God rules (or not?)

 

Contrary to opinion, there are absolutes. A woman is either pregnant or not. My house is either on fire or not. A car’s gas tank either has fuel in it or not. And God is either SOVEREIGN or not.

Sovereign means a ruler with supreme authority. The dictionary says, “possessing supreme or ultimate power.” The theological term is omnipotent which describes a deity having unlimited power; able to do anything — another absolute. He is either sovereign or is not.

Even though the concept of God’s total power and rule is throughout the Bible, such an important word is used in Scripture only three times. When read in their context, I notice something I’d not thought of before:

Acts 4:23–31. When they were released, they went to their friends and reported what the chief priests and the elders had said to them. And when they heard it, they lifted their voices together to God and said, “Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them, who through the mouth of our father David, your servant, said by the Holy Spirit, “ ‘Why did the Gentiles rage, and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers were gathered together, against the Lord and against his Anointed’— for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place. And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word with all boldness, while you stretch out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness.

1 Timothy 6:13–16. I charge you in the presence of God, who gives life to all things, and of Christ Jesus, who in his testimony before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, to keep the commandment unstained and free from reproach until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, which he will display at the proper time—he who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see. To him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen.

Revelation 6:9–11. When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the witness they had borne. They cried out with a loud voice, “O Sovereign Lord, holy and true, how long before you will judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?” Then they were each given a white robe and told to rest a little longer, until the number of their fellow servants and their brothers should be complete, who were to be killed as they themselves had been.

Each time the term is used, so also is the word Lord, a biblical term for master of the world and a word used in the OT by the Jews who felt that the term Jehovah was too holy to be spoken. In other words, the rule of God over all the earth is not to be taken lightly. Not only that, but I also notice that in each of the above three passages, this word about God’s sovereign lordship is used by people in extreme need of remembering that God is indeed sovereign. That knowledge holds their faith firm when threatened and even dominated by outside opposition.

GAZE INTO HIS GLORY. These days, the challenges to faith include personal losses, unanswered prayers, the plight of thousands in countries where Christianity is not accepted and believers are being slaughtered, the absence of respect for God in many circles and in the media, and open opposition to what God says is good. Much good is now considered evil while much that God calls evil has become accepted. It is when these things slap me in the face that I cling to the truth that God is sovereign. If He is not, then there is no God and no hope. Humanity has proven its inadequacy to make the world a hopeful and safe place to live. Without God, I can understand nihilism and society’s slide into apathy and even lawlessness. The sovereignty of God, even though I don’t understand what He is doing and why He hasn’t stepped in, is my anchor and so important when life goes amok.