Dear friends,
Our second episode of our summer series on Paul’s evangelism in Athens points to the enormously important doctrine of God’s sufficiency and our dependence. I hope during this holiday time, for our Southern Hemisphere subscribers, you are having a great time to reflect on God’s goodness. For our Northern Hemisphere subscribers, we wish you well as you lurch into winter.
Yours,
Phillip
Phillip Jensen: For the second episode of our summer series, we will once again delve into Acts 17 together.
Peter Jensen: I love this passage because it demonstrates a very interesting way of preaching the gospel to unbelievers. In many ways, the ancient Athenians are exactly like us.
Phillip: The city of Sydney is not much different from the city of Athens in ancient times, especially in its paganism. Today, we will follow up on last week’s episode about God the Creator by looking at God the Sustainer.
Acts 17:24 starts with God the Creator, then gives the implications about this Creator for religion: Paul tells the Athenians, “The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man.” In verse 25, Paul introduces God the Sustainer: “Nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.” That is the God of whom Paul speaks.
Peter: As we saw last time, God reveals himself in the wonderful news that he is the one who has made all things. The word ‘reveals’ here is essential to our understanding of him. Last week, I read an extract from the book The Intellectual Adventures of Ancient Man,1 which describes the “discovery” of monotheism as “Israel’s greatest achievement”. But it wasn’t a discovery; it was a revelation. It is impossible to think that human beings may have stumbled across monotheism in the way in which it is described in the Bible. It is a revelation from the God who speaks to us, based upon what he is like. Therefore, it is a wonderful revelation of the truth.
But there is more to God than simply the revelation that he is one and that he created all things. Many people down through the ages have agreed that there is one creator God. But they think that having made all things, God stepped back. They see the universe as a machine that was set into action: the world has been made by God, but it is independent of him, and it carries on in the way in which he has designed it to. Meanwhile, God watches but does not interfere with the unfolding history of the world.
Phillip: But the God in the Bible reveals himself. We are told that he knows all things; nothing would operate without God’s work. In fact, Hebrews 1:3 tells us, “He upholds the universe by the word of his power.” That is, the Old and New Testaments both tell of a God who is actively involved and engaged in every aspect of life. Furthermore, Isaiah 45 speaks of him creating ill and creating good; nothing happens without the supervisory activity of God. Yet we still talk in terms of the laws of nature. Where do you think the laws of nature fit into God’s world? If it is not a machine, does nature itself have laws?
Peter: I don’t strongly object to the phrase ‘the laws of nature’, provided that we recognise that the laws of nature are only possible because they describe the habitual, ongoing work of God. For example, the chair I’m sitting on only remains a chair because God sustains it every moment. As you pointed out, everything is God at work, including every hair on our head. Because God is good, he is consistent in all that he does, and that consistency can be described as the laws of nature.
Furthermore, it’s not that cause and effect doesn’t matter, for God uses cause and effect; in fact, cause and effect are only possible because he continues to use it. So our scientific enterprise is not made impossible by what I’ve stated. Indeed, the reverse is true; it is the ongoing work of God that we trust every day. We all exist by faith, for we constantly trust the world in which we live. The basis of that trust is the goodness and the power of the one God, who has made and continues to supervise all things. God makes a promise after the flood, signified by the rainbow, where he assures all people in Genesis 8:22, “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.” Now this is the work of God.
Phillip: This is not descriptive of the world; it’s prescriptive by God.
Peter: Indeed. Jesus comments in the Sermon on the Mount, in Matthew 5:45, that God “makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.” This is at the heart of the matter: God is constantly at work. The rain comes for the just and the unjust. It’s directed at the human race, which has been made by God. Thus we are in the hands of this good God wherever we go.
Phillip: As Christians, we are not living in the fear and anxieties of the world: we do not use religion to try to control the world, nor do we attempt to manipulate God into controlling the world according to our will. We don’t say, ‘It’s raining, so I must have done something bad,’ or ‘It’s sunny, so I must have done something good.’ God is habitually controlling our welfare.
Peter: I believe that is the best way of seeing it. Our welfare does include pain and suffering, of course. But before we get to that, there is another issue: the subject of miracles. Because God is not always consistent. He allowed someone to walk on water; he fed 5,000 people with a small portion of bread and fish; he raised people from the dead. What’s the best way of thinking about miracles?
Phillip: Firstly, the word ‘miracle’ is not a biblical word. It comes out of that mechanistic way of understanding the world, where miracles are the moments in time when a mechanism of the world seems not to have worked in its usual fashion. But the Bible uses half a dozen other words that are not the word ‘miracle’. It describes ‘shock’, ‘amazement’, ‘awe’, and ‘wonder’ about what takes place. All of these words express what is abnormal, but it doesn’t mean that God has abandoned the normal processes of life.
