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Providence Over Suffering (Part 3) · Pastor John Piper's answers

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  Speaker 1: We focused last time on the providence of God in nature,
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  Speaker 1: in particular the world that comes at us. Let me
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  Speaker 1: Borian a little more specifically on the difficult topic of sickness, disease, life, death, disability,
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  Speaker 1: and ask how does the providence of God relate there? Now,
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  Speaker 1: Let me admit and indeed affirm the reality of Satan
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  Speaker 1: in this world as a real agent, a real causer
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  Speaker 1: of pain and evil. He's a murder, He's a liar.
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  Speaker 1: Revelation two ten. Behold, the devil is about to cast
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  Speaker 1: some of you Christians into prison, so that you will
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  Speaker 1: be tested, and you will have tribulation for ten days.
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  Speaker 1: Be faithful unto death, and I will give you the
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  Speaker 1: crown of life. So it seems to teach that not
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  Speaker 1: only can Satan throw Christians into prison, he can so
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  Speaker 1: orchestrate things that they die, and we should be faithful
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  Speaker 1: unto death. So I don't mean to minimize at all
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  Speaker 1: between the overarching providence of God and our experience the
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  Speaker 1: reality of Satan in here doing his thing. However, Satan
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  Speaker 1: does not have absolute or final or decisive control in
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  Speaker 1: any of the things that he does. Deuteronomy thirty two
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  Speaker 1: thirty nine, God says see now I I am he
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  Speaker 1: There is no god besides me. It is I who
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  Speaker 1: put to death and give life I have wounded. It
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  Speaker 1: is I who heal. There is no one who can
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  Speaker 1: deliver out of my hand. Or for Samuel two six,
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  Speaker 1: the Lord kills, and the Lord makes alive, He brings
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  Speaker 1: down to shield, he raises up. And most obvious is Jesus,
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  Speaker 1: the son of God comes into the world, and he
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  Speaker 1: is sovereign over all disease and over death. He heals
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  Speaker 1: all the diseases that come to him. He raises people
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  Speaker 1: from the dead. For example, Matthew four, verse twenty three,
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  Speaker 1: he went throughout all Galilee, healing every disease and affliction
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  Speaker 1: among the people. Or Luke seven fourteen young man arives
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  Speaker 1: and the dead man wakes up. Or Mark five point
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  Speaker 1: forty one, talitha Kum little girl rise from the dead,
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  Speaker 1: or Revelation one point eighteen. I am the first and
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  Speaker 1: the last, the living and the living one. I died,
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  Speaker 1: and behold I am alive forevermore. I have the keys
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  Speaker 1: of death and hades. Heals all diseases, raises the dead.
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  Speaker 1: In other words, the final decisive control over sickness and
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  Speaker 1: death is Jesus, not Satan, even though Satan can make
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  Speaker 1: sick acts ten thirty eight. Jesus went about doing good
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  Speaker 1: and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for
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  Speaker 1: God was with him. Nevertheless, when it comes to sickness
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  Speaker 1: or disability, or the wait children are born, it is
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  Speaker 1: not Satan who has the final say Exodus, chapter four,
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  Speaker 1: verse eleven. The Lord said to Moses, who has made
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  Speaker 1: man's mouth or who makes him mute or death, or
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  Speaker 1: seeing or blind? Is it not I the Lord? Or
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  Speaker 1: John nine one to three, Rabbi Jesus, who sinned this
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  Speaker 1: man or his parents? That he was born blind? That's
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  Speaker 1: their assumption. Somebody sin it's his fault, or is his
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  Speaker 1: parent's faults. Somebody's gotta be blamed here. And Jesus said,
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  Speaker 1: it is not that this man sinned or his parents,
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  Speaker 1: but that the works of God might be displayed in him.
