why me?

These are questions we tend to ask when things aren’t going the way we would desire for them to go.  Why me?  Why this? Why now?

Justin Taylor posts an answer tree from David Powlison, “God’s Grace and Your Sufferings,”  in Suffering and the Sovereignty of God (pp. 172-173)..

here is a paragraph from the middle, but you really have to go read and perhaps meditate on the whole thing

As that deeper question sinks home, you become joyously sane. The universe is no longer supremely about you. Yet you are not irrelevant. God’s story makes you just the right size. Everything counts, but the scale changes to something that makes much more sense. You face hard things. But you have already received something better which can never be taken away. And that better something will continue to work out the whole journey long.

I have the Kindle version of Suffering and the Sovereignty of God on my iPhone. Obviously, I need to read past the introduction.

Matt Chandler

Matt Chandler’s surgery to remove a mass from his frontal lobe begins in about 20 minutes. Be in prayer for him during the surgery and for a complete recovery.

Here is a post from Matt going into surgery about the things for which he is thankful.

The beginning:

The last seven days have been some of the most interesting of my life. I have felt anxiety, fear, sadness and a deep and unmovable joy simultaneously and in deeper ways than I have felt before. I am grateful for this heightened sense of things. Today at 10:45 a.m. CST I will have a good portion of my right frontal lobe removed. I head into that surgery with a heart that is filled with gratitude and hope.

Here are some of the things I am thankful for in no particular order:

1. I am thankful for the thousands of you who have prayed and fasted for my health. It has brought far more tears to Lauren’s and my eyes to receive this kind of attention from the Church universal than this tumor has.
2. I’m thankful for health insurance because I’m guessing they aren’t doing my five-hour surgery for free!

God’s Glory

An interesting twitter discussion has arisen between Mark Lamprecht Wes Widner and Jacob Hall.

Friends of Mark’s have a six year old son who has developed a brain tumor and on his blog, Mark posted John’s facebook entry about Faith, Sovereignty, and God’s glory. Go take a look at John’s response to this situation and the thanks people are expressing for the faith that he and his wife are showing in this trial. here is some of it, but go read it all.

First of all, I’m unsure about what kind of faith is being talked about. I’ve never been sure that it is God’s will that our Gideon be brought back to full health.

Now, when I say that, I’m not saying that I don’t think God could do that nor do I want you do think that I don’t desire that. I just don’t think that is the way God always works. However, I do know that God does work all things out for Him to get the maximum glory.

Now, many of you may ask “how can God get glory unless he heals Gideon?” My response would be that he definitely gets glory by healing Gideon, but He gets even more glory when we have our full satisfaction in Him and Him alone!

God isn’t all satisfying and worthy of my praise because he makes us healthy and wealthy. He isn’t worthy because He heals my little boy. He is all satisfying because He is God and He always does what is right! He is all satisfying because he rescued me from my biggest problem.

Our greatest problem isn’t poverty, lack of self-esteem, or brain tumors. Our biggest problem is we have sinned against a holy righteous God. He has saved me from my sin, and for that reason alone he is all satisfying. He is enough.

Yes, we have faith in our God, but our faith is that He will do what’s right and what is best…even if that meant taking Gideon from us.

Mark then posted the link to the blog entry on twitter as follows:

How would you react if your 6 yr old had a brain tumor? Would you glorify God? One family’s responsehttp://bit.ly/3IV3Xh

Wes responded with this:

@hereiblog Glorify God for what? Giving the strength and comfort to endure it or for giving the brain tumor? One isn’t glorifying.

Jacobhall jumped in then with this:

@kai5263499 Your view of God is totally skewed. He is worthy of Glory regardless of the situation.

then Wes:

@JacobHall86 Not if he kills innocent people for no reason. Sorry, that’s not the picture of God the bible paints.

then Jacob:

@kai5263499 Noone is innocent. That is the picture painted in the Bible. You assume with Pelagian views. None are Righteous.

Now look up at the two portions of Wes Widner’s entries that I bolded. do you see it? Wes has decided that he knows what brings God glory and he knows who is innocent and he knows when there is “no reason” for a death.

I have some questions.
Why does Wes have such a high view of himself and his own knowledge?
Why does he not approach this topic with a little more humility?
Why doesn’t he even give lip service to the possibility that God has something in mind in this situation that is far higher than our poor power to deduce as we rock along here in our finite bubble of right now with our limited intellects and our limited set of emotional responses?

Does Wes think God doesn’t at least have the ability to control this boy’s tumor?
If so, then what else doesn’t God control in Wes’ world?
If not, then isn’t allowing it to happen functionally the same as causing it?
Wouldn’t God remain culpable for the illness?
If that is the case, then isn’t it better to believe God to be fully sovereign over every aspect of this situation and every other situation in our lives?
Isn’t it better to fully trust a sovereign God who loves us, sent his Son to die for us, and promised us good things, with our illnesses and their outcome?
Isn’t it true that God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him, even in the midst of loss, heartache and pain?
Isn’t that what makes God look most fantastic to this lost and dying world?

just asking some questions here.

the Jesus threat

Todd Bumgarner posts an interesting quote from John Stott. what do you think about this?

The context is Stott talking about the first century Jewish people and their priests and how they reacted and responded to Jesus’ ministry:

“So they felt threatened by Jesus.  He undermined their prestige, their hold over the people, their own self-confidence and self-respect, while leaving his intact.  They were “envious” of him, and therefore determined to get rid of him.  It is significant that Matthew recounts two jealous plots to eliminate Jesus, the first by Herod the Great at the beginning of his life and the other by the priests at its end.  Both felt their authority under threat.  So both sought to “destroy” Jesus (Mt 2:13; 27:20 AV). However outwardly respectable the priests’ political and theological arguments may have appeared, it was envy which led them to “hand over” Jesus to Pilate to be destroyed (Mk 15:1, 10).

