The Size of Our God

In the middle of very difficult circumstances, have you ever found yourself mad at God? John Piper says you are skating on thin ice.

So for me to say, I'm mad at you, God, is sinful. And what I should have said was, this really hurts. I don't understand what you've done. I don't get it. Because you don't. Right. I mean, you're finite.

You're not God. It's utterly perplexing. It's baffling. It hurts.

You tell him it hurts. This is Family Life Today. Our hosts are Dave and Ann Wilson.

I'm Bob Lapine. You can find us online at familylifetoday.com. We're going to talk with Dr. John Piper today about how we should think rightly and respond rightly to what has been called the sometimes frowning providence of God. Stay with us. And welcome to Family Life Today.

Thanks for joining us. There was a book came out many years ago. This is one of the first books I remember seeing as a Christian. But it described me. The title of the book described me. Oh, boy. It was a book called— I have a lot of titles going through my head right now.

This was a book titled Your God is Too Small. You remember that? J.B. Phillips? I think it was. Yeah. Yeah. No, it was Paul Little. Oh, that one?

No, no, no. Was it Phillips? Paul Little was Know Why You Believe. That's right. J.B. Phillips wrote Your God is Too Small. Hey, I get 10 points. I got something right.

I think that's right. And my God in those days, in those early days of understanding Him, was too small. I have to tell you, it wasn't until I had somebody sit down and point me to the passages in Scripture that talk about the sovereignty of God that I started to go, oh, He is much bigger than I realized, and also pointed me to the reality of my own sinfulness, which was deeper than I thought it was. That was a revolutionary turning point for me to see that God was much bigger than I realized. I think if anyone would comment on my preaching in 30 plus years, if they ever listened. You wonder, is anybody out there listening? And they could recount the big idea of my life. That's it.

I think that's the theme I keep coming back to. It's the size of your God will determine the outcome of your life. And I always used to think it's the size of your faith. It's not the size of your faith. He could have musters to see faith. It's the size and really the character of understanding who is God. And when you understand not just how vast and majestic and how big He is, but the heart of who God is, it literally changes every second of your life.

That's why I say it determines the outcome of your life. Who is God? And that's what we're probing this week as we get to spend time. We're going deep. We're spending time with Dr. John Piper, who is joining us again. Dr. Piper, welcome back. Thank you.

Good to be back. I am trusting that our listeners don't need to know your bio, that they are familiar with your books, with your teaching, with your years of pastoral ministry at Bethlehem Baptist Church. You've just written this 700-page book on the subject of providence, and people who will invest in this book will come away with a bigger, better, more glorious understanding of the God we serve and the God who loves us. And that's your intent behind the book, isn't it?

I certainly hope so. I'm aware, I mean, as soon as you say 700 pages, most people just say, okay, next, click Amazon for another read. But here's my plea for those folks is only a few people read 700-page books. Those, in my mind, happen to be the people who influence those who don't, so I care about those people. But lots of people care about this issue. I mean, everybody does, ultimately.

They may not even know the name of it, but they care about it. And they like the fact that somebody tried to put all the pieces together in the Bible to make sense out of the providence, and I like having that big book on my shelf so that every now and then, if I think of an issue, I can go to the index and take it down. Oh, so he has a chapter on that. He has a chapter on the sack of Jerusalem and the destruction of all those people and how do you deal with God. He has a chapter on Job. He has a chapter on all those things. So I'm not too worried that people aren't going to read this cover to cover.

I don't expect lots of ordinary folks who care about the issue to read it cover to cover. Really, the majority of the book is the practical application of the issue of providence in our lives, and you are pretty comprehensive. All of these questions seem to come back to that basic theodicy question that has plagued all of us from the beginning time. If God is all-powerful, if God is all-loving, if God is all-good, how can bad things happen to the people he has created? Do you have a satisfactory answer for that in your own heart? In my own heart, I do, but whether it satisfies others is another question.

I think we need to just step back and sketch the big picture and pick one of how many texts could you choose. But once there was only God, then he's absolute reality. John Piper is absolutely and totally dependent. I don't dictate to God anything. I'm not his counselor.

He's my counselor. I am sinful. I am fallible. I am finite. I am culturally controlled. For me to get in God's face and tell him what's right and wrong is infinitely absurd.

That's where I start. I have to be a learner when it comes to the world that's out there and what God is, who he is, what he's done. So, he creates a world, and that world, by his, I would say, purposeful permission, which a lot of people consider that phrase a contradiction. By his purposeful permission, the world crashes and burns in sin. And every human being since Adam and Eve is born a child of wrath, Ephesians 2, 3. Under the just judgment of God so that he can do them no wrong, because they don't deserve anything but judgment anyway. He brings into that world a saving purpose in order to display the glory of his grace.

