10 Oct If God Loves Us, Why Doesn’t He Take Better Care Of Us?
FOUR EXTRAORDINARY DEMONSTRATIONS OF GOD’S LOVE
Though there is plenty in Scripture to indicate that God loves us, some of us are still unconvinced, held back by the nagging question, “But if He really loves us, as He says He does, why doesn’t He take better care of us?” For those of us who are parents, we instinctively feel that if we loved someone and had the power to help them, we would help them more than God seems to help us.
While we may not be able to answer that question on the level that satisfies us – just as a parent cannot always answer the questions of a two-year-old on a level that satisfies him – we can see from Scripture what the answer is not. It is not that He doesn’t love us.
God’s goodness and love can be seen in four of His extraordinary intentions toward us:
- God will restore us.
God has forgiven and redeemed us, and one day He will complete His redemption process and restore us to the magnificence of life in heaven where there will be nothing to diminish us.
Revelation 21:3-4 says, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is among men, and He will dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be among them, and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.”
- God will reward us for faithfulness.
The Bible says that if any man builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones (i.e. does the good works that God has prepared for him to do – Ephesians 2:10, and has gifted and empowered him to do – 1 Peter 4:10, Philippians 2:13),… he will receive a reward (1 Corinthians 3:12,14).
God’s reward will be given to both “small and great” (Revelation 11:18).
His reward is disproportionate to anything we suffer until that time. “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us” (Romans 8:18).
- God will elevate us.
One day we will be beings of such intellect and talent that we will be capable of reigning with Jesus (2 Timothy 2:12).
1 Corinthians 6:2-3 says, “Or do you not know that the saints will judge the world?… Do you not know that we will judge angels?
Daniel 7:22 adds, ” The Ancient of Days came and judgment was passed in favor of the saints of the Highest One, and the time arrived when the saints took possession of the kingdom.”
So apparently the day will come when the kingdom will be turned over to the saints who will judge the world and angels. One day we will be more than we can even imagine today.
- God will exalt us
2 Corinthians 4:16- 17 says, “Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison.”
God does not keep His glory to himself. He will share his glory with us. And again, the glory is disproportionate. The glory will be so great that it won’t even compare with the light affliction we experience on earth.
Our definition of love must be adjusted
In a remarkable quote, C.S. Lewis wrote:
“The problem of reconciling human suffering with the existence of a God who loves, is only insoluble so long as we attach a trivial meaning to the word “love”, and look on things as if man were the centre of them. Man is not the centre. God does not exist for the sake of man. Man does not exist for his own sake. “Thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.” We were made not primarily that we may love God (though we were made for that too) but that God may love us, that we may become objects in which the divine love may rest well pleased.” (The Problem of Pain)
James Packer made a similar point when he wrote:
“God’s purpose in revelation is to make friends with us. It was to this end that He created us rational beings, bearing His image, able to think and hear and speak and love; He wanted there to be genuine personal affection and friendship, two-sided, between Himself and us—a relationship, not like that between man and his dog, but like that of a father to his son, or a husband to his wife. Loving friendship between two persons has no ulterior motive; it is an end in itself. And that is God’s end in revelation. He speaks to us simply to fulfill the purpose for which we were made; that is, to bring into being a relationship in which He is a friend to us, and we to Him, He finding His joy in giving us gifts, and we finding ours in giving Him thanks. (God Has Spoken)
So in answering the question of why God doesn’t take better care of us, we start out by saying that He does take the best care of us – but only on a higher level than we are thinking.
I have awakened from four surgeries feeling truly awful. If I were thinking on a very shallow level, I would conclude that the surgeon had not taken very good care of me. My shoulder still hurt, or my knee still hurt, or my abdomen still hurt – and I felt mentally foggy and physically depressed because of the anesthesia. I was hungry because I hadn’t been able to eat for hours before the surgery.
If I looked only at my immediate comfort, I would conclude that there was something wrong with the surgeon, that he must not be a good person because I was not feeling good at the moment.
However, to take a longer, broader, more comprehensive view, I realized that I am now able to walk, I am now able to use my shoulder, in fact I am now alive because the surgeon had a higher purpose – a higher good – for me than my immediate pleasure. If he only had my immediate pleasure in mind, he could have shot me full of morphine to make me feel good, but left my real problem unsolved.
And so it is with God. He has higher purposes for us than our immediate pleasure; purposes that will ultimately lead to greater pleasure than we can even comprehend now.
That God does not always seem to take very good care of us, causing us to question His love, is a misperception. He does take the best care of us, but only on a higher level than we realize.
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