The Lord is awe-inspiring, fearsome, fascinating, intriguing, majestic, and full of splendor: breathtaking! Here is what I saw of him and what came to my mind and heart in Psalm 59:3-4,
"See how they lie in wait for me! Fierce men conspire against me for no offense or sin of mine, Lord. I have done no wrong, yet they are ready to attack me. Arise to help me; look on my plight!"
David voiced his complaint and his cry for help to God as he faced "fierce men" who sought to kill him. Within this psalm we find it is a time in David's life when he was a good man, a man after God's own heart. A time that reflected what Paul had to say of him when describing David to the folks in the synagogue in Pisidian Antioch, "I [God] have found David son of Jesse, a man after my own heart; he will do everything I want him to do." Acts 13:22b. In this psalm David claimed he had done no wrong, that God was his strength, his fortress, the One upon whom he relied.
This psalm speaks of a bad thing happening to a good man and raises that oft heard question, "Why do bad things happen to good people?" I have heard it answered many times but have felt frustrated as the answers always seem to dodge the real issues. Here is my take on it:
We live in a hostile, rebellious world at enmity with God. Our existence here is described as "darkness" and all live in this darkness since the fall of man in the garden of Eden. As a result, this world looks like what happens when God is absent, when people are estranged from him. Man rejected God and now he lives in the environment of his own devices. Somehow, this rarely gets expressed. Believers are delivered from this darkness and now have spiritual light, but we remain in danger from the evil this darkness promotes.
It appears to me that the prevailing notion is that we live in God's creation (which is true), and that God attends, maintains the world as his creation (which is also true). Since God is all powerful (again, true), whatever happens is something that God either causes or allows, and if something terrible happens to good people, he is looked to as either the cause or the culprit for lack of prevention. I couldn't disagree with this notion more. Yes, it is God's creation John 1:3, and yes, the Scriptures tell us that the creation is maintained by God's Son, Hebrews 1:3. We are also told that God is very involved in the affairs of this world, see Romans 13:1-7 and Acts 17:24-28.
What we are told in our Bibles is that God steps into this world that exists in an estrangement to him, (e.g. John 3:16) for his purposes, his agenda, an agenda of redemption. We are also told that God answers prayer and that we should be persistent in our prayers to him.
What the Scriptures do not teach us is that God has committed himself to insuring bad things don't happen to us. Living in this lost and fallen world, estranged from God and dominated by a collective sinful nature, this world is a hostile and dangerous place with many opportunities for bad things to happen. This world is so dangerous, we all live in a fatal condition. We all face death in this life, we all face sickness, we all face all of the consequences of a world existing in estrangement from God. Again, this does not mean that God will not respond to prayer, but he has not committed himself to answer all prayer according to our wishes. It also doesn't mean God is not carrying out his redemptive agenda.
As it turns out, God uses these "bad things" that will come into believer's lives, the things that are common to all mankind, for the purposes he chooses to pursue. For instance, we are told that God has predestined that his people, good people, will be conformed to the likeness, the nature of Jesus Christ, things like patience and so forth. He has decided to use these bad things, these difficulties for this purpose, "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters... Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written: 'For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.'" Romans 8 28-36. As Jesus told the Laodiceans, "Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline." Revelation 3:19a.
One of the great disservices of the pre-tribulational rapture folks was the false notion they promoted, "God loves you and so he wouldn't want you to suffer, would he?" May I suggest a reading of the book of Acts and another book called "Foxes Book of Martyrs". I think even a brief reading of the two will disabuse us of that kind of faulty thinking.
I have often wondered, and I certainly don't know this for sure, that God allows born-again believers to continue in the struggles that are common to all mankind, but that for believers, these struggles now become God's toolbox for conforming us to the likeness of Jesus Christ - otherwise the opportunity for faith may become compromised. What I mean is that if the world sees that everything is a bed of roses when someone embraces Jesus Christ, that may lead to many embracing the bed of roses rather than Jesus Christ. Just musing here.
In any event, it is not in this life that we seek our happiness, our deliverance from bad things. We are all going to get sick, we are all going to die. Many of us will be victims of the violence of evil people in this life, all while we are good folks and pleasing to God. Note the plea of the sons of Korah in Psalm 44:13-22,
"You have made us a reproach to our neighbors,
the scorn and derision of those around us.
You have made us a byword among the nations;
the peoples shake their heads at us.
I live in disgrace all day long,
and my face is covered with shame
at the taunts of those who reproach and revile me,
because of the enemy, who is bent on revenge.
All this came upon us,
though we had not forgotten you;
we had not been false to your covenant.
Our hearts had not turned back; our feet had not strayed from your path.
But you crushed us and made us a haunt for jackals; you covered us over with deep darkness.
If we had forgotten the name of our God
or spread out our hands to a foreign god,
would not God have discovered it,
since he knows the secrets of the heart?
Yet for your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.
We look for deliverance from "bad things", not is this life, but in the resurrection. I like how the writer of Hebrews puts it as he speaks of people of faith, "All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance,admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth. People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them." Hebrews 11:13-16. Also, "These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised, since God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect." Hebrews 11:39-40.
Bad things happen to good people in this life because it exists under God's condemnation. In spite of the fact that he redeems those who will embrace him in faith, the same bad things that affect unbelievers still impact believers to bring about what God wants in our lives. God has not committed himself to keeping bad things happening to good people in this life. However, the next life, in the resurrection... well that is a whole other story! No bad things there! As believers, we need to stop expecting heaven on earth and begin to look forward to our "heavenly country" as those of faith are to do.
Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share what moved you about him from your Bible reading today. I'd love to hear from you!
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