Greetings,
I can agree that Proverbs 3:5-6 is a good attitude to have in regards to when bad things happen, a good way to stay calm so that one can get with God to find out what to do, but i really do not think that it has anything to do with why bad things happen to good people.
Bad things happen to good people because they make wrong choices. They may be grumbling or in strife with someone, and take a drive on their motorcycle, to cool off so that they can stay walking in love and forgiveness as God has been directing them to.....and because the enemy has had them so preoccupied with combating the strife in their home.....they forgot to check their brakes (that are so low, it makes it difficult to stop) and as they take a corner a little to fast, they end up in an accident that cost them their life. Was this God's will that they die. Or get into an accident in the first place? Not hardly...but the devil who wants to hurt God, by destroying His people...gets in there if we open the door. James 3:16 says where there is envying and strife, there is confusion and every evil work.
If it has anything to do with stealing, killing or destroying......it is of the devil. There are a lot of things that happen in this earth that the devil is the cause of, but because people cannot explain it or think that God is in control of everything.....the devil just sits back hiding in the shadows while doubt is cast and God's character is questioned.
blessings
I hear you sister. I even agree with you. However, I have said this before and we all need to think real hard on this.
You said.........."Bad things happen to good people because they make wrong choices".
In a lot of instances that is right. But is that what YOU would say to the parents of a 2 year old child who is afflicted with terminal cancer???
We are all bothered by the fact that we think people suffer undeservedly. And I think we should be. Any person with an ounce of moral sensitivity is outraged by the injustices of our world but we are not the first ones to think that.
Abraham asked G-d, "Should the Judge of the whole world not act fairly?"
Moses asked, "Why have You treated this people badly?"
And today don't we still ask, "Why God, why?"
Imagine you are in a hospital and you hear a woman screaming with pain. Outside her room, her family is standing around chatting, all smiling and happy. Wouldn't you scream at them, "What's wrong with you? Can't you hear how much pain she is in?" They answer, "This is the delivery ward. She is having a baby. Of course we are happy."
When you have an explanation, pain doesn't seem so bad anymore. We can tolerate suffering when we know why it is happening.
There in lies the real problem. If we could make sense of innocent people suffering, and that 2 year old with cancer we could rationalize tragedy, then we could live with it. We would be able to hear the cry of sweet children in pain and not be horrified.
But we can not do that. As long as the pain of innocents and loved ones remains a burning reality, we are bothered by its existence. And as long as we can't explain pain and suffering, we must alleviate it. If innocent people suffering does not fit into our worldview, we must eradicate it. Rather than justifying their pain, we need to get rid of it.
Greetings my friend!
As i read the definition of perfect will, i would have to say that even if it is church doctrine....in my understanding of the scriptures....it is not true to what the Word teaches.
If one reads the first 10 verses of Ephesians 1 i believe that we find the plan that God has for every person that He has created. Should we choose to accept God's perfect will and assignment for our individual lives, whether it be a janitor or shoe salesman or a pastor or teacher.....every day we still have a choice to obey God's directions. Just because someone chooses to accept God's assignment for their lives does not mean that everything is automatic....that God overrides everything and automatically has everything in place. There are still everyday instructions that have to be chosen to obey. Like walking in Love and forgiveness with another person, or speaking God's Word over a persons word or opinion.
When God sovereignly decided to give man dominion over the earth, He gave us the right to control things on this earth, and unless we invite Him in and know that we have the authority, then God has no say. In other Words we are God's mouthpiece in the earth, and if we do not take authority over things like the weather or what have you then no God cannot act, or does not have the power or the right to intervene.
What you have said makes it sound like God chooses to allow people to be killed in tornadoes or floods or whatever. (Please correct me if i am misunderstanding what you have said at the end of the second large paragraph)
In my opinion 1 Timothy 2:4 describes God's perfect will, and John 6:44 describes how that plan is carried out, or how that plan is put into motion.
Thank you for letting me but in and give my understanding.
Blessings!
No buts sister. We are all here to communicate one with an0ther and hope grow and learn and still be friends in the process.
Now, I really do not know how else to explain this Bible doctrine on the "wills" of God.
God says in Ephesians 1:11, that HE is the one “
who works all things according to the counsel of His will.”
I take ALL to mean all which then means that God has a plan and is working that plan no matter what. What happens He determines either by direct contact or by the action of allowing something to happen. Either way they both are due to the soventry of a Holy and powerful God who is in control of ALL things.
We can then go to Job 42:2........
"I know that You can do everything, And that no purpose of Yours can be withheld from You.”
This view of God’s will is based on the fact that, because God is sovereign, His will can never be frustrated.
Nothing happens that is beyond His control.
Proverbs 19:21 ............
"Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand."
Isaiah 45:6-7 ..............
"That people may know, from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides me; I am the Lord, and there is no other. I form light and create darkness,
I make well-being and create calamity, I am the Lord, who does all these "things."
As we see from the Word of God, God himself is brings ALL things to the end He has intended them to be.
That is His "soverign" will.