II

“ALL THINGS . . . FOR GOOD”

“The Lord reigneth.” The Creator is King in His universe. God “worketh all things after the counsel of his own will” (Eph. 1: 11). The decisive factor in world history, the purpose which really controls it and the key which really interprets it, is God’s eternal plan. We have seen that the sovereign lordship of God is the basis of the biblical message and the foundation-fact of Christian faith.

But this is a truth which raises problems for sensitive and thoughtful souls at many points. Like other matters of faith, it is not an object of rational demonstration, and circumstances on occasion prompt the most painful doubts about it. Some of the things which happen to God’s servants, in particular, hurt and bewilder us: how, we ask, can these misfortunes, these frustrations, these apparent setbacks to God’s cause be any part of His will? And we find ourselves tempted when we contemplate events of this sort (of which the Christian world is full) to deny either the reality of God’s government or, if not that, at least the perfect goodness of the God who governs. To draw either conclusion would be easy — but it would also be false; and when we are tempted to do so, we should stop and ask ourselves certain questions.

“The Secret Things”

In the first place: ought we to be surprised when we find ourselves for the moment baffled by what God is doing? Surely not. We must not forget what we are. We are not gods; we are creatures, and no more than creatures; and, as creatures, we have no right or reason to expect that at every point we shall be able to comprehend the wisdom of our Creator. He Himself has reminded us, “My thoughts are not your thoughts . . . as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are . . . my thoughts than your thoughts” (Isa. 55:9). Furthermore, the King has made it clear to us that it is not His pleasure to disclose all the details of His policy to His human subjects. As Moses declared, when he had finished expounding to Israel what God had revealed of His will for them — “the secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us . . . that we may do all the words of this law” (Deut. 29:29). The principle illustrated here is that God has disclosed His mind and will so far as we need to know it for practical purposes, and we are to take what He has disclosed as a complete and adequate rule for our faith and life. But there still remain “secret things” which He has not made known and which, in this life at least, He does not intend us to discover. And the reasons behind God’s providential dealings sometimes fall into this category.

Job’s case illustrates this. Job was never told at any stage about the challenge which God met by allowing Satan to plague His servant in the manner which the book describes. All Job knew was that the omnipotent God was morally perfect and that it would be blasphemously false to deny His goodness under any circumstances. He refused, therefore, to “curse God” even when his livelihood, his children and his health had been taken from him (Job 2:9-10). Fundamentally, in his heart, he maintained this refusal to the end, though the well-meant platitudes which his smug friends churned out at him drove him almost crazy and at times forced out of him wild words about God of which he had later to repent. Though not without a struggle, Job held fast his integrity throughout the time of testing, and maintained his confidence in God’s goodness unshaken. And his confidence was in due course vindicated, for when the time of testing ended, after God had come to Job in mercy to renew his humility (40:1-5; 42:1-6), and Job had obediently prayed for the souls of his three maddening friends, it is recorded that “the LORD gave Job twice as much as he had before” (42:10). “Ye have heard of the patience of Job,” writes James, “and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy” (James 5:11). Did the bewildering series of catastrophes that overtook Job mean that God had abdicated His throne, or abandoned His servant? Not at all; as Job in due course proved by experience. But the reason why God had for a time plunged him into darkness was never told him. And may not God, for wise purposes of His own, treat others of His best followers as He treated Job?

But there is more to be said yet.

What is God doing?

In the second place: has God left us entirely in the dark as to what He is doing in His providential government of the world? Indeed, no. He has, in fact, given us extremely full information as to the central purpose which He is ????uting, and thereby, as we shall see, has given us a very positive rationale of the trying experiences of Christians which constitute our present problem.

