Proverbs 3:5-6 – Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; 6 in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.
Hebrews 11:17-19 – By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had embraced the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, 18 even though God had said to him, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.”[c] 19 Abraham reasoned that God could even raise the dead, and so in a manner of speaking he did receive Isaac back from death.
We say that a man is good because of what He does or says. God is not good because of what He does or says, but He does good because of who He is. We, as an inferior example, reflect this truth of God. We in Christ do good works not because we want to have Christ within but because we already have Christ within. In us, we are being transformed by the Holy Spirit within (Romans 12:2, 2 Corinthians 3:18), but God who does not change is not transforming into a greater or better good because He is already perfect in all His ways. The goodness of God does not depend on our acknowledgement of His goodness, it is true of Him even if no-one or nothing else acknowledges it. God is so pure, so good, so perfect that all persons or things cannot help but bear witness to His goodness. Jesus said that if the people did not praise God then the rocks would cry out in praise (Luke 19:40). The goodness of God is eternal truth from a past with no beginning to a future with no end. He does not change because He is perfect.
He is good all the time and all the time He is good and so it is not possible for Him to do or say evil. He cannot tell a lie because He is Truth and there is no deceit in Him (1 Peter 2:22). What God says is eternally true (Isaiah 40:8, 1 Peter 1:25). What God states is eternal knowledge both past and future. His Words cannot be challenged or changed. To challenge or desire to change even the seemingly most minute part of what He has said is to doubt not only His Word, but the very essence of who and what He is.
So, do we believe that God is good all the time and that all the time He is good, as His Word states (1 Chronicles 16:34, Psalm 25:8, Mark 10:18)? Do we believe that He loves us now and has loved us into eternity past and into eternity future (Jeremiah 31:3, 1 John 3:1, John 15:12)? Since we believe those things, what place in our knowledge of God, in our faith in God, does doubting God’s goodness, kindness and knowledge have within us?
Furthermore it is common to hear from the pulpit and the radio pulpit that, being human, it is acceptable to doubt the goodness of God. That is not scriptural. If it is, bring that scripture forth as evidence that it is okay to doubt God’s goodness. I dare say that such a scripture will not be found. It is not acceptable, but like most sins, is forgivable.
As Englishman Alexander Pope famously stated “To err is human, to forgive, divine.” So err we do. To be tempted is also human. To be tempted to doubt the goodness of God is human and not a sin. Sinning only occurs when one succumbs to temptation. We need to resist temptation, even to run from it as necessary. Being tempted to lust is not a sin, being tempted to hate is not a sin, but giving in to what we are tempted to do is a sin. So, when the opposite of what we have prayed for happens, the enemy is quick to tempt us to doubt the goodness and love that are inherent qualities of God. Being tempted is not sin. However succumbing to and dancing with the temptation transforms it from temptation to sin.
Is it possible to resist this sin? Is it possible to grow to a point where this sin rarely, if ever tempts us? It depends on what we trust in and what truth we hold dearest. Proverbs 3:5-6 “Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to Him, and He will make your paths straight.” Nothing about who we are prepares us to never doubt God. We want to trust what we can understand, what we can figure out. We expect the finite to comprehend the fullness of the infinite. How silly! If we know beyond all doubt and beyond all arguments that God is good and that He loves us, then that knowledge will crush any supposed fact and argument that is contrary to it. The key is to know and trust God infinitely and eternally beyond anything that any person may say and beyond any demonic reasoning. Should a supposed physical law seem to contradict what God has done or declared, even that is a weak argument against God and who He is. Since God supernaturally created all of creation, that being bringing everything out of nothing, He certainly can temporarily interrupt natural laws to bring about His will. From His Spirit and His Word we know who and what God is. His goodness and love will become a rock that cannot be moved, not ever, not by any means or any argument.
If our knowledge of the goodness and love of God is what we know above all else, then nothing can cause us to doubt who He is or what He does. Furthermore, since our lives are based on that knowledge where does a demand for personal understanding come into play? Since we are convinced of these two facts, do we need to understand the “why” of God’s actions? Certainly Abraham must have wondered at God’s instructions to sacrifice Isaac (Genesis 22:1-19). However at the end of the matter he did not know why God ordered what He ordered, neither did he need to. He was confident in the goodness and love of God and so he would obey (Hebrews 11:17-19). Simple as that. Family, since we are convinced of the goodness and love of God, why do we need to know the “why” of His will. The fact that He ordains a thing, isn’t that enough? Isn’t doubt caused by trust of self rather than trust in God? If doubt enters our garden, shouldn’t we resist and chase it away as Adam and Eve should have done. Questioning God does not originate from God or heaven, but as in the Garden of Eden from he who is the enemy of God and of us. Family, we need not know why God wills what He wills, we only need to know what is His will and then we need to do it without doubt. To us who are called by His name, doesn’t the truth of this ring out from within our spirit? Let us not heed our flesh and earthly nature, but rather be transformed by the Spirit of God to obey because of our knowledge of Him. We obey, whether we understand of not. Great if we understand, and if God so desires, great if we do not. He is perfectly good, He know us, He loves perfectly and we do not. Nothing changes that, and there is never a reason to doubt that. Let us trust and obey and in that we find the peace and joy of God. Praise God!
Psalm 150:6 – Let everything that has breath praise the Lord. Praise the Lord!
Micah 7:7 – But as for me, I watch in hope for the Lord, I wait for God my Savior; my God will hear me.
Micah 6:8 – He has shown You, O man, what is good; And what does the Lord require of You but to do justly, to love mercy, And to walk humbly with Your God.