In looking back at some of the painful events in my life, I now see God was with me, and used it for good eventually. In some cases it helped me to become more compassionate.
I think that one of the biggest beliefs that Satan made sure that we humans would lose, is the idea that God is sovereign. As long as humans held onto that belief, they had at least some sort of "God-consciousness". I mean that they at least had some idea that God was part of their every day experience. Very few people in the so called "civilized" world today though, understand that God is sovereign or what that really means. When I think about it, I think the most simple way of seeing it is to say it makes you aware that "God is God and I'm not". In other words, it makes you realize that there are many things you will never understand and that no matter how well you think you're able to control your life, it's all just a fantasy because the only one that's really in control of your life is God - not you.
When you read the Bible, you see all through it that the people back then had this understanding. They sometimes got a bit mixed up on the specifics, but they did understand that God was in control of every single little detail in their lives and everyone elses.
People today, especially don't like that idea though. Even "Christians" will fight you on this because they don't like to admit that God would allow evil things to happen, therefore they say that proves He isn't involved in people's lives. That simply shows that they don't have a very good grasp of what the Bible actually teaches though.
We hate it when a little child suffers and dies or is raped or murdered or dies in an accident or any other horrible thing that could happen. For someone to state "it was God's Will" then, is a good way to get their head knocked off. While it would certainly be insensitive to say something like that when loved ones are grieving, it is none the less the truth. Nothing happens that is outside of God's Will. But we have to also understand that "God's Will" takes into consideration both the things He causes as well as the things He allows, and that because He allows something, it doesn't mean He likes it.
Because God is all knowing, all seeing, etc, we can also say truthfully that it's His predetermined will. He knows what choices each human will make before they make them, but that doesn't stop Him from giving them a chance to do what's right and so evil happens.
In today's world, we're very quick to blame God for the bad things and forget to thank Him for the good things. We often hear people cry, "where was God when..." for example. It's one of the few times in today's world that we'll actually admit there's a God. After all, we don't want to have to blame ourselves that's for sure!
The difficult part for Christians, for you and me, is to recognize that we God is working out His predetermined Will in our lives every second of every day. We cannot change His predetermined will, even by not believing in it! All we can do is choose whether or not to cooperate with Him. And that's the one thing that will make a big difference in our lives and how they turn out. If we choose to cooperate with Him, things are a bit easier for us. I don't mean that bad things won't still happen - they will, but we'll know who to turn to, where to go and how to seek wisdom about the situation and what our attitude should be and He will give us His peace even as we go through it. We'll have His peace and guidance during it so we won't be walking "blindly" through life and just "hoping for the best". Instead, we'll have a goal to strive for, a God who loves us dearly and will help us in every way He can without interfering in our growth.
There is one other way it will make our lives easier when we cooperate with Him though. Generally, when the Lord is trying to teach us something, He will continue to put us in circumstances where we have to use what He wants us to learn, one after another, until we finally learn it. Each situation will be different, but the attitude we need to display, or the characteristic we need to use most, will be the same in each situation.
For example, if He's trying to teach us about forgiving others, we may find ourselves in circumstances where someone has hurt our feelings or stolen something from us, or done something that we think is mean, so that we can practice forgiving them. If we choose to fight the Lord and not forgive, then we'll find ourselves in yet another circumstance where something like that happens. And so it will continue. Eventually we'll wind up as bitter, angry, hateful people, until we finally choose to forgive.
BUT, if we're paying attention and we know the Lord is working with us about forgiveness, then it won't surprise us when we suddenly find ourselves in a position where someone has hurt our feelings or something like that. (and even if we do get surprised, we'll know who do go to to find out what we need to do) We'll realize what the Lord is doing and we'll "pass the test" because we'll forgive the person with His help. Then, because we've passed His test, we can know that it's over and we won't have to face another similar situation. (Oh, I'm sure eventually we will, because people are constantly doing things that we need to forgive, but that particular trial or test will be over) I don't know about you, but I much prefer only having to learn a lesson once!
