One Giant Leap- Or, Reading Providence with Dyslexia

It is a good thing to affirm the sovereignty of God over all things. God delights in the truth and we ought to draw the deepest comfort from it. It is right and proper to understand that His sovereignty is over all things, the great and the small, that He ordains not just the rise and fall of kings and nations, but the swirling fall of every leaf that kisses the ground. Yeah, and amen.

It is, however, a most dangerous and damaging tiny little step to move from affirming that God is in control of all things to affirming we know precisely why He does any one thing. We know He does all things for His glory and our good. We don’t always know what that means. I once read a Puritan sermon in which the pastor told the story of when he found in the corner of their meeting house a torn up old copy of the Book of Common Prayer. He rightly discerned it had been chewed up by a mouse. He rightly affirmed that God had determined from before all time that that mouse would come upon that book (which as a Puritan the preacher would have despised) and chewed it up. Then he affirmed, “Even God’s creature the mouse knows the Book of Common Prayer should be destroyed.” Well, maybe. Could we not just as easily affirm, based on God ordaining that mouse to eat that book, “Even God’s creature the mouse knows to feed upon the Book of Common Prayer.” Same event, same affirmation that God brought it to pass, two wildly differing but equally plausible views as to why God did it.

We are in the midst of what our fathers would have called a “hard providence.” That is, God in His sovereignty is leading us through some significant challenges. It is critically important that we acknowledge the glorious truth not only that He is leading us, but that they are His challenges. The Chinese may be as guilty as Joseph’s brothers. But it is still His plan. God isn’t merely sovereign enough to respond to hardship. His sovereignty extends to sending the hardship.

And as always, He has His reasons why. Which reasons He has not been pleased to reveal to us. Beware of anyone who claims that they know. Could this illness be judgment on the world for our unbelief? Could God be tearing down our idol, Mammon? Of course He could. Even if we could know that however, we still don’t know why. That is, what if God is sending this hardship to bless us with a Joseph? What if He is sending this hardship to drive those whom He has chosen but who have not yet been brought in, to repent and believe? What if He is sending this hardship so that His children can minister to unbelievers in the name of Jesus? What if it’s all those things?

We thought we knew this- that our days would go on much the way they always have. We were wrong. We do, however, know this- our days are in the scarred hands of Jesus, the King of Kings. I know not what the future holds. But His grace, however, I know the One who holds it. It is more than enough.