Memory Verse:
2 Corinthians 4:17-18a (ESV)
“For this light and momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen, but to the things that are unseen.”
Song:
Doctrine: The Sovereignty of God
When I was a new Christian, an argument that some friends brought to me against God shook the foundations of my faith. It went something like, “because there is all this suffering and evil in the world, God either isn’t good, or He isn’t God.” Putting the argument another way- the fact that there is suffering and evil means that if there is a “God”:
He is willing to prevent it, but not able, so He’s not all-powerful over creation.
He is able to prevent it, but not willing, so He’s malevolent (or at least uncaring) towards His creation.
This isn’t a new argument at all. No, this was something that pre-dates even Jesus’ life on earth, and is often referred to as the problem of evil and suffering. And it’s an argument we’ve probably all summed up in this way before: “Why God, why?”
I expect that phrase has crossed the mind of most people living through these times of physical, financial, social, and emotional suffering induced by the Covid19 pandemic. Christians are now confronted with this problem on a more consistent and wide-spread scale than we are used to. Holding onto a faith that professes God is all-powerful and completely good may seem comforting at first, but then the thought creeps in:
God is able to stop all of this, or even prevent it from happening in the first place, but He has so far allowed it.
It makes us recoil. But what other choice do we have, if we still want to cling to Him?
It is a fitting time for Riverbend to be going through 2 Corinthians as a church. In this letter, Paul is writing to a suffering people who believe that he has suffered too much to really be a proper messenger for God. He’s certainly not the one they want to help them out of their troubles. The Corinthian people answer their “Why God, why?” question about suffering with “because you weren’t good enough, and you deserve this”. It’s not the right answer. Throughout the letter, Paul answers the question in a way that beautifully preserves both God’s “sovereignty”, His complete control over creation, and His complete goodness: God uses suffering for good.
No, it’s not the most heartwarming thought at first. But it is consistent throughout all of Scripture, from the Old Testament to the New. And in 2 Corinthians, Paul hammers the point home:
“as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too” (1:5)
“we felt we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead” (1:9)
“we are afflicted in every way… always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies”(4:9-10)
“For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (12:10)
Notice anything about those verses? Jesus is referenced as Paul’s hope through suffering in each one. That’s because God’s sovereignty through suffering is most on display in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. Here we find answers to the “problem” of pain and suffering:
Is God willing to end our suffering? Yes! He entered into it, experiencing the suffering Himself so that we may one day live in freedom from it.
Is God able to stop our suffering? Yes! He has power over suffering even to the point of making death itself come undone.
In his book Coronavirus and Christ, John Piper comments about our current times and the challenges we may be facing when thinking about God in this way:
“The same sovereignty that could stop the coronavirus, yet doesn’t, is the very sovereignty that sustains the soul in it.”
We don’t know how God is using this suffering. But the cross reminds us that He has not abandoned us in it, and the empty grave shows us that He has complete control over it.
I wanted to end with a page from the children’s book that Ellie Holcomb wrote called Don’t Forget to Remember. I could have spared you all my words and just shared this page, as it captures the sovereignty of God with such simplicity and relevancy for our situation today:
