94-13 Suffering: Faith on Trial – Is God Omnipotent?

The following sermon by Dr. Chuck F. Betters is from a 7-part series on suffering.

In this scripture-packed sermon series, Dr. Chuck F. Betters walks suffering believers into the honest, holy language of the Psalms, where God’s people bring their doubts, fears, questions, and grief into the presence of the Lord. Beginning with Psalm 73, Chuck helps listeners wrestle with the questions pain often raises: Is God truly sovereign? Is He perfectly good? Why do the wicked seem to prosper while God’s people suffer? This series reveals the building blocks of a shabby belief system, like proof-texting, a lack of understanding of the omnipotence and goodness of God in an evil world, and then builds a theology of suffering that is more than a belief system. Such a strong biblical understanding of suffering equips God’s people to turn to Him when crisis comes. It points hurting hearts to the steady love of Christ, the purposes of God that cannot be shaken, and the comforting truth that in our weakest moments, we are held securely in His grip.

Transcript

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Welcome to In His Grip with Dr. Chuck F. Betters, produced by Mark Ink Ministries. Each in his grip message is designed to help turn your hearts toward Jesus and equip you to walk by faith. Let's join Dr. Betters as he preaches today's message.

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Please take your Bibles and turn with me to Psalm 73. The pathway of suffering for the Christian nearly always leads us into the Psalms. Primarily, I think, because we can identify with the psalmist. Or human doubt, uncertainty of some sort? And their eyes seem to be wide opened as you read these psalms to the prosperity or seeming prosperity of the wicked. Again and again in the Psalms, you read that question: Why are the wicked prospering? Why are you so far from me, O Lord? Why have you cast me away? The characteristics of the Psalms seem to be the remarkable honesty of men who tell the truth about themselves. They're transparent in their honesty. All the facades are stripped away. They get down to the core of their doubts. Down into the heartbeat of their uncertainties. No clearer illustration can be given than we find in Psalm 73. Look at verse 1, written by Asaph. Surely God is good to Israel, to those who are pure in heart. Now I have this underlined in my Bible. But as for me, as for Asaph, my feet had almost slipped. I had nearly lost my foothold. Now notice how desperate it gets. Verses 21 and 22. Drop down for a moment, then we'll come back. When my heart was grieved and my spirit embittered. I was senseless, foolish, and ignorant. I was a brute beast before you. Now this man calls himself bitter, senseless or foolish, ignorant and a brute beast before God. Now you can't get much more honest than that. That is real honesty. That's why to me the Psalms are so encouraging. There is nothing more discouraging than meeting up with Christians whose lives or who live in denial as though life were meant to be lived from some sort of mystical mountaintop. Thank God for real people like the psalmist who gutted themselves and vented their doubts and confessed their sins and labored before God on the questions of pain and sorrow. Now, some people are willing to confess such things as the psalmist in order to demonstrate how humble they are, but not the psalmist. They tell us the plain truth about what happened to them, not some sort of show of, quote, spirituality, but to reflect the glory and the grace that God has given to them that became operative through their pain and through their sorrow. Now you notice how he starts. What his beginning point is, where he jumps off from, the springboard. He starts off by saying, Surely God is good to Israel, to those who are pure in heart. Now that's a good place to start. Verse 3, I envied the arrogant. And by the way, as you read this, think about yourself. If you ask these same questions, I have, I can tell you right up front, I have asked these questions. For I envied the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. They have no struggles. Their bodies are healthy and strong. They are free from the burdens common to man. They are not plagued by human ills, therefore, pride is their necklace, they clothe themselves with violence. From their callous hearts comes iniquity. The evil conceits of their minds know no limits. They scoff, they speak with malice. In their arrogance, they threaten oppression. Their mouths lay claim to heaven, and their tongues take possession of earth. Therefore, their people turn to them and drink up waters in abundance. They say, How can God know? Does the Most High have knowledge? Underline that, we'll come back to that. This is what the wicked are like, always carefree. They increase in wealth. Now that doesn't mean that everybody who has wealth is wicked. That's not what the psalmist is saying. Surely, in vain have I kept my heart pure. In vain have I washed my hands in innocence. All day long I have been plagued, underlying this. I have been punished every morning. If I had said I will speak thus, I would have betrayed your children. When I tried to understand all of this, it was oppressive to me. And then there's a turning point in the Psalm. And here is the turning point. Until I entered the sanctuary of God. Then I understood their final destiny. Surely you place them, how appropriate this morning, on slippery ground. You cast them down to ruin. How suddenly are they destroyed, completely swept away by terrors. As a dream when one awakes, so when you arise, O Lord, you will despise them as fantasies. When my heart was grieved and my spirit embittered, I was senseless and ignorant. I was a brute beast before you, yet I am always with you. You hold me. Notice who's doing the holding here. You hold me by my right hand. Ever since our son died, I've signed every letter I've written in his grip. Because that's where I am. In his grip. It's not me holding on to him. As a little child, it's God holding on to me. That's what the psalmist is saying. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you take me into glory. Whom have I in heaven but you, and earth has nothing I desire. Can you say that this morning? Can you honestly sit here this morning and say that this earth has absolutely nothing you desire but Him? My flesh and my heart fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Those who are far from you, they will perish. You destroy all who are unfaithful to you. But as for me, it is good to be near God. I have made the sovereign Lord my refuge. I will tell of all your deeds. Now, if you understood that psalm, you won't need this sermon series on suffering. But I think you don't understand the psalm, and that's why we're going to go through the next several weeks talking about faith on trial. I've entitled this particular message in the series, Is God Omnipotent? Well, you would sit there intellectually as I would and say, well, of course God is all-powerful. Of course he is all-powerful. You notice the Psalms, they generally start with the conclusion. Read some of the Psalms, some of the early Psalms especially, and certainly Psalm 73. The psalmist starts with his conclusion. Surely God is a sovereign God. But then he takes the next 20 verses or so to complain against God and to express the doubts that he has that God truly is sovereign. And then he comes back to his conclusion at the end and talks about the various turning points in his life. This is the great exegetical tool of the psalmist, to convey up front the truth discovered and then to explain how they got there. And that's exactly what Asaph is doing. He begins with the conclusion that God is good to his people, that is, to those who are pure in heart. Here, in this verse, in this passage, Asaph is very much like you and I are, through the journeys of life with spiritual experiences and struggles that I know for me have raised great questions, and I know for you raised great questions. He starts out on the right note with a sound expression of faith, then he goes astray and wanders into a virtual field of doubt and uncertainty, even depression and anger. But then he takes us on this excursion and returns us to the conclusion, and he's very careful to tell us how he got there. And this is why the Psalms are so precious to suffering saints. They come from real people with real issues of faith, and these kinds of psalms show us how we can gain or regain our soul's composure. You know, I think Christians need a biblical theology on suffering. We need to put it all into a perspective that is biblical. And so I raise the $64,000 question. Here it is. Why does God allow pain and evil? You ever asked that question? I know if you haven't, certainly somebody to whom you have witnessed, who is not a Christian, inevitably will raise the question. How does God allow or why does he allow pain and evil? Is he omnipotent or isn't he? That's really what they're asking. Is God omnipotent or isn't he? Now listen carefully, as we help to frame this theology, listen carefully. We believe as Christians that God is both omnipotent, that is all powerful, and that he is perfectly good. Anybody have a problem with that? God is omnipotent and God is perfectly good, then how can he permit evil? Reason this through with me. If he is willing but unable to check the evil in the world, follow me? If he is willing but unable to check the evil in the world, then he is not omnipotent. Right? Isn't that how we would reason? If God is willing but unable to check the evil in the world, then he is not really omnipotent. Or put it on the other side of the coin. If he is able, but unwilling to check the evil, then he is not perfectly good. Yet we maintain that he's both omnipotent and perfectly good. These lines of reasoning will call into question the very existence of God. If he is able and if he is willing, then how do we justify that he is both omnipotent and perfectly good when evil and suffering continue in the world? And Christians who suddenly become aware of suffering, and I say suddenly underscoring it, suddenly become aware of suffering and suddenly become aware of evil, face the pressure of questions and doubts, and you know what we normally do? We bottle those doubts up out of fear of losing the respect of other Christians or of being a bad witness to the lost. We don't want to in any way infringe upon either the goodness of God or the omnipotence of God. And so we bottle all of it up inside. As if God cannot defend himself. Since we feel powerless to defend him in the face of or against the backdrop of sudden suffering or sudden pain, then we hold it all inside. After all, to question God is a sin, isn't it? Isn't that how we reason? Something must be wrong with my belief system if I have these questions about either God's omnipotence or God's goodness. This