The following crossed my desk today, and it's certainly relevant to our discussion:
God Is Really God
by – W. B. Screws
God is operating the universe in accord with the counsel of His will, and life and death are in His hands – not in hands of man. This is not known among the ultra-religious. They are too much taken up with their own importance, and with their belief in God’s inability to carry on without them. This recognition of the sovereignty of God is found mainly among those who have never been in the spotlight of the religious world.
That God is operating the universe in accord with the counsel of His own will (Ephesians 1:11), is a satisfying truth to those who have learned that God is never under the necessity of giving an account of His doings. But to those who do not concede to Him the right of absolute sovereignty, this passage cannot seem true. Not having full confidence in Him, they cannot conceive of Him as the source of all. Once we see that His goal is the justification of all (Romans 5:18), the salvation of all (I Timothy 2:3-6), and the reconciliation of the universe (Colossians 1:20), and that everything between the beginning and the consummation is a necessary step in the reaching of the goal, we not only see that He is operating the universe, but we acquiesce in it, and thank Him for it.
Job, the man who spoke that which is right concerning Jehovah (42:7), asks in all seriousness,
What! Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil? (Job 2:10).
Since we learn to value good only through an experience of evil, there is nothing strange in God bringing evil upon us. His chief aim with man is to reveal Himself. How could any person appreciate Him for what He is, unless there has been an experience of evil? Adam had no more appreciation of God than a hog has of the tree from which the plum falls. This is why it was necessary for him to be brought into an experience of evil.
Some of the most majestic words ever spoken by Jehovah are found in Isaiah 45. Yet, to the average religious person, they seem partly untrue. Here they are:
I am Jehovah, and there is none else, there is no God beside Me. I girded thee though thou hast not known Me. That they may know from the east and from the west, there is none beside Me, that I am Jehovah and there is none else, I form the light and create the darkness; I make peace and create evil; I, Jehovah, do all these (5-7).
When the sun is gone and darkness spreads about us, and we feel apprehensive, and little children cling closely to their parents, it is Jehovah Who has created the darkness, just as it is He who forms the light when the sun shows itself above the eastern horizon. Peace is His creation, and so is evil. He who would say God makes peace but that evil is no creation of His is simply broadcasting his unbelief.
There is a future period of peace. In this we exult by faith. Wars shall cease and peace spread its beautiful wings over all the Earth. When this comes to pass it will be the doing of Jehovah – but not any more so than the present evil is of His making. Before the world will learn that wars are futile, the evil must increase. Nations must be exhausted. Man’s fighting power must reach the bottom. There must be untold suffering. This evil will prepare mankind to appreciate the peace which will be brought to Earth by the Prince of Peace. The world of mankind had never yet wished for this Prince. Men have had too much confidence in themselves. That confidence must be lost in the prevalence of evil before the world will be ready for Him Who brings peace.
Men have largely lost confidence in the ability of the masses to manage affairs. They are turning to leaders more and more. Even in our own country there is a feeling of helplessness, so far as the wisdom of the multitude is concerned, and we are trusting more and more in one man’s wisdom. In other countries on both sides of this titanic struggle, mankind looks to leaders more than to themselves. This will continue until there is a world-wide confederation looking to one man to run the affairs of the world. He too shall fail to give men what they desire. When the failure of the dictator is fully manifested by his ignominious defeat on the plain of Megiddo, the world will be ready for the Prince of Peace. It is then that He will take the helm.
They who have a program of their own have neither time to consider God’s program nor faith to believe He has one. They will concede that there is, indeed, a program, but it is one that God has given them to carry out. They do not believe He has told them exactly what it is but that this only shows His faith in man’s ability to devise something that is better than He could suggest! This is why pastors spend so much time planning what to do, and how to do it.
I have in mind a young man who, in former days, listened with apparent interest to the truth. Now he disdains, not only the truth, but those who preach it. What has happened? Why, he has been given a place of prominence in the church, and on his shoulders is much of the task of carrying out its program.
Such people, if honest, are bound to know that the program of man is fast failing, and if they are sincere it must give them many an anxious moment. They cannot see ahead, nor can they believe there is anything better, unless man can think of it and bring it to pass. They are thoughtless ones who refuse to see that man’s efforts are a failure. They believe man’s ingenuity will yet devise something that will work.
The Pilgrim’s Messenger
Volume XXI; Number 11
June, 1942
Glennville, GA
5-7).