Suffering & the Sovereignty of God

Dear hurting Christian: you’ll never persevere through pain unless you believe that God is still in control when life hurts. Consider what the Bible says about God’s sovereignty over our suffering.

God is sovereign over sickness and disabilities:

Exodus 4:11—“Who has made man's mouth? Who makes him mute, or deaf, or seeing, or blind? Is it not I, the LORD?   

1 Samuel 1:5—the LORD had closed [Hannah’s] womb.   

God is sovereign over nature:

Job 37:10-13—By the breath of God ice is given, and the broad waters are frozen fast. He loads the thick cloud with moisture; the clouds scatter his lightning. They turn around and around by his guidance, to accomplish all that he commands them on the face of the habitable world. Whether for correction or for his land or for love, he causes it to happen.   

Amos 4:7—“I also withheld the rain from you when there were yet three months to the harvest; I would send rain on one city, and send no rain on another city; one field would have rain, and the field on which it did not rain would wither.  

God is sovereign over the tiniest creatures:

Exod. 23:28—I will send hornets before you, which shall drive out the [nations]  

Jonah 4:7—God appointed a worm that attacked the plant, so that it withered.  

God is sovereign over kings and rulers:

Isaiah 40:23-24—who brings princes to nothing, and makes the rulers of the earth as emptiness. Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown, scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth, when he blows on them, and they wither, and the tempest carries them off like stubble.   

Proverbs 21:1—The king's heart is a stream of water in the hand of the LORD; he turns it wherever he will.   

God is sovereign over Satan and his minions:

Job 1:12—The LORD said to Satan, “Behold, all that he has is in your hand. Only against him do not stretch out your hand.”  

Job 2:6—The LORD said to Satan, “Behold, he is in your hand; only spare his life.”   

God is sovereign over seemingly random events:

Prov 16:33—The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the LORD.  

God is sovereign over daily events:

Prov 16:9—The heart of man plans his way, but the LORD establishes his steps.   

Prov 19:21—Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the LORD that will stand.   

God is sovereign over life and death:

Deuteronomy 32:39—there is no god beside me; I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal; and there is none that can deliver out of my hand.  

1 Samuel 12:6—The LORD kills and brings to life  

God is sovereign over all things:

Isaiah 46:10—"My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose,”  

Ephesians 1:11—[God] works all things according to the counsel of his will,   

No one can stop God’s sovereignty:

Job 42:2—“I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted.   

Psalm 115:3—Our God is in the heavens; he does all that he pleases.   

Prov 21:30—No wisdom, no understanding, no counsel can avail against the LORD.   

Isaiah 14:27—For the LORD of hosts has purposed, and who will annul it? His hand is stretched out, and who will turn it back?   

God is sovereign over the voluntary, sinful decisions of humans.

Genesis 50:20—As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.   

Act 4:26-28—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.   

The Bible is clear: God reigns! Even when we’re suffering, God is sovereign.

This is comforting for two reasons. First, it’s comforting because your pain is not outside His control. Margaret Clarkson put it this way: “The circumstances surrounding our lives are no accident: they may be the work of evil, but that evil is held firmly within the mighty hand of our sovereign God. . . . All evil is subject to Him, and evil cannot touch His children unless He permits it.”[i]

Second, God’s sovereignty in our suffering is comforting because if you’re a follower of Jesus you can have confidence that God is using your suffering for your good. This was Joseph’s confidence in Genesis 50:20. It was Job’s confidence when he worshipped God after losing everything. And it was Paul’s confidence in Romans 8:28 where he wrote, “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.”

[i] As quoted in Jerry Bridges, Trusting God (Colorado Springs, NavPress, 2008), 28.