For instance, one of the greatest miracles of all time is the crossing of the Red Sea. The Bible explains how it happens, in terms of a great wind driving back the waters. It’s not a suspension of the laws of nature, but rather God using the laws of nature in ways that astonish us. God can, at any time, use the very ways in which he normally operates to bring about his purposes. He doesn’t have to suspend how the world operates; he uses it because he is in control of it.
The Bible does speak of signs and wonders, often in terms of the judgement that is coming. But that language in itself reveals that these signs and wonders signify God’s work: for example, they often signify that Jesus is fulfilling the expectations of the Old Testament. In the book that I wrote some time ago, The Coming of the Holy Spirit,2 one of my many appendices speaks on the subject of miracles itself. I encourage you to think about it, because we must not turn miracles into proof of God’s existence, for the Bible never does such a thing. It does point to God fulfilling his promises in the person of the Lord Jesus, but some of the things that happen in the world are bad. When we talk about God supervising all things all the time, using the ways in which he has created the world for it to be used, what do we say about the fact that some things in this world are incredibly awful?
Peter: Before we get there, I have another observation about miracles. You are right that in the Bible we sometimes see miracles occurring through an unusual, unexpected natural force, like a gust of wind. But sometimes we can’t. God doesn’t need such things to walk on water, for instance. So bear that in mind.
Your question is about suffering in the world in which God is in charge. One of the things that is very striking about the Bible is the way that from the third page all the way to the end, it stares pain and suffering in the face. Though some people use suffering as an argument against Christianity, the Bible is unwavering in talking about it. Virtually every page is an acknowledgement and a description of the pain and suffering of living in this world after the Fall. So we live in the world of death, for as God says in Genesis 2:17, “In the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” When Adam and Eve ate the fruit, they were expelled from the garden into a world in which there was pain and suffering. So suffering is attributed to Adam and Eve’s decision to be like God. It’s not as though pain and suffering are just natural; they occur because of the rebellion of human beings.
But at the other end of the Bible, Revelation 21:4 says, “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes,” promising a future in which suffering will come to an end. Therefore the Bible is not just a book about the inevitability of pain and suffering, though it tells us that pain and suffering is the world in which we are living by choice.
Phillip: People who raise the problem of suffering as being a put-down argument against God’s existence have never read the Bible, I presume, because the whole Bible is about this subject and has multiple answers within itself.
Peter: Indeed. But one viewpoint that the Bible maintains is that God is good. Additionally, the Bible tells us that God does not approve of evil; however, through his power, he can use evil to accomplish his good ends, and to benefit those who serve him. So all things work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose. It doesn’t mean we will always succeed at everything we do, or that our faith can be strong enough to make miracles occur. It means that as we go on living in this world of pain and suffering, God will turn what happens to us for our good. Of course, the ultimate good is to be more like the Lord Jesus. This brings us to the very central story of the Bible, which is the story of God himself: the Son of God who came among us and was betrayed, deserted, and crucified. If there’s anyone who understands evil, pain and suffering, it is Jesus Christ.
Phillip: You keep moving from evil to suffering. Can you explain the difference?
Peter: People have different ways of putting it, but I see it like this: because of human beings in their sinfulness seeking to be like gods, we now live in a world in which there is pain, suffering, and evil. But not all pain and suffering is a direct result of evil. For example, in John 9, when Jesus came across a blind man, his disciples asked, “Who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”, to which Jesus replied, “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.”
Furthermore, the book of Job tells the story of a man who suffered terribly, but it was not because of his sin; it was due to other events behind it, of which he was ignorant. So not all pain and suffering is directly attributable to evil, though overall, we live in a world like that because of our own rebellion against God.
Phillip: There is a general suffering that comes from evil, but particular suffering may or may not come from any particular evil.
Peter: That’s what the Bible tells us, which is worth remembering because we sometimes think, as the disciples did, ‘I’ve fallen sick; what evil have I done?’
Phillip: But is it necessarily wrong to think that way?
Peter: It’s always right to remember that we’re all sinners, and we live in the sort of world where these things happen. Sometimes it is right to contemplate our sins. The epistle of the Hebrews reminds us that God will sometimes deal with sin in that way as a way of forming us and shaping us.
Phillip: 1 Corinthians 11 speaks in those terms, too. I remember that in the section of the Book of Common Prayer called The Visitation of the Sick, one of the first things that the sick person is instructed to do is to ask themself if there is a particular sin for which God has visited this sickness upon them. However, there need not be, for we live in a sinful, sick world. It’s important that sickness and death remind us of sin; therefore, they remind us to think again about ourselves. But sickness and death will come to all because we are all in this fallen world.
Peter: I couldn’t live in this world without God and the hope that he provides. Because the Son of God came for us, we are given the hope of resurrection that the world does not have.
Phillip: One immediate issue is a misunderstanding about the reasons for which a person may become sick. Many ask themselves, ‘I’m sick; am I sinful?’ or ‘I’m not sick; am I good?’ Personally, many of my friends are sick whilst I’m enjoying good health, and I thank God for my good health, but I know that it has nothing to do with the fact that I am in some way morally better than my sick friends. The idea that sickness is a direct result of the afflicted person’s sin is a dreadful doctrine.
Peter: It sure is, and we should avoid it.
Phillip: That is not what Paul is talking about when he explains God and his self-sufficiency in Acts 17. Paul makes the point in verse 25 that God is not “served by human hands, as though he needed anything.” There is this constant temptation of human beings to make God in our image. We think of him as a superior man: just a bit more intelligent, a bit bigger, a little stronger; slightly above us in power and might, but someone to whom we could lend a hand. We think we can help him out just as he helps us. But Paul puts an end to that way of thinking about God. God needs nothing from me; not even my worship or my good works will do anything to improve or assist God. He is independent of us, so this sense that we are doing God some service by our good works is a terrible misconception about the nature of God.
Peter: This reminds me of the sayings that we hear sometimes in Christian circles, such as ‘We are God’s hands’, ‘He is impotent apart from us’, or ‘We do his work for him in the world.’ The truth behind that is that God, in his mercy and kindness, uses human beings to do his work. However, we only do it through his wisdom and with his power.
Phillip: He doesn’t need us to do it.
Peter: But God is very kind, so he enables and encourages us to do it. For example, in Job chapter 42, God, having uttered a rebuke to Job, tells him to pray for his friends so that God may forgive them. God doesn’t need Job’s prayer, but God incorporates it into his deeds, and grants Job a status as an adopted son of God. So we are all doing the work of God in the world, not because he needs us, but because he kindly incorporates us into his work and empowers us to do it.
You spoke about what’s going on in our own generation. It’s interesting that the atheistic thinking of the early 21st century seems to have died down because it is not satisfying. There’s a move back to what people are calling ‘spirituality’ or, as I sometimes say, ‘the new paganism’. But even within the Christian community, there is sometimes a temptation to treat God as our servant. There’s this idea that if we have enough faith, we can move the levers of the universe, and then all sorts of good things like health and prosperity will come pouring out, as though we are God. But that is not how faith works.
Another thing that we are all guilty of doing is taking the salvation wrought by Christ for granted, as though it’s a band-aid for our sores, when indeed it should move us every day in wonder and awe of what God has done in his love for us. We use the fatherhood of God as though he’s a cheery ‘dad figure’ of sorts who hands out lollies to his kids. He’s not a grandfather in the heavens, so to speak; that is a trivialised picture of God. Worse still, we think that we are giving money to God when we are generous. We think that we are truly worshipping him when we do good works to make him happy with us. In short, the attempt, by the goodness of our hearts and our deeds, to win God’s approval, is the most popular religion of all.
Phillip: This obscures the very truth of the grace of God. It is not until we understand that we can give God nothing that we can begin to see the nature of his mercy and grace. Our relationship with God is not transactional. We should not think, ‘I do this for God, and God does that for me; if I don’t do this for God, God won’t do that for me.’ Sinners, as we are, have nothing to give to God, who sustains all life and does not need us yet gives us everything. Therefore, it’s only through his mercy and his generosity that we breathe our next breath. It’s only by his grace that we are saved from the judgement that we deserve. It’s only as we discover that God needs nothing from us, and he owes us nothing, that we can truly grasp how sinful we are, and how merciful and generous he is towards us.
So we pray for the mercy of God, not to win favour, but because he is merciful. It’s the right response to God. As the song goes, “Amazing grace that saved a wretch like me.” I always ponder, when people sing that song, whether they actually believe that they are wretches. I’m sure that the man who wrote it understood it. Because you need to understand it in order to understand the God that Paul proclaimed to the Athenians all those years ago.
H.A Frankfort, The Intellectual Adventure of Ancient Man, 1946 (The University of Chicago)
Phillip Jensen, The Coming of the Holy Spirit, 2022 (Matthias Media)
Scripture quotations are from The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Links & Recommendations
For more on Acts 17, check out this sermon. It’s called The Religion of a Dead World.
For more information and a link to purchase Phillip’s book The Coming of the Holy Spirit click here.
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