Our relationship with God is obviously dependent on the covenant we have with him. But we also need to be aware of the nature of God himself, as our thinking on this will also affect our relationship. David said
One thing God has spoken, two things have I heard: that you, O God, are strong, and that you, O Lord, are loving
(Ps 62:11-12).
Here I want to look at the first characteristic mentioned her - God's strength. What do we understand by saying God is strong? Is he like a superhero, with more power than the rest of us, or does being God mean something more fundamental than that?
David said:
God is the King of all the earth; ... God reigns over the nations; God is seated on his holy throne.
(Ps 47:7,8).
The Lord has established his throne in heaven, and his kingdom rules over all
(Ps 103:19).
These statements tell us that God is a king, but what do we understand by that? An earthly king has authority and issues decrees, which are obeyed insofar as his subjects are willing and able. But this picture, like that of the superhero, seems to be an inadequate description of God.
David went further in his praise to the Lord:
Yours, O Lord, is the greatness, and the power, and the glory and the majesty and the splendour, for everything in heaven and earth is yours. Yours, O Lord, is the kingdom; you are exalted as head over all. Wealth and honour come from you, you are the ruler of all things. In your hands are strength and power to exalt and give strength to all (1 Chron 29:11-12).
This is saying that God rules everything, and that he bestows wealth, honour and strength as he wishes. So he must be controlling circumstances and events in order to grant such privileges.
When God answered Job in chapters 38 to 41 of the book of that name, he didn't explain to Job why he had to suffer as he had. The whole speech from God was about God's power and Job's impotence. God orders the morning and the dawn to appear. He reserves the snow for times of trouble. He makes channels for rain and storm; thunderbolts report to him and he even fathers the dew. He provides food for lions and ravens. Job, on the other hand, cannot do any of this. He is powerless. He cannot control the wild ox, the eagle, the behemoth or leviathan, and, by implication, God can.
There seems to be a level of control described here that is more than God creating the world and the laws of physics, and then letting nature take its course. God is seen here intervening in the sunrise, the weather, and animal welfare. He asks Job
Does the eagle soar at your command?
(Job 39:27).
The answer is obviously
No
,
but also, by implication, the eagle does soar at God's command.
Who can speak and have it happen if the Lord has not decreed it? Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that both calamities and good things come?
(Lam 3:37-38).
Here is further witness that happenings require a decree from the Lord before they can take place.
Isaiah chapter 45 supports the sovereignty of God. God uses Cyrus as a tool for his own purposes, and claims sovereignty over prosperity and disaster:
I summon you by name and bestow on you a title of honour, though you do not acknowledge me. I am the Lord, and there is no other, apart from me there is no God. I will strengthen you, though you have not acknowledged me, so that from the rising of the sun to the place of its setting men may know there is none besides me. I am the Lord, and there is no other. I form the light and create darkness, I bring prosperity and create disaster; I, The Lord, do all these things (v4-7).
He then goes on to liken God to a potter, and man to clay:
Woe to him who quarrels with his Maker, to him who is but a potsherd among the potsherds on the ground. Does the clay say to the potter,
What are you making?
Does your work say,
He has no hands
?
Woe to him who says to his father
What have you begotten?
or to his mother,
What have you brought to birth?
(v9,10).
In the next chapter he expresses his sovereignty, his purpose, and his planning even more forcefully:
Remember this, fix it in mind, take it to heart, you rebels. Remember the former things, those of long ago; I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me. I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come. I say: My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please. From the east I summon a bird of prey; from a far-off land, a man to fulfil my purpose. What I have said, that will I bring about; what I have planned, that will I do (Isa 46:8-11).
An example of God planning the course of history is the story of Jacob's son, Joseph. He told his brothers:
You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good
(Gen 50:20).
It was his brothers that sold him as a slave, not God. It was Potiphar who had him jailed after his wife accused him, not God. Yet Joseph said
God intended it.
Where was God all this time? Having all that he intended come to pass! In other words, God controlled this sequence of events to perfection. Behind all the human agents that we read about was God's intent. Note that it was not a case of God making the best of a bad situation, nor of his coming to the rescue after a period of absence, even though that may be how it seemed at the time. Each circumstance was as intended by God.
Jesus, sending out the twelve, said:
Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father
(Matt 10:29).
Some translations omit
the will of
here, and understandably so, because the phrase is not there in the original. The implication, however, is that it wouldn't happen without the Father's active participation or enablement, as when we say
I couldn't have done it without you
.
If we accept this then it means that the will of God is involved despite it concerning something which to us is relatively insignificant, a sparrow worth a halfpenny. God is in control of the smallest detail. But there is another ramification of this. It would seem to us that the death of a sparrow is in the natural course of events. Sparrows die. So we learn further that God's will is involved despite the existence of natural laws which we assume are normally governing the situation. Of course, if a sparrow survives supernaturally, we can see God taking a hand. But whether a death follows the normal course of nature or not, God's will is involved. He authorises the death of each one.
