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I. What would it mean for God not to be sovereign over sin?
A. How would we then interpret passages like Romans 8:28?
B. Is there a difference between saying that God causes sin and God lets sin happen? If so, is the distinction an important one?
II. What does the scripture teach?
A. The Lord creates calamity.
Isaiah 45:7; Amos 3:6.
B. Genesis 50:20.
What did Joseph's brothers mean for evil?
What did God mean for good?
Was God the one in control of Joseph's brothers' sin?
If God was not in control of it, could Joseph say that God meant it for good? Would it not make more sense for Joseph to say that God worked through it turn it into good?
C. 1 Kings 22:19-23.
What kind of spirit did God send out?
What was God's purpose in doing so (v. 23)?
D. 1 Chronicles 21:1, 7.
Who moved David to number Israel?
What was God's response to the census?
Read 2 Samuel 24:1, 10.
Who incited David to number Israel?
Who sinned?
E. Job chapters 1 &2.
1:21--Who did Job attribute as the ultimate cause of his calamity?
1:22--Did Job sin when he attributed it to God?
2:10--Who should we accept adversity from?
2:10--Did Job sin when he said that adversity comes from God?
F. Job 42:11.
Why did Job's brothers and sisters console and comfort Job?
Who brought on this evil?
G. Lamentations 3:37-38.
Can an evil man say or do evil things apart from God commanding (ordaining) it?
What does it mean for both good and ill to go forth from God's mouth?
H. 2 Thessalonians 2:11-12.
Why does God send a deluding influence?
Why does God want them to believe what is false?
III. How can a good God who hates sin, will that sin comes to
pass?
A. The problem--verses which apparently contradict.
God commands Pharaoh to let His people go (Exodus 5:1), but then He hardened Pharaoh's heart so that he would not let them go (Exodus 4:21; 7:3; 9:12; 10:1, 20, 27; 11:10; 14:4, 8).
God commands us to love all people (Leviticus 19:18) and then causes hatred in people's hearts (Psalm 105:25; Isaiah 19:2).
God commands that the Sabbath be remembered (Exodus 20:8-11) and then causes them to forget it (Lamentations 2:6).
God does not take delight in the death of the wicked (Ezekiel 33:11), yet He says that He will delight in destroying Israel when they do evil (Deuteronomy 28:63).
God desires all people to be saved (1 Timothy 2:4; 2 Peter 3:9), and yet He does not save all people even though He has the power to do so.
God commands us not to murder (Exodus 20:13), but He had predestined the crucifixion of Christ which could not have happened apart from sin (Luke 22:22; Acts 2:23; 4:27-28). In fact, it was God who ultimately killed Christ (Isaiah 53:10).
B. How can we explain these verses?
C. How would an Arminian deal with these verses?
IV. The two wills of God.
A. God's Moral Will.
This is God's will as it is revealed to us in scripture. He has given us clear instructions on what we ought to do and what we ought not do. We do not need to try and guess what His moral will is, nor do we need to ask Him to reveal it to us. To find God's moral will all we must do is open the Bible.
In each example listed above, the first set of verses were God's moral will. They were clear commands that He does want us to do.
B. God's Sovereign Will.
This is the will of God that He actually brings to pass. This is His will that has been determined from all of eternity. If something happens, you can be assured that it was God's sovereign will for it to happen for we know that God sovereignly brings about all things, including evil.
The second set of verses illustrate God's sovereign will. We can see that it can be different than God's moral will. After all the cross of Christ was predestined to happen, yet it could not happen without violation of God's moral will. Even though God's moral will had to be violated, God still wanted Christ to be crucified.
C. Does this make God a schizophrenic?
V. The narrow lens and the wide lens.
A. God can look at the world in two different ways. Therefore he can look at sin in one way and hate it, yet when it looks at it differently He can desire that it be brought about.
B. The narrow lens.
When God considers sin in and of itself, He hates and commands us not to do it. He has no desire for people to sin.
When God looks at all of mankind, He genuinely wants all to be saved. He desires that none perish.
C. The wide lens.
When God considers sin in the context of all of redemptive history, He can will for it to come about. He does not bring it about for its own sake, rather He does it for the sake of a greater good. While He hates sin in and of itself, when all things are considered, He may will for it to happen.