The same evil passion influences our own contemporary attitudes to Jesus.  He is still, as C. S. Lewis called him, “a transcendental interferer.” We resent his intrusions into our privacy, his demand for our homage, his expectation of our obedience. Why can’t he mind his own business, we ask petulantly, and leave us alone? To which he instantly replies that we are his business and that he will never leave us alone. So we too perceive him as a threatening rival who disturbs our peace, upsets our status quo, undermines our authority and diminishes our self-respect. We too want to get rid of him.”

–John Stott, The Cross of Christ. p58

Choice, Sovereignty and an example

John Piper recently explored free will, God’s sovereignty and Paul’s example. fascinating stuff.

One of the most influential passages in the Bible that God used to open my mind to his sovereignty over my will is Philippians 2:12-13.

Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

So my working and willing are necessary. They are real. But they are not first or ultimately decisive. God’s willing and working is decisively under and in my willing and working. The word “for” is crucial. I work because he is working in me. I will, because he is willing in me.

Believing this precedes understanding how it works. God says it. I believe it. Now I am spending a lifetime learning what it is like to live this way.

go read the rest (its short).

two on suffering

first courtesy of Vitamin Z we get this comforting bit that we will never be able to fully explain the problem of evil but that we can trust God anyway:

So how do Christians explain the problem of evil?

The reality is, we can’t provide an exhaustive theodicy or explanation of the existence of evil.  Our minds cannot fully fathom “why.”

But, in his recommended book, Return to Reason, Kelly Clark, explains why Christians need not feel intellectually compromised if they cannot explain the existence of evil.  Here is how he concludes the discussion.

The Christian theist need not be troubled by is his ignorance of a theodicy.  This ignorance is not insincere, questionable or obscurantist.  Rather, it is quite consistent with his theistic beliefs.  The Christian theist will believe that God has a good reason for allowing evil, although  he does not know what it is or know it in any detail.  He believes that God has a good reason because of God’s redemptive incarnational revelation.  It is not rationally incumbent upon the theist to produce a successful theodicy; the theist, in order to be rational, must simply believe that God has a good reason for allowing evil.  A God who shares in our pain, who redeems our sorrows and our shortcomings, who wipes away ever tear, is surely a good God. (page 89).

and then Halim Suh is making plans. He is thinking about what he wants his friends to tell him when suffering comes in his life. It is so very helpful to have right theology and right thinking about suffering firmly in place in your mind before the suffering hits. before the cancer diagnosis, before the layoff, before the horrible accident etc. etc. Here are some of Halim’s prospective advices to himself. Go read the rest.

Yesterday in our book group, we were discussing suffering. Honestly, I haven’t endured a lot of suffering, yet, in this life. Especially not the tragic, life-changes-in-a-moment kind of suffering. But, only the Lord knows if it is coming. I’ve been thinking a lot about what I would want people to tell me if I do go through a crisis – and these are things that I think I would need to hear:

Tell me that there is a God in heaven, who made the heavens and the earth and all that is in them. Remind me that my crisis, my suffering, is not a surprise to Him, and that it has not happened outside of His control. Tell me that my God has a purpose in everything – my suffering included. Remind me that He is the God who sees everything – not one thing has ever escaped His attention. He sees me now.
….
Tell me that there is a Savior that suffered – a lot more than I can ever imagine. No matter how much suffering I am enduring, remind me that Jesus suffered so much more, infinitely more. Tell me that He can comfort me because He knows my pain. He knows my suffering. Tell me that my Jesus is there.

Tell me that God loves me with a fierce love – the kind that rips open seas, that drowns armies, that throws hailstones from heaven, that shuts up lions’ mouths, that saves from consuming fires, that heals the lame, that feeds the hungry and that conquers death. Remind me that my God loves me like that. And that this God doesn’t change, nor does His love for me change. So, if He has ordained suffering in my life, He is still loving me – although I may not see it or understand it.

Halim is one of the staff at Austin Stone Community Church.

powerful stuff

Timmy Brister posted this video “Choosing Thomas” and like he says it is worth the next ten minutes of your time.

somewhat related, Randy Alcorn talks here about the absolute necessity for Christians to have a well developed theology of suffering to avoid falling into serious error when something like the events in the video above come into our lives.

I wrote If God Is Good because the question of suffering and evil is the most commonly raised and perplexing problem there is. It’s unusual to have serious prolonged interactions about believing in God, with either believers or unbelievers, without them raising it.

I am also deeply concerned with how radically unbiblical viewpoints are being assimilated into the thinking of evangelical Christians. In If God Is Good, I wrote four chapters critiquing the attempts of misguided theologians to resolve the problem of evil by minimizing the divine attributes of omnipotence, omniscience, goodness, or love.
….
I also wanted to address the issue of mystery and faith, and our need to trust God even when we can’t see his purposes. That used to be a central part of faith, but somehow it seems more difficult for modern Christians. I argue that while the nature of faith is to trust God for what we do not see, we may base our trust in him on many things we have seen—His Word, His creation, and how he has shown himself in others in our lives and throughout history. I point out that if you write down the worst things that have ever happened to you and then write down the best things, there is often, especially when sufficient time has passed, a shocking overlap of the lists, confirming the workings of God’s sovereign grace.

Do people have free will?

Andrew Naselli takes a long look at the question of free will over here. Fascinating stuff. take some time this weekend to explore it.

Here is the introduction to get you started:

Non-Christians and Christians alike often give the same answer to difficult questions like these: Why did God allow sin in the first place? Why does God save some people and not others? Why does God send people to hell? Why can living like a Christian be so frustrating? The immediate solution often suggested is simple: “free will.” To many people, it’s a satisfying answer: “Oh, that makes sense. Yeah, God does x because he has to preserve my free will. Yeah, OK. Next question.” I’d like to suggest that we re-think this important issue. 

The title of this short essay is a question: “Do We Have a Free Will?” That question may be jarring to you because it asks if something exists that most people assume exists. My short answer to that question is that it depends on what you mean by “free.” The longer answer is the rest of this essay.

ok and just because I can’t let it go, here is another section to tease you over there for all of it.