is why, listen, this is why it is critical. Especially, especially, especially in the light of the fact that we may be very well living in the last days and will be exposed to even greater and greater forms of pain and evil, that we have a solidly biblically based belief system and a theological understanding of pain and suffering before we become the victims of evil's onslaught. You need to know up front what you believe. Is your God omnipotent? And is your God perfectly good? Now, this does not mean we will not doubt, but with a biblically based theology of suffering, we will at least have some handles and some parameters that will sustain us even through some of the darkest moments we'll have to face. In those dark moments, Christians want more than assurance that their beliefs are consistent. I know I did. I knew what I believed. I know what I believe. I know what my doctrine teaches me. But I needed more than to know that my doctrinal system is correct. You see. I think suffering people, we want more than assurance that the theology we hold is true. We want to be able to draw comfort from the living God Himself, from the direct application of the Holy Spirit's presence. The felt experience of the love of a Father who has invaded us with some form of suffering, but has not explained his reasons for doing so. We want him to touch us, even beyond our theology. You know, to saints about to endure great pain and sorrow, it's amazing to me that the Apostle Paul or Peter or any other the great evangelist offers no self-help book on 22 ways of how to stand against the pressures of life. Nor do they tell us to get your act together and tough it out. Go to the local bookstores, and you know what you're gonna find? Book after book after book after book that tells you how to do this and how to do that and how to do the other thing. Go over to Ephesians chapter 3. I want to show you what Paul says we are supposed to do. That's where we are going to get our greatest comfort and assurance is not in 22 easy steps to overcoming death, or 22 easy steps to overcoming suffering, or 22 easy steps in order to overcome this, that, or the other thing. Ephesians 3, verse 14. For this reason, Ephesians 3, 14, I kneel before the Father, from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth, notice where his family is, his families in heaven and his families on earth, derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray, watch this now, that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power. Together with all the saints, now underline these next phrases, to grasp how high and wide and long and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses your theological belief system. My translation. That you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than we ask or imagine, according to his power that is worked within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ through Jesus through all generations forever and ever. Amen. Notice what he's saying there. It goes beyond knowledge, it goes beyond your belief system. What he's saying is that God, the Holy Spirit, desires to make specific application of his grace to you as a father, hold you, as Asaph said, in his grip. That's assurance. Now there's one word I picked up there in Ephesians 3. Notice where he says, where I told you to underline, to grasp. How long and wide and high and deep is the love of Christ. Underscore that word grasp. I looked at that word. I thought, well, I wonder if that's really what the word means, grasp. In the King James Version, I think the translation is comprehend, that you may comprehend. The NIV says grasp. And I think both translations do significant injustice to what Paul is saying here. In the Greek, the word means to take something eagerly, to seize something in order to possess it. There's a note of urgency in the Greek. As I understand the word, it's the picture of I'm walking on a cliff, and I see this beautiful, beautiful panoramic view of all the valleys down below, hundreds of feet below, and I'm walking on the cliff, and suddenly I come to the very edge of the cliff. I'm standing there, and what is underneath me, the ground underneath me, gives way. And down I go. And as I'm traversing through space on my way to my death, there's a tree, and I grasp it. I get a hold of that tree. Now, how do you think I'm going to hold on to that tree? I'm going to tenaciously and feverishly, that tree becomes my lifeline. That's the word grasp. That's the essence of the word grasp. Paul is saying to suffering people, he is saying that your theology of suffering has to be greater than a belief system, that you need to grasp onto a truth. That is, that God Himself wants to express personal and specific love and commitment and hold you in his grip. He's the tree that sustains us. Searching, if you will, for a branch, a twig, anything that will break the fall, grasping. Go over to First. 