This bring us to yet another part of the problem with the attitude most people have in today's world. We really do think we're smarter then God. Seriously, we do. If we really understood that God was God and we're not, we'd realize that He really does know what He's doing and not keep trying to manipulate people and situations so things turn out the way we want them, because we're afraid that the way God wants them to turn out won't be as good as the way we want them too. Now, whenever I catch myself doing something like that, or thinking about doing it, I imagine a squirrel or an ant arguing with me about the wisdom of where I intend to plant a bush or something like that.
An ant or squirrel being smarter then we are, would be ludicrous wouldn't it? Of course! Well so is the idea of us being smarter then God! What's amazing is that God puts up with us and doesn't just squash us out of existence! What this all shows us is that in order to feel secure and be at peace in this life, it's imperative that we find out just who God is and what He's like. I mean, if this God who's sovereign is a mean, fickle God who's just playing games with us for His own amusement, we might as well throw in the towel right now. We lost the game before it started. But, if He's a loving God, why then we have a chance, right? And the more we find out about Him, the more secure and a peace we can be in our lives, because we'll fully realize that we really can trust Him. Which brings us yet again to the only way we can learn about Him: through knowing all of His Word and through prayer. The better we know it, the better we know Him. But like I told the young man in apologetics yesterday, we can study his word till we're old and grey and not understand it or know Him at all. God has made it so that only those who sincerely want to know Him, and who ask Him to reveal Himself to them, (teach them) are able to actually understand His Word and get to Know Him.
You and I know that our God is a loving God who is always righteous, just, true, perfect, complete, gracious, merciful, kind and all powerful -among other things, and He never changes. He's not one way today and another way tomorrow. Therefore whenever we go through trials, disappointments or even tragedy, we can accept it all as part of His divine plan for our life knowing that eventually it will always lead to His glory and our good. We don't have to know "why" and can accept not knowing because we know Him and that He'd never do anything to harm us and that He works out everything for our good. So we accept it and keep on keeping on, with our focus on Him and not on ourselves or the "problem" because we know He's already taking care of it.
This is something that's very interesting and edifying to reflect on because there's just so much truth tied up in God's sovereignty, and it affects us in so many different ways.
jackswife wrote:
AMEN Cindy!
At GriefShare do you know what they said the #1 lesson we learn from grief - That we are NOT in control. That God truly is
I see so many expressing that negative attitude about God you spoke of- something happens let's blame God. The flip side of that attitude is that those who are quick to blame Him for the death of a loved one or a natural disaster usually are unwilling or unable to credit Him for the good.
As you talked about, it's not really a question of is God sovereign. He is. It's a question of can we trust in His goodness and mercy. And after all I've been through in my life, I can say that while I don't understand it all I still can trust in His goodness
And if anyone read that part about redemption, it really goes along with this because it shows one of the way God uses these things. I've found over the years though that often even when I think I know "why" something's happened, I really don't know it all by any means. I think most of the time, the Lord uses our day to day experiences in many ways, most of which we most likely won't know about in this life time.
For me one of the passages in scripture that really pointed this out to me was when a man cursed David. One of his body guards was angry and wanted to take care of it, but David stopped him and reminded him that if the man had cursed him it was because God had allowed it, so it was His Will. That story starts at 2 Samuel 16:5. Many years later the man was punished for it because it was a sin, even though the Lord had allowed it at the time. The Lord was giving him a chance to do the right thing, but he chose sin instead as we all often do. Anyway, I think that particular story opened my eyes to just how the much the people realized that God was in control during that time, since having someone curse you isn't really that big a deal. At least compared to what most of us would consider saying "God's in control" about, that's just a little thing. And that's really the point too. He is in control of every little thing as well as the big things. Which is why it's a sin to complain about things that happen to us. That particular passage is the one that also helped me begin to really understand that as well. For if God is in control of everything, and we complain about something that happens to us, what we're saying is that God made a mistake - or that He's mean and shouldn't have allowed that, etc.
It's really amazing, at least to me, how interconnected everything is with God's sovereignty.
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