God’s Sovereignty
This post is for Christians. It probably won’t make any sense to you if you are not a Christian.
What does it mean to you when you say that God is sovereign? There’s a reason I ask. When you are going through a trial, aka a “hard time,” it is not enough to tell yourself that God is sovereign. You need to have a truly Biblical understanding of God’s sovereignty in order to trust him in the midst of trial. Unfortunately there are a lot of cherry-picking preachers out there who have misrepresented God’s sovereignty. They have preached various feel-good theologies that are based on verses taken out of context.
First, some Christians will say that what they mean by saying “God is sovereign” is that they know God “works all things together for good for those who love him,” which is a quote from Romans 8:28. What they take the verse out of context to mean is that they think God wants them to be happy, and the current situation is just an odd fluke that he is using somehow to make them super-happy later on. Romans 8 is talking about “future glories” we receive after we die though. Just a few verses later in Romans 8 it asks, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?” So it is ridiculous to think that Romans 8:28 means that you won’t have “tribulation, distress, persuection, famine,” etc.
Other Christians will say that what they mean by “God is sovereign” is that God has a destiny for them. Other words they use for this “destiny” is a “birthright” an “inheritance” or a “reward.” Usually this means to them something along the lines of if they do something small right now that seems difficult to them, that they will “reap” a reward 100 times bigger. I’ve heard a lot of prosperity theology about how giving $10 to the church will mean you get a check in the mail for $100 tomorrow, but more often lately what I’m hearing are things like you’ll become a music star or on a lesser level, that you’ll get that promotion, award, or recognition. My question is, why does God always get portrayed as a pinata that you whack with a stick to get things you selfishly want? James tells us, “You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions.”
To me, God’s sovereignty is the bedrock I lay my faith on. What it means in a nutshell is that shit happens, but God is a refuge in the midst of it. Shit happens because this is a sinful world, and people will sin against you and each other. If you are not hurt by someone, people you know and love deeply will be hurt by someone, or something. Sometimes it is a senseless tragedy. It could be a disease like cancer. It could be a natural disaster like a flood. Other times it is not senseless, but evil. A woman goes jogging and is attacked and raped. A man is cheated out of his business by his business partner. No matter what it is, God’s sovereignty means that God knows about it, and he will one day judge it. Meanwhile, he will provide the comfort, truth, and strength to deal with it until that day.
Most importantly, God’s sovereignty means he has the solution to sin: the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Since sin is the cause of both senseless tragedy and evil, the removal of sin is the most important demonstration of God’s sovereignty. One day there will be a new world, without sin, where we continually pour out our worship to God, and there is no more sadness or pain.
The next time you are tempted to view God’s sovereignty as a source of benefit for yourself, remember the reality of the sinful world we live in, and remember that God’s sovereignty means God has power even over that.
An article at Billboard is reporting that Michael Jackson albums may claim the top ten sales slots for the week after his death on June 25. Apparently sales of the expanded anniversary edition of Thriller are currently at over 100,000 units!