Ephesians 1, 6. He chooses a people for himself before the foundation of the world. He predestines them for sonship. He redeems them by the blood. He sends the Holy Spirit to make them his own, and he saves them forever.

And what I would say with regard to the existence of evil in the world is that ultimately, it is there by God's purposeful permission, because there are dimensions of God's glory and reality that would not be rightly known any other way. We would not know his mercy. We would not know his grace. We would not know his justice. We would not know his wrath if there were no sin and guilt and Christ and forgiveness.

Here's the way. I mean, I'm giving you the ultimate answer. There's lots of secondary answers, but the ultimate answer is Jesus Christ is presented in the Bible, in his life and death, especially, and resurrection, as the apex of the grace of God. When Christ died, the Son of God, taking my sins upon him as an innocent, infinitely valuable being and dying the most excruciating of deaths, when that happens, ultimate evil and ultimate grace meet and God is shown to be what he could not be shown to be any other way. So, in a sense, I would say the fall happened, Lucifer rebelled, sin entered the universe, and all the calamities and catastrophes came with it, that there might be Jesus Christ crucified and risen, saving millions of people for himself.

Because in Ephesians 1.6, it says, He predestined us for adoption as sons to himself through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, unto the praise of the glory of his grace. Unto the praise of the glory of his grace. That grace came to a climax in the most horrible, wicked, sinful, suffering, evil act in the universe. It couldn't have happened without evil. There would be no Jesus, no cross, and no salvation, and no display of all the dimensions of God without that. It says as much, for example, in Romans 9.20, if God, desiring to show his power and his wrath, endured with much patience the vessels of wrath prepared for destruction. It just wouldn't have happened.

That revelation wouldn't have happened. So, the ultimate answer is there is evil because in a universe where there is real evil, real guilt, real judgment, there is a real, fuller revelation of the glory of God. There's a revelatory purpose, but there's also a providential purpose in the fact that evil will one day be vanquished totally.

Yeah. Hebrews 2.14, he defeated the devil in whose hands is the power of death, and people had been held in bondage to that fear all their life long. So, the cross was the decisive battle against evil, and ultimately, evil will be cast into outer darkness called hell, and the new heavens and the new earth will have no evil.

It will only have righteousness and peace forever. And it's interesting when you, obviously you wrote about this, when you think about the character of God in the reality of evil, in conjunction with one another, it can be an intellectual pursuit. It's like, I can try and understand it, but when it gets personal, when the evil is in your own life, cancer, wife, spouse dies, you know, any evil, that's where it gets really hard to join together the providence and the sovereignty of God and the evil that I'm experiencing in my life, unless I understand the heart and character of God. And even when I do, it's still hard, right? When it gets personal, it's another deal. Absolutely. I mean, the fact that all things are controlled by God creates problems for us, painful beliefs, and it creates solutions to problems.

Give me an example of what I mean. When your spouse gets cancer and you walk that line and they die, you feel, wow, God, I don't understand all the specifics of why you did that. That was the most painful thing you could have done to me.

And I think talking like that is perfectly appropriate. That's what Job said. The Lord gave. I mean, his 10 children were killed by a wind. And he said, the Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.

So to talk that way is a godly way to talk. But the providence of God doesn't just create problems. She now has, what, 30 years to live? How will she live? How will she survive?

How will she handle the first 10 weeks and then the 10 years? I have a good friend whose husband was just snatched away from her like that two years ago, 62 years old. And she now has a beautiful ministry to widows, strengthening the hands of widows all over the Twin Cities and really beyond that. The answer to that, how you survive, is the very providence that took him. If you were to throw away the providence because you don't like the fact that it took my husband, you throw away the very power and sovereignty and goodness of God that enables you to survive everything you deal with in life.

And I think true saints who have not thought, you know, big high deep thoughts about providence, that's exactly where they are. I remember one grandmama one time, well she wasn't yet a grandmama when this happened, but she didn't like my theology. Okay, we won't even name it, but she didn't like this big sovereign God theology.

And her 16 year old son was killed in a car accident. Her first and innate response was, I trust you God. You are a good God. You made no mistake.

You made no mistake. She didn't have all the articulate biblical foundations that I try to provide for a statement like that, but she's born again and she knows deep in her soul better than her head knows that the God she worships is in charge of railroad crossings and sons who are careless. I mean, who would you rather have run the world, Satan or God? Who would you rather have in charge of your martyrdom? And I choose martyrdom because, you know, in Revelation 6 11 it says to the martyrs under the throne, be patient until all your brothers are gathered in whom I have appointed to suffer martyrdom. Like, you know, I step back and I say, whoa, God, you have a number of people to be killed? Like are some of those missionaries from my church?

