Mike,

Hey, I read your article about how God is in Control of Everything….

SO, let me make sure I understand you here… you are saying that YOU believe that EVERYTHING that happens in life, both good and evil, [ are] God’s doing?

I have never believed that. I think that God and Jesus are up in Heaven, and the ONLY thing we have down here is the Holy Spirit to help us as Believers. Therefore, all the unbelievers like I used to be, are able to live a sinful life against God’s Will, and basically have an “equal” control against us in the world and all its happenings.

Help… thanks,

G____

Hi G____,

You say “Help” and “Thanks.”

My experience has been that whenever someone tells me what they believe without bothering to give the scriptures to back up their convictions, they generally aren’t really looking for any help. Most people have their minds made up before they ever open their Bibles. From that point on, they are simply attempting to make the scriptures say what they want them to say. Then when someone like me comes along and shows them scriptures like:

Pro 20:24 Man’s goings [ Good or evil] are of the LORD; how can a man then understand his own way?
Pro 16:1 The preparations of the heart in man, and the answer of the tongue [ Good or evil] , is from the LORD.
Pro 16:4 The LORD hath made all things for himself: yea, even the wicked for the day of evil.

… they can’t grasp it.

Did you catch that? “The Lord hath made … the wicked…” You have just told me that you don’t believe that. That is fine. It is certainly not my business to make you believe something that maybe God Himself doesn’t intend for you to see or understand at this time. Nevertheless the scriptures are all there:

Pro 16:33 The lot is cast into the lap; but the whole disposing thereof is of the LORD.

According to that scripture, God even controls the lottery. I did not write it, I just quoted it. Now I could go on and write another After The Counsel of His Own Will, attempting to get you to see something that God Himself has blinded your eyes to. It would be an easy thing to quote another 30 nor 40 pages of scripture and not even touch on the one in my previous paper, showing that man has no ‘free’ will. ‘Will?’ Oh yes. Man has a will to do evil. It was God Himself who made man “subject to vanity.”

Rom 8:20 For the creature was made [ By God] subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope,

Yet you tell me:

Therefore, all the unbelievers like I used to be, are able to live a sinful life against God’s Will, and basically have an “equal” control against us in the world and all its happenings…

You believe a whole lot like Pilate just before he ordered the crucifixion of Christ:

Joh 19:10 Then saith Pilate unto him, Speakest thou not unto me? knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and have power to release thee?

Just like Joseph’s brothers when they sold Joseph into slavery in Egypt, you, Joseph’s brothers and Pilate actually believe that they had the ability to carry them out as a the result of “free” will. But who do the scriptures reveal as the architect of this, the worst crime of all time?

Act 4:26 The kings of the earth stood up, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord, and against his Christ.
Act 4:27 For of a truth against thy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, both Herod, and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the people of Israel, were gathered together,
Act 4:28 For to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done.
Isa 45:5 I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me: I girded thee, though thou hast not known me:
Isa 45:6 That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the LORD, and there is none else.
Isa 45:7 I formthe light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.

But you don’t believe that. And you call yourself a ‘believer.’ What you ‘believe’ is what you have been taught. I have had many tell me what they ‘believe.’ I have yet to receive a letter showing me the scriptures that say ‘I, God, have made man capable of doing good. I, God, have imbued man with free will.” Telling someone to “Choose ye this day whom you will serve” in no way whatever denies that God had already decided that Pilate’s ‘choice’ would be to crucify Christ. And such a scripture in no way denies that God has already decided every ‘choice’ Joseph’s brothers or you or I will make day by day.

Pro 16:33 The lot is cast into the lap; but the whole disposing thereof is of the LORD.

To man, it seems like it is his choices that make everything happen as it does. That is the same mentality that would have you to believe that a gun can kill someone.

Joh 19:11 Jesus answered, Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above: therefore he that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin.

But you beg to differ with the Holy Spirit here. You would rewrite this to say that “Pilate has equal control against Christ in the world and all it’s happenings.”

Here is not just “what I believe”; here is what God says:

Eph 1:11 In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:

And here, on the other hand, is what believes

Therefore, all the unbelievers like I used to be, are able to live a sinful life against God’s Will, and basically have an “equal” control against us in the world and all its happenings.

Go ahead, choose which of those statements you “freely” wish to believe, with no influence from God for either good or evil.

But when that choice is made, this scripture will still be true:

Rom 9:15 For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.
Rom 9:16 So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.

“Not willingly…” “Not of him that willeth…” Are you getting the picture? The single most succinct scripture in all the Bible, telling us why “God creates evil,” is this:

Gen 50:20 But as for you [ Joseph’s brothers, you, me, and all of Adam’s progeny], ye thought evil against me; but God meant it [ the evil of all mankind] unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive.

I hope I haven’t offended you with all these scriptures. They certainly do offend most orthodox Christians. These verses are avoided like the plague in the churches of our nation. But they are Truth.

I hope I have been of some help.

Mike