Is libertarian free will the reason for the origin of sin?

Short answer: No. 

When addressing this hugely difficult question, it is helpful to consider the following: 
1.  God is not the author or agent of evil, and he is not culpable for evil. 

2.  Satan is not God’s equal opposite (i.e., a God-versus-Satan dualism). 

3.  God, who accomplishes all things according to the counsel of his will, ordained that sin would enter his universe. (See the short essay in this series entitled “How Could a Good God Allow Suffering and Evil?”) God sovereignly works through secondary causes (such as humans) such that he is not culpable for evil but the secondary causes are. 

4.  Satan and then Adam and Eve sinned because they wanted to sin, and they are morally responsible to God for it. (The ability of humans to sin has four historical stages. First, Adam and Eve were initially able to sin. Second, after their fall, all unregenerate humans [i.e., those who are spiritually dead] are not able not to sin. Third, regenerate humans [i.e., those whom God has given spiritual life] are able not to sin. Fourth, glorified regenerate humans are not able to sin.) 

5.  Tension remains because compatibilists cannot explain exactly how God can ordain all things without being the author or agent of evil. It is at places like that that your head will start spinning if you try to put all the puzzle pieces together (we don’t have all the pieces!). Rather than deny explicit statements of Scripture that support compatibilism, a far better option is to acknowledge that this is a mystery that we finite and fallen humans simply cannot comprehend exhaustively.

6.  There is no easy answer to explaining why God ordained the origin of sin in the first place. John Piper offers a helpful pastoral perspective in Spectacular Sins and Their Global Purpose in the Glory of Christ (Wheaton: Crossway, 2008). (This is available online for free as a PDF: http://www.desiringgod.org/media/pdf/books_bss/bss.pdf. See esp. pp. 39-64.) Why doesn’t God simply wipe out Satan? Piper concludes, “The ultimate answer . . . is that ‘all things were created through [Christ] and for [Christ]’ (Col. 1:16). God foresaw all that Satan would do if he created Satan and permitted him to rebel. In choosing to create him, he was choosing to fold all of that evil into his purpose for creation. That purpose for creation was the glory of his Son. All things, including Satan and all his followers, were created with this in view” (p. 48).

emphasis added.

I read Spectacular Sins earlier this year. it was really very good indeed.

Now it is on sale for 5.00

Do yourself a favor, and if this stuff interests you, spend five dollars on Spectacular Sins and read it too. Then you will see why I was so offended by Wm Paul Young on page 165 of The Shack.

Hat tip to Challies who says this one is not for skimming so set aside a few minutes to read it.

conception of self part II

earlier I quoted C.S. Lewis in Perelandra to illustrate the point that our enemy has as his project the inflation of our ego to the point that we find it difficult to deny anything to ourselves and our own vision of how the world should be.

Satan has as his project affirming to us that we are the most important thing in the world and that everything else revolves around us and what we want and like.

I would submit that there are two basic things that we have to get right before anything else in the Bible or Christian life makes sense. We have to have a proper view of God and we have to have a proper view of ourselves in God.

God is everything. He made everything. He is sovereign over everything. He is God. Isaiah 46 is just one place where He laid it out for His people to see.

⁹remember the former things of old;
for I am God, and there is no other;
I am God, and there is none like me,
^10(K) declaring the end from the beginning
and from ancient times things not yet done,
saying,^(L) ‘My counsel shall stand,
and I will accomplish all my purpose,’
^11(M) calling a bird of prey from the east,
the man of my counsel from a far country.
^(N) I have spoken, and I will bring it to pass;
I have purposed, and I will do it.

the first four of the ten commandments are also reminders that God is God and will be worshipped as God.

^2(C) “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.

^3(D) “You shall have no other gods before^[a] me.

^4(E) “You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. ^5(F) You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the LORD your God am^(G) a jealous God,^(H) visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, ⁶but showing steadfast love to thousands^[b] of those who love me and keep my commandments.

^7(I) “You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.

^8(J) “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. ^9(K) Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, ¹⁰but the^(L) seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the^(M) sojourner who is within your gates. ¹¹For^(N) in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

The whole point of all creation is to reflect the Glory of God. God chose Israel as His people in order to show the nations who He is. God chose us for the same reason.

God did not save us in order to meet our needs although that is a byproduct according to Matthew 6. God did not save us because He needed anything that we had to offer according to Romans 5:6-8.

God saved us for the praise of His glorious grace.  Check this out.

^3(A) Blessed be^(B) the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing^(C) in the heavenly places, ^4(D) even as he^(E) chose us in him^(F) before the foundation of the world, that we should be^(G) holy and blameless before him. In love ^5(H) he predestined us^[a] for^(I) adoption as sons through Jesus Christ,^(J) according to the purpose of his will, ^6(K) to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in^(L) the Beloved. ^7(M) In him we have^(N) redemption^(O) through his blood,^(P) the forgiveness of our trespasses,^(Q) according to the riches of his grace, ⁸which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight ^9(R) making known^[b] to us the mystery of his will,^(S) according to his purpose, which he^(T) set forth in Christ ¹⁰as a plan for^(U)the fullness of time,^(V) to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.

¹¹In him we have obtained^(W) an inheritance,^(X) having been predestined^(Y) according to the purpose of him who works all things according to^(Z) the counsel of his will, ¹²so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be^(AA) to the praise of his glory. ¹³In him you also, when you heard^(AB) the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him,^(AC) were sealed with the^(AD)promised Holy Spirit, ¹⁴who is^(AE) the guarantee^[c] of our^(AF) inheritance until^(AG) we acquire^(AH) possession of it,^[d](AI) to the praise of his glory.

emphasis added.

you have to get these two things written/engraved/etched into your very heart and soul.

1. God is God
2. Everything in all creation including us exists only and always to reflect God’s glory

that’s it.

