I am going to digress a little today and ask you a True/False question. This question is very critical and meaningful as to how you respond to what happens to you and around you. The question is:
True or False: God is all-powerful and causes everything that happens in the world. Nothing happens without His willing it.
I would dare venture to say that many, if not most, Christians would quickly respond: “True”. I am going to shock many by saying: “False”. Let me explain.
God is all-powerful. TRUE.
BUT
God is also just and righteous and God created man and angels with a free will.
From scripture, we learn that sometime in eternity past, 1/3 of the angels, lead by Lucifer, rebelled against God. They fell. The angels prior to the rebellion had a free will to choose between serving God or rebelling. There is no scripture that would lead us to believe that the angels still have a free will. The angels that rebelled are lost and the ones who did not rebel are no longer able to rebel.
Man was created with a free will also. Man chose to disobey and fell. God sent His Son to save mankind. Man still has a free will to decide to either accept or reject God’s offer of salvation.
A just and righteous God could not and can not overlook man’s sin. Someone had to pay the price. His Son did. His Son paid the price for man but not the fallen angels.
NOW, did God cause Man, or for that matter, Satan, to fall?
NO!
Did God WILL man and/or Satan to fall?
NO!
To follow up on the first question, I want to ask a follow-up question: Does everything that happens the result of God WANTING it to happen?
NO!
Did God want Job’s family killed. Did God want Job to loose everything. The answer to both questions is: NO! Who killed Job’s family? Who took everything from Job? Satan!
Did God ever answer Job’s question as to why he had to suffer? No! God did not reveal the source of man’s suffering until in the New Testament though His Son. Jesus revealed to us His Father and simultaneously revealed to us the inner workings of Satan.
I started by saying that I was digressing; but, in reality, I was not. In order to understand spiritual warfare and be successful, you must KNOW both your heavenly Father and Satan. To many times God is blamed for events when in reality Satan is the cause.
Many of you still are in shock and reject everything that I just said. Let me offer one more thought. Most everyone has prayed the Lord’s prayer. What is the 4th sentence of that prayer?
“Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.”
If everything that happens is God’s will, then this part of the Lord’s prayer is meaningless. I do not believe that Jesus said anything meaningless. Paul told the Romans:
“I make mention of you always in my prayers; Making request, if by any means now at length I might have a prosperous journey by the will of God to come unto you.”
If everything that happens is what God wants, this is also another meaningless prayer.
Finally, to set your mind at ease, your heavenly Father KNOWS everything that happens to and around you.
“Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. 30But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. 31Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.” Matthew 6:29-31
In closing, you and I have been given a job:
“Verily I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. 19Again I say unto you, That if two of you shall agree on earth as touching any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven. 20For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.” Matthew 18:18-20
Are you up to the job?
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