1 Corinthians chapter 9. You'll see this word used another way. 1 Corinthians 9. Look with me at verse 24. Paul's talking about running races. You know that famous passage? We all know that famous passage about running the race. Only one gets the prize. Notice 1 Corinthians 9 24. Do you not know that in a race all the runners run? But only one gets the prize. Run in such a way as to grasp. That's the word. Run in such a way as to get the prize. Now we're all tuned into the Olympics now, aren't we? Do you know? I'm sure you do if you follow anything about the Olympics, especially when you get to summer type games when there's a lot of racing going on, and even with some of the power skaters and some of the speed skaters, do you know like 0.01 seconds is the difference between a winner and a loser? I mean, you lunge for the tape, you lunge for the wire, you thrust yourself because there are others running the race, but only one will get the prize. That's the word. It's that surge, it's that leaping, that throwing of yourself forward. And what are we throwing ourselves into? The love of Christ. The love of Jesus. Go over to Philippians chapter 3. Let's take one more look at that word. Philippians chapter 3. Look with me at verse 12. And you're going to see something, because there's a variation on the word here that I think helps us to understand it a little better. Philippians 3, verse 12. Not that I have already obtained. Now that's the same word. It's not something we lunge after as though we're grasping at air or swatting at flies, but it's something that we actually grasp or reach out to that we do obtain. It's not the flailing of our hands in the air, it's actually possessing something. But he says, not that I've already obtained all this or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus holds me in his grip, my translation, took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do, forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, and he goes on and talks about that. Here's the picture of Paul saying, in one sense, I've grasped it, but in another sense, I've not yet attained it. There's a dimension of the love of Christ that we can only in our frail bodies, in our weak, human, limited ways, fully comprehend. There's only a smidgen of the love of God that we can fully comprehend in this life. And we grasp on to that and we hold on to that. But what Paul's saying is that's only a measure, that's only a drop in the bucket compared to the degree to which God is going to reveal Himself to me in the life to come. Grasp it. Get a hold of it. Get a feel for it. In fact, in 1 Thessalonians, you don't have to turn to this 5-4, the Apostle Paul uses that same word, grasping, to talk about being surprised by something. He says, brothers, you're not in darkness, so that this day, the day of the coming of the Lord, should not surprise you. Same word, like a thief. So there's an element of surprise in the word grasp. There's an element of the already and the not yet in the word grasp. I already have, but I don't really have. I'm holding on to, but I'm not really holding on to. Something's holding on to me. I have something now, but there is more to come. And it is in that context the Apostle Paul turns to suffering people and he says, Now I want you to grasp. I want you to comprehend. I want you to lunge toward. I want you to obtain. I want you to use. I want you to hold in your grip the love, the depth, the height, the width, the length of God's love and compassion for you. Your belief system is just not enough. There's more to it than that. You see the essence of the word? It involves a straining after, a seizing control of something, a surprise element. There's even surprise in it. Because you see, God delights in revealing more to us of himself than we expected. Sometimes we don't really expect God to reveal much of himself to us. But then he does. In surprising us with his love. In fact, when we are most grieved and in the greatest danger or suffering, when the intensity of the heat gets turned up the hottest, then I believe we are most in his grasp. Remember holding your little children by the hand as you're crossing a street? How many of you have done this? Your child darts away from you. You're holding their hand very loosely, they dart away from you, they're ready to cross the street, and you see a car coming. What do you say? What do you do? Oh Johnny, would you please come back here? You should never, never, never, never do that, as he's about to be killed. No, what do you do? You strain after and you grab hold in a way that you never grabbed hold before. Why? Because he's in danger. He's in trouble. I believe that's the love of God for us. I believe when we are most grieved and suffering with the greatest degree of intensity, when Satan turns up the temperature in the kitchen, I believe the tight grip of God becomes even tighter. Why? Because we're tempted to let go. We're tempted to allow all the doubts that Asaph had, all the emerging questions that the world throws at us. Well, God, where are you? How could you say you love me? How could you be omnipotent? And all these horrible things happen, and God's holding tighter and tighter and tighter. I want to give ample testimony to that. Because when we are least in his grip, we are actually most in his grip. Paul says to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Wow, what a wonderful picture. Now, let me hasten to say this. This is not to say that our belief system is irrelevant, that our doctrine is irrelevant. In fact, just the opposite. It is even more relevant as we are engaged by the love of God. That is, our belief system becomes usable. And that's the problem, I think, with too many of us in our doctrinal understandings. Christian beliefs are not to be stacked in some sort of emotional warehouse, but our belief system is to be tested and proven and applied and handled in real-life situations. Otherwise, they bring us no comfort, they bring no godliness, we have no more