So, as believers we are mirrors reflecting God’s glory to the world. Notice something though in II Corinthians 3:18:

¹⁸And we all, with unveiled face,^(A) beholding^(B) the glory of the Lord,^[a](C) are being transformed into the same image^(D) from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

emphasis added.

Did you see that? in addition to the magnificent, amazing, unbelievable, wonderful, glorious privilege of being glory reflectors, God is also lovingly transforming us into the very image that we are reflecting for His increased glory.

The point is that God is the only light source in the universe. We are mirrors, not suns.

mirrors try to make themselves better reflectors of God. Little make believe suns try to impose their reflection onto the world.

Do you see why these two things matter?

The basic foundational lie of Satan is that we are little light sources ourselves. As little gods, we are thus entitled to all the perks of godness including a world ordered around us and our whims.

notice on page 179 what the Lady learned in Perelandra after she did not succumb to temptation to go on fixed land:

The reason for not yet living on Fixed Land is now so plain. How could I wish to live there except that because it was Fixed? And why should I desire the Fixed except to make sure–to be able on one day to command where I should be the next and what should happen to me? It was to reject the wave–to draw my hands out of Maledil’s [Jesus’s], to say to Him, ‘Not thus, but thus’–to put in our own power what times should roll towards us….as if you gathered fruits together to-day for to-morrow’s eating instead of taking what came. That would have been cold love and feeble trust. And out of it how could we ever have climbed back into love and trust again?”

a cold and feeble love and trust indeed is one that says thank you to God for saving us, now get out of our way while we make our world like we want it. But yet that seems to be what we do, and much pain follows our rash willfulness.

Why do we do it? How can we stop?

the Shack part I

I am reading the Shack. It took all the way to page 165 (out of 246) before I got completely angry. Up to that time I was reading at a relatively low grade frustration level. The prose was juvenile. the story was wooden. The theology was wrong. The emphasis was on Mack instead of God. All frustrating things.

But on page 165 Mr. Young finally made me mad. Here is what appears there, beginning at the bottom of 164 for some context:

“For love. He chose the way of the cross where mercy triumphs over justice because of love. Would you instead prefer he’d chosen justice for everyone? Do you want justice, ‘Dear Judge’?” and she smiled as she said it.

“No, I don’t,” he said as he lowered his head. “Not for me, and not for my children.”

She waited.

“But I still don’t understand why Missy had to die.”

“She didn’t have to, Mackenzie. This was no plan of Papa’s. Papa has never needed evil to accomplish his good purposes. It is you humans who have embraced evil and Papa has responded with goodness. What happened to Missy was the work of evil and no one in your world is immune from it.”

emphasis added.

The “She” above is Sophia, who is the distillation of God’s wisdom like Solomon portrayed in Proverbs.

Now just think one brief minute about what we know about God from the scripture. Revelation 13:8 says that there is a book written before the foundation of the world that is known as the book of the slain Lamb. It seems fairly obvious to me that God “needed” “planned” for some evil to occur that would result in the propitiatory sacrifice of His Son for the reconciliation of the folks whose names were written in that book.

The idea that God didn’t plan for things we don’t like is deeply offensive.

The thing about it is that this statement that Mr. Young puts in the mouth of God’s distillation of wisdom undercuts the whole central message of the book up to that point.

The Godhead was up to then taking turns convincing Mack that he had no right to sit in judgement of God’s actions or others. The author then does exactly what he is writing a book to argue against. He sits in judgment of God and decides that God would never plan or need what the author and Mackenzie agree to be evil. how arrogant is that? how stupid? how blasphemous?

Don’t get me started.

For a contrast between this kind of theology and the Bible’s portrayal of God see this post of mine regarding two approaches to the bridge collapse in minneapolis minnesota.

W. Paul Young is trying to do the same thing that Roger Olson wants to do which is to help God get off the hook for bad things that happen in the world that we humans don’t like.

Olson:

And God says, “Pray because sometimes I can intervene to stop innocent suffering when people pray; that’s one of my self-limitations. I don’t want to do it all myself; I want your involvement and partnership in making this a better world.”
It’s a different picture of God than most conservative Christians grew up with, but it’s the only one (so far as I can tell) that relieves God of responsibility for sin and evil and disaster and calamity.

emphasis added.

The Bible:

5 I am the LORD, and there is no other,
besides me there is no God;
I equip you, though you do not know me,
6 that people may know, from the rising of the sun
and from the west, that there is none besides me;
I am the LORD, and there is no other.
7 I form light and create darkness,
I make well-being and create calamity,
I am the LORD, who does all these things.

emphasis added.

So the question is, do we take God at His word or not? Do we think it is our job to “relieve God of responsibility” for things that happen to us that we don’t like?

sovereignty

John MacArthur nails it with the opening sentence of this post (the second and third sentences are excellent as well) which is an excerpt from the book Ashamed of the Gospel.

No doctrine is more despised by the natural mind than the truth that God is absolutely sovereign. Human pride loathes the suggestion that God orders everything, controls everything, rules over everything. The carnal mind, burning with enmity against God, abhors the biblical teaching that nothing comes to pass except according to His eternal decrees. Most of all, the flesh hates the notion that salvation is entirely God’s work. If God chose who would be saved, and if His choice was settled before the foundation of the world, then believers deserve no credit for their salvation.
…..
Scripture affirms both divine sovereignty and human responsibility. We must accept both sides of the truth, though we may not understand how they correspond to one another. People are responsible for what they do with the gospel—or with whatever light they have (Rom. 2:19, 20), so that punishment is just if they reject the light. And those who reject do so voluntarily. Jesus lamented, “You are unwilling to come to Me, that you may have life” (John 5:40). He told unbelievers, “Unless you believe that I am [God], you shall die in your sins” (John 8:24). In John chapter 6, our Lord combined both divine sovereignty and human responsibility when He said, “All that the Father gives Me shall come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out” (v. 37); “For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him, may have eternal life” (v. 40); “No one can come to Me, unless the Father who sent Me draws him” (v. 44); “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes has eternal life” (v. 47); and, “No one can come to Me, unless it has been granted him from the Father” (v. 65). How both of those two realities can be true simultaneously cannot be understood by the human mind—only by God.