Same in reference to salvation. While
through the narrow lens, God wants all to be saved, when
He looks through the wide lens and sees what will bring
Him the most glory, He wills that not all people be
saved.
VI. God ordains all sin and evil and yet He is not the "author of sin." This is shown in the following five points.
A. God never sins (Deuteronomy 32:3-4).
How do we know that God never sins?
Is the phrase, "God ordains sin," synonymous with "God is sinning?" Why or why not?
B. God is not the positive cause of sin.
1God is the ultimate cause of sin, He has ordained to happen and He makes sure that it does.
2God is not the positive cause of sin, rather He is the negative cause of sin.
Why does God get credit for when He cause us to do good, but He isn't blamed when He causes us to do evil?
1. God is the positive cause of good. He acts in us to cause us to do good. If He did not act, we, by nature, would never do good (Romans 3:10). Because good deeds are totally dependent on God acting in a positive or active way in our hearts, He gets all of the credit for it.
2. God is the negative cause of sin. He does not put evil desires in us so that we will sin (James 1:13). Rather, God withholds the grace necessary to keep you from sinning, thereby bringing about His desired purpose, which included sin. When God ordains sin, He doesn't make your heart evil so that you will do what He wills. No, He orchestrates all circumstances so that in our flesh, sin will be the most desirable thing and then He withholds the grace that would prevent us from sinning. He simply acts in such a way that He insures that our sinful nature will carry out the sin that He desires. Therefore, while God is the ultimate cause of sin, He is not guilty of sin.
3. A good example of this is the sun. The sun is the positive cause of light, the sun makes light. However, it is also the ultimate cause of darkness. When the earth rotates and is no longer facing the sun, it no longer receives the suns lights. Therefore, the sun is the ultimate cause of darkness, though it is not the positive cause, rather it is the negative cause. The absence of the sun is what creates the darkness, but it would not be right to say that the sun is the morally guilty cause of darkness.
C. God cannot be blamed for sin.
Scriptures make it clear that there is no evil in God (Psalm 5:4; 92:15). Therefore, if scripture teaches that God is sovereign over evil, and it does, then this objection should not even be raised. For if the Bible doesn't have a problem with God being in control of sin and yet innocent, neither should we.
D. God does not approve of sin (Psalm 11:4-6; 34:16; Habakkuk 1:13).
E. God does not ordain sin for its own sake.
When God ordains sin it is not because He enjoys sin in and of itself, rather He has a greater good in mind. While we have evil intentions in our sin, God is always working for the greatest good (Genesis 50:20).
How can God be in control of sin and bring it about, but not be guilty of sinning?
If someone came and stabbed you in the stomach out of malice, that would clearly be sin. But if a surgeon cuts your stomach open to remove a tumor, no sin is present. Yet they both have done the same thing, they cut your stomach open with a knife. So what is different? The random attack was done out of malice, but the doctor has good intentions. Now, imagine that the doctor's knife is alive and it is evil and delights in causing you pain. We can see that even though the knife is delighting in cutting you open, the doctor would still not be morally guilty of sin because he is acting for your good.
VII. Is God more like a surgeon or a fireman?
A. Does God bring about sin with good purposes in mind, or does He merely react to it?
We've already shown that the Bible clearly teaches that God is sovereign over sin and is the ultimate cause of sin. He does not merely react to sin and then bring good about. If he did, we could never fully hope in Romans 8:28 because God wouldn't be causing all things to work for our good because he isn't in control of sin. But the verse says that God causes all things to work for good. The reactionary, fireman idea of God does not work.
VIII. Applications.
A. We can hope in the midst of suffering, even when the suffering is caused by the sin of others. For we know that God is the one bringing it about for our good.
B. We can rightly honor God as sovereign over all things. He did not give up any part of His sovereignty for the sake of human freedom, even in regards to sin.
C. We can feel more free to proclaim the gospel in the midst of persecution because we know that God is in control of the persecution we receive.
D. We can praise God for his infinite wisdom in devising a plan to bring himself the greatest glory possible which included evil.
E. While we are responsible for our sin and should be repentant, we can still have hope knowing that even when we turn from God, he is at work in our lives.
F. We can find comfort in the fact that Satan can not thwart God's plans for our lives, rather Satan is often the means by which God fulfills his plan.
Go back to Contend for the Faith.
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