courage, there is no humility, there is no joy, there's no other fruit of the Spirit, because our belief system is neatly tucked away over here in the corner, and we fail to understand the experiential dimensions of faith under fire. Now there are some false assumptions that contribute to a shabby belief system. Some false assumptions, number two under that point, some false assumptions that contribute to a shabby belief system. If God, listen, if God is my heavenly father, who has loved me with an everlasting love, then why, says Asaph, does he seem to bless those who hate him and treat me as though I'm the enemy? Isn't that what Asaph's asking? But as for me, verse 2 of Psalm 73, my feet had almost slipped. I nearly lost my foothold, for I envied the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. They have no struggles, their bodies are healthy and strong, they are free from the burdens common to man, they're not plagued by human ills. Fundamental to those kinds of questions are some missteps that not only Asaph took, but we take. Let me give you some of those missteps. At the top of the list, I think is an imbalanced view of Scripture. An imbalanced view of Scripture. The heroes of the Bible are seemingly men and women of faith who always rise above their circumstances, or at least they seem to, don't they? Always in faith, walking off, rejoicing in the God of their salvation. But I gotta tell you something, we're only reading the end of the story. We look at the end of Abraham and the end of Isaac and the end of Jacob and the end of the great apostles, and we look at the kind of faith that now we can look back on and say, boy, I wish I had that kind of faith. But let me tell you something. That kind of faith does not come without a very, very, very heavy price tag. A very heavy price tag. We look at David, we say, Oh, here's a man after God's own heart. But he had to lose a child in the process. I know what that feels like. I know why he went up into the mountain and rent his clothes and all of Israel could hear him grieve. I know why this man needed a good, swift kick in the backside to get him back on track. Because he was so engulfed and he was so possessed by the grief and the loss of his child. You see, David's faith didn't just happen. It wasn't just created in a vacuum, it came through the experience of human suffering. Or we look at Job. We say, wow, isn't it wonderful how God doubled his wealth. He doubled all of his possessions. He made him more powerful and more famous. He even gave him ten more children. We say, isn't that wonderful what God did? Wow, I wish I could have the faith of Job, but did it ever occur to you that Job and his wife lived the rest of their lives in grief? They lost ten children. And those ten children had names. Ten of their children were killed. We say, well, God gave them back ten. You think God giving back ten replaces the grief of the ten that he lost? If you believe that, you never experienced grief. Say, ah, I want to be like Job, but you see, there was a price tag. Or we say, Samson, the great mighty man of Israel, yet we fail to see that he ended his life with his eyes plucked out and committed suicide. Or Elijah. Oh, if I could be like Elijah. Oh, I wish I could call fire down from heaven like Elijah did. I wish I could be taken up in a chariot like Elijah was. Oh, I wish I could have a smidgeon of the faith of Elijah. And I do too. But you know there was a price tag on that. Elijah suffered from bouts of depression. Not the least of which was the one in the cave, where he wished that his life had been taken, where he wished and cursed the day he'd ever been born. Oh, I wish I could be like Elijah. You see, there's a heavy price tag on being a hero of the faith. Balanced theology has a clear view of both sides of the coin. Absolute dependence upon the love of God, that's over here, and heavy artillery fire from the kingdom of hell, that's over here. And if you want to be a hero of the faith, you've got to take both. You can't just bathe in the love of God, you've also got to be able to stand against the attacks that come out of the kingdom of hell. So many of us have an imbalanced view of scripture, and it shapes a shabby belief system. Secondly, sometimes we may bow to the tyranny of the urgent. We bow to the tyranny of the urgent. You say, what do you mean? God ought to alleviate my struggles. When? Now. Right now. Any delays calls into question either his promises or his love. But have you ever noticed how God dealt with the giants of faith? Moses, want to be like Moses? He had to live for 40 years on the backside of the desert. You know, that man's life didn't begin until he was 80. It didn't begin until he was 80. Joseph had to wait nearly 20 years for vindication from false charges. Even the anguish of the saints under the altar in heaven seems long and arduous. You ever read Revelation 6, 9, and 10? This is coming from the saints who are under the altar in heaven. When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they had maintained. They called out in a long voice, listen what they're saying. How long, sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood. Even coming from underneath the altar. You see, God is not constrained by our timetables. His timing is always, listen, always in accordance with a predestined plan and purpose. Go over to the book of Acts. Let's take a little tour. God does nothing without a purpose. Nothing without a