God is Sovereign

A recent glance at the news was enough to get my anxiety up for a moment. The headlines of the stories would make anybody stop and pause. A severe drought in California, earthquakes and volcanoes, violence in Missouri, 100 teenagers randomly attacking people in a shopping center in Tennessee, the Islamic state in Iraq and Syria, Russia and Ukraine, and the list goes on.

These are all situations that are out of our control (especially the ones caused by nature) and are enough to make anybody nervous. After my moment of anxiety ended my heart went into immediate praise of my Father in Heaven. No matter what is going on in the world, no matter what difficulties I face in this life, I know that my God reigns and in that I can rejoice.

One of the reasons that I love the Old Testament narrative is that we see God's sovereignty throughout. We see Egypt being raised up for the bondage of the Hebrews; we see God hardening pharaoh's heart so that the world will see His glory; we see the Assyrians being raised up to punish Israel and Babylon being raised up to punish Assyria and Judah; we see the Medes and the Persians being raised up to punish Babylon. We read in Daniel how God was going to raise up and bring down the nations. And then we see that God did exactly as He said. In essence, the Old Testament provides us with a behind the curtain look at the Divine involvement in world politics. The players do not know their eternal purpose - they are doing what they know how to do and what they think is best for them and for their kingdoms. But throughout we can see that God is directly involved in the world.

Fast forward to the New Testament. Paul tells us that God puts the leaders in their positions and therefore we must respect them and submit to their authority. We are not, however, given a behind the curtain look at what God is doing and how He is doing it. We are told how all things will end but not about the storyline getting there. This is where faith comes in. Is God any less sovereign because He hasn't told us what He is doing? Is God less trustworthy because we don't know the next nation God is going to raise up or tear down? By no means! God has shown Himself over and over again to be faithful and this is where an eternal perspective must be used. If my hope is in this world, in this country, or in this leader then I will be very disappointed. We can be patriotic; we can be involved in politics and we can vote but we, as followers of Jesus, cannot hope in this world. That is the glory of hoping in Christ - He wins! And He will always win. But, He may not go about winning in a way that we want. Jeremiah knew that God was going to win yet he was the weeping prophet. Habakkuk knew that God was raising up the Babylonians and it confounded him. It is ok to be concerned or to question God's way of doing things but let us use these questions and the answers to them as ways to bring us to our knee in worship. His ways are higher than our ways and let us rest in Him.

Run the Race

I have spent many hours contemplating where God is leading me and my family. God is a God of order and not of confusion (I Corinthians 14:33) and so surely He is leading us somewhere and it will be obvious...or so I thought.

As I have struggled knowing and understanding what God is doing in my life and in my family there have been disappointments (we started an adoption process but that went nowhere in 1 1/2 years), there have been changes (3 jobs in 2 years + 8 months of unemployment), there have been ups and downs and successes and apparent failures. What there has not been is much clarity. But if God is a God of order and not of confusion then why am I so confused? If God's Word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path (Psalm 119:105) then why do I not know where we are going?

The answer lies in Hebrews 12:2. Yes, Jesus sets our course and we are to run it (Hebrews 12:1; Proverbs 3:6; II Timothy 4:7). However, Hebrews 12:2 does not tell me to look at the course I am running; it does not tell me to look for the turns or to plot the best approach to the course. Indeed it is true that we are to train our spirit for the race that is set before us (I Timothy 4:8), but this is not done by analyzing the best approach to the challenges ahead or to know the places where I can take it easy. My problem has not been that God has been a God of confusion or that God has not set out a course before me. My problem has been that I have been too worried about the course and wondering if I am even on the right course and I have not been setting my eyes on Jesus, the author and finisher of my faith. As we set our eyes on Jesus we know just where to go - the cross. As we set our eyes on Jesus we will know that we are running the race and like Paul we will be able to say, "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith; 8in the future there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day; and not only to me, but also to all who have loved His appearing."