Put Off the Old Self

He is faithful to answer prayer. No matter how the darkness attempts to rage, at times, it can go only as far as He allows and no further.

To realize that our God is one who restrains evil, lest suffering be so far worse in the world than it is...can be so difficult, in the face of abject pain. That He would allow pain and even ordain it is hard to comprehend, at times.

And yet the curse of death, the curse of disease, the curse of suffering...are all ordained as the results of breaking God's moral law. He ordained moral order and we have broken it. We have broken all of His laws.

All of them, in as far as we have been able. Pressing to the very reaches of depravity, even now.

Mocking Him to His face by attempting to uncover Him on our terms, simultaneous of ardent refusal to acknowledge the truth of who He is.

These aren't small matters. They're not light. They're no trivial.

We're not entitled to know Him, is the thing. Merely, He is willing.

On His terms, and not our own.

And we rage against even that, as though we somehow had ought be catered to in our desires to approach Him according to just any means of approach. So long as we, in some capacity, believe we intend well.

Problem is, though, that very stance is one in direct, flagrant opposition to God.

To simultaneously assert a sense of self-worth and self-righteousness in approaching the Creator of the Universe and owner of all which is in it...

...is the height of arrogance. Basically saying that, because we are created, then we are equivalent unto our Creator...in power, in significance, in worth. Claiming that the free will which He gives us would be erred against, if He would deign ordain any particular requirements upon us, as unto Him.

All of which ignores the fact that free will only exists within the scope which He ordained it. And no further. Which basically means...free will isn't free. It's a gift. And a gift with limitations preset by the giver.

Because He has that prerogative. We don't.
We didn't create ourselves. He created us.

He owns us. All the earth and everything on it is His.

Check His word.

It's not up to us to approve of what He does, to approve of God. Rather, we are given to tremble at the reality of the fact that it's only by His grace that we've not already destroyed ourselves completely. And at any moment, He could choose to remove His restraining arm. And the very evil which we have glutted ourselves on would absolutely overwhelm.

Were it not for love, perhaps. Love such that He even sent His son to die--a markedly gruesome picture which does indeed evidence the depths of how atrocious sin is, that such an act would be the means of having it overcome. Unto death, death on the cross.

His own son. For love of us. That whoever believes on Christ would have the life of God restored, within, as a new heart be given in place of the heart of stone, loving wickedness, delighting in evil.

He will eventually right all things, though. He will bring all things into total subjection.
But awaits, even now, seeking more would be reconciled through Christ as not to endure wrath He willingly bore on our behalf.

Ultimately, it's not a choice, is the thing. We didn't choose to be born. And despite that some attempt to take matters into their own hands (self-included, on all counts), we have not chosen to bear death. These things are given, by God. One, as grace, per His divine will so to do. The other, as a result of having ever erred against Him.

And yet we continually choose death. I despair of it, the ongoing giving in to temptation. But it drives to a deeper reliance upon God, as the only deliverer.

He's been faithful. Ongoing, incrementally fulfilling all things according to His Word.

Which He will do. Period.
All the more reason to seek to know what that means.