Posts Tagged: the sovereignty of God

“Beginning the Year with God: God’s Nearness or Resignation?”

On January 1, 2020 by Dteb With 0 Comments - down to earth believer

The YouVersion app on my phone has the verse of the day as Proverbs 16:9: “The heart of a man considers (or ponders or plans?) his way, and (or but?) the LORD determines his steps.” (My translation.)

I had a look at one of my favorite commentators on the book of Proverbs, Christine Roy Yoder, who wrote the following helpful comments:

Whereas mortals have the capacity and responsibility to plan their “way” . . . , God is proximate—God approves or redirects each step (the conjunction may be translated as “and” or “but).  The proverb may be interpreted as a comforting reminder of God’s nearness and sovereignty, a matter-of-fact acknowledgement of human limitations, or, more cynically, as a sigh of resignation (cf. 20:24; Jer 10:23).[1]

So, how am I going to take this verse as a guide to the new year?  A sigh of resignation may be appropriate at times, but I think it would be better for me to take this proverb as a reminder of God’s nearness and sovereignty and as an acknowledgement of my limitations.

If I acknowledge my limitations, that will help me not to have to be so perfect all the time.  Frankly, my progress is impeded much more by my desire for perfection, than by my obvious imperfections.  It has been said that “the good is the enemy of the best.”  Yes, I suppose that is true.  However, for me at least, there is another, even more important truth: The perfect that I can’t achieve is the enemy of the good that I can achieve.  If I accept my limitations, that does not take away my drive to be better.  Quite the contrary!  It is accepting my limitations that empowers me to do well.

And, of course, being reminded of God’s nearness and sovereignty helps to counter my tendency to worry and want to control.  There is an old story that goes something like this: “Good morning!  This is God.  I will not need your help today.  So relax and have a nice day!”

Might work!  And what works for one day probably would work for the entire year of 2020 as well.

[1] Christine Roy Yoder, Proverbs, Abingdon Old Testament Commentaries (Nashville: Abingdon, 2009), 184.

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“The Powerlessness of Success”

On June 28, 2019 by Dteb With 0 Comments - down to earth believer

“We are just as powerless over our successes as we are over the worst of our behaviors. We can only be faithful to our duties and ourselves. The successes, which flow from our work, come and go. Since we can’t nail them down, they may make us feel insecure. Many a man has destroyed his moment of success because he couldn’t stand the powerless feeling. We must return to our program and allow success to rise and fall, as it will.

Today, I turn to my Higher Power for help in accepting success.”  (Touchstones: A Book of Daily Meditations for Men)

I don’t always handle failure well.  I am generally about as unsuccessful at handling success.  Let me explain.

One of my favorite Paul Simon songs is titled “Something So Right.”  It could be the theme song for my life.

“When something goes wrong
I’m the first to admit it
I’m the first to admit it
But the last one to know
When something goes right
Well it’s likely to lose me
It’s apt to confuse me
It’s such an unusual sight
I can’t get used to something so right
Something so right”

I have known for quite some time that I don’t handle successes well.  I had never thought about why.  I think that this Hazelden reading hit the nail squarely on the head: Successes make me feel out of control.

But the deeper problem is not success, or feeling out of control, or even being out of control.  No, the problem is wanting to be in control in the first place, and thinking that I should be.  This has plagued me since the Garden of Eden.

So, here is the deal: I need to give up the illusion that I am or ought to be in control.  But how do I do that?  Giving up anything—even illusions—is not easy.  Giving up the illusion of control makes me feel very out-of-control.

Perhaps I need to pull out an old theological idea from my mental attic: the sovereignty of God.  The Bible, both the Old and New Testaments, indicate that ultimately, God is the One who is in control.  The Bible affirms this bizarre notion, even as the Bible portrays the importance of human choice.  And, of course, the Bible also portrays how often we screw up and choose foolishly.  (If you think that the Bible tells us the way things should be, in some perfect world, you haven’t read the Bible.  Perhaps the first two chapters and the last chapters do that, but there’s a lot of other really awful stuff in the 1185 chapters between those four chapters.)

If I think more and count more upon the sovereignty of God, I can relax a little.  Perhaps then, neither failures nor successes will mess with my mind quite as much.  Sometimes, I start my day with the following confession: God is God, I am not, and that is good.  That is a good confession, no matter what the day throws at you, whether that be failure or (God forbid!?) success.

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