“There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which [God] who is Sovereign over all, does not cry, ‘Mine!’”[i]
Abraham Kuyper, theologian, journalist, and former prime minister of the Netherlands

“If there is a God, where was He? Why did He let that happen? Why didn’t God stop it?” I was 20 years old, and it was just days after September 11, 2001, when a man angrily asked these questions. He wasn’t talking to me, but I intended to regale him with a philosophical perspective that would illuminate his simple mind to the complex realities of the divine order. It didn’t work. He didn’t give a rip. He didn’t care about the mysteries of free will and sovereignty. He just saw planes smash into the World Trade Center. He saw people engulfed in flames plunge to their death. He didn’t want the musings of an amateur philosopher; he needed something more.

That may have been the first time I clearly heard the question, “Where was God?” but it wasn’t the last. Since that day, I’ve heard the question repeated and rephrased: “If God is loving, why would He let that happen? Why didn’t He show up? Couldn’t He have stopped it?” Often in those moments of examination, many religious people try to defend God, as I did. They feel obligated to be God’s defense attorney or publicist. The intention is to make God look good, be understandable, and sort of bring Him down to earth.

I’ve heard well-intentioned people say things like, “God didn’t do that; that’s the devil; God will never give you more than you can handle; God needed your child more than you; he is now a little angel; it isn’t our place to ask why,” or worse. In those moments of intense scrutiny, the faithful often fall back on empty expressions, platitudes, and clichés. It’s fortune cookie philosophy or greeting card counseling with a religious twist. The thoughts may sound like they are in the Bible, but they lack substance and truth. Occasionally, people really want to know, “Where is God? Why didn’t He stop this from happening?”

All of the doubts, frustration, confusion, and skepticism are circling around a couple of core questions: “Who is God? What is God like?” If God is… (fill in the blank however you want), but then something in life threatens that belief, we are faced with a problem. If my pastor, priest, teacher, parents, or grandma told me something about God when I was a kid that life now proves to be false or unreliable, what gives? Did they lie to me? Is everything I’ve learned about God wrong? Maybe what I’ve been taught about God is just a nice bedtime story or religious fairytale?

Our view of God often begins to be shaped in childhood. As life forces us to grow, change, and embrace more complex realities, sometimes our opinions about God from our youth just don’t seem to keep up.[ii] The God we learned about in Sunday School, catechism, or from grandma doesn’t seem fit for the challenges and rigors of everyday life. We love grandma, but eventually we conclude that the god she told us about when we were a child is only for children. The Bible does talk about child-like faith, but that is different than a childish faith. Faith that doesn’t mature and grow eventually sours.

For some, it is a first-semester science class in college that reveals their feeble faith. It very often prompts them to question God’s existence (atheism). If not His existence, then His awareness or involvement in the world (agnosticism). The god of their childhood is incapable of standing up against the arguments of academia. For others, a personal crisis in life can bring doubts and disappointments to the surface. Even for so-called believers, the idea that God is good all the time seems questionable when life isn’t so good. In our disappointment, we decide that who we’ve been believing in, singing about, and praying to isn’t worthy of those things. Here’s the point: what we believe about God shapes what we expect of Him.

If we believe God is just a character in some nice fairytale stories, of course He wouldn’t belong in science, logic, and higher learning. If we believe God promises health and wealth to moral, well-behaved generous people, then we expect that from Him. Beliefs, views, and opinions about God are all over the map. And because of that, expectations of what God supposedly does and does not do vary wildly. Depending on your background, you could view God in a variety of different ways and base your expectations on that set of beliefs.

However, instead of having an accurate understanding of God, we often settle for a caricature of God. Like a caricature drawn at a county fair, we overemphasize and exaggerate one or two specific characteristics of God and ignore all others. Caricature artists will also create, imagine, or fabricate something that isn’t even there. We can do the same with God. Here are a few caricatures that summarize what some people believe about God.

