Terri Green@TerriGreenUSA
God is actually quite content to make it clear that He is in fact unhesitatingly sovereign over everything that exists, including evil, which He is glad to state without a hint of reluctance. He is not asking to be rescued from His biblical caricature. He is not asking to be delivered from bad press fallen upon Him by inept biblical writers, and even more inept interpreters of Scripture.
The Problem of Evil — John MacArthur // March 17, 2007
This is a problem for liberal theologians and assorted other so called evangelicals who desperately need to rescue the true God from this bizarre biblical caricature. But God is actually quite content to make it clear that He is in fact unhesitatingly sovereign over everything that exists, including evil, which He is glad to state without a hint of reluctance. He is not asking to be rescued from His biblical caricature. He is not asking to be delivered from bad press fallen upon Him by inept biblical writers, and even more inept interpreters of Scripture. He is very content to speak for Himself in unmistakable terms. He is glad to announce, in the words of Paul writing to Timothy, that He is the only potentate – I love that word. He’s the only potentate, the one with power, potent.
In Revelation 4:11, worship given to God goes like this: “You are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power; for You have created all things, and for Your pleasure they were created.” And in Proverbs 16:4, “The Lord has made all things for Himself, yes, even the wicked for the day of evil.”
God created everything that He created of His own free choice, and He designed them the way He designed them, because that’s the way He wanted them, knowing full well that angels would rebel, and so would men. God created angels and people, and planets and stars, the sky and earth, and mountains and seas, and deserts and plains, and lakes and streams, and sun – and you go on, and on, and on, and on, in every kind of form and fashion, because that’s exactly the way He wanted it done. Second Samuel 10:12 says, “The Lord does what seems to Him or what is known to Him to be good, to be good.”In Job 23:13 says, “But He is in one mind, and who can turn Him? And what His soul desires, even that He does.” God is not conflicted. God is not duplicitous. God is not wringing His hands trying to figure out whether He should go this way or that way.
Psalm 33:9-11, “He spake, and it was done; He commanded, and it stood fast. The Lord brings the counsel of the heathen to nothing; makes the devices of the people of no effect. The counsel of the Lord stands forever, the thoughts of His heart to all generations.” He is equivocating, He is fixed and unchanging. “The Lord” – says Psalm 103:19 – “has prepared His throne in the heavens, and His kingdom rules over all.”
Isaiah 14:27, “The Lord of hosts has purposed, and who would annul it?” First Samuel 2:6-8, “The Lord kills and makes alive; He brings down to the grave and brings up. The Lord makes poor and makes rich; He brings low, and lifts up. For the pillars of the earth are the Lord’s, and He set the world on them. From the beginning He laid the foundations the way He wanted them to be to affect exactly what has happened.” Amos says it pretty directly. Amos 3:6, “If there is a calamity in a city, will not the Lord have done it?”
This is the God of the Bible. This is the only God who exists, the God who is in control of absolutely everything, and evil is no disruption in His plan; no shock and surprise which somehow call for Plan B. He knows everything that can be known, that is to be known, that is knowable, and He has known it eternally, and He has comprehensive power to do anything and everything He desires to do; and that is the God who exists. So evil exists manifestly so; God exists manifestly so. The great Creator of the universe is the only explanation for the universe.
