Sermon Tone Analysis

Romans 8:28

1 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.

Romans 8:28 New International Version.

There were a few others,

Genesis 50:20 and Ecclesiastes 3 are two that come to mind

When I first began studying these passages, I believed that all things couldn’t happen for a reason.

There was no way you could convince me that some of the bad things we deal with were God’s doing.

How can you justify killing innocent people like those killed that day on 9-11!

Or robberies gone bad?

People lost at sea.

People dying in plane crashes, car wrecks, etc.

The list goes on and on!

Technically, everything actually does happen for a reason.

The reason, however, may be as simple as a random occurrence of specific circumstances, such as someone fiddling with his car radio and, in that moment, not seeing a small child run in front of his car resulting in him hitting and killing the child.

The reason is inattention, or negligence, or just bad luck.

But that kind of “reason” is not the kind of reason implied by the statement “Everything happens for a reason.”

The kind of reason usually implied by that statement would require the full statement to read as follows: “Everything happens for a reason, and that reason is God’s will.”

That fuller expression of the statement is meant to give a grieving person a sense that God has some wise and loving purpose for everything that happens and we mere humans just do not have the capacity for understanding that purpose.

Instead of losing a child in a car accident due to random events (which is hard for people to accept), the “Everything happens for a reason” statement is generally intended to reassure a survivor that we are not victims of cold and unthinking bad luck and that, instead, there is a wise and loving God who has everything under control.

This is true for many kinds of misfortunes: Someone diagnosed with untreatable and terminal cancer; or a high school kid dying suddenly from a burst blood vessel in the brain; or a kid drowning because a parent’s attention was momentarily diverted.

We want things to happen for a purposeful reason (as opposed to a random reason).

If a friend gets struck and killed by a random flash of lightning, it doesn’t feel good to think that we live in a world where bad things just happen.

We want to be able to identify a purposeful agent as the cause of that misfortune (either someone who is good and wise – God – or someone who is evil – either another person or the Devil).

For many people, it’s just too hard to accept that something terrible may happen simply because of random circumstances.

When you got that new job you were hoping for, that happened for a reason -- you applied for it, you interviewed well, and the company thought you were the best candidate for the job.

When you failed that test you needed to pass in order to maintain your G.P.A. and keep your scholarship, that too happened for a reason -- you spent too much time on Facebook, going out with friends and catching up on your favorite shows when you should have been studying.

The time that house on the news got hit by lightning and burned to the ground, that happened for a reason -- the roof of the house was the closest contact point for the bolt of lightning, and the massive charge of electricity caused the wood the house was built with to catch on fire.

And when that young mother and her child were hit by a drunk driver and died tragically in a car accident, that also happened for a reason -- someone had too much to drink, and without concern for anyone else's well being, they got behind the wheel of their car, wherein their impaired judgment and slowed response time resulted in them running a red light and taking the life of a mother and her child.

But there was no grander narrative behind these moments, no deeper meaning to be discovered if we simply read the signs correctly.

They happened, and there was a reason behind their happening, but that reason was mundane, not divine.

They were not part of God's plan.

When these sorts of events occur, and we find ourselves in a moment of speechless horror, many of us instinctively utter the words "Everything happens for a reason," either to ourselves or to those who are suffering, with the thought being that God is behind these events and has a reason, or purpose, for them occurring.

Let's assume for a moment that is true, that the sort of events I've described, as well as other horrific tragedies, were the handiwork of the divine.

What, then, does that say about the nature of God?

It says that God is a God who apparently delights in suffering.

It says that God is the sort of god who sends drunk drivers to kill, who burns down people's homes and afflicts random people with horrendous diseases, like cancer.

Regardless of any potential "reason" such a God would choose to do these things, if indeed God had a hand in intentionally causing them to occur, then that God is not the God of the Gospels.

Does the Bible speak of a God who works to draw out good in the midst of great evil?

Absolutely.

But there is tremendous difference between a God who orders the chaos and a God who causes it.

The doesn't mean God does not enact judgment.

Scripture testifies to the fact that God does.

But what scripture does not do is ascribe to God the responsibility or blame for every terrible thing that happens in life.

The truth is we live in a broken world, and in such a world, terrible, meaningless things happen.

Not because God wants them to happen, but because our decisions have unavoidable consequences and because nature is an untamable beast that is always on the prowl.

But when we try to ascribe divine meaning, purpose or reason to tragedy, we merely compound the pain and turn God into a villain.

Mothers who suffer miscarriages should never have to hear that God killed their baby.

Family members who just lost a loved one to cancer should never be told that God made their loved one sick.

Friends whose homes have been lost to natural disaster should not have to hear that God caused these things to happen.

While we would never say these things exactly this way, when we try to comfort our friends and loved ones with the words "Everything happens for a reason," or "God has a purpose," then this is exactly what we are telling them.

It is a good and holy thing to want to console our friends who are suffering, but more often than not the greatest comfort you can give is the silence that accompanies a listening ear, a loving shoulder to cry on, and the promise of prayer.

Which means we must do everything we can to avoid becoming our loved ones tormenters in their time of trial.

We must stop putting our friends through pain every time they suffer by tormenting them with the words "Everything happens for a reason."

Yes, there will come a day when every tear will be wiped away and there will be no more death or crying or mourning or pain.

But until that day comes, our testimony to that future reality is not found in trying to attach meaning to the meaningless.

Our testimony, and our gift of grace to those to suffer, will be found in our willingness to suffer with them, to walk with them through the valley of the shadow of death so that they know they are not alone.

In that act of grace, we incarnate the truth that though meaningless pain and suffering may seem to rule the present, they are not part of God's plan.

God's plan is that one day He will make His dwelling place among His people to dwell with them.

They will be His people, and God Himself will be among them and be their God.

On that day, and not before it, the old order of things will pass away and all things will be made new.

All things, whether good or bad, work together for good to those who love God and follow His plan for them.

Like Joseph said in Genesis 50:20 to his brothers

You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.

It wasn't God's plan for his brothers to work evil against him and sell him as a slave, that was the enemy's doing.

But God USED this opportunity for good, and in the process, perfected Joseph's character so that he would be ready to do what God had planned for him to do.

In the same way, God has plans for us.

Even if sometimes things happen that we do not understand, God plans to use these to prepare us to carry out the plans He has for us.

Nevertheless He does not violate our free will, so this only happens if we so choose to submit our will to His.

Now here is what the Bible tells us: In Ecclesiastes 9:11, the wise man Solomon, with God's guiding hand, tells us, "The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor bread to the wise, nor riches to men of understanding, nor favor to men of skill; but time and chance happen to them all.

For man also does not know his time; like fish taken in a cruel net, like birds caught in a snare, so the sons of men are snared in an evil time, when it falls suddenly upon them."

Thus we learn that things happen, evil happens.

And it isn't always God making things happen.

We learn here that sometimes we are "just in the wrong place at the wrong time."

For example, a tornado hits a neighborhood; 10 people are killed.

Are they all bad, are they all good?

Did God do this?

The Bible tells us that this is not the case.

Jesus Himself said in Matthew 5:45, the Father "makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust."

Don’t ever let someone convince you that you are sick because God wants to teach you a lesson.

God has never desired for you to be sick.

Lets face it, what lesson was so important to learn that the 8yr.

old boy needed to die of cancer.

Or to cause the family never have their mother because she is in bed day and night?

And is God so incapable of teaching this lesson to you through a method while you are well that He had to make you sick?

Now hear me out here, I am not saying you will not grow through your sickness.

Will you learn things through your sickness?

Absolutely, God will always take the worst hand life will deal you and turn it around for good.

He loves to see us grow in spite of the bad things that happen in our lives.

In fact what I’ve actually seen many times is that God is so good at turning things around for good that people often blame Him for the bad He had to turn around.

God is the author of good, not bad!

God is not the author of every situation.

We are the ones in control of our own lives, God is sovereign but that doesn’t mean that He is control of every little thing.

He has delegated that control to us and our inability (or ability) to use that delegated authority has very far-reaching implications.

We cannot just sit back passively and watch the world fall to pieces and our lives crumble and just say “well that must be the will of God”.

How can I be so bold to say that God’s will does not always happen?

Let me ask you a simple question.

Does God want you to sin?

No.

So how on Earth is it that we all manage to sin so frequently?

God has given us free-will.