What is God doing? In a word, He is “bringing many sons unto glory” (Heb. 2:10). He is saving a great company of sinners. He has been engaged in this task since history began. He first spent many centuries preparing a people and a setting of world-history in readiness for the coming of His Son. Then He sent His Son into the world in order that there might be a gospel, and now He sends His gospel through the world in order that there may be a Church. He has exalted His Son to the throne of the universe, and Christ from His throne now calls sinners to Himself, keeps them, leads them, and finally, brings them to be with Him in His glory. God is saving men and women through His Son: first, by justifying and adopting them into His family for Christ’s sake as soon as they believe, thus restoring the relationship between them and Himself which sin had broken; and then, within that restored relationship, by continually working in and upon them to renew them in the image of Christ, so that the family likeness (if the phrase may be allowed) shall appear in them more and more. And it is this renewal of ourselves, progressive here and to be perfected hereafter, which Paul identifies with the “good” for which “all things work together . . . to them that love God . . . the called according to his purpose.” For God’s purpose, as Paul explains in the next verse, is that those whom God has chosen and in love has called to Himself should “be conformed to the image of his Son, that he (the Son) might be the firstborn among many brethren” (Rom. 8:28-29). All God’s ordering of circumstances, Paul tells us, is a means designed for the fulfilment of this purpose. The “good” for which all things work is not, therefore, the immediate ease and comfort of God’s children (as is, one fears, too often supposed), but their ultimate holiness and conformity to the likeness of Christ.

Does this help us to understand how adverse circumstances may find a place in God’s plan for His people? Certainly, it does; it throws a flood of light upon the whole problem, as the writer to the Hebrews demonstrates. To Christians who had grown disheartened and apathetic under the pressure of constant hardship and victimisation, we find him writing thus: “Have you forgotten the exhortation which addresses you as sons? — `My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor lose courage when you are punished [better, reproved, as R.V.] by him. For the Lord disciplines him whom 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? . . . We have had earthly fathers to discipline us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? . . . He disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness. For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant; later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it” (Heb. 12:5-11, R.S.V., quoting Prov. 3:11-12). It is striking to see how this writer, like Paul, equates the Christian’s “good”, not with ease and quiet, but with sanctification. The passage is so plain that it needs no comment, only frequent re-reading whenever we find it hard to believe that whatever the form of rough handling which circumstances (or our fellow-Christians) are giving us can possibly be God’s will.

The Purpose of it All

However, there is more to be said still. A third question which we should ask ourselves when the problems of providence distress us is: what is God’s ultimate end in His dealings with His children? Is it simply their happiness, or is it something more? The Bible indicates that it is something more. It is the glory of God Himself.

God’s end in all His acts is ultimately Himself. There is nothing morally dubious about this; if we allow that man can have no higher end than the glory of God, how can we say anything different about God Himself? The idea that it is somehow unworthy to represent God as aiming at His own glory in all that He does seems to reflect a failure to remember that God and man are not on the same level; and to show lack of realisation that, whereas a man who makes his own well-being his ultimate end does so at the expense of his fellow-creatures, God has determined to glorify Himself by blessing His creatures. His end in redeeming man, we are told, is “the praise of the glory of his grace,” or simply “the praise of his glory” (Eph. 1:6, 12, 14). He wills to display His resources of mercy (the “riches” of His grace, and of His glory — “glory” being the sum of His attributes as He reveals them: Eph. 2:17; 3:16) in bringing His saints to their ultimate happiness in the enjoyment of Himself. But we may ask, how does this bear on the problem of providence? In this way: it gives us insight into the way in which God saves us, and suggests the reason why He does not take us to heaven the moment we believe. We see that He leaves us in a world of sin to be tried, tested, belaboured by troubles that threaten to crush us — in order that we may glorify Him by our patience under suffering, and in order that He may display the riches of His grace and call forth new praises from us as He constantly upholds and delivers us. Psalm 107 is a majestic declaration of this.

Is it a hard saying? Not to the man who has learned that his chief end in this world is to “glorify God, and (in so doing) to enjoy Him for ever.” To glorify God by patient endurance and to praise Him for His gracious deliverances: to live the whole of one’s life, through smooth and rough places alike, in sustained obedience and thanksgiving for mercy received — to seek and find one’s deepest joy, not in spiritual lotus eating, but in discovering through each successive storm and conflict the mighty adequacy of Christ to save — and in the sure knowledge that God’s way is best, both for our own welfare and for His glory: that is the heart of true religion. No problems of providence will shake the faith of the man who has truly learned this.