Above all, we must not conclude that God is unjust because He chooses to bestow grace on some but not to everyone. God is never to be measured by what seems fair to human judgment. Are we so foolish as to assume that we who are fallen, sinful creatures have a higher standard of what is right than an unfallen and infinitely, eternally holy God? What kind of pride is that? In Psalm 50:21 God says, “You thought that I was just like you.” But God is not like us, nor can He be held to human standards. “‘My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,’ declares the Lord. ‘For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts’” (Isa. 55:8, 9).

We step out of bounds when we conclude that anything God does isn’t fair. In Romans 11:33 the apostle writes, “Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways! For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who became His counselor?” (Rom. 11:33, 34).

stormy seas? no problem

Courtesy of John Mark at Sweet Tea and Theology, here is a great quote from John Newton (the author of the hymn Amazing Grace)

I heartily sympathize with you in your complaints; but I see you in safe hands. The Lord loves you, and will take care of you. He who raises the dead, can revive your spirits when you are cast down. He who sets bounds to the sea, and says “Hitherto shalt thou come, and no further,” can limit and moderate that gloom which sometimes distresses you. He knows why he permit, you to be thus exercised. I cannot assign the reasons, but I am sure they are worthy of his wisdom and love, and that you will hereafter see and say, He has done all things well. If I was as wise as your philosopher, I might say a great deal about a melancholy complexion; but I love not to puzzle myself with second causes, while the first cause is at hand, which sufficiently accounts for every phenomenon in a believer’s experience. Your constitution, your situation, your temper; your distemper, all that is either comfortable or painful in your lot, is of his appointment. The hairs of your head are all numbered: the same power which produced the planet Jupiter is necessary to the production of a single hair, nor can one of them fall to the ground without his notice, any more than the stars can fall from their orbits. If providence, no less than in creation, he is Maximus in minimis. Therefore fear not; only believe. Our sea may sometimes be stormy, but we have an infallible Pilot, and shall infallibly gain our port. – Letter IX, Dying in the Lord by John Newton. Nov. 27, 1778.

emphasis added

aren’t there times in life when the only available comfort is that God is “Maximus in minimis”, that we can fear not only because we trust completely in our infallible Pilot?

What a great word. by the way, this movie was similarly great and to me, the best parts were Wilberforce’s conversations with John Newton.

suffering

I noticed in the sidebar at the Straight Up blog a three part series on God’s role in suffering by Gerald Hiestand. Here is part three which contains links to the first two parts. Go check it out.

I like these bits here especially well, but it is all good and very much worth a read:

And it is at this particular point that I find indeterminism wanting. As a theodicy, indeterminism generally attempts to lessen the tension between God’s goodness and human suffering by appealing to moral freedom. It is through the wrong choices of free moral agents, we are told, that suffering has been introduced into the world. Well and good—even determinists would agree so far. But then indeterminists often (not always) make a logic-leap and conclude that when faced with suffering, we should look not to God, but rather man, Satan, and the random effects of a fallen world as the ultimate source. The subtle and (often not so-subtle) implication of indeterminism is that God has no causal relation to our suffering. Now I affirm human freedom. And I affirm that much of the suffering we experience is the direct result of creation’s choice to live independently of God. But one cannot simply sprinkle the pixie dust “free will” over all suffering and magically resolve the tension between God’s goodness and human suffering.

At the end of the day, there’s no way around it. God, by very nature of his being, is the ultimate “buck stops here” person in the universe. Nothing can happen apart from his divine sovereignty. He could have prevented the planes from crashing into the towers. But he chose not to. From massive natural disasters, to the death of the smallest creatures, God’s eye beholds all; his hand oversees all. And nothing happens apart from his divine counsel. Not even open theism, with it denial of God’s exhaustive foreknowledge, gets God off the hook. Even the open theist has to admit that God knew the intentions of the terrorists—if not from the dawn of time—then at least on the morning of 9/11. And still he chose not to intervene. The fact remains that creaturely freedom, however immediately the cause of suffering, does not operate outside the exhaustive scope of God’s sovereignty. The story of Job is a classic example.

…..

As far as theodicy is concerned, I prefer determinism’s willingness to call a spade a spade. It acknowledges up front that God is the ultimate first mover, the One who ordains all things. Nothing happens apart from his divine will. At the end of the day, peace in the midst of suffering comes through submission to the divine will. It comes through trusting that God has a good reason for why he ordains what he ordains in relation to my life. And perhaps even more significantly, it acknowledges that he has the right to do so. Any theodicy that attempts too vigorously to wipe the blood off of God’s hands robs us of the rest that comes from resting submissively in the wisdom of God’s divine care. Such theodicies are an emotional quick fix, but they can’t satisfy the hurting heart in the end. Like Job, we find our ultimate peace in bowing before the mighty hand of a sovereign God who, beholden to no one, has the right to purposefully ordain all things—even suffering—for our good and his glory. Determinism reminds us that God owes us nothing, and yet has given us everything.

that bit about trying to wipe the blood off of God’s hands reminded me of Roger Olson being scared of the “calvinist” (I think he means the Biblical) God. The way I read the Bible it says that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. As a matter of fact, the Bible talks a lot about fearing the Lord. hmmmmmm.

God’s glory

Al Mohler also touches on the question that I quoted from John Piper the other day.

First he starts with an important reminder:

Human beings are trapped in a human frame of reference. When we think of motivation, we inevitably start with our own self-conscious knowledge of our own motivations. For a human to seek his or her own glory is narcissism in purest form. Human egotism is constantly on display. And, if we are honest, we know that we seek our own glory as a reflex.

then he gets to the meat of the matter:

The Bible tells us that God does all things for the sake of his own glory. As God spoke to his people through the prophet Ezekiel: “Therefore say to the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord God: It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations to which you came. And I will vindicate the holiness of my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, and which you have profaned among them. And the nations will know that I am the Lord, declares the Lord God, when through you I vindicate my holiness before their eyes” [Ezekiel 36:22-23].