The terms
election
and
the elect
,
which mean the process of choosing, or those chosen, are mentioned throughout the New Testament. They tell us that God is in control of who gets saved, as do references to predestination
(Rom 8:29,30; Eph 1:5,11).
This is strong confirmation of the Sovereignty of God.
The conclusion from all of this is that God is running the whole show, and that consequently he is ultimately responsible for everything. Natural disasters, as mentioned above in Isaiah 45:7, are included. So insurance companies are technically correct when they call them
Acts of God
,
but only in this sense, that
every
event is an act of God! Nothing is excluded, meaning that the actions of evil men; the deeds of Satan; and our own actions and sins are covered too.
Some will be keen to latch on to this last point and take the opportunity to blame God for their own errors. Many others will see this interpretation to be taking things too far, since we know that God disapproves of sin and Satan. and holds perpetrators responsible. In summary, there is a great deal of scriptural evidence for the absolute sovereignty of God, yet the concept seems to conflict with all we know about how God relates to Man from the rest of the Bible. He seeks obedience, sometimes fails to get it, and holds man accountable. It's a dilemma.
But Paul deals with it! In Romans chapter 9 he recognizes the dilemma and zeroes in on the paradox of God being responsible for our own sin. The important thing to notice is that he does not solve the problem by denying the sovereignty of God. He asserts its truth, by likening God to a potter, and us to the clay (Rom 9:21),
recalling the passage in Isaiah already mentioned, and others too
(Is 29:16; 45:9; 64:8).
Straightaway this tells us that our very being has been moulded by God. This includes our body, and hence our brain, and by extension our nature, character, flaws and strengths. We normally attribute these features to DNA and upbringing; nature and nurture. But the Lord told Moses:
Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the Lord?
(Ex 4:11).
The reference to
mouth
,
here, in context, is not just its physical attributes, but the ability to know what to say and to communicate effectively with people. But Paul goes even further in his defence of God's sovereignty. Besides his reference to the potter, he also uses the illustration of Pharaoh at the time of the Exodus. He affirms that it was God who hardened Pharaoh's heart (vv 17-18).
See for example:
The Lord said to Moses,
... But I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go
(Ex 4:21).
Exodus 7:3; 9:12; 10:1,20,27; 11:10; 14:4,8,17 are similar. This is going down to the level not just of Pharaoh's ability or character, but to his very thinking at a particular time and hence his course of action. So by these two illustrations Paul is confirming to us the sovereignty of God over his creation, and indeed even over us individually.
Faced with all this, we can now start using human logic to jump to conclusions. If we are predestined, why seek God at all? Why bother with preachers and evangelists? Or, as mentioned above, if God controls me, then He is responsible for my sin! Paul anticipates the latter line of reasoning, and counters it, as he continues his discourse in Romans 9:
One of you will say to me:
Then why does God still blame us? For who resists his will?
But who are you, O man, to talk back to God?
Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, why did you make me like this?
(Rom 9:19-20, see Isa 29:16,45:9).
Note that Paul does not contradict the assertion that no-one can resist God's will. In addition, his need to give this explanation is another affirmation of the extent and meaning of God's sovereignty that he has established in the preceding verses. God really is in control of all, or why would he need to explain the logical problem we now have?
So what can we deduce from Paul's answer? He simply uses Isaiah's proposition that the creature cannot talk back to or quarrel with its creator. This is Paul's sole argument. We are not in a position to talk back to God. Why is this? It must be because our human reasoning about such matters is defective. I suggest it's a matter of perspective. We have our own sense of self that tells us we are responsible for our own actions. That is our perspective. It is the one God gave us and expects us to be governed by. The other perspective, that God is sovereign, we know only by revelation. God does not allow us to talk back to him using this perspective.
Perspectives matter. Two perspectives can give two different answers to the same question. An example of this is in the Theory of Relativity, where the
simple
question of whether two events are simultaneous or not depends on one's frame of reference. Further, we have to realise that human reasoning has its limitations when it comes to understanding God. We cannot bring God the Creator into our earthly equations, just as in mathematics you have to be careful if infinity is involved. For example,
∞+1 = ∞; ∞+2 = ∞; ∴ ∞+1 = ∞+2; ∴ 1 = 2
is not a valid conclusion. Consider the issue of the deity of Jesus Christ. This can be ascertained, for example, from the exclamation by Thomas to Jesus:
My Lord and my God!
(John 20:28),
which Jesus did not contradict. Yet in the same chapter Jesus himself says
I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God
(John 20:17).
The lesson is that both are true. Jesus is God to Thomas, and the Father is God to Jesus as well as to us. This latter point is supported earlier, where Jesus is again talking about the same subject, namely returning to his Father.
If you loved me, you would be glad that I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I
(John 14:28).
Again, Jesus stated that those privileged to sit next to him in his kingdom were not his choice, but were to be as decided by the Father (Matt 20:23).
So, Jesus is God, and the Father is God. But we cannot conclude from this that Jesus is equal to the Father in authority, as it contradicts Jesus' own words when he said
the Father is greater than I
,
and separately referred to his Father as
my God
.
Paul also confirms this point when he says:
For he
has put everything under his feet.
Now when it says that
everything
has been put under him, it is clear that this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ. When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all
(1 Cor 15:27,28).
This shows very explicitly a definite hierarchy of authority, with God as supreme, Christ, the Son, subject to him, and everything else under Christ. We also see this relationship between the Father and the Son before the incarnation, for it was the Father who sent the Son into the world (John 10:36).
There is a similar scenario in the story of Joseph in the Old Testament. I mentioned earlier that Joseph's life was a picture of Christ. When Pharaoh promoted him, he told him
You shall be over my house, and all my people shall order themselves as you command. Only as regards the throne will I be greater than you
(Gen 41:40 ESV).
As God put everything under Christ, so Pharaoh, while remaining supreme, made everyone subject to Joseph, such that
without your consent no one shall lift up hand or foot in all the land of Egypt
(v44 ESV).
Like Jesus when he began his ministry, Joseph was thirty years old at this time
(v46, Luke 3:23).
There is another analogy to the position of Jesus with the words of the centurion, which Jesus commended:
For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one,
(Matt 8:9).
The authority of the centurion is a picture of the authority of Jesus. But the fact that the centurion is under authority is also relevant, for this applies to Jesus too. He is under the authority of the Father.
Go,
and he goes; and that one,
Come,
and he comes. I say to my servant,
Do this,
and he does it.
The conclusion that the Father and Christ are both God, yet the Father is greater than Christ, has its own mathematical analogy. Georg Cantor showed in the 19th century that some infinities are greater than others [based on attempting to map elements of infinite sets].
To return to the previous discussion, this conclusion is also invalid:
God controls me; I have sinned. ∴ God is to blame for my sin, not me.
God is God. If He decides to restrict our perspective on this to the one he has given us, then so be it. We cannot use his. From God's perspective, yes, he controls everything. But for us, we cannot use God's perspective combined with human reasoning to then blame God for our own sin. We have to use our own perspective. God holds us accountable, and he is God. End of story.
For the same reason we need evangelists and pastors to teach and spread the gospel, because we have to use our own perspective that we are responsible for our service towards God.
Pharaoh, too, had to use his own perspective, not God's. In this perspective he hardened his own heart, as is also mentioned in Exodus:
But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, he hardened his heart and would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the Lord had said
(Ex 8:15).
Exodus 8:32; 9:34 are similar, and later on the Philistine priests said the same (1 Sam 6:6).
From his point of view, Pharaoh hardened his own heart, and is held accountable for it. It is interesting that the account in Exodus shows the situation from both perspectives.
Satan, though created by God, cannot blame God for his fall and rebellion either. God will punish him in the fullness of time. And since Satan cannot blame God for his evil deeds, neither can we. We cannot blame God for our own sin; for the sins of others; or the calamities caused by Satan. Nor can we use the Sovereignty of God to blame God for natural disasters that occur today. One day there will be
the day of vengeance of our God
(Is 61:2),
but until then we have to recognise the secondary cause, be it the Fall of Man, or Satan, or both. That is the perspective we are obliged to use. Acknowledgement of this secondary cause is also the reason why disasters should not be called judgements by God, punishment meted out to particular sinners, as Jesus' story of the falling tower teaches
(Luke 13:4,5).
Joseph told his brothers
God intended it for good
.
This does not absolve the brothers from their responsibility for the wickedness of what they did. Nevertheless, there is comfort for both Joseph
and
his brothers that God intended the whole thing, and intended it for good. It brought peace to their hearts. So this is a valid use of God's perspective which they were enlightened about and thereby authorised by God to rely on. They
could
use God's perspective in this way!
And so can we! Say someone makes a mistake, be it out of ignorance, fear, carelessness, stupidity or stubbornness [OK, this is experience talking]. Yes, he should take ownership of his error. He lacked the requisite knowledge, courage, diligence, common sense or humility to do it right. But God could have given him the missing character ingredient. Who made man's mouth? God is the one who ultimately gives or withholds such qualities. As the Lord told Job concerning the ostrich:
God did not endow her with wisdom, or give her a share of good sense
(Job 39:17).
We cannot blame God for our lack, as Paul taught, but we can accept ourselves and thank God that he made us exactly as we are. He created us, and he knew what he was doing when he did. He is the potter; we are the clay. We can take comfort in that. God is sovereign. It is a mystery; but it is something which, if we know it, can bring peace into our hearts even after mistakes. And because God is sovereign over everyone and everything else as well, we can have that peace in every situation we encounter.