"If people want to get into discussion with me about the sovereignty of God, I will tell them front and center that God doesn't like spinal cord injuries. he takes no pleasure in multiple sclerosis or children born with spina bifida. John Piper talks about how God looks at suffering through two lenses. He looks at the isolated incident through a narrow lens and loathes it. His heart loathes it when you go through a divorce. His heart aches when you give birth to that child with multiple disabilities. He hates the isolated lens of suffering. But he delights in the wide-angle lens. He sees the mosaic. He sees how it all fits together into this incredible pattern for not only our good, but the good of all those around us, and for his glory. I'm grateful that God is sovereign. His fingers hold back a deluge of evil in this world. I'm grateful that He only allows to slip through his sovereign fingers that which He's convinced will help our souls and fit us better for eternity."
~ 63-year old Joni Eareckson Tada
who has lived with quadriplegia for 45 years
from a diving accident when she was 17.
From an interview in World Magazine
God's word tells us to give him thanks in all circumstances, and in fact, the very act of giving thanks is God's will for me as a follower of Christ (1 Thessalonians 5:18). This implies an absolute trust in my God and King. Now, if God is not sovereign over all things, isn't it foolish to give him thanks in all my circumstances? It would be like thanking my wife for the grass or for elephants. Neither had anything to do with those things. But I thank my wife for her awesome Oatmeal Scotchie cookies because it was by her hand that they came. For God to tell us to give thanks in all circumstances implies that no thing comes to us apart from his divine goodness--as hard or as easy as those circumstances might be. If he is not sovereign over all, he has no business asking us to give him thanks.
Will I trust him today?
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