purpose. And a shabby belief system nearly always thrusts us into the tyranny of the urgent. God, you must do this and you must do it now. But please walk through these verses with me. I'm not going to comment much on them, but I want you to pick up a theme that runs through these verses. Acts chapter 2. Look with me at verse 23. Now this is Peter standing up, ready to preach a message. He says, this man, referring to Jesus, verse 23, was handed over to you by God's, what's the next word? Set. Set. Purpose and foreknowledge. And you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross. Did it ever occur to you that even the evil acts of men are under God's sovereign care and watchful eye? Same book, chapter 13, Acts chapter 13. Look with me at verse 36. What a wonderful verse. Verse 36. For when David had served God's purpose in his own generation, he fell asleep or died. He was buried with his father's and his body decayed. Why did David exist? For God's own purposes. That's why he existed. That's why you exist. The book of Romans, chapter 9. I gotta tell you, there's mystery in these two verses. Mystery in these two verses. Verse 11, verse 12, Romans chapter 9, yet God is speaking now of Jacob and Esau, the sons of Isaac, the ones who would carry on the promises of the covenant. Notice what he says there in verse 11. Yet before the twins, and they were twins, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad. In other words, not based on what Jacob or Esau did, God did not prescribe this based on what kind of men they would turn out to be. But the reason God did what Paul is going to say he did in selecting Jacob and rejecting Esau, the reason he did that is not because of the goodness or the badness in either of these boys. In fact, he says, neither had they done anything good or bad in order that God's purpose in election might stand. There's that purpose again, not by works, but by him who calls, she was told the older, that's Esau, will serve the younger. That's Jacob. Now, why did God choose Jacob over Esau? Because he had a purpose. Does he tell us what that purpose is? Absolutely not. You know why? He doesn't owe you that. He does not owe you that. In fact, from a human point of view, and I tell every membership class we have when we study these verses, from a human point of view, which one should have been chosen? Esau. Hair on his chest, muscles, man's man. Jacob walked around in a dress, real sissy, smooth skin, didn't know how to work, sat like a mama's boy. Esau was the hunter, the man's man. And from a human perspective, you'd look at that and you'd say, why in the world did God choose this loser when he had this winner? Because from their perspective, and from a human perspective, although it makes sense to us, from God's perspective it doesn't. I know that's one question I'm going to ask when I get to heaven. I have a whole bunch of questions. But one question I'm going to ask when I get to heaven is, why did you choose Jacob and not choose Esau? Why is Jacob in heaven and Esau in hell? And why was that choice made even before the twins were born? Explain that to me. Well, you know, the Apostle Paul in Romans 9 presupposes you're going to ask that question. He says, Well, now wait a minute. Is God unfair? Read on. Is God unfair? Notice what the Apostle Paul doesn't do. He doesn't say, Read my book. You'll find it in the library, and it explains the sovereignty of God in 22 easy steps. Notice where Paul stops, where you and I should stop. There are mysteries of the Godhead we will never, ever comprehend. I have no idea why. He chose Jacob and didn't choose Esau. The Apostle Paul stands up and he says, Here's where you need to stop. Who are you, O man, that you would reply against God? Shall the thing formed say to the one who formed it, Why have you made me thus? You see where Paul stops? He bows in holy adoration to a sovereign God. And you know why he did that? Because he was so eternally grateful that God had chosen him. Of all the people on the face of the earth that God should have chosen, he should not have chosen the Apostle Paul. That's at least how Paul thought. And rightfully so. And that's where you and I need to be. Look at the same chapter, verse 17. For the scripture says to Pharaoh, now he goes back, talks about Mr. Pharaoh. Remember Pharaoh? Ten plagues, all that other stuff? Cecil B the Mill, remember all that? I raised you up for this very purpose. God said to Pharaoh, I raised you up for this purpose. I brought you to this point, and here's the purpose. That I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth. Do you mean that God could use a heathen like Pharaoh to proclaim his name? He says, I raised Pharaoh up. Pharaoh did evil things. I raised you up. Why? I have a purpose. I have a plan. Go over to 2 Corinthians chapter 5. I said I wasn't going to comment on these. I guess I lied. 2 Corinthians 5. I can't help it. These are just so powerful, these verses. 