The Sovereignty of God

ecently I received an email from someone asking that I give my thoughts on the sovereignty of God in relation to some specific topics. I’ll go ahead and answer each one of her questions under the captions below. I’ll start off with some general comments on the sovereignty of God and then answer each one of the questions one by one.

1. General Comments

In my opinion, the sovereignty of God refers to the fact that God can simply do whatever He wants, whenever He wants, to whomever He wants and however He wants. In other words, God is completely free to do whatever He wants either in heaven above or on this earth below, and no one is going to tell Him what He can or cannot do.

Webster's dictionary describes the word sovereign as:

"One who exercises supreme, permanent authority. Self-governing, independent, having supreme rank or power, complete independence, the right to exercise supreme power and dominion."

All of these words and phrases perfectly describe what it is attributable to God in reference to this quality.

I believe that God is sovereign in all of His ways. He can heal who He wants, protect who He wants, help who He wants and have mercy on who He wants.

However, this quality also tells us that God can choose to do just the opposite on all of those actions. He can choose not to heal, not to protect and not to have mercy on someone for whatever His specific reasons may be.

The Bible says that God cannot "cause" evil to occur since there is no darkness in Him - but He can "allow" evil and bad things to happen. In other words, He can pull back His hand of protection to allow an attack to come in from either demons or humans.

I believe the attack we had on 9/11 is a perfect example. I do not believe God caused this attack to occur - but I believe that He did allow it to come through for whatever His specific reasons were.

Since God is sovereign in all of His ways - this presents a very interesting and fascinating scenario for all Christians. Since we are saved and born again under the shed Blood of His Son Jesus, the Bible says that we are now free to approach Him anytime we want for prayer and intimate communication. The Bible actually tells us to approach His throne boldly and with confidence.

When you put these verses together with the other verses telling us to ask, to seek, to knock, to pray, to state our cases and contentions before Him - the picture that is given to us is that we can get answers to our prayers if we properly approach God with our specific requests and petitions.

The fact that God is sovereign means that we all have a chance to approach Him and possibly get answers to some of our prayer requests. Since God is sovereign, we never know when He is going to move on a certain situation. Many times we have absolutely nothing to lose in going ahead and praying for something specific.

Now that we know that God is definitely sovereign in all of His ways since the Bible tells us so - this will lead to some very interesting insights to some of the other questions that she had sent me. I’ll cover each of her specific questions under the remaining captions below.

2. Healing

Per the article I just did on the Healing Verses of the Bible, I believe that God’s sovereignty really comes into play on this issue. The Bible tells us that the gift of healing is one of the 9 gifts of the Holy Spirit and that each one of these 9 gifts - including the gift of healing - is a manifestation as God wills, not as we will!

In other words, we cannot control any part of this gift and when it will manifest. It will manifest when God chooses to manifest it, and the best we can do is to approach God in prayer and try to persuade Him to move on a particular situation with His healing power.

We are to ask, to seek, to knock, to state our case before Him as to why we would like Him to release His healing power - but the final decision will always belong to God as to whether or not He is going to sovereignly choose to heal someone in a particular situation.

3. Prayer/Intercession

Per my comments under the general comments caption, God’s sovereignty really comes into play on this issue. Whenever you pray to God with any particular requests you may have, or stand in the gap and intercede for someone else’s particular prayer need - the best you can do is state your case before Him and pray in the way that is best suited for whatever it is that you are asking Him for.

There are different types of prayer strategies that you can take with the Lord such as praying in the Spirit, Pleading the Blood, quoting specific Scripture verses back to God to back up your case, forming battle prayers that fit the situation, using prayer warfare or wrestling with God trying to get Him to move with His healing and/or deliverance power to save the day for you or someone else.

However, no matter how hard and how intensely you pray for a specific request or need, the final decision as to whether or not God is going to ultimately answer your prayer falls back on His sovereign will. God will simply make up His own mind as to whether or not He will answer your particular prayer and it is up to us to accept whatever His final decision and verdict is going to be on a specific prayer request.