God’s saving acts are for the sake of his own glory, even as his people are redeemed. He acts to vindicate his own name and to display his own power and holiness. Creation itself displays his glory, extending to every atom and molecule. “The heavens declare the glory of God,” sings the Psalmist, and God created the world for the purpose of putting his glory on display [Psalm 19:1].

….
As Herman Bavinck expressed this truth, “God can rest in nothing other than himself and cannot be satisfied with anything less than himself. He has no alternative but to seek his own honor.” Similarly, though from a very different theological perspective, Karl Barth defined God’s glory as “his dignity and right, not only to maintain, but to prove and declare, to denote and almost as it were to make himself conspicuous and everywhere apparent as the One he is.”

This is merely the logic of what it means for God to be the one perfect being. As such, he cannot look beyond himself for anything or anyone greater. In an often-overlooked passage in Hebrews, we are told that “when God made a promise to Abraham, since he had no one greater by whom to swear, he swore by himself” [Hebrews 6:13]. When humans take an oath, we naturally invoke God’s name. When God makes a promise, he can invoke no greater name then his own. This is not evidence of selfishness or narcissism — only an irrefutable logic.

Even so, some who are troubled by this question may remain puzzled. Even when God is understood to be the one perfect being, this still appears to be a cold logic.

The most important corrective to this misunderstanding is to realize that God’s glory is a generous and self-giving glory. His glory is his own joy, and the display of his glory brings his creatures true joy.

When a human glorifies himself, he robs others of joy. Self-aggrandizement and human megalomania cause hurt and harm to others, not blessing and joy.

But when God displays and exhibits his glory, he shares joy with his creatures and wholeness with all creation. Put most directly, without the knowledge of God’s glory, we would be robbed of true joy. God would be less than perfect — even selfish — if he did not display his glory and allow us to share in the divine joy and fulfillment.

emphasis added

Go read the rest, and especially the conclusion. excellent.

Is God for us or Himself?

Is God for us or Himself? That is the question answered by this sermon from John Piper delivered at Wheaton College back in 1984. My brother-in-law, Todd, sent me the link by email last weekend.

Such an excellent reminder of the whole point of this exercise we are going through. how do you react to statements like this:

Why did God create us? Isaiah 43:6-7, “Bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth (says the Lord), everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory.”

Why did God choose a people for himself and make Israel his possession? Jeremiah 13:11, “I made the whole house of Israel … cling to me, says the Lord, that they might be for me a people, a name, a praise and a glory.”

Why did God rescue them from bondage in Egypt? Psalm 106:7-8, “Our fathers, when they were in Egypt, did not consider thy wonderful works…but rebelled against the Most High at the Red Sea. Yet he saved them for his name’s sake that he might make known his mighty power.”

Why did God spare them again and again in the wilderness? Ezekiel 20:14, “I acted for the sake of my name, that it should not be profaned in the sight of the nations in whose sight I had brought them out.”

Why didn’t God cast away his people when they rejected him as king and asked for a king like the nations? 1 Samuel 12:20-22, “Fear not, you have done all this evil yet do not turn aside from following the Lord … For the Lord will not cast away his people for his great name’s sake.”
…..

Ezekiel 36:22-23,32 puts it like this: “Thus says the Lord God, ‘It is not for your sake, 0 house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name … And I will vindicate the holiness of my great name … and the nations will know that I am the Lord. It is not for your sake that I will act,’ says the Lord God. Let that be known to you. Be ashamed and confounded for your ways, 0 house of Israel.'”

Why did the Son of God come to earth and to his final decisive hour? John 17:1, “Father, the hour has come; glorify thy Son that the Son may glorify thee.” A beautiful conspiracy to glorify the Godhead in all the work of redemption!

And why will Jesus come again in the great day of consummation? 2 Thessalonians 1:9-10, “Those who do not obey the gospel will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction and exclusion from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might, when he comes on that day to be glorified in his saints and to be marveled at in all who have believed… ”

From beginning to end, the driving impulse of God’s heart is to be praised for his glory. From creation to consummation his ultimate allegiance is to himself. His unwavering purpose in all he does is to exalt the honor of his name and to be marveled at for his grace and power. He is infinitely jealous for his reputation. “For my own sake, for my own sake I act,” says the Lord. “My glory I will not give to another!”

emphasis added.

I have to say that the most intense reactions that I ever received teaching Sunday school to adults was when I would hit this truth. God is God. God’s purpose in everything is to bring praise to Himself. If God existed for any other purpose then He would be an idolator. God alone is worthy to receive honor and glory and praise and worship.

Here is how John Piper describes the reaction that he encounters:

My experience in preaching and teaching is that American evangelicals receive this truth with some skepticism if they receive it at all. None of my sons has ever brought home a Sunday school paper with the lesson title: “God loves himself more than he loves you.” But it is profoundly true, and so generation after generation of evangelicals grow up picturing themselves at the center of God’s universe.

go read or listen to the rest of the sermon. excellence.

here is one more bit, because I can’t resist:

God is the one Being in the entire universe for whom self-centeredness, or the pursuit of his own glory, is the ultimately loving act. For him, self-exaltation is the highest virtue. When he does all things “for the praise of his glory,” he preserves for us and offers to us, the only thing in the entire world, which can satisfy our longings. God is for us, and therefore has been, is now and always will be, first, for himself. I urge you not to resent the centrality of God in his own affections, but to experience it as the fountain of your everlasting joy.

emphasis added

Spectacular Sins

I am just finishing the book Spectacular Sins by John Piper.

As you might expect from Piper, his purpose is to demonstrate from scripture the sovereignty of God in every situation including several specific spectacularly sinful occasions.