2 Corinthians 5, verse 5. Underline this. You can put your name in there. Now it is God who made me for this very purpose and has given me the Spirit as a deposit guaranteeing what is to come. God has a purpose for me. And he gave me his Holy Spirit as a down payment of what is to come. I have the Holy Spirit guaranteeing, as a down payment, He's the cosigner. He has put the down payment in the blood of Christ applied to my heart through the Holy Spirit for what is to come. And what is to come is a part of God's plan and purpose for me. Ephesians chapter 1 and verse 11. Ephesians 1, 11. In him, we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will. Now there's two words in there I want you to know. And what do you think those two words are? Immediately you're going to say predestined, and I'm going to say, no, those aren't the two words I want you to look at. There's two words there that I think highlight the essence of predestination. Plan and what? Purpose. God's plan and God's purpose. That's the phrase. That's the key. That's the heartbeat of what he's trying to say. You have been predestined as God's elect people for a plan and a purpose that belongs only to God, and that plan and that purpose includes your suffering. It includes your pain. You don't have to like it. But you ought to submit to it and learn to love Him through that pain and that suffering. Same book, chapter 3. He says the same identical thing. We have been called for a purpose. Look at verse 10. His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms according to his eternal purpose, which he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord. God has a purpose. Paul would say the same thing in Philippians 2, 12 and 13. He would say the same thing in 2 Timothy 1, 8 and 9. He would say the same thing in Hebrews 6, 17, the writer of Hebrews would. John would say in Revelation 17, 17, for God has put it into their hearts to accomplish his purpose by agreeing to give the beast their full power to rule until God's words are fulfilled. What John is saying that God has even given to Satan the power to rule, so that his purposes may be accomplished. That boggles my mind. Strange as this might sound. You know what that's saying to me? The evil, the evil and corruption of world governments, civil magistrates, political rulers, evil empires, whether they be Babylon or Persia or Rome or Greece or Clinton or any of the others, whatever they might be, those powers that men claim to possess for themselves, those evil systems of government and rule are absolutely under the control of God's plan and purpose, which he ordained before the foundation of the world. He hasn't wound up the clock, turned the world loose, stood back and allowed it to run. That's deism, and we're not deists. He stood before Pilate, and Pilate said, What? Don't you know I have the power to put you to death? What did Jesus say? Oh, please, Mr. Pilate, I beg of you, please don't put me to death. You have no power. I believe fire may have come out of his eyes. You have no power unless I gave it to you. And then Peter would stand up like the same coward, become a lightning bolt for Christ. He would stand up and say, by the predeterminate counsel of God, wicked men, you have put him to death. But God was in control. You see, we tend to key in, and that's the third point under there, and we'll stop here. We tend to key in on and proof-text certain verses. I told you I would mention Romans 8.28. That's one of the verses that we use. That's an imbalanced view of scripture. It's a shabby belief system. It's proof-texting at its best. What do we say? And we know that all things God works for the good of those who love him who have been called according to his purpose. There it is, doesn't it say all things? And doesn't it say for the good of the elect? Yet in the context of Romans 8.28, bookends, in front of and behind Romans 8.28, what do we have? A picture of human suffering. He says in verses 22 and 23 of Romans 8, we know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth, right up unto the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have been the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we await eagerly our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. And then on the other side of the book ends, Romans 8, 35 and 36, who shall separate us from the love of Christ shall trouble, hardship, persecution, famine. Anybody suffer from famine here? Nakedness, danger, sword, as it is written, for your sake we face death all day long, and are considered as sheep to be slaughtered. Groaning and moaning, not only of the earth, but as children of God awaiting our adoption. And then on the other side, nakedness and peril and sword, hardship and difficulty. What shall we say in response to all this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He did not spare his own son, but gave him up for us all. How will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against God's elect? And he goes on, it's God who justifies, it is he who condemns. Christ Jesus, who died more than that, who was raised from life, is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. It is into that context, into that context of pain and suffering and heartache and grief and death and groaning and moaning that he says, all things work together for good to them who love God. You can't just claim the good without the suffering. What have we said? Well, we have said that there are some false assumptions that contribute to a shabby belief system, an imbalanced view of Scripture, bowing to the tyranny of the urgent, proof texting certain key verses. I think that's a very dangerous thing to do. And we'll pick that up the next time we're together.

SPEAKER_02 51:44

Now may the grace of God, the love of our Lord and our Savior, Jesus the Christ, the very presence, person, and power of his Holy Spirit abide with each of you now until Christ comes again and forevermore. And all God's people.