The Invisible Hand: Coming to Grips With God's Providence - Genesis 50:20

Do all things really work together for good? Consider the following:

•A little baby is born with no brain, only a brain stem. The doctors tell the parents that she has no chance of surviving. Somehow she stays alive for sixteen months. The parents struggle to take care of her. When she gets sick, the doctors tell the parents, "Don't bring her to the hospital. There is nothing we can do for her."

•A young lad of twelve goes with his church youth group on a Saturday outing. That night he comes down with a fever. The next morning he has trouble breathing and his mother calls the doctor. By the time the ambulance gets there, he has stopped breathing. The doctor does everything he can but the boy is dead on arrival. He died from a strange bacterial infection.

•A man feels the call of God to go into the ministry. He leaves his good job and moves to a distant city to enter seminary. His wife takes a job to help him make it through. He's in his last year now. In just a few months he'll take a church somewhere and begin serving the Lord. But one day his wife comes in and says, "I'm leaving you. I don't want to be a pastor's wife." She walks out and never comes back.

•Another man is a policeman. One day he stops a man known to be a drug dealer. It happens on a busy downtown street and a crowd gathers to watch the unfolding drama. There is a struggle and somehow the drug dealer grabs the officer's gun. Someone in the crowd yells, "Shoot him, man." And he does, at point-blank range, in the face. The officer was in his early twenties.

These stories are all true. The first happened to dear friends in Texas, the second to a childhood friend in Alabama, the third to a man attending seminary in Texas, the fourth on the streets of Dallas. And those who read these words would have no trouble adding stories of their own.

My Friend Ken

I think now of my friend Ken Sibley, a friend for over half my lifetime, dying now of Lou Gehrig's Disease. Because I haven't seen him very often in recent years—and not at all in perhaps 12 or 14 years—and because we haven't kept up with each other except through mutual friends who would say, "I ran into Ken the other day down in Birmingham" or "Did you hear that Ray is moving from Texas to Chicago?"—because of all that, my memories of Ken run almost exclusively to those happy days when we both attended the First Baptist Church in Russellville.

Motion. That's the word that comes to mind. Motion. Action. A blue of movement. Ken was never quiet, never still, not really the contemplative type. I remember him—even in those teenage years—as a man of action.

For some reason, one little episode sticks in my mind. It was either 1970 or 71 or perhaps 72—no later than that. I had come home from college for a visit. Ken had become one of the leaders of the youth movement in that town—a movement that started, I suppose, sometime during the days of Kenny Edmundson and would climax several years later with the production of a musical called "Celebrate Life." Those were good, happy, amazing, unbelievable days—days when everything seemed possible to us. Looking back, it is easy to see the hand of the Holy Spirit moving through the midst of eager hearts from many churches.

I came to Christ during those days—earlier by a year, but still part of the same movement—and so did Alan. Along the way God spoke to Phil, Butch, Bruce, Fire, Ken, Sutt, Joey, Ricky, Big Mac—men mostly, a sure sign of God's movement, in my opinion—and many others whose names are momentarily lost to me. Of those I have named, every single one is still going on with the Lord in his own way—yet one more evidence of the Spirit's lasting work.

Whipped Cream and Skim Milk

One day I came home from college and attended a joint youth meeting at the Presbyterian Church. I can't put my finger on the reason or the season, but there we were praying together. It was mostly high school students and already I was out of place, but there because I knew so many people—and because of the girls, too, I'm sure. At one point we had prayed, then Ken stood us to speak to us. He was earnest, serious, sincere in what he said. One phrase floats across the years. "If you can't walk the walk, don't talk the talk." Some of you, he said, speaking more as a prophet than as a high school buddy, have been talking whipped cream and living skim milk.

That was Ken in those days—and even today, I feel certain. I remember his smile, his friendship, but more than that, I remember his determination to serve the Lord will all his heart. That was always there—a bedrock faith in God coupled with a zeal to make Christ real in his life. He had no time for those who wished to follow halfway or halfheartedly.

It's hard to believe that he has Lou Gehrig's Disease. I said earlier than he is dying. Well, he is dying in the sense that we are all dying—some sooner, some later. Death is still the last enemy of the people of God (1 Corinthians 15:26). And the prognosis isn't good although one hears whispers of new medical breakthroughs on the horizon, new treatments, new therapies.

