Dear Jim,
Well, with your views on God’s will, I’d say that you’re in good company. I’ve read books from Jerry Bridges (Is God Really in Control, Trusting God), Ray Pritchard (Discovering God’s Will for Your Life), Josh McDowell (God’s Will, God’s Best), Charles Swindoll (The Mystery of God’s Will) along with some others, too. I’ve also listened to some podcasts from Piper, Sproul and MacArthur on God’s will. Just curious, are you familiar with Garry Friesen’s book, Decision Making and the Will of God?
Hopefully we’re not already past the point where each of us should have been carefully defining our terms. I have, for instance, found it all too easy to essentially ‘talk past’ each other when speaking with LDS & JW folks on matters of faith. But given that you seem pretty emphatic that EVERYTHING is ordained and otherwise set into place by God to the minutest detail including hopes, dreams, thoughts, desires, attitudes, actions and responses, I think a fair question for me to ask is when have you ever praised God that abortion is the law of the land? For obviously, God WANTS abortion and has brought it about, right?
Perhaps we can’t, but if we can agree that abortion is the unwarranted killing (i.e. murder) of an innocent child, then, how can it be that God, who set out in the Ten Commandments that “thou shall not kill,” can violate his own sovereign decree on such a massive scale that there have been (what?) 40+ million murders of pre-born children in this country alone?
By sheer numbers alone, it would not be unreasonable to state that God is more of a moral monster than Adolf Hitler who only killed some 6 million Jews. But wait, by your assessment, Hitler did what he did because it was God who ordained it – and brought it about.
For me, the logic of what you’re intimating via a just and holy God sovereignly decreeing such evil simply doesn’t hold water. It may sound good to say, “God is in control,” and therefore whatever came about is God’s doing. But I don’t think that is in any way, shape or form accurate. I believe you are in error as to your understanding of God’s sovereignty.
With respect, and I do mean that sincerely, I believe you have just removed any and all need for God to have sacrificed his own son on the cross. For, if it is God who has brought about the sins of the world, then it is God and God alone who must atone (to himself, I suppose) for the actions God himself brought about through his creation for nothing that man has done can therefore be attributed to man. I’m chuckling at the absurdness of this thought – and I’m guessing you are, too. To which, I think there needs to be a different understanding as to what constitutes the sovereign will of God and how that differentiates from the moral will of God.
In order to keep my posts a bit shorter, let me stop here and let you respond if you like, before I provide my $0.02 worth as to how I understand God’s sovereign will vs God’s moral will vs God’s personal will.
Sincerely,
Bob
Martin's Mercurial Musings 