Yes, they might be. But I ask, who would you rather be in charge of your martyrdom? Satan? Really?

Man, these enemies that you're trying to reach with the gospel, you'd rather them to be ultimately in charge or God to be in charge? So the question comes up. We're coming here yesterday, driving to the airport, and we get a text, Anne and I both from a mutual friend whose daughter has just passed, 32 years old, three months ago maybe.

Husband has ALS and it's digressing. And her checks to us and really to Anne because Anne lost her sister 21 years ago this week. So she said, Anne, have you ever gone through a crisis of faith? And as Anne, I'm on the text, you know, I'm watching this and she's like, what are you talking about?

What's going on? And her question was, how do I pray? I prayed that God would heal my daughter in the hospital.

He didn't. I prayed when my husband went to the doctor today that the ALS would be stabilized and it's progressing worse. I feel like God doesn't hear. God's in control anyway. It doesn't matter what I pray. His sovereignty is already determined. So it feels pointless.

Yeah. How I'm going to talk to her will depend on where she is emotionally at the moment because I have biblically, theologically rigorous answers to the question, why pray if God is sovereign? But then I have experiential, more gut wrenching things to say and of my experience over here. So if she said, I just need to figure out theoretically and biblically, how does it work? I'm going to give her one answer. And if she says, I don't know if I can even wake up to be a Christian tomorrow morning because I'm just done praying.

There's going to be another. Now, I would say to the first, because it's the most existentially ripping, you're walking through something I would guess every honest believer has walked through. If they're dishonest, they cover it up because they're afraid to say it, that they're not sure God answers prayer.

But I certainly have been there. I mean, anybody that has unbelieving children deals with that issue probably more urgently than the death from cancer because everybody dies. But heaven and hell in the balance.

So I would say, you know, Jesus seemed to know that prayer is going to be a problem because he told two parables and he said, he told them this parable to the effect that they ought always to pray and not lose heart. Why would he say that? Because you lose heart. You've knocked on this judge's door so long. It's midnight. They keep knocking on my door. And I would say to her, I don't know why. I don't know why in your case and in my case we've had to knock so long. But I do know it's not a surprise in the Bible.

It's there. That's the first thing I'd say. An empathetic effort to say the Bible and I know what you're talking about. And we're going to walk through this together. I'm not going to give up on you. I'm not going to let you fall away from Jesus because of this crisis.

I'm going to stand with you. I'm going to point you to scripture and promises. And then the second thing I'd say is, you know, it says in John 15, 7, if my words abide in you and you abide in me, ask whatever you will and it will be yours. Yeah, what about that?

Yeah, what about that? And there are one or two other texts that seem that absolute. And my answer is, what does it mean if my words abide in you? Because it says in 1 John 5, ask whatever you will according to his will and we know that he hears you. And if he hears you, you have what you ask.

Why would he stick in the qualification in 1 John 5 and not stick it in that way in John 15, 7? And my answer to that is, and I try to make this really personal in talking to her, I'd say, what does it mean to have the word of God abiding in you right now? And all the words of God with regard to his sovereignty over life and death. If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that, James 4, 15. He ultimately governs the number of our days. He ultimately governs whether we live or die.

And he has chosen to take your loved one. You have that sovereign vision of reality abiding in you, governing the expectations of the way you ask for prayer. That's the way I think the verse works. That what abides in you is all the teachings of Jesus about the sovereignty of God and his own control of all things. And therefore, you don't pretend to be God when you pray. I think name it and claim it stuff is like playing God.

Like, I know best. I will tell God how he should run the universe. And he's pledged himself to do what I tell him to do. That's not the way we're supposed to think about prayer. And his words abiding in us keep us from thinking that way. And I would just say to her, you can't see it yet how good will come from this. But I can give you from the Bible four or five places where the kind of good that will come from this is taught for your good, for the good of those around you. This slight momentary affliction is working for you an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison.

Be patient and ask God to show you that. Well, and that's what I had told Debbie as I was when I found myself mourning and angry with God for taking my sister who was 45, four young children. I remember being on my knees in the bathroom crying out to God saying, it makes no sense to me. This was a bad plan, God. I don't understand it. I'm mad at you for it.

I'm not seeing how her kids will grow up well under their husband. And as I was praying and venting and letting God know what I felt, I also had this awareness. And I came to this point of saying, but I will surrender all that I am, all of my pain, my anger, all of it. I lay it at your feet because I trust you and I know that you love me.

I know that you love her. And with that, because of that foundation of knowing his love and what I told Debbie, our friend, is that God loves you. Venit, tell God what you feel and he loves you so much. That's our foundation of knowing that we can trust a God that knows more than we do.

We can't understand it, but he loves us. That's David's pattern in the Psalms. Lord, how long will you forget me? How long will you allow your enemies to triumph over me? But he always comes back, but on your kindness, I rely. I will exalt over your saving faith.

I will sing unto the Lord. So, I think you're on good biblical ground with that kind of advice. I do think, John, it's important when we vent, there's a right way and a wrong way to be emotionally expressive before the Lord, right? We have to be careful in our emotional— Such as Job?

Yeah. God can handle anything we give him, but we shouldn't give him anything. So, I would say it's a sin to be angry at God, and you should repent. But if you feel angry, you should say it. There's no point in compounding the sin of anger at God with hypocrisy.

Duplicity, yeah. So, I don't ever encourage people to be angry at God. Lots of people do today. I encourage anger at God. And lament is a big word, and I'm fine with the word lament because it means to grieve, and this is a world we should grieve over. But anything that approaches blaming God, disapproving of God, anger at God, we're crossing a line from submitting to God and feeling hurt and grieved by God into the disapproval and indictment of God. That's evil. To indict God with evil, to indict God with blame is sin.

So, for me to say, I'm mad at you, God— Is sinful. And what I should have said was— This really hurts. I don't understand what you've done. I don't get it. Because you don't.

Right. I mean, you're finite. You're not God. It's utterly perplexing. It's baffling. It hurts. You tell him it hurts. And if you are mad at God, you say, I'm mad at you, God, but you repent of being mad at God.

Because that shouldn't be your posture. The sin, anger at God is a sin in the heart, not a sin in the mouth. In the mouth, you're just being honest.

Honest is good. This is why people are going to want— these kinds of issues and questions is why you want to have on your bookshelf a 700-page book on providence. Straight beside the Bible. So you can go in these moments— Under the Bible. Yeah, underneath the Bible. Tested by the Bible. Pull the Bible first. Make sure the Bible's first. Absolutely right. There are 3,000 scripture references in the book, so there's a lot of Bible in this book. But in those moments where this is what you're feeling and you don't know what to do with it, you go to the index and say, what do I do with the loss of a loved one? And John said earlier, there's not a person that doesn't deal with these issues.

That's right. Almost daily. Go to our website, familylifetoday.com, to order your copy of the book Providence by John Piper. Again, the website is familylifetoday.com. If you'd rather call to order, the number is 800-FL-TODAY. 800-358-6329. 800-F as in family, L as in life, and then the word today. The book by Dr. John Piper is simply called Providence.

So get your copy today. I'm guessing for many of our listeners, the last 12 months for your marriage and family have had a few stresses and strains that have been unusual. I think all of us have felt the stress and strain of a global pandemic, the stresses and strains of making adjustments to kind of a new normal. And I think for many of us, our marriages have kind of been set aside for a season while we focus on other things.

But there's a problem with that. We've learned this over the years. When we set our marriage aside, we start to drift apart as a couple. And so at Family Life, we've been working on a resource designed to help couples move back toward one another. It's a resource we're calling Dates to Remember. And any of you who have been to one of our Weekend to Remember marriage getaways, you know that the getaway is all about pursuing oneness in marriage. We have taken some of the key ideas from the getaway and put them together in three dates that a couple can have together where they can interact with one another, have some important conversations, and grow closer together as a couple. Go to familylifetoday.com to find out more about the new Dates to Remember date box. You can order it from us at familylifetoday.com, or you can call if you have any questions or if you'd like to order by phone. Again, the number is 1-800-FL-TODAY. Keep in mind, Valentine's Day is coming up.

That may be a good touch point for you to begin a rhythm of having some purposeful, intentional interaction as a couple, having some dates where you focus on what really matters. Again, more information about the Dates to Remember date box can be found online at familylifetoday.com, or call 1-800-FL-TODAY. Now, tomorrow we want to talk about how our own sinful choices work together with God's providence.

How do those two intersect and interact? John Piper will join us again tomorrow. We hope you can join us as well. I want to thank our engineer today, Keith Lynch, along with our entire broadcast production team. On behalf of our hosts, Dave and Ann Wilson, I'm Bob Lapine. We'll see you back next time for another edition of Family Life Today. Family Life Today is a production of Family Life of Little Rock, Arkansas. A crew ministry. Help for today. Hope for tomorrow.