He deals with the fall of Satan, Adam’s sin in the Garden of Eden, The pride of Babel, the sale of Joseph into slavery by his brothers, Israel demanding to be ruled by a king like other nations, and Judas’ betrayal of Jesus. He shows in each circumstance how God permitted “wisely” the sin to occur and that the sin was a preexisting part of God’s plan to achieve maximum glory for His name.

The book is very easy to read. The book is very short. I highly recommend it as a handy dandy reference book for anyone who struggles with the concept of God allowing evil to occur in His creation.

I bring it up because of this bit that I read last night on pages 84-85:

The most magnificent thing about the Lion of the tribe of Judah in his fulfillment of Jacob’s prophecy is that he lays claim on the obedience of all the peoples of the world not by exploiting our guilt and crushing us into submission, but by bearing our guilt and freeing us to love him and obey him with joy forever. The Lion of Judah is the Lamb who was slain. He wins our obedience by forgiving our sins and making his own obedience–his own perfection as the righteous one–the basis of our acceptance with God. And in this position of immeasurable safety and joy–all of it owing to his suffering and righteousness and death and resurrection–he wins our free and happy obedience.

The story of Joseph is the story of a righteous one who is sinned against and suffers so that the tribe of Judah would be preserved and a Lion would come forth and prove to be a Lamb-like Lion and by his suffering and death purchase and empower glad obedience from all the nations–even from those who put him to death.

Does he have yours?

emphasis added

Why pray?

Pulpit Magazine concludes its series on why we should pray if God is sovereign with part 4 here. The first three parts are linked here.

“5. We should pray because God has ordained prayer as a means by which He accomplishes His eternal purposes.”

This part is a little longer and more involved, but it is the crux of the whole thing. Go read it and think about it a while. Read the Bible passages that it points to and think about it some more.

here is one of the examples:

A second example can be found at the end of the book of Job. God addressed Job’s friend, Eliphaz the Temanite, saying,

I am angry with you and your two friends, because you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has. So now take seven bulls and seven rams and go to my servant Job and sacrifice a burnt offering for yourselves. My servant Job will pray for you, and I will accept his prayer and not deal with you according to your folly (Job 42:7b-8a; NIV)

Then, as verse 9 reveals, Eliphaz “did what the Lord told them; and the Lord accepted Job’s prayer” (NIV). From this it is clear that God not only ordained that His wrath toward Eliphaz would be turned aside, but He also ordained that the means He would use to accomplish that end would include the intercessory prayer of His servant Job.

why pray?

A recurring theme in our men’s Bible study and on this blog is the question “why should we pray if God is sovereign over all?” another variant is “why should we pray if God is going to to what God is going to do anyway?”

Here are two previous posts that I have put up about this question.

Why Pray?
the power of prayer

Pulpit Magazine has now posted three parts of an answer to the question as well.

Part 1 sets up the issue.

Part 2 begins the answer with 1. God commanded us to pray and 2. Jesus modeled a life of prayer.

Part 3 continues the answer with 3. God is able to respond to our prayers and 4. God actually does respond to our prayers.

Here is a bit from number 4:

Scripture is filled with examples of God granting to His people what they have requested in their prayers of petition and intercession. First Chronicles 4:10a records the prayer of Jabez in which he said, “Oh that Thou wouldst bless me indeed, and enlarge my border, and that Thy hand might be with me, and that Thou wouldst keep me from harm, that it may not pain me!” In response to Jabez’s prayer, “God granted him what he requested” (v. 10b). In Exodus 32:10, God told Moses of His intentions to destroy the people of Israel because of their idolatry. But Moses interceded on behalf of Israel (vv. 11-13), and in response to his prayer God relented and did not destroy them (v. 14). And as James records, God responded to the earnest prayers of Elijah in both initiating and ending a three-and-a-half-year drought (James 5:17-18; cf. Genesis 18:22-33; 32:26; Daniel 10:12; Amos 7:1-6; Acts 4:29-31; 10:31; and 12:5-11).

At the same time that it is acknowledged that God is sovereign, then, it must also be acknowledged that “[t]he effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much” (James 5:16b; cf. 4:2). In fact, immediately after answering the question of how to pray in Luke 11:2-4, Jesus goes on to answer the question of why to pray by giving two reasons—because God rewards diligence in prayer by granting requests (Luke 11:5-10), and because God delights in giving good gifts to His children (Luke 11:11-13).

How great is it that God delights in giving good gifts to His children?

sovereignty of God

Joe Thorn is back up and running with his blog. here is his post quoting from A.W. Pink on the Sovereignty of God.

here are two snips from either end, but go read the middle.

How different is the God of the Bible from the God of modern Christendom! The conception of Deity which prevails most widely today, even among those who profess to give heed to the Scriptures, is a miserable caricature, a blasphemous travesty of the Truth. The God of the twentieth century is a helpless, effeminate being who commands the respect of no really thoughtful man. The God of the popular mind is the creation of maudlin sentimentality. The God of many a present-day pulpit is an object of pity rather than of awe-inspiring reverence.

…
To declare that the Creator’s original plan has been frustrated by sin, is to dethrone God. To suggest that God was taken by surprise in Eden and that He is now attempting to remedy an unforeseen calamity, is to degrade the Most High to the level of a finite, erring mortal.

Doesn’t this caricature of a limited God being railed against by A.W. Pink 90 years ago sound an awfully lot like the caricature of God being “relieved” by Dr. Roger Olson?

God is Sovereign

Todd Burus is on the same wavelength that I was on in the comments to this post.

God is sovereign. Honestly, I don’t think there are nearly as many people who believe this as there are that say it. Ask any ol’ Baptist biddy why it is that she is maintaining faith even though her health is failing and her husband died and she will say with a sigh, “God is sovereign.” Ask her if she believes that God has chosen for himself a people unconditionally from the foundation of the earth though and prepare to be chastised. “God is sovereign,” as I’ve learned in Southern Baptist vernacular, does not mean that ‘God is sovereign,’ as much as it means ‘I’m doing alright, or at least I’m pretending like I am because I don’t know what else to say.’