God: The Divine Santa Claus

Throughout the year, I do my best to stay off the naughty list and stay on his nice list. I do some charity work and try to be good, so that when I need to talk with him (pray), I can sit on his lap, give him my wish list, leave him out a plate of chocolate chip cookies, and BAM! Christmas day comes and Santa (god) delivers everything I told him I wanted and needed. It’s all good until Santa doesn’t give me what I want.

God: The First Responder

Crisis comes and we call 9-1-1. We pray, hoping god will answer the “phone.” “God, if you get me out of this mess, I’ll never do this again.” Or “God, if you make this go away, I’ll do [fill in the blank] for you.” Often when the emergency is over, we forget our promise.

God: The Punisher

Angry and vengeful, god is waiting for you to make one wrong move and then he’ll strike you dead. No mercy is his motto. People who view god like this often walk on religious eggshells completely terrified of god. This god has zero love, grace, mercy, or compassion. The punisher god is all law, order, and judgment. Don’t you dare enter a church – the roof will certainly come crashing down on you!

God: Just Out Of Reach

In the 16^th century, Michelangelo created one of the most renowned pieces of art in history. Lining the walls and across the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel are incredible frescos illustrating various events in the Bible. God is painted with a stern face, long gray hair and beard, and what looks to me like a pink robe. Even though you may not be a fan of fine art, this might be how you view god – as a distant, just out of reach being, floating around in the clouds.

God: The Old War Veteran

Each year in towns across America, military veterans march down mainstreet in their local parades. People stand and applaud. Communities remember the sacrifice of these brave men and women. Many times the veterans are old and frail and it may be hard to imagine them young and full of life. God the old war veteran is somebody who did some great and awesome things “back in the day.” Where and what exactly he did we don’t know, but there are some monuments and statues somewhere. He was useful and important, but those days have passed. As a courtesy, we’ll stand and applaud for him on a holiday, usually Christmas and Easter.

God: The (hopefully) Heavyweight Champion of the World

God is locked in a cosmic battle with the devil and the forces of evil. These two are viewed as opposites and equals. In the end, we hope that god will win this divine tug of war.

God: Father to Unruly Children

God is shocked by the actions of Adam, Eve, and all of humanity. This idea of god sees him as scrambling to adapt. He is constantly operating in a Plan B-type mode. If people would just do right and “let go and let god” then everything would go to plan. God is a parent standing by totally helpless while his children run wild!

God: The Grandparent

God is like a fun grandparent. No rules, no bedtime, cookies, tons of fun, and endless snuggles. When something bad happens or rules are enforced or consequences for bad behavior are given, that just couldn’t be god, because he is just love!

God: One Of Many

In Greek mythology, the gods lived on Mount Olympus. The god Cronos/Saturn eats all his kids, but Zeus/Jupiter escapes. He later returns and overthrows his father. Eventually, we get the demi-gods. The gods of Mt. Olympus were preceded by the Titans. Where did they come from? Perhaps they came from an endless line of humans who became gods, the God of the Bible or Jesus or whoever is just part of this big, violently unhappy family on Mt. Olympus.

God: The Absent-Minded Owner

God created something beautiful, and then rested. Is he sleeping? He must have washed his hands of it. Is god aware that things are literally spinning out of control? He’s the driver completely asleep at the wheel of the universe. It must be up to us. Good luck folks. “May the odds be ever in your favor.”[iii]  

Some of these descriptions are ridiculous and extreme, but I’ve met people who have explained God, maybe not in these exact terms, but in every one of those ways. Again, what we believe about God determines what we expect of Him.[iv] 

But what if we are wrong about God?

One of the best people in all of the Bible totally underestimated the Lord. His name was Job. His story is one of the most heartbreaking, troubling, and confusing of all time – at least to me. The book begins by describing Job as “blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil” (Job 1:1). The Bible continues, explaining that Job was an incredibly wealthy man and a loving father to ten children (seven sons and three daughters). But then the setting of the story unexpectedly shifts from earth to heaven.

God and Satan are having a conversation. As if that’s not hard enough to wrap our minds around, God then draws Satan’s attention to Job, whom He calls, “my servant.” Satan challenges God, explaining that the only reason Job serves and loves Him is because God protects and blesses him. In response, God tells Satan that he can do what he wants to everything that belongs to Job, but he can’t lay a finger on Job. God told Satan what he could and could not do.  “Even the devil is God’s devil,”[v] Martin Luther said. Satan had to come to God’s throne for permission.

As the scene shifts back to earth, what would certainly be the worst day of Job’s life begins to unfold. Before the sun sets, much of Job’s wealth would be gone and all ten of Job’s kids would be dead. Here is his response:

Then Job arose and tore his robe and shaved his head and fell on the ground and worshiped. And he said, “Naked I came from mother’s womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” In all this Job did not sin or charge God with wrong. Job 1:20-22

WHAT? Wow. Job is an upright guy and these crises that came in rapid succession proved his character. But Job’s story doesn’t stop there. In the second chapter of the book there is another conversation between God and Satan. Again, God brings up Job, calling him “my servant.” Satan argues with God that if he could touch Job’s body, Job would abandon his integrity and curse God. In response, God gives Satan authority over Job’s body, but with the limit that Satan cannot kill Job. Keep in mind, Job is not privy to any of God and Satan’s conversations.

Satan quickly and ruthlessly strikes Job with “loathsome sores from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head” (Job 2:7). Job becomes such a pitiable sight that his wife mercifully encourages him to “curse God and die.” But Job refused. He responds, “‘Shall we receive good from God, and shall we not receive evil?’ In all of this Job did not sin with his lips” (Job 2:9-10). Job was sick, broke, and childless. Then his “friends” show up.

The next 35 chapters are a back-and-forth conversation between Job and his “friends.” Notice I keep putting friends in quotation marks. Just imagine Job in this terrible state and these guys want to show up and give him some advice. More than that, they want to figure out what secret sin Job has been hiding that led to this calamity. Honestly, when you keep Job’s emotional and physical condition in your mind, these “friends” are pretty cruel.

However, these conversations are brought to an abrupt end when God finally speaks to Job. And frankly, God isn’t what Job expected. When God finishes, Job responds:

I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you; therefore, I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes. Job 42:5-6

What is interesting to me is that prior to God speaking, Job’s one actually wise friend says, “God is great, and we know him not; the number of his years is unsearchable” (Job 36:26). God wasn’t what Job or his friends had pictured in their minds.

When you hear a voice on the phone or on the radio or a podcast, unless you know the person or have seen a picture of them, naturally we create an image of what that person looks like. Rarely have any of the images I created in my head been accurate. Usually, they aren’t even close! Job had heard things about God, but it turned out God was much bigger, grander, more powerful, and way beyond Job’s simplistic ideas and imagination.

The same is true for us. We may “hear” things about God, and then create in our imagination what God must be like. And again, like the voice on the radio, we are way off! We rely on clichés, pithy sayings, and second-hand knowledge about God that falls abysmally short of reality. Very often our deeply held convictions about God are just plain wrong. The god we create in our heart, mind, and imagination isn’t worthy of faith or reliance because he isn’t real. It isn’t the God of the Bible. We settle for worshiping or praying to a caricature of our own making. Like Job, we need a real encounter with God. We need to stop talking and let God speak.

What does God say about God?

Throughout human history, God has revealed Himself to all people in a few specific ways. Whether or not someone reads a Bible or encounters a missionary, basic knowledge about the character of God is accessible to all people for all time, across all languages, races, cultures, countries, and continents. Regardless of how remote a certain tribe may be, God has revealed Himself to them. These general revelations include creation, conscience, and eternity.

• Creation is a display of God’s character. Romans says, “For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.” Romans 1:19-20

• As Creator and Designer, the Law of God has been hardwired into every person. Romans 2:15 says, “The law is written on their hearts.” This is an inherent, basic sense of right and wrong that every person is born with. We call this conscience.

• Mankind’s pursuit of immortality is a result of God implanting the very concept of eternity in our hearts. Ecclesiastes 3:11 says, God “has put eternity into man’s heart.” John Calvin wrote, “There is within the human mind, and indeed by natural instinct, an awareness of divinity.”[vi]

To reject the testimony of creation, moral absolutes, and the “awareness of divinity” is to reject God as He has graciously revealed Himself.  The Apostle Paul, while explaining the one true God to the polytheists in Athens, explained that “they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us” (Acts 17:27). God is not playing the unwinnable game of hide and seek.

God has allowed us to seek and find Him through the true stories and teachings of the Bible. “No prophecy,” the Apostle Peter writes, “was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit” (2Peter 1:21). God spoke to and through the writers of the Scripture. What they wrote was inspired (God-breathed). Often the Bible is called “God’s Word,” because it is God’s words about Himself.

God’s Word declares God to be in complete and sovereign control of the universe. Defining sovereignty, A.W. Pink writes, “We mean the supremacy of God, the kingship of God, the Godhood of God. To say that God is sovereign is to declare that God is God. To say that God is sovereign is to declare that He is the Most High, doing according to His will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth.”[vii]

Sovereignty means that God is the boss, the owner, and the ruler.  Absolutely nothing in the universe happens that does not first come to His throne. Here are some verses from the Bible that affirm God’s sovereign control of every inch of the universe.

Yours, O Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the victory and the majesty, for all that is in the heavens and in the earth is yours. Yours is the kingdom, O Lord, and you are exalted as head above all. 1 Chronicles 29:11

He is unchangeable, and who can turn him back? What he desires, that he does. Job 23:13

I know that you can do all things and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted. Job 42:2

The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein. Psalm 24:1

The counsel of the Lord stands forever, the plans of his heart to all generations. Psalm 33:11

The Lord reigns. Psalm 97:1

Our God is in the heavens; he does all that he pleases. Psalm 115:3

Whatever the Lord pleases, he does, in heaven and on earth, in the seas and all deeps. Psalm 135:6

Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand. Proverbs 19:21

His dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom endures from generation to generation; all the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, and he does according to his will among the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay his hand or say to him, “What have you done?” Daniel 4:34-35

In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will. Ephesians 1:11

Hallelujah! For the Lord our God the Almighty reigns. Revelation 19:6

The Bible unapologetically claims God is in absolute control in Heaven and on earth. He has been ruling and reigning over the entire universe from the very beginning to the very end. And by saying the beginning and end, the Bible includes everything in between.

The Beginning…

When there was nothing, there was God. Then He spoke, and all that is came into being. That is the creation account of Genesis chapter 1. God is the creator, not a jump starter, facilitator, or participator. He is the origin of everything! There are no accidents or mistakes in creation. There is a divine designer.

The heavens are yours; the earth also is yours, the world and all that is in it, you have founded them. Psalm 89:11

I am the Lord, and there is no other; besides me there is no God…I form light and create darkness; I make well-being and create calamity; I am the Lord, who does all these things. Isaiah 45:5,7

Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created. Revelation 4:11

Rise and fall of Nations

Every nation and border has been set in place by the hand of the Almighty. The rise and fall of every nation and kingdom is by divine design.

He makes nations great, and he destroys them; he enlarges nations, and leads them away. Job 12:23

And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place. Acts 17:26

Weather

All weather, including “snow…rain…heat…[and] gloom of night”[viii] are determined by the divine decree of God.

For to the snow he says, “Fall on the earth” likewise to the downpour, his mighty downpour….By the breath of God ice is given, and the broad waters are frozen fast. He loads the thick cloud with moisture; the clouds scatter his lightning. They turn around and around by his guidance, to accomplish all that he commands them on the face of the habitable world. Whether for correction or for his land or for love, he causes it to happen. Job 37:6, 10-13

You rule the raging of the sea; when its waves rise, you still them. Psalm 89:9

He it is who makes the clouds rise at the end of the earth, who makes lightnings for the rain and brings forth the wind from his storehouses. Psalm 135:7

He sends out his command to the earth; his words run swiftly. He gives snow like wool; he scatters frost like ashes. He hurls down his crystals of ice like crumbs; who can stand before his cold? He sends out his word, and melts them; he makes his wind blow and the waters flow. Psalm 147:15-18

See Matthew 8:18, 23-27; Mark 4:35-41; and Luke 8:22-25 where Jesus calms the storm.

Our days

The truth of God’s sovereignty can remain a distant, ethereal idea – meaning, we think He’s off handling only big issues and far removed from our everyday lives. Or we can personalize it and recognize His providence even in the things we think are small or trivial. Before the sun rose and set on the first day, your birthday and death-day were written in God’s book. His sovereignty and foreknowledge extends to the lifespan of every human being who has and will ever live.

Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them. Psalm 139:16

See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god beside me; I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal; and there is none that can deliver out of my hand. Deuteronomy 32:39

…and the End

God is the beginning (Alpha), and He is the end (Omega). God is not reacting to world events. God is orchestrating them.

I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. Revelation 21:6

Remember this and stand firm, recall it to mind, you transgressors, remember the former things of old; for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, “My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose,” calling a bird of prey from the east, the man of my counsel from a far country. I have spoken, and I will bring it to pass; I have purposed, and I will do it. Isaiah 46:8-11

See also Isaiah 44:6; 48:5, 12.

We find stability and strength if, by faith, we accept that there is a God, who is all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-present. We grow in confidence that, despite popular opinions or how things look from where we stand, our world is not careening out of control. God actually does have the whole world in His hand. Resting in that reality, we aren’t forced to try to save the planet, preserve the human race, or stare down the next existential threat. We know that God sits securely on His throne, ruling and reigning over every square inch of the universe. We have the peace of God that “surpasses all understanding” (Philippians 4:7) knowing that nothing happens that has not first come to His throne. God is the King of the universe.

Is it well?

In 1873, Horatio Spafford wrote the words of the beautiful hymn, “It is well with my soul.” The story behind the hymn is tragic. Spafford was a successful lawyer in Chicago. When the great Chicago fire destroyed the city, Spafford, like many others, suffered massive financial losses. Several years after the fire, with the city slowly recovering, Spafford decided to travel to Europe with his wife and four daughters for vacation. Because of some business issues, Spafford sent his wife Anna and their daughters ahead on the S.S. Ville du Havre, a ship bound for Wales. During the journey across the Atlantic, the ship sank and all of Spafford’s daughters died. When his wife arrived in Wales, two simple words contained in the message conveyed the tragedy to Spafford, “Saved alone.” When Spafford sailed to meet his wife, he wrote these words near the spot where his daughters had perished.

When peace like a river attendeth my way,

When sorrows like sea billows roll;

Whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say,

It is well, it is well with my soul.

How can somebody face tragedy and loss and then write such profoundly beautiful words? How can faith in God remain? How can anyone after such loss say, “It is well with my soul”? And mean it? How can you? It is only by accepting, believing, and trusting in the truth that there are no such things as accidents or coincidences. God is in complete control. His sovereignty conveys His ownership. Spafford’s daughters first and foremost belonged to God. This reality doesn’t erase sorrow, but it does sustain us through it. Bible Commentator William Barclay wrote, “Sorrow can do one of two things to us. It can make us hard, bitter, resentful, rebellious against God. Or, it can make us kinder, softer, more sympathetic. It can despoil us of our faith. Or, it can root faith ever deeper and more immovable. It all depends how we think of God.”[ix]

Truth #1 challenges us to acknowledge the reality of God’s sovereignty. By faith we believe that God is not absent, distant, or aloof. The Bible explains that God is ruling and reigning. So why would God sink a ship? He could have stopped it, so why didn’t He? That brings us face to face with Truth #2 – All things exist for God’s glory.

Prayer of confession and belief –

God, you are in complete control. As your servant Job prayed, so I pray too. You give and you take away, blessed be your name. Amen. 

For further reading: Job 1-2; Psalm 57:2; Psalm 138:8; and 1 Samuel 2:6-8