God always knows best, and sometimes it is actually in our best interests that He not give us what we have been praying for. It may actually cause us more harm than good in the long run.

If God chooses not to heal someone who may be dying of cancer and wants to bring this person home early - no matter what the age - we should respect His final decision and let it go at that. God may have very good reasons for wanting to bring this person home early and we have to faith and trust in Him that He knows what He is doing.

4. The Will of God

Per one of the articles that we have in our site titled: "Prayer Secret #2 - The Will of God," - this was one of the topics I discussed - making sure that your prayer requests always line up with the will of God for you and your life. I believe that most, if not all of your prayer requests, should always line up with what God's perfect will is on a particular situation.

A perfect example of this principle and how it may sometimes interrelate with God’s sovereignty on a particular request is the following short story I recently read. A woman had been praying to God that He heal her 10-year-old son of a disease that was slowly killing him. God kept telling her that He wanted to bring her son home early and for her to let it go.

The woman would not take no for an answer and kept praying and pressing into God to heal her son. Because she was so insistent and would not let the matter go with God, God finally granted her the request and healed her son. The story then ends stating that the woman lived along enough to see her son hanged as a criminal for a murder he ended up committing at 41 years of age.

God’s perfect will for this situation was that He allow the boy to be brought home early from the disease that was killing him. God knew what his future held in store for him and He didn’t want the boy risking losing his salvation for the crime that he was going to end up committing - not to mention the death of the person that he had murdered and all of the grief and torment that he would end up inflicting on this victim's family and close loved ones.

However, since the woman was praying and wrestling so hard with God, God sovereignly chose to grant her request and heal the boy. This story is a perfect example of why we need to be very careful on how hard we wrestle and pray to God for a specific request. I feel that once you know what God's perfect will is on a specific prayer request - that you accept His final decision, let it go and not try to change His mind.

This story is a dramatic example of what can happen if you are successful in changing God’s mind from what His original intentions were. The results could be disastrous like they were in this story.

However, per the article I did on Moses, there are unique, special situations where I feel that you can attempt to get God to change His mind - but you better be guided by the Holy Spirit on this to see if it is really in your best interests to try and get God to change His mind on a particular request.

In the case of Moses, I felt Moses did the right thing in persuading God to change His mind on wanting to kill the Israelites when God got so mad at them when He was giving Moses the 10 commandments. But that was a very unique, special situation. Most of the time, God knows what is best for you and anyone else you may be praying and interceding for. Let His perfect will be done on all matters once you find out what it is.

Otherwise, if you press too hard and too often with Him on a particular prayer request, His sovereignty may just come into play and He may choose to change His mind from what His original intentions were, and you could end up reaping disastrous consequences like the woman did in the above story praying for her 10 year old son.

5. Is God in Control of All Things?

I believe the answer is definitely yes - God is in total control of all things. The Bible says that the earth is God’s footstool, and that God literally gets involved in removing and putting in of kings in different kingdoms.

The fact that the Book of Revelation and the rest of the end time prophecies from the Bible tells us exactly how everything is going to end up all show that God has to be in total control of all things.

The Bible tells us of an Antichrist that will come, that he will rule from a 10 nation confederacy, that the last 7 years on earth will be called the Great Tribulation, that in the middle of this tribulation the Antichrist will seat himself up in the middle of God’s temple to proclaim himself to be god, that the battle of Armageddon will occur, that Jesus will come back a second time to set up a 1000 year Millennium Kingdom, and that the final end for all of us will be a New Heaven and New Earth.

These are all specific events that are prophesied to occur from our Bible. And if they are all going to come to pass, which I believe they will because the Bible tells us so, then this tells me that God has to be in total control of everything - both in heaven and on earth. There is no way that all of these specific end time events can come to pass just from natural cause and effect or simply by chance. All of these events are specific events with dates and times stamped on them coming into manifestation.