Ken has a wife and children and he is much too young to die. I'm 44, if you can believe it, and he is younger than me, so I know he should have many more years to live.

But … in the end we all face our own mortality.

Why? Why? Why do these things happen? And why do they happen to good people, decent people, Christian people? Why is it happening to my friend—my good friend—Ken Sibley?

I. Providence Defined

There is a doctrine that helps us understand. If it does not answer every question, at least it provides the only possible foundation for understanding. It is the doctrine of the providence of God. In English the word "providence" has two parts. It's pro and video put together, literally meaning "to see before."

Though the word Providence is not found in most modern translations of the Bible, the concept is certainly biblical. It refers to "God's gracious oversight of the universe." Every one of those words is important. God's providence is one aspect of his grace. Oversight means that he directs the course of affairs. The word universe tells us that God not only knows the big picture, he also concerns himself with the tiniest details.

Here are five statements that unfold the meaning of God's providence in more detail.

He upholds all things

He governs all events

He directs everything to its appointed end,

He does this all the time and in every circumstance,

He does it always for His own glory.

No Accidents, Only Incidents

The doctrine of God's Providence teaches us several important truths: First, God cares about the tiniest details of life. Nothing escapes his notice for he is concerned about the small as well as the big. In fact, with God there is no big or small. He knows when a sparrow falls and he numbers the hairs on your head. He keeps track of the stars in the skies and the rivers that flow to the oceans. He sets the day of your birth, the day of your death, and he ordains everything that comes to pass in between. Second, He uses everything and wastes nothing. There are no accidents with God, only incidents. This includes events that seem to us to be senseless tragedies. Third, God's ultimate purpose is to shape His children into the image of Jesus Christ (Romans 8:29). He often uses difficult moments and human tragedies to accomplish that purpose.

Many verses in the Bible teach these truths, including Acts 17:28 ("in him we live and move and have our being"), Colossians 1:17 ("in him all things hold together"), Hebrews 1:3 ("sustaining all things by his powerful word"), Proverbs 16:9 ("in his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord directs his steps."), and especially Psalm 115:3, ("Our God is in heaven; he does whatever pleases him").

The doctrine of God's providence is really a combination of four other attributes:

Sovereignty—He is in control

Predestination—He is in charge of how everything turns out

Wisdom—He makes no mistakes

Goodness—He has our best interests at heart

In the words of R.C. Sproul, "God doesn't roll dice." Nothing happens by chance. Ever.

Predestination and Free Will

Now as soon I write those words someone is sure to ask about predestination and freewill. We'll be dealing with that question in a later sermon so I won't go into very deeply here. But let me give you something I jotted down a few days ago:

He is in charge of

what happens

when it happens

how it happens

why it happens

And even what happens after it happens

This is true of

all events

in every place

from the beginning of time.

He does this for

our good

and his glory.

He is not the author of sin, yet evil serves his purposes.

He does not violate our free will, yet free will serves his purposes.

We're not supposed to understand all this

We're simply supposed to believe it.

I hope that clears up any misunderstanding! (Actually this statement—brief though it is—does summarize the Christian position on God's providence as it has been developed over the centuries.)

II. Providence Illustrated

With that as background, we turn to consider the story of Joseph. If you are acquainted with the Bible at all, you have heard his story somewhere along the way. It goes something like this. Because Joseph was the favored son of his father Jacob, he was the object of envy by his many brothers. The day came when his brothers conspired to sell him into slavery to the Midianites who happened to be passing by. They did that, and then splashed his "coat of many colors" with the blood of a goat in order to make it appear that he had been killed by a wild animal. They then showed the coat to Jacob, who believed their lie and sorrowfully concluded that Joseph was dead.

Meanwhile Joseph was taken to Egypt by the Midianites. There he was sold again, this time to Potiphar, who was head of Pharaoh's security force. Genesis 39 tells us that Joseph gained favor with Potiphar because the Lord was with him to bless him. Eventually Potiphar put Joseph in charge of his entire household, which included the land, care of the property, and oversight of the other slaves. This was a signal honor for a Hebrew slave. Because he was competent, confident, and good-looking Potiphar's approached him about having a sexual affair. Joseph refused, pointing that he could not betray Potiphar and he would not sin against God. The woman persisted, to the point that one day when everyone else was gone, she attempted to pull him down on her bed. Joseph fled from the scene, leaving his cloak behind. The woman was humiliated and accused him of rape. It was a false charge, of course, but Potiphar believed his wife and had Joseph thrown in prison.

