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Transcript 341B — God's Purpose in Allowing Sin
HC: Good evening. Welcome to Open Forum.
CALLER: The Bible states that God is perfect. Therefore, how do you explain the creation that went sour, and that's Satan. Now God is supposed to know everything, from the beginning to the end if He knew that Satan would eventually mess up the world, why did God send him down in the first place?
HC: The question is raised: Why, if God is perfect, and knows the end from the beginning, would He create a world that eventually would become completely rebellious against Him? Why would He create angels, so that one of them would lead many of the other angels into rebellion against God?
The fact is that before God ever created the world, the universe, God not only knew that sin was going to enter the world. But He already made provision for the redemption of the world, for the redemption of the believers. We read in Ephesians 1:4 that He chose us, the born again believers, "in Him [that is, in Christ] before the foundations of the world." So you can depend upon it that God did not become surprised at any point. He not only knew what was going to happen. But He also made provision for the redemption of those whom He planned to save.
Now the question might then logically follow: "Well, why did God go through all this agony, of creating a world, allowing it to rebel against Him, so that He would have to go through this massive effort in order to redeem the world? The best answer that I can think of (and I know that this is very biblical) is that everything happens to God's glory. He says that "even the wrath of man shall praise God."
But let's think of it this way. The Bible says, "God is love." That's an excellent statement: "God is love." But it is not nearly as dramatic and recognizable and highlighted when it is said, as when it is expressed in reality. Think, for example, of the love that God had for this creation, allowing it to rebel against Himself, so that it became that which ought to be stamped out. It did not deserve to continue. But to provide for its redemption, it was necessary for Christ, for God to become the God-man, to be humiliated as a man, to be maligned by sinful men, to be spit upon, and then to endure the wrath of God, the equivalent of an eternity in hell. All this had to happen in order to redeem this world.
Now that is an expression of love that cannot be gainsaid. There's no deeper love than this, that God would do this for those of us who are so unlovable, who by nature are so rebellious against Him, that God would leave the perfection of Heaven, and become so involved in the misery of our sins. That is a dramatic expression of the love of God, that dramatizes that God is love far beyond what words could ever express.
Now the same thing can be said for the wrath of God, and the justice of God, the mercy of God, the grace of God, the patience of God . . . all of the divine attributes, which are all true and trustworthy. They're truisms that will stand forever. But all of them come into sharp and brilliant focus in actual demonstration in the drama of the fall of man and the redemption of man and the universe, by virtue of the fact that Christ went to the cross. This I believe, is one reason that God allowed all of this to happen.
Isn't it marvellous that we have a God who so loved us? If He had not made provision for our salvation, you could rest assured that every last human being on the fact of the earth would end up in hell. We deserve to go there. Absolutely we deserve to go there. There's not one of us that deserves salvation. Praise God for such a wonderful Savior.