As I'm thinking about Easter and what God did to bring us into a right relationship with Him, I've been given a new perspective about "knowing good and evil". Hear me out:
God works to help us through our experience of dealing with evil. He didn't want us to know evil. He created us not to know evil, but only to know good. But, we chose to know evil (when we ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil). God enacted a plan to help us even though we would have to come face to face with evil. He decided to come down to earth, live this life of knowing good and evil as a human, and then sacrifice Himself, so that we could eventually have a way to not only deal with life, but also to be reserved a seat in Heaven where we would experience a new Heaven and Earth without evil!
As I think about this I am so incredibly grateful for a God who would look at the mess Adam and Eve made when they ate from the tree, be grieved in His heart at their choice to disobey Him and then enact this great plan to save us (all of humanity) from it. Yes, we would still have to live our lives knowing evil, but we would also have a relationship with God, if we choose it, and then watch God save us from trouble time and time again. The pain is real, the loss is real, evil is real, but God is bigger than evil, He is greater and His ways are greater. So, He came up with a way to save us and to bring us into a place where we can face the hard things in life, but instead of allowing it to crush us, we can turn to the God of all gods, King of all kings and experience the love and peace of God, the wisdom and discernment of God that helps us to make it through our pain and into a place of strength. He mourns with us and comforts us in a way that only He can do. Jesus, our high priest who knows all pain and all grief, helps us and brings us through the experience of salvation from complete and utter destruction.
He not only meets us in our grief and fear, He does something completely amazing...He gives us beauty for our ashes. He takes the wrong, the bad, the loss, the evil and He works out an amazing plan to save us and to bring good out of evil. The story of Joseph is an example of this, but even more my favorite is the story of Job where at the end of all his loss and grief, He experiences something new. Job has an encounter with God and he learns that he knows nothing. God is great and he is not. Job says he spoke about things he did not understand. We can never fully understand evil and especially we cannot understand what God does or does not do, what His ways are or His thoughts, but the good news is we do not have to. All we need is trust. If we can accept God and trust Him and take Him at His word, we will experience a freedom like what Job came to know. And in the end God blessed Job with more than he had before he lost everything that mattered to him. God blessed Job with double for his trouble.
So, God doesn't cause evil. It's not in His nature. He doesn't want us to suffer, but if we do and we will because we live in a fallen world where evil is around every corner; we can trust that God will make a way. God will turn it around and make good come from evil, because He loves us and because He is good. All He does is good. So my question to you today is, will you choose to trust a God who loves you and who will bring you through whatever trouble comes your way? Today, seeing evil from a new perspective and the good that God does in the midst of that evil; I am choosing God for good. No one else can do what He can do. I trust Him. Will you?
God works to help us through our experience of dealing with evil. He didn't want us to know evil. He created us not to know evil, but only to know good. But, we chose to know evil (when we ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil). God enacted a plan to help us even though we would have to come face to face with evil. He decided to come down to earth, live this life of knowing good and evil as a human, and then sacrifice Himself, so that we could eventually have a way to not only deal with life, but also to be reserved a seat in Heaven where we would experience a new Heaven and Earth without evil!
As I think about this I am so incredibly grateful for a God who would look at the mess Adam and Eve made when they ate from the tree, be grieved in His heart at their choice to disobey Him and then enact this great plan to save us (all of humanity) from it. Yes, we would still have to live our lives knowing evil, but we would also have a relationship with God, if we choose it, and then watch God save us from trouble time and time again. The pain is real, the loss is real, evil is real, but God is bigger than evil, He is greater and His ways are greater. So, He came up with a way to save us and to bring us into a place where we can face the hard things in life, but instead of allowing it to crush us, we can turn to the God of all gods, King of all kings and experience the love and peace of God, the wisdom and discernment of God that helps us to make it through our pain and into a place of strength. He mourns with us and comforts us in a way that only He can do. Jesus, our high priest who knows all pain and all grief, helps us and brings us through the experience of salvation from complete and utter destruction.
He not only meets us in our grief and fear, He does something completely amazing...He gives us beauty for our ashes. He takes the wrong, the bad, the loss, the evil and He works out an amazing plan to save us and to bring good out of evil. The story of Joseph is an example of this, but even more my favorite is the story of Job where at the end of all his loss and grief, He experiences something new. Job has an encounter with God and he learns that he knows nothing. God is great and he is not. Job says he spoke about things he did not understand. We can never fully understand evil and especially we cannot understand what God does or does not do, what His ways are or His thoughts, but the good news is we do not have to. All we need is trust. If we can accept God and trust Him and take Him at His word, we will experience a freedom like what Job came to know. And in the end God blessed Job with more than he had before he lost everything that mattered to him. God blessed Job with double for his trouble.
So, God doesn't cause evil. It's not in His nature. He doesn't want us to suffer, but if we do and we will because we live in a fallen world where evil is around every corner; we can trust that God will make a way. God will turn it around and make good come from evil, because He loves us and because He is good. All He does is good. So my question to you today is, will you choose to trust a God who loves you and who will bring you through whatever trouble comes your way? Today, seeing evil from a new perspective and the good that God does in the midst of that evil; I am choosing God for good. No one else can do what He can do. I trust Him. Will you?
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