For the atheist, deist, polytheist, and open theist… December 26, 2004, or any other day bringing evil or suffering, poses no problem. But for the one who believes the words of the Bible to be true, “The LORD sits enthroned over the flood; the LORD sits enthroned as king forever” (Ps. 29:10), has a potential problem. How do we have a potential problem? If God is good and if he is completely sovereign… how and why did He allow the Tsunami of 2004, the cyclone that hit Myanmar in 2007, and such much more to happen? How is it that He allows so much evil when he is the measure of all that is holy and good? There seems to be a great gape between the God we read about in our Bibles and the world we live in. Christopher Wright acknowledges this in his book, The God I Don’t Understand, and points out that men and women in the Bible who followed God lovingly and passionately struggled with this seemingly irreconcilable problem:
Such radically inexplicable disasters fill biblical believers with desperate,passionate concern for the very nature of God. So they cry out in vertigo above the chasm that seems to gape between the God they know and the world they live in. If God is supposed to be like that, how can the world be like this?
For us who share the faith of these biblical believers, this is an agonizing emotion precisely because we too love God In such moments we can even understand those who hate God, and our anger and pain could easily make us shake our fists with them. But we don’t, because our whole lifetime of trust and love for God and gratitude for his limitless goodness and mercy toward us in Christ cannot be overthrown in the day of disaster. But the pain remains, and the pain is acute.[1]
One such example is found in Job 24. As you know, the story of Job is one of a righteous man who loses everything but his life because Satan thought he could get him to curse God. The book serves as a template for God’s people when it comes to dealing with the type of pain brought by evil and suffering in one’s life. Job’s kids and home were destroyed, his wealthy was depleted, his body was filled with blisters, his friends were an annoyance instead of a help, and his wife wanted him to throw in the towel of his faith. This man could have written a very good country song. In the middle of all his suffering, he asked what we not only seeing the Psalmist ask, but what we ourselves ask from time to time if we are honest:
Why are not times of judgment kept by the Almighty, and why do those who know him never see his days? Some move landmarks; they seize flocks and pasture them. They drive away the donkey of the fatherless; they take the widow's ox for a pledge. They thrust the poor off the road; the poor of the earth all hide themselves. Behold, like wild donkeys in the desert the poor go out to their toil, seeking game; the wasteland yields food for their children. They gather their fodder in the field, and they glean the vineyard of the wicked man. They lie all night naked, without clothing, and have no covering in the cold. They are wet with the rain of the mountains and cling to the rock for lack of shelter. (There are those who snatch the fatherless child from the breast, and they take a pledge against the poor.) They go about naked, without clothing; hungry, they carry the sheaves; among the olive rows of the wicked they make oil; they tread the winepresses, but suffer thirst. From out of the city the dying groan, and the soul of the wounded cries for help; yet God charges no one with wrong.
Have you not asked similar questions in your own life? The first time I sat at the bedside of a person I cared about as she lay dying of cancer, I kept asking God why he allowed her to linger for so long. Watching the woman struggle for air, seeing her facial expressions as she lay very uncomfortable while her body shock in periodic convulsions rocked my faith as a young Christian; I just could not understand why a God who with the breath of his nostrils could part the Red Sea, but did not remove this woman’s cancer nor allow her to die a quick painless death. I still do not know why He allowed this woman to die the way that she did. I am sure you have stories of your own as well as questions you still wrestle over concerning the actions of a good and loving God.
I am not going to pretend that what I write here will give you any real satisfactory answer because the Bible only answers this question to a certain point, but leaves what is unanswered for us to believe by faith that all that God does is shaped by His love for you and me. Permit me to offer some answers that the Bible does give.
Satan is Alive and Well on Planet Earth
I want to be very clear that the Bible is also very clear that Satan is not the cause of most of the evil and suffering in the world. He certainly hates good and loves evil, He has command over the thousands of demons who operate under him, and He despises God and His people with deep hatred. The Bible points to him as the originator of evil, suffering, and sin.
Satan at one time was known as Lucifer. He was the highest ranking angel with the title of “Guardian Cherub” (Ezek. 28:14). We are told very little of what went wrong in Lucifer, but we are given some idea in Isaiah 14,
How you are fallen from heaven, O Day Star, son of Dawn! How you are cut down to the ground, you who laid the nations low! You said in your heart, “I will ascend to heaven; above the stars of God I will set my throne on high; I will sit on the mount of assembly in the far reaches of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High.”