I believe God the Father knows the exact date and time Jesus will be returning to us for His second coming. And if He knows the date and time on all of these other events that have to happen before He comes back, then this tells me that God has to be in total control of everything in order for these events to occur on the time frame that He has them set up to occur.

What this means is that God will be "causing" some events to occur, and "allowing" other events to occur to properly set in motion the proper sequence of events that has to occur in "domino fashion" for everything to fall in place as prophesied out of the Bible.

I look at the earth as God’s big chessboard. Sometimes God makes His own specific moves to bring about or to cause a certain event to happen. Other times He will "allow" something to happen because of the free will factor involved with humans and demons.

For instance, God does not "cause" many of the bad things that happen in this world such as the attack on 9/11, the murder of innocent children by all of the abortions that are occurring, all of the children that go missing each year like what we have been hearing about recently in the news, and all the bad and horrible car accidents which are either killing people or leaving them permanently disabled.

I don’t believe God is causing any of these types of bad things to happen. However, God is "allowing" some of these bad events to occur in the normal flows of life. Why? If God is all-good and incapable of committing any type of evil act - then how can He allow such horrible and evil things to occur in this life - especially to some of His own people?

I believe the answer goes back to the story of Adam and Eve. God tested Adam and Eve to see if they would obey Him and stay off of that one forbidden tree. When they blew it, the entire landscape and scenario changed as far as the rest of us are concerned.

As a result of committing this one severe transgression against the Lord, we all have to be born into an imperfect, cursed and fallen world. We are born with bodies that are subject to aging, disease, illness and finally death. We all have to work and sweat to be able to live and eat. The Bible says that our earth became cursed with all of this the minute Adam and Eve sinned by eating from that forbidden tree.

I believe that this earth is an "extension" from the story of Adam and Eve. Just as God was testing Adam and Eve in the perfect environment He initially gave to them - He is testing every single one of us as we plow and journey through this earthly life.

God is seeing who is going to accept His Son Jesus for their eternal salvation. He is watching how people live their lives and whether or not they can stay out of serious sins and transgressions. We know that God is going to be judging each and everyone of us when we die and cross over for everything we have ever done or said - whether it be good or bad. All of this tells me that we are all in a "testing mode" with God the Father while walking through this earthly life.

And since we are all in this testing mode with God the Father in this life - this means from time to time God has to "allow" some people to act out on their evil desires. God has to see if these people are going to actually commit the murder they have been thinking about doing for quite some time. As a result, God has to "allow" some of these bad things to happen in order to properly test that person to see if they will really go that far to commit what they had been thinking about.

The minute this person acts out on his evil thoughts and desires and commits the evil deed, they have just placed themselves under the automatic judgment of God, and God will either judge and convict them in this life or the next life when they die and cross over.

God has to test these people to see if they are really going to "cross the line" and commit a certain evil act. Adam and Eve did not transgress against God as they were initially thinking about eating from the forbidden tree. It was only after they had actually ate from the tree and officially "crossed the line" did they they reap the consequences of their actions and bring down God’s severe judgment on them.

Since God is testing all of us out and has to allow man’s free will to come into play - God has to "allow" some of these evil acts to occur in order to complete the testing out process that He has set up for each and everyone of us.

For instance - if someone is contemplating on robbing a bank, and no one is praying for this man, or God has chosen not to sovereignly interfere with his plans, then God is going to sit back and watch and see if this person will actually go through with his thoughts just like He did with Adam and Eve. And the minute this person fails his test by acting out on his thoughts and actually robs the bank - then judgment will fall on him - either in this life if he is caught or in the next life when he dies and crosses over.

As a result of God "allowing" this man to complete his test because of his free will - some good and innocent people could get hurt or killed when he attempts to rob the bank. This scenario explains why God has to "allow" a certain amount of evil to occur in this life. All of these bad and evil people are being tested, and their eternal destinies are being determined by the choices they are making as to whether or not they will actually follow through and commit some of the evil acts they have been thinking about.

However, here is where God’s sovereignty really comes into play. I believe many times God is sovereignly choosing to prevent an evil act from occurring. He is running interference or protecting one of His own from dying at the hands of someone wanting to commit an evil act.

This could be as a result of someone Pleading the Blood on his body for protection and God is honoring that prayer. It could be because your mom has been praying for your safety and God is sovereignly choosing to answer her prayers and keep you safe from any intended harm being plotted against you by someone else. Or it could be because God Himself has chosen to protect you for whatever His own personal reasons may be.

If God was not sovereign in all of His ways - then I believe this world would be in much worse shape than it is now. If God’s protection and restraining hand was not "sovereignly operating" on this earth - I believe there is a good chance that we would all be living in a hell on earth.

Even though God has to allow this scenario to complete and work itself out until Jesus comes back for the second time - God is still in control of all things. The Bible says that God can still take something bad that may have happened to you and turn it around and cause something good to come out of it. I call these "counterbalances."

Something bad has come against you. You have just been knocked unjustly to the ground. God will then come in with a "counterbalance" to get you back up on your feet.

For instance, you have just been hit with a loss of money at your job. Then God comes in with the counterbalance and brings you the exact amount of money you had just lost from your job from another source. I’ve seen God do this so many times with myself and others - that I have coined the term "counterbalance" to explain this phenomena when it does occur. This is God sovereignly choosing to help you out in order to help get you back up on a level playing field.

Bottom line - God is in total control of all things even in the midst of having to "allow" a certain amount of evil to occur with the testing out process that is occurring with all of us.

God has given each man a free will, and each person has to make his own choices in this life as to whether or not they will accept God’s free gift of eternal salvation through His Son Jesus Christ and how they will actually live their lives - choosing to live and abide by God’s laws and ways, or choosing to live life their way, breaking any law they see fit just to satisfy their own desires and cravings.

God will "allow" the people that have chosen to live this life on the dark side to do whatever they want within the boundaries that He has sovereignly chosen for them to operate in. And after their time in this life is up, and they have failed all of their tests and have to face God for their own personal judgments and end up getting thrown into hell as a result of all of the evil they have done - none of them will be able to complain back to God that He did not give them enough time and warning to get their act together.

Criminals know they are breaking God's laws when they choose to kill, steal and destroy. And God will only give them a certain amount of time to get their act together. The Bible says that God will not strive with a man forever.

And once their time is up and they have failed all of their tests - then they will all have to face God for His final judgment on their lives - and their eternal destiny will then be decided as to where they will end up going. And that’s a very scary thought. This shows us how serious this life really is and that we all try to stay on the straight and narrow and stay out of any serious sins and transgressions against the Lord.

Our eternal destinies are being determined by the choices that we make while living down here on this earth. And the sad fact about this is that many people really do not realize this and many of these people go on living not caring what they do or who they hurt - all thinking that there will be no eternal consequences to all of their bad choices and actions.

This life is a real game of "life and death," and how we play the game and the specific choices we make will determine whether we live or die once we cross over into our final destinations. Maximum life for those who will be entering into heaven and maximum death for those who will end up being cast into hell, and then eventually the Lake of Fire and Brimstone after the Great White Throne Judgment has been passed.

6. Does God Know All Things Past, Present and Future?

This was her next question. I definitely believe that God perfectly knows all things past, present and future. I believe God is all-knowing and that He knows exactly what is going to happen to all of us in our futures - down to the very smallest details. Here is my argument to back this up.

If God is totally perfect in His being, in His very nature, then I believe this tells us that God is also perfect in His knowledge

And if God is perfect in His knowledge on all things, then this means He has to perfectly know all things in reference to their past, present or future. I don’t see there is any other possible conclusion that we can come to if we accept the premise that God is totally perfect.

If God is totally perfect, then it only stands to reason that He is perfect all the way through His entire being - which would include His intelligence. If His intelligence is perfect, then His knowledge on all things has to be perfect. If His knowledge is perfect, then it only stands to reason that He has perfect knowledge on all things - which would include everything that has to do with the past, present and future.

The second thing that proves this point is the Bible itself. The Bible says that with God "nothing is impossible." If nothing is impossible for God, then this means He is all-powerful. And if He is all-powerful - then this means His intellect and knowledge on all things is all-powerful and thus all-perfect - which again would give Him the ability to perfectly know all things past, present and future.

The Bible also lays down hundreds of prophecies about the first and second comings of Jesus. Jesus has already come the first time and all of the prophecies foretelling of His first coming in the Old Testament have already come true. There are also many prophecies telling us what is going to happen when He comes back for the second time.

The Bible gives very specific prophecies on the events that will occur before His second coming such as the rise of an Antichrist, the wars that will be fought, the judgments that will occur, the specific events of the Great Tribulation, and what the 1000 year Millennium Kingdom will be like.

If God the Father is laying down and telling all of us the specific events that will occur before they actually occur - then this tells us that He has to have perfect knowledge on all future events.

If you believe that all of the Bible is truly the inspired and infallible word of our Lord - then again, there is no other possible conclusion to come to in reference to God being able to perfectly know all things past, present and future. If God did not have this supernatural ability - then there would be no way that He could perfectly predict all of these coming future events.

All of the prophecies about Jesus coming the first time have all come true. If the Bible is truly the real and inerrant word of God, then all of the prophecies about the second coming of Jesus will also come true.

I have my money on the fact that everyone of these prophecies in reference to His second coming will all be coming true - just like they did on His first coming. I believe the Bible itself shows and proves that God is all-powerful and all-knowing, thus giving Him the ability to perfectly know all things past, present and future.

7. What is Predestination?

Webster's dictionary defines predestination as:

"The doctrine that God has foreordained all things, especially that God has elected certain souls to salvation, the act of God foreordaining all things gone before and to come."

I believe there are two angles in which to look at this concept from.

A) God

If we look at this concept from God’s point of view, then everything is in a predestination mode. Why? Because God knows all things past, present and especially future. If God knows everything that is going to occur in all of our futures - down to the smallest and most minute details - then this means we are all in a "predestination mode" with God since God knows exactly what all of our futures are going to hold for us. As a result, everything is predestined as far as He is concerned.

B) Humans

However, there is another angle in which to look at this concept from - and that is from all of our points of view. As humans, we do not know what the future holds - either for us or for anyone else. We don’t know what’s going to happen to us two minutes from now, much less what is going to happen to us two years or twenty years from now. Only God does.

Since we do not know what our futures are going to be holding for us, we have to play the game of life with the idea that only God knows what is in store for us in the future and we should all be trying to play this game of life with the intention of trying to win in God.

Here is what I mean. Say you have a loved one who is not saved. God already knows what is in that person’s entire future and whether or not he or she will accept His gift of eternal salvation. However, we do not know any of this person's future. And unless God gives us a direct word not to pray for this person's eternal salvation - we should continue to pray for this person until he or she literally dies, since some people do get saved on their deathbeds. We cannot give up until the last pitch of the ninth inning has been thrown.

Most of the time, God will not reveal future events that will be coming our way. The Bible does tell us that the Holy Spirit will from time to time show us specific events that will be coming our way - but this is always done for a reason and a purpose - and that is to help prepare us to handle this future event. But for the most part, we have to live life not knowing what is really in store for us even two minutes from now. We can plan all we want for the next days events - but we never know if something will come out of the blue to disrupt our perfectly laid plans for that next day.

The same goes for healing. Say for example you have a friend has just come down with cancer and the doctors have told her she only has 6 more months to live barring a major supernatural miracle from God.

Since God is the only One who knows what is going to happen to her in those six months, and whether or not He is going to choose to heal her, we still have to make the attempt anyway to pray to God to try and get Him to move into her situation with His healing power. We have nothing to lose in trying to pray this out and everything to gain should God decide to heal her - unless God lets you know beforehand that it is not His perfect will to heal in this particular situation.

Since we do not know what God’s intentions may be on a specific event or issue - we have to stand on the basics - which is the fact that God is sovereign, that He can be prayed to, communicated with, reasoned with - and that we never know when God will move in on a particular situation with His healing and/or deliverance power to save the day for someone as a result of our direct prayers to Him.

We have to pray to win when approached with adverse circumstances since we know God is sovereign and there is always a good chance that He will choose to answer our specific prayers - especially if we have established a good personal relationship with Him.

In my opinion, predestination just simply refers to the fact that God knows all things that are going to occur in the future - but for the most part will not reveal those things to us because He expects us to try and play the game of life to win as best we can. Not knowing what the future holds for any of us is actually a blessing as it makes this life much more fun and spontaneous. We wake up every day never knowing what is going to happen next.

Can you imagine professional ballplayers knowing exactly what was going to happen in each game they played - who was going to win, who was going to lose. It would take all of the fun out of the game. The uncertainty of tomorrow keeps us on our toes, keeps us more alert, makes the game of life that much more fun to play - especially when you are walking close with the Lord. You wake up everyday never knowing what God is going to do next in your life.

All in all, I think Christians should be very careful not to get too bogged down with the idea of predestination. God knows what the future holds - we do not - and unless God decides to reveal the future on a specific issue or event - we should just concentrate on playing hard to win the game of life with God on whatever comes our way.

8. Does Man Still Have Authority And Dominion Over the Earth?

I believe that man still has basic dominion over this earth. In Genesis, after God creates man, He states that man shall have dominion over all of the earth - including the fish in the sea, the birds in the air and the cattle and all of the creeping things that creeps on this earth.

However, Adam and Eve got thrown out of the Garden of Eden and the earth has now become fallen and cursed. So did man still retain his dominion over all of the earth as he had in the Garden of Eden? I believe the answer is still yes and that this answer is given to us in the Book of Psalms. The verse reads as follows:

"What is man that You are mindful of him, and the son of man that You visit him? For you have made him a little lower than the angels, and You have crowned him with glory and honor. You have made him to have dominion over the works of Your hands; you have put all things under his feet." (Psalm 8:4-6)

I believe this verse is not talking about Adam and Eve, but all men and women who have been born since the fall of Adam and Eve. If this is correct, then this verse is telling us that man still has dominion over the earth as Adam and Eve had in the Garden of Eden.

Scripture Verses

Here are several good verses from Scripture pertaining to the sovereignty of God and the question on predestination.

1. The Sovereignty of God

Here are two good Scripture verses all showing us that God is sovereign by the way these verses are worded.

• For He says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whomever I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whomever I will have compassion ... Therefore He has mercy on whom He wills, and whom He wills He hardens ... But indeed O man, who are you to reply against God? Will the thing formed say to him who formed it, "Why have you made me like this?" Does the potter have power over the clay, from the same lump to make one vessel for honor and another for dishonor?" (Romans 9:15-21)
   
• "All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing; He does according to His will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth. No one can restrain His hand or say to Him, "What have you done?" (Daniel 4:35)

Notice in this second verse it says that God "does according to His will" in heaven and on earth, and that no one will be able to restrain His hand telling Him what he is going to do or what He is not going to do. Those five powerful words - "does according to His will" - give us perfect and total revelation that God is totally sovereign in all of His ways.

2. Predestination

Here is a good verse showing that things are in a predestination mode as a result of God’s perfect knowledge on all future things. This one has to do with our salvation.

"Just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will." (Ephesians 1:4-5)

Though God the Father knows who will be getting saved and who will not since He can see perfectly into all of our futures - this still does not violate man's free will on all of this. God's initial intentions and plans on all of this is that all men and all women accept His gift of eternal salvation through His Son Jesus. He is thus giving every man and every woman a free choice to make on this decision during the entire time they are walking down here on this earth.

Since we do not have God's perfect knowledge on any future events, we still have to play the game of life as hard as we can and as best as we can - since we never know what God may do next.

All of the above is some good food for thought on the subject of the sovereignty of God.

 

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Scripture taken from New King James Version.
Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2005-2008 by Michael Bradley.


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