Lamentations 3:38 - Homiletics

How evil and good both proceed from God.

The Hebrew prophets show no inclination towards Persian dualism. They never attempt to solve the mystery of evil by the doctrine of two principles in nature, a good and an evil principle, in any respect coordinate one with another. On the contrary, they emphasize the monism of their creed by ascribing sole supremacy and originating power to "the Eternal." Nevertheless, they do not teach that moral evil is caused by God. This they regard as springing from the heart of man. In the verse before us we have no question of this darkest kind of evil. It is not sin, but suffering, that is referred to, as the context clearly shows. We have just been told that God will not cast off forever because he does not afflict from his heart. We are now reminded that it is not the less true that God sends adverse as well as pleasant things.

I. THE WHOLE OF OUR LIFE EXPERIENCE IS UNDER THE DIRECTION OF GOD . Our conduct is in our own hands; but what is not thus immediately dependent on our own will is directed by God. Other men influence us, but they are overruled by the Most High. Chance and accident seem to strike us, but chance and accident only exist to our ignorance. They are not really, for Providence excludes them. We sometimes speak of visitations of God, as though he came and went. But that only means that we perceive his action at one time more than at another. God is ever working in us. "In him we live, and move, and have our being." Things great and small, pleasant and painful, spiritual and physical, eternal and temporal, are under the hand of God and regulated by his will.

II. GOD TREATS US IN VARIOUS WAYS . He sends both evil and good. He has not one unchanging method of action. He varies his treatment according to requirement. To one he sends more evil, to another more good. Yet to none does he send experience of one kind only. The hard lot has many mitigations. The pleasant places have their shadows. As we pass through life we see how God deals with us in wise suitableness, now sending most good, now most evil.

III. WE MUST NOT INFER THAT IF GOD IS WITH US NO TROUBLE CAN BEFALL . If evil as well as good proceeds from the mouth of the Most High, no assurance of the presence of the Author of both wilt justify us in disbelieving in the coming of either experience. We must be on our guard or we shall be disappointed. We must be prepared to expect evil things even while we are under the care of God.

IV. WE MUST NOT INFER THAT IF EVIL BEFALL US GOD CANNOT BE WITH US . This inference of unbelief is the natural consequence of disappointment in the presumption that, if God is with us, we cannot suffer trouble. There is real comfort in the thought that evil is sent by God, if only by the removal of the common assumption that it indicates desertion by him.

V. WE MAY INFER THAT IF EVIL PROCEEDS FROM GOD IT IS PERMITTED FOR THE SAKE OF ULTIMATE GOOD . For God does not delight in sending evil. His heart is not in it. But his heart is in mercy. He may seem to send the two indifferently; hut he does not bestow them with equal pleasure nor with similar results, for the good is sent for its own sake, and the evil only that it may lead to higher good in the future.