Bible
Study
Chapter
5:
Section
5: When it seems like God is far off
By:
Moses Flores
Some hundreds of years ago, a man by
the name of
It is almost the common experience of every Christian to recall a time in their life where they seem to feel that God left them at one point. It could be for several reasons why they have felt that way. Usually they felt that God was punishing them for their own sins. In this section of the Westminster Confession of Faith we read of God leaving His children for a time. We read,
“The most wise, righteous, and gracious God doth oftentimes leave, for a season, His own children to manifold temptations, and the corruption of their own hearts, to chastise them for their former sins, or to discover unto them the hidden strength of corruption and deceitfulness of their hearts, that they may be humbled; and, to raise them to a more close and constant dependence for their support upon Himself, and to make them more watchful against all future occasions of sin, and for sundry other just and holy ends.”
In this last few sections of the Westminster Confession, we have dealt with God’s relation to sin in a general sense. In this section, we come to deal with God’s providence and the sin of believers. Why are Christians allowed to sin? Why do some Christians commit some of the worst sins? If we are Christians, why do we suffer? Such questions drive the intention of this section.
God leaving?
The opening words of this section of
the
How is it that the same God who has said that He will “never leave you nor forsake you” (Hebrews 13:5; cf. Joshua 1:5) now is proposed by the Westminster Confession to “leave” us? Well first, we must distinguish between the purpose for which God will “leave” and the sense in which He leaves. First, let’s settle the fact that God does leave.
In Judges, there emerges a cycle in which
ancient
Having mentioned Romans 1, it might
quickly be said, “But that is speaking sinners and not believers. It is sinners who are given over to more
sin.” This is well and true. However, the previous passages are about
Well, let’s first understand that whom God has already decreed to save will be infallibly saved according to the gracious decree of God. God will not abandon any that He has sent Christ to be the ransom for to perish. God’s punitive wrath has been fully dealt with through the atonement of Jesus Christ. However, God’s discipline in our journey of sanctification is something entirely different. Thus, God’s “leaving” of the believer is not the end like it is the unbeliever in which God says, “let him who is unjust, be unjust still” (Rev. 22:11). Rather, it is our sense of God’s nearness and His gracious gaze toward us that we lose. Obviously, we should take it that Scripture is true and cling to its promises that God will never leave us nor forsake us. Those things are true.
God’s purpose in His apparent absence
Although the apparent absence of
God’s presence is enough to fall into a state of despair, the believer need not
to think that God’s separation is ultimately for punishment of their sins. Rather, we read in the Westminster Confession
of Faith that God has a just and holy purpose in leaving His elect at
times. The
“…to chastise them for their former sins, or to discover unto them the hidden strength of corruption and deceitfulness of their hearts, that they may be humbled; and, to raise them to a more close and constant dependence for their support upon Himself, and to make them more watchful against all future occasions of sin, and for sundry other just and holy ends.”
Let’s examine the concept of chastisement first.
The word can be a tricky one as one might be lead to conclude that God is laying on us the penalty of our own sins. Such is hardly the case! Isaiah 53 states clearly that God has laid on Christ the iniquities of His people and has borne their punishment as their substitute. Thus, it cannot be the case that God is exacting atonement from us for our sins as well as from Christ for our sins. God would be unjust to do so. Rather, we are to understand the “chastisement” of God as His Fatherly discipline. Let us consider this from Hebrews 12:3-11. We read,
Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted. In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons?
‘My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives.’
It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness. For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.
First, we note the author’s argument from the greater to the lesser in calling the readers to consider the life of Christ. Christ’s life was marked by a certain suffering which he endured from sinful people and from sinful motives against Him. Christ “endured hostility” as the Son of God, thus, argues the author, why shouldn’t see as adopted sons of God expect some sort of suffering because of sin? If Christ, the greater suffered, we, the lesser, shouldn’t be discouraged when we suffer for we suffer as Christ did and with Christ. The author continues to note that their struggle is “against sin.” In the context, it is more than likely the author means against the sins of others, particularly their persecutors. However, it is not wrong to understand from other Scriptures that believers struggle with their own sins. In Romans 7:7-25 we find the Apostle Paul recalling personal struggles with his own sins. Several NT letters detail the struggles of churches and individuals with their own sins. I John 1:8-10 even reminds Christians that they have sin, that they commit sins, and that it is important to recognize this and to understand the forgiveness of Christ when we commit sins.
One of the most difficult things that a conscious Christian deals with is sin in their own lives. As we rest on the obedience and atonement of Christ alone for salvation, our consciences do not convict us. However, once we “abandon” Christ for our own merits, we can become full of despair. I can personally recall my first “conscious” sin after I had been recently been saved. Personally, I was devastated. However, looking back I can see that my attitude at the time of that sin was more on myself and relying on my own power and boasting in my own sanctification. As I have grown in my understanding of human depravity, I have learned not to boast “beyond measure.”
Paul wrote something similar to those in 2 Corinthians 12:7-9. Paul writes,
So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited. Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
Some commentators have suggested that this “thorn in the flesh” was a physical infirmity and others have suggested that it was a demonic influence of some sort or even Jewish persecution. Whatever it was, we note that is was something Paul felt he could live without as a Christian. Yet, God’s reasoning in allowing the “thorn” was that Paul might become “exalted” in his own mind, but that he may, in all things especially as a Christian, come to completely rely on the grace of God for all things!
As sinners, we tend to ignore God or not be conscious of God until we want help for something. Some people, Christians even, go all day without mentioning or thinking of God until they find themselves in trouble, and then we hear the “God help me!”. Is that the kind of relationship that God wants with His children? Obviously not! God wants us to rely on Him, especially on Christ alone, for our righteousness. It is possible, and happens, that believers begin to forget about the imputed righteousness of Christ and we begin to live as if we have a righteousness of our own and to think of ourselves more highly than we ought. According to the Confession, God allows us to sin to reveal to us that we are not what we think we are apart from Christ! He shows us, “our own corruption” and how even though we have been justified, our need for faith in Christ does not cease when we become Christians. Rather, it should grow more and more as we see just how sinful we are. And as we see how sinful we are and cry out to God like Paul, “O wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death?”, that we should also look to Christ, and to him alone to deliver us.
And thus, does God effect humility in us as Christians. As Christians, we are those who before the great throne of the Judge of all the earth will not have anything of ours to boast in for we will all be aware of our own workings and the nature that hides behind them. Rather, we will be those who, with great humility, will say,
“Not the labor of my hands, could fulfill thy laws demands;
Could my zeal no respite know, could my tears forever flow,
All for sin could not atone; Thou must save and thou alone.”[1]
In this manner, the wisdom of God raises us “to a more close and constant dependence for their support upon Himself, and [makes us] more watchful against all future occasions of sin, and for sundry other just and holy ends.”
Never forsaken
Even as Christians, we find ourselves not perfected and still struggling with sin. It is not that God is unable to prevent it, but that He allows it for various ends which are according to God’s holy purposes and even part of our sanctification process. It was asserted by the Westminster Confession that God “withdraws” Himself from His children. As Christians we should know what when this happens, it is only an apparent withdrawal and is an opportunity to see our own faith: either its weakness or its strength. But we must never think that God will ever forsake us completely.
As Christians, God reveals to us that it was Christ who was forsaken by God and separated from Him in a way that we cannot fully understand. But we know tha tiw as enough to cause the Lord of Glory to shout, “My God! My God! Why have you forsaken Me!” God is true to His word that He would never leave us nor forsake us. But He is also true to His word to sanctify us and to purify us to be vessels of honor in His kingdom. In order to be this, we must come to see our own inability and unworthiness of His salvation. We must see ourselves as we really are in truth: Guilty and exposed before God, needing to be dressed by Him alone. God gives us our clothing of righteousness, the righteousness of Christ, His very own righteousness through faith. We must always live by faith (Hab. 2:4; Rom. 1:17) and never quit placing our faith in Christ for our own works, even the ones done as Christians.