From Prison to the Palace

And in prison Joseph prospered once again and gained the respect of his fellow prisoners and of the guards. This happened because the Lord was with him to bless him. Eventually the cupbearer and the baker were thrown in the same prison and Joseph befriended them. One night they both had dreams they could not interpret. But Joseph was able to interpret them with the Lord's help. The dreams came true exactly as Joseph had predicted—the baker was hung but the cupbearer was released. Joseph asked him to remember him after he was out, but he didn't.

Two years passed and Pharaoh had a dream that he could not interpret. That's when the cupbearer remembered Joseph's amazing ability and mentioned it to the Pharaoh who ordered Joseph brought before him. Joseph correctly interpreted his dream and was rewarded by Pharaoh, who made him the Prime Minister of Egypt. Not bad for a Hebrew slave who had been sold into slavery by his brothers!

Eventually a famine settled on the Near East. Jacob told his sons to go to Egypt and buy some grain. They go and in the process meet Joseph—only they don't know it's Joseph. This happens twice. Then Joseph reveals his true identity. They are shocked and then scared because they betrayed him and now he is in a position to get even. But Joseph doesn't do that. In fact, he stuns them with these words:

And now, do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you. For two years now there has been famine in the land, and for the next five years there will not be plowing and reaping. But God sent me ahead of you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance. ‘‘So then, it was not you who sent me here, but God.

Genesis 45:5-8

The Pharaoh Meets Jacob

But that's not the end of the story. The brothers go back to Canaan and tell their aged father that Joseph is still alive. He can't believe it but eventually they convince him to come to Egypt with them. He makes the trip and is reunited with the son he had given up for dead many years ago. Then he meets the Pharaoh who offers to let Joseph's family settle in Egypt for as long as they like. The family settles in Egypt and lives in peace there for many years. Finally Jacob dies at the age of 147. Now it's just Joseph and his brothers. They fear that with Jacob's death Joseph will be free to take revenge on them. So they tell Joseph, "Oh, by the way, before Dad died he told us to tell you to treat us kindly." It sounds like just one more deception to cover their guilt.

Listen to Joseph's response. These are the words of a man who believes in the providence of God:

‘‘Don't be afraid. Am I in the place of God? You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.

Genesis 50:19-20

The King James Version translates verse 20 this way: "You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good." Both sides of that statement are true. "You meant it for evil"—what the bothers had done was indeed evil and Joseph doesn't sugarcoat the truth. They are 100% responsible for their sin. "God meant it for good"—this doesn't mean that evil isn't evil. It just means that God is able to take the evil actions of sinful men and to use them to accomplish his plans. Joseph saw the "invisible hand" of God at work in his life. He understood that behind his conniving brothers stood the Lord God who had orchestrated the entire affair in order to get him to just the right place at just the right moment in order to save his whole family.

At Just the Right Moment

Joseph is saying, "Though your motives were bad, God's motives were good." And though it took years and years for God's purposes to be clear, in the end Joseph saw the hand of God behind everything that had happened to him.

Think about the implications of that statement:

At just the right moment his brothers threw him into the cistern.

At just the right moment the Midianites came along.

At just the right moment he was sold to Potiphar.

At just the right moment Potiphar's wife falsely accused him.

At just the right moment he met the baker and the cupbearer.

At just the right moment the cupbearer remembered Joseph.

At just the right moment Pharaoh called for him.

At just the right moment he was promoted to Prime Minister.

At just the right moment Jacob sent his sons to Egypt.

At just the right moment the brothers met Joseph.

At just the right moment Jacob's family moved to Egypt.

At just the right moment Pharaoh offered them the land of Goshen.

At just the right moment they settled there and prospered.

All of this happened at "just the right moment" and "just the right way" so that the right people would be in the right place so that in the end everything would come out the way God had ordained in the beginning. God never violated anyone's free will, yet everything happened as he had planned. That's the providence of God in action.

That's also what Romans 8:28 means when it says that "In all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose" (Romans 8:28).

III. Some Implications of God's Providence

1. Providence frees us from bitterness.

This is clearