Proverbs 16:4 The LORD hath made all things for himself: yea, even the wicked for the day of evil.Give God the glory! Fall before the King of heaven! Here are the final and true answers to four of life's greatest questions: What is the origin of things? Why do they exist? Who is the true God? And why does evil exist? This single sentence is worth the weight of your house in gold! Humble yourself before this axiom from heaven and learn wisdom!
Proverbs is of little value, if you stumble here. The beginning of wisdom depends on grasping this proverb (
1:7;
9:10). This verse should be one of the first children memorize. Here is the Bible worldview. From this foundation of knowledge, we can reason safely and sanely about other matters of life. If you neglect or reject the truth here, your life will be a nightmare of confusion, and then you will meet an angry God (
Ps 7:11;
Amos 4:12).
What is the origin of things? God made all things. Evolution is a lie, told by God-haters, to discredit the Bible. The Bible is plain: "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth" (
Gen 1:1). This is more certain than any fact you will ever hear. If you do not have the faith to believe it, you are unreasonably stupid (
II Thess 3:2;
I Tim 6:20-21). It is a sign of insanity to begin your reasoning about the universe from a big bang of chaotic matter. Where did the matter come from? How did an explosion bring order out of chaos?
Jesus Christ, the Mighty God, made all things. The Bible is plain: "All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made" (
John 1:3). We do not argue creation versus evolution with unbelievers; for unless they have the gift of faith, they cannot learn anything, especially if they are educated. An arrogant man that has been flattered with education is worse than a fool (
26:12;
I Cor 1:19-20;
3:19-20;
I Tim 6:3-5).
The only big bang this universe ever felt was the shocking force of God's words, "Let there be light!" And there was light! Even without a sun, moon, or stars for three days! He made all things, and He made all things out of nothing. By faith we not only know this fact, we understand it as well (
Heb 11:3). Man is nothing more than a vessel of the divine Potter. Grasp this first answer thoroughly, and you are on your way to wisdom.
Consider what makes a person. Parents, height, nationality, intelligence, looks, time of birth, strength, race, coordination, personality, and opportunities make a person. God chose every one of these for you, without consulting you at all. He did not ask you a single question about your preferences. He chose them Himself! He gave you existence, a very personal thing, and the pain and trouble it brings, without asking you! You cannot even end your existence! You will eventually have to deal with Him! He is God!
While you are fearfully and wonderfully made, so are all His creatures (
Ps 139:14)! You are not special. And you are certainly not special, because you are human, as humanists suggest. God is special, and you owe Him all that you are and have! Reject the folly of self-love and self-esteem (
II Tim 3:1-2). Lift your eyes up to heaven, and bless and extol the most High. Read the greatest king's personal testimony about it (
Dan 4:1-37)!
If a person does not believe God made all things, there is no reason discussing anything of any importance with him. He has chosen a worldview of insanity, reasoning in a circle from his own imagination. How will you settle anything with him? He has the same answer for all questions - I think so. He cannot know anything for certain, for his foundation rests on the thin air of speculative hallucinations that he calls theories.
Why do things exist? Why is the universe here? Why is man here? Why are you here? God made all things, and He made them for Himself! Give glory! Worship Him! Sing praise to Him! "Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created" (
Rev 4:11). You will soon bow to this Blessed and Only Potentate (
Phil 2:9-11;
I Tim 6:13-16)!
These first two answers are so true, we may say, "For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen" (
Rom 11:36). He is the First Cause of all things, and He is the Final End of all things. All things were created by Him and for Him (
Col 1:16). Fall before Him now! Give Him the honor and praise due to His name!
The universe exists because God wanted to make something for Himself! He did not make the world for man; He made the world and man for Himself! You do not exist for yourself, nor does anything else exist for you; you and all things exist for His pleasure. It is time to humble yourself and see the purpose of your existence - the glory of God! If you rebel against this fact, or even neglect it, you will have hell to pay, now and later!
Why do elephants have long noses? For you to praise God for His creativity! Why do giraffes have long necks? For the same reason! Why can a blue sky with white clouds and a warm sun make your heart sing? For the glory of God! Why do baboons not pull their hairy pants all the way up? For you to laugh with God! Do you know the value of a zoo? It is for family worship - to praise God and ridicule Charles Darwin and Carl Sagan!
Why are ostriches stupid? For you to know God made dumb things (
Job 39:13-18)! Why are horses wonderful? For God to brag about them (
Job 39:19-25)! Why does a woman's body have curves that take a man's breath away (
Song 4:1-7;
7:1-9)? For the praise of His work with a rib! Why are there rainbows? To remind you God keeps His promises (
Gen 12:9-17)! Give Him glory, reader! Praise Him this minute to fulfill your existence!
If you are short, fat, ugly, and stupid, God made you that way for Himself! You know He didn't make you that way for you! You wish you were tall, thin, attractive, and smart! He made the baboon for Himself, and He made you for Himself! Give Him glory! Horrible parents, few opportunities in life, and poor health are also His choices. It is a key to happiness to learn and accept this knowledge. Whatever you have, and whatever you do not have, are both by God's choice for His own glory. Thank Him! Worship Him!
Even Satan was made for the glory of God! God allowed him, as part of His eternal purpose, to rebel in pride; so He could display His wrath and power in Satan's eternal punishment. God was not surprised by his rebellion. He and his angels shall be cast into everlasting fire, prepared for them from the foundation of the world (
Matt 25:41). The smoke of his torment and that of his followers will be incense in heaven (
Rev 14:10-11)!
Pharaoh was conceived easily, survived childbirth, and avoided the diseases that took the lives of many Egyptian children. He graduated at the top of his class, won several victories leading the army, and was chosen from numerous siblings to be ruler of Egypt. While king, the nation prospered and became powerful. He was a success at anything he tried. His glory and power increased. He became the greatest monarch on earth. Why?
Where did Pharaoh come from? What was the source of his unique ambition, personality, dreams, and successes? God made him, and God promoted him to the top of Egyptian power by arranging the events of his life. Why did God do this? To crush him in the Red Sea to magnify Himself (
Ex 9:16;
Rom 9:17)! God did not make Pharaoh wicked; but God did raise this wicked man up to destroy Him wonderfully for the praise of His own reputation. If you do not know these things, you do not know the God of the Bible.
Who is the true God? The LORD is His name! What does LORD mean? It is the English designation for the sacred Hebrew tetragrammaton, JHVH, which stands for I AM THAT I AM, which we pronounce as Jehovah! Allah is merely the moon god of hallucinating Arabians; and Vishnu, Brahma, and Shiva are merely three of the Hindu imagined deities.
The LORD Jehovah is the true God. He is the only God. He looked for other gods, but He could not find any. He alone is God. He created the heavens, the earth, the sea, and all that in them is in six days. He is independent of all His creatures. He is infinite by any measure. He is eternal, immortal, invisible, omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent.
Why does evil exist? Some believe the first three answers. They believe Jehovah created all things for Himself. But they limit His dominion by suggesting that wicked men and their sinful actions are outside His plan and control. To correct this false notion, Solomon immediately included even the wicked and their judgment in Jehovah's creating of all things for Himself. Even wicked men and their eventual destruction are for God's glory.
Evil exists because God gave Lucifer a free will. Rather than be content with his office as the anointed cherub of God, he swelled up in pride and purposed to be like the most high (
Is 14:12-15;
Ezek 28:13-15). God gave him privilege and freedom, and he used it to rebel against his Creator. The blessed God was not surprised or disappointed; Satan is responsible for his wicked deed; God is righteous in tormenting him forever for his sin.
Where does suffering come from? Satan brought his rebellion to earth. He lied to our first parents, and Adam chose his foolish wife over God. Jehovah had made man very good in a perfect world, but man corrupted the earth by sinning against His Maker (
Gen 1:31;
3:16-19;
Eccl 7:29). Adam chose the curse of sin for his family over Paradise with God. The whole creation groans in pain, travail, and death due to his sin (
Rom 5:12-14;
8:22).
Evolutionists cannot explain death. It should have evolved away long ago, since it is the most dreaded and hated thing in life! If a slimy salamander can choose to be a bald eagle, then surely man could have chosen to evolve death away! Death is the wages of sin! And the Bible teaches us this fact clearly, which no evolutionist will ever find in a test tube! God created death, in several forms, as just punishment for sin. Therefore, all men die.
Adam's sin in the Garden of Eden did not surprise or confuse the LORD. He had planned the entrance of sin into the human family, though Adam freely chose Eve over God without any coercion at all. Adam alone is responsible for his sin and the consequences. God made him perfect, warned him, and gave him only one commandment to keep. God had planned the entrance of sin for the ultimate display of both his wrath and mercy.
Depraved children of Adam, with hearts in all-out rebellion against God and morality, commit atrocities daily. You hear and read about them. They, nor their atrocities, surprise or confuse the LORD. He made them as surely as any creature. He restrains their wickedness, so all they can do is what He will use for Himself (
Ps 76:10). They never think about God at all (
Ps 10:4); they only want to satisfy themselves (
James 1:13-16).
The blessed and holy God does not make men sin, but He does control and use their sins for wise and righteous purposes. God is perfectly holy and good. Man chooses sin willfully against the light of nature and warnings from God and men. God never puts sinful lusts in men, for He does not need to. They are so full of lust and wickedness: all He needs to do is lift His restraining mercy, and any man will do anything!
He controls and directs all wickedness in the universe to His own praise and glory. Even the devil must obtain permission to touch a man or pig (
Job 1:12;
2:6;
Matt 8:31). He can keep a king from touching a woman (
Gen 20:6), and he can use the offspring of incest for His glory (
Gen 38:1-30). He used the envy of Joseph's brothers to get him to Egypt (
Gen 45:5;
50:20), and He used Roman cruelty to crucify His Son on a tree (
John 18:31-32).
When God needs to reveal His wrath and power against sin, He looses men to rush greedily after their own lusts, and then He punishes them for it. About 1656 years after creation, He drowned the earth with a flood for their sins. He let Satan have David to number Israel, and He killed 70,000 men in punishment for their sins (
II Sam 24:1-25). God controls and directs the sins of men and their punishment to magnify Himself.
King Sennacherib wanted to expand the Assyrian Empire and conquer neighboring nations; God used him to chasten His rebellious people, and then He destroyed him for his arrogant presumption about doing it (
Is 10:5-19). God used Jewish hatred for Jesus to bruise His only begotten Son for the sins of His elect, and then He miserably destroyed them by the Romans just 40 years later for that horrible crime. It was their wicked hands that crucified Him, but it was all according to His eternal purpose (
Acts 2:23;
4:27-28).
Here is the wisdom of God's saints. They are never alarmed or surprised by wicked men. They know the LORD made Adolph Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Mao Tse Tung, Pol Pot, and Idi Amin for Himself. He used their evil to accomplish holy and wise ends, and then He did, and will yet, punish them for their wickedness. If God used World War II to crush Germany for the blasphemous higher criticism coming out of that country, give Him glory! If He crushed Japan for their blasphemous worship of Hirohito, give Him glory!
We do not know the secrets things of God's eternal counsel, unless and until He reveals them to us (
Rom 11:33-34). History reveals some secret things (
II Sam 12:22-23), and so do His prophets, which recorded them for us in Scripture (
Dan 2:27-30;
Amos 3:7). Most of His secret purposes are far outside our ability to know or understand. But He has revealed many things for us to do, and these are for our children and us (
Deut 29:29).
A great Day of Evil is coming, the Day of Judgment, in which all angels and men shall be judged. The wicked were created for this day, as our proverb declares. The "evil" is the misery and pain He will pour on them (
Job 2:10;
Is 45:7). He has eternally purposed to display His mercy on the elect and His wrath on the reprobates (
I Pet 2:8;
Jude 1:4).
"Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour? What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory, Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?" (
Rom 9:21-24).
Do not even think of questioning Him! It took Nebuchadnezzar seven years to learn He is above questioning (
Dan 4:35). Paul, blasting those who might question God's absolute sovereignty, wrote, "Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?" (
Rom 9:20). You should not even complain or question, if He made you without hands (
Is 45:9)! Rational men do not accuse their parents of error, much less should you accuse God (
Is 45:10)!
What should you do? "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man. For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil" (
Eccl 12:13-14). Hear Solomon's father, "Stand in awe, and sin not: commune with your own heart upon your bed, and be still. Selah" (
Ps 4:4). And, "Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth" (
Ps 46:10).
Do you know you are wicked? There is one escape from the Day of Evil - salvation by the Lord Jesus Christ. God sent Him to save His people from their sins (
Matt 1:21), and He will not lose one of them (
6:39;
17:2). The elect were chosen out of wicked men by the grace of God and predestinated to eternal life (
Rom 8:29-39;
Eph 1:3-12). The gospel brings these facts to light (
II Tim 1:9-10). To know you are one of His elect, fall before Him, beg for mercy, and rise up to obey His word (
Acts 16:31;
II Pet 1:10-11).
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