When he rebelled, we learn from Revelation 12:7-9, that he convinced one-third of the angels to help him sit on God’s throne by rebelling alongside of him. I am not sure how many one-third equaled out to, but currently there are millions of Angels who did not rebel against God, which means there are probably hundreds of thousands of demons. Lucifer was not created evil, he chose to be evil; God knew what Lucifer would become, yet He created him anyway. We are not told how long Lucifer existed as God’s “Guardian Cherub”; it could have been hundreds or thousands of our earth years that he served God before he fell. However, the Bible does say that, “He was guilty of sinning from the beginning” (1 John 3:8).
Lucifer is not just known as Satan, but he is given a whole host of names such as the Accuser (Rev. 12:10), the Adversary (1 Peter 5:8), the Beast (Rev. 14:9-10), Beelzebub (Matt. 12:24), the Deceiver (Rev. 12:9), the Devil (1 John 3:8), the Dragon (Rev. 12:9), the Enemy (Matt. 13:39), the Evil One (John 17:15), the Father of lies (John 8:44), the God of this age (2 Cor. 4:4), the Lawless One (2 Thess. 2:8-10), Murderer (John 8:44), the Prince of the power of the air (Eph. 2:1-2), the Ruler of Demons (Luke 11:15), Ruler of this World (John 12:31-32), Serpent of Old (Rev. 12:9), the Tempter (Matt. 4:3), Thief (John 10:10), and the Wicked One (Eph. 6:16).
There are other names for Lucifer, but the one we must always remember, for I think it embodies all his other names, is found in 1 Peter 5:8, “Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” Understand this dear friends; Lucifer wants nothing but harm for you. If you are a follower of King Jesus, he knows that he cannot touch your soul, but he wants nothing more than to see you rendered impotent for the Kingdom of God. If you are not a follower of Jesus, then he will do all that he can to keep you from seeing and knowing the truth of the Good news of Jesus Christ. Know this friends: we are warned that Satan disguises himself as an angel of light; the demons and all of his other servants do the same (2 Cor. 11:14).
Satan tried to tempt Jesus to sin, tried to keep Him from the cross, and when handed over to die, poured out all he had to make sure His suffering was ruthless. I believe he had a heavy influence on the likes of Hitler and Stalin, as well as other leaders in the past, present, and future. He is strategic, wise, cunning, crafty, and very intelligent. He has had the opportunity, along with his demons, to observe mankind for thousands of years which makes him all the more dangerous. I believe he targets God’s people, especially pastors, evangelists, and all those in places of leadership in the Church and has the demonic “man” power to do so. As followers of King Jesus, we ought to respect who Satan is – a very dangerous and intelligent adversary that hates you and me with the deepest of hatred.
All that being said… you must also understand that Satan is a defeated foe whose doom is sure to come. When you fall into sin or things do not go your way, understand that it is most likely not Satan tempting you or frustrating your plans; he is one person and cannot be everywhere at once. There are 6.8 billion people for him to choose to directly harm, and the chances are you are not that person. Now with that being said – On Tuesday morning I was mostly done writing my sermon having just made this very point. I took a break to write on my Facebook profile: “Finishing up my sermon... heavy, scary stuff: The Nature of Evil and Suffering. Right now I am writing the part of my sermon on the nature and character of Satan. Praise God that Jesus will squish Satan's head like a grape.” About 15 minutes later my computer crashed and I had to reformat my hard drive, losing my entire sermon in the process. I am not saying that Satan possessed my computer, but I did find a bit of irony in the timing.
When it came to the suffering of Job, we are told that it was Satan who approached God seeking permission to harm him. What the Bible makes emphatically clear is that Satan’s power is limited, and should he chose to bring harm upon God’s people, he must first seek God’s approval.
[1] Christopher Wright. The God I Don’t Understand (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan; 2008), p. 53.
To listen to the sermon that this blog came from, click on the following link:
http://bootes.websrvcs.com/clientimages/29768/sermons/audiosermons/theoriginofevilandsufferinggenesis3job24.wma
No comments:
Post a Comment