But what if we recovered the true meaning of this phrase? What if, instead of saying “God is sovereign” as a default comfort in times of trial we really grasped it as the supreme comfort in all situations, how much impact would that have on how we relate to God?

….

Sure, we say “God is sovereign,” but our theology, and our pride, overrule our words and display what we really think of God: that he is subservient to our “free will” and impotent to do anything unless we open the door for him first. That little seems like a God who is worthy of worship, and even less like the great God we read of in the Bible, who loved us so much that he appointed a worm to demonstrate just how sovereign he really is!

go read the rest of it and see his wonderful example from Jonah 4:7. God provided, prepared, appointed, sent a worm. For his purposes and for his glory.

another thought for the day

Charles Spurgeon from Reformation 21:

“Winter in the soul is by no means a comfortable season, and if it be upon thee just now it will be very painful to thee; but there is this comfort, namely, that the Lord makes it. He sends the sharp blasts of adversity to nip the buds of expectation: He scattereth the hoar-frost like ashes over the once verdant meadows of our joy: He casteth forth his ice like morsels freezing the streams of our delight. He does it all, He is the great Winter King, and rules in the realms of frost, and therefore thou canst not murmur. Losses, crosses, heaviness, sickness, poverty, and a thousand other ills, are of the Lord’s sending, and come to us with wise design.” (Morning and Evening)

we must get this

here again is a link to John MacArthur’s two part message on God and evil. if you only have 25 minutes, then listen to part two only. Unfortunately, the free listening of the message is no longer available. They cost money (2 dollars) to download, but are worth it.

originally posted on 8/27. everyone needs to listen to part two at this link. seriously.

if God is sovereign over all like He says He is in Ephesians 1:11, then it necessarily follows that God wills that evil exist.

“God wills evil to exist. (without being evil)” according to the Ligonier ministries blog, that is how John MacArthur begins the two sermons linked here. UPDATE: the quoted phrase comes at the beginning of the second message.

I am going to give these messages a listen this morning and this evening.

UPDATE: The first message was only 24 minutes long. Mainly it consisted of establishing with scripture that God is sovereign over all things. That everything is part of His plan.

oooo! part 2 starts out with a kick.

UPDATE II: Excellent 2nd message as well. as you would expect from John MacArthur, it is mostly just straight scripture. If you don’t start from the assumption that the Bible is God’s word to us and that our job is to figure out what it says and get under it, then you will not get these messages. if you do start from that assumption, then it is a wrasslin’ match. ding, ding. let the match begin.

we must KNOW this Christ

this is the Christ we must know:

parting question. does the supremacy of Christ recited here give you comfort? or does it provoke some other emotion? Just asking.

hat tip to Vitamin Z

calvinism and evangelism

Tim Challies has a long detailed look at calvinism and evangelism that is well worth reading for those who do not understand why someone who believes in sovereign grace feels the need to spread the good news of the gospel far and wide.

Here is the question Tim is answering.

“Given the tenets of total depravity (the spiritually dead are unable to choose God), unconditional election (saved through God’s sovereign choice) and irresistible grace (once God chooses you and regenerates you, you can’t NOT embrace Him)… what does a Calvinist see as the purpose of proclaiming the Gospel? Does a gospel presentation simply provide the context in which God ‘pulls the trigger’ of regeneration and faith for those He has already chosen? (cf Acts 13:48.)”

Tim notes that:

This question introduces an apparent antinomy–an appearance of contradiction between conclusions which seem equally logical, reasonable or necessary. The antinomy we face is what we perceive as tension between God’s sovereignty and human responsibility. In short, how does our responsibility to evangelize interact with God’s absolute sovereignty in the salvation of souls?

Tim then shares what christians do not have a responsibility to do in witnessing and what we do have responsibility to accomplish.

and then he gives this paragraph which is key.

To be consistent with Reformed theology we must say that if a person is one of the elect, he will come to faith and repentance. It is divinely predestined that this will happen and it is impossible for it not to happen. But God has not shared with us two vital pieces of information. He has not told us just who the elect are and how they will be brought to repentance. He has decreed that we are to share the message with everyone, in every way possible (within the bounds He sets in His Word). Charles Spurgeon once said “if all the elect had a white stripe on their backs I would quit preaching and begin lifting shirt tails” (or something to that effect). God has not put a visible mark on the elect, so we are to treat all men as if they are among the elect, and are to share the Gospel far and wide. We need to share it with a sense of urgency.

we must implore those we know to be reconciled to God and we must do so today.

Tim’s conclusion is right on the money.

Ultimately we need to understand that God has not seen fit to share with us exactly how human responsibility and Divine sovereignty interact in evangelism. While we need to always remember that God is the only one who can bring about salvation, He has decreed that we will be the instruments He uses to take the Good News to the world. And that is what we must do, all the while asking God to equip us to be worthy ambassadors for Him.

more on Prayer

Here is part 2 of R. C. Sproul’s article on prayer. (I mentioned part 1 here)

In this one he asks two questions. Does prayer change God’s mind? Does prayer change things? The answer he gives is different for each one. Go read the whole thing with bonus quotes from Jonathan Edwards.

key paragraph

No human being has ever had a more profound understanding of divine sovereignty than Jesus. No man ever prayed more fiercely or more effectively. Even in Gethsemane he requested an option, a different way. When the request was denied, he bowed to the Father’s will. The very reason we pray is because of God’s sovereignty, because we believe that God has it within his power to order things according to his purpose. That is what sovereignty is all about–ordering things according to God’s purpose. So then, does prayer change God’s mind? No! Does prayer change things? Yes, of course!

and conclusion

All that God does is for his glory first and for our benefit second. We pray because God commands us to pray, because it glorifies him, and because it benefits us.