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  Speaker 1: God's at work here, He has a design here. Let's
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  Speaker 1: just look closing at job. Almost everybody thinks about job
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  Speaker 1: when they think about disease or death. So you know
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  Speaker 1: the story. He was a good man, better man than
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  Speaker 1: anybody in the land. Satan challenges God with respect to
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  Speaker 1: job right, and he says, stretch out your hand. This
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  Speaker 1: is chapter one, verse eleven. Stretch out your hand and
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  Speaker 1: touch all that he has. He will curse you to
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  Speaker 1: your face. That's Satan to God. And God says, behold,
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  Speaker 1: all that he has is in your hand, only against him.
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  Speaker 1: Don't stretch out your hand so you can go this far, Satan,
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  Speaker 1: no further. God is sovereign over Satan. So without touching
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  Speaker 1: Job's skin, this is what happens. Sabeians kill the servants
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  Speaker 1: and steal all the oxen and all the donkeys. Lightning
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  Speaker 1: strikes and kills all his sheep and his shepherds. And
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  Speaker 1: worst of all, a great wind hits the house. This
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  Speaker 1: would be like a tornado hits the house where all
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  Speaker 1: ten of his children are partying, and every last one
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  Speaker 1: of them dies. And the news comes to Job. And
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  Speaker 1: this is what happens. Then Job rose. This is chapter one,
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  Speaker 1: verse twenty and twenty one. Job rose and tore his
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  Speaker 1: robe and shaved his head, and fell on the ground
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  Speaker 1: and worshiped. And he said, naked I came from my
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  Speaker 1: mother's womb. Naked I will return. The Lord gave, and
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  Speaker 1: the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of
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  Speaker 1: the Lord. He worshiped, He acknowledged the Lord has done this,
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  Speaker 1: even though Satan got permission to do it. Now was
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  Speaker 1: he wrong? Some people say, oh, Job is wrong to
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  Speaker 1: say that, and the very next says, in all this,
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  Speaker 1: Job did not sin or charge God with wrong. It
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  Speaker 1: wasn't wrong. It wasn't sin for him to talk that
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  Speaker 1: way and to say God has done this, I bow
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  Speaker 1: under it and worship my God. So Satan challenges God again,
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  Speaker 1: skin for skin, Let me touch his skin. He will
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  Speaker 1: curse you. Let me touch his skin. The Lord said
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  Speaker 1: to Satan, behold, he is in your hand. Only spare
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  Speaker 1: his life. So Satan went out from the presence of
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  Speaker 1: the Lord and listen to this, and Satan struck Job
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  Speaker 1: with loathsome swords from the soul of his foot to
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  Speaker 1: the crown of his head. The text says, Satan did that.
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  Speaker 1: Satan did that. God's in control. You can go this far,
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  Speaker 1: no further. Here's what Job says when his wife says,
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  Speaker 1: you should just curse God and die two verse ten,
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  Speaker 1: shall we receive good at the hand of God or
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  Speaker 1: good from God and not receive evil? Job, The text says,
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  Speaker 1: Satan did it, and you're saying shouldn't we humble ourselves
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  Speaker 1: and be willing to receive both good and evil from
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  Speaker 1: the hand of God. Job, that's wrong, and the very
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  Speaker 1: next verse says, in all this Job did not sin
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  Speaker 1: with his lips. And the reason we know we're not
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  Speaker 1: misreading those verses that say Job was right to talk
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  Speaker 1: that way is because the end of the book, chapter
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  Speaker 1: forty two, verse eleven goes like this, this is the
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  Speaker 1: inspired writer to looking all his brothers and sisters, and
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  Speaker 1: all who had known him before, comforted him for all
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  Speaker 1: the evil that the Lord had brought on him. That's
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  Speaker 1: the summary statement of the Book of Job, and James
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  Speaker 1: in the New Testament writes about it like this, This
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  Speaker 1: is James five eleven. You have heard of the steadfastness
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  Speaker 1: of Job, and you have seen the purpose of the Lord.
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  Speaker 1: How the Lord is compassionate and merciful. So yes, God
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  Speaker 1: is in charge of all sickness, all disease, all life,
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  Speaker 1: all death, all disability. His providence is that pervasive. And
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  Speaker 1: when you trust him through Jesus Christ, his mercy, his wisdom,
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  Speaker 1: his power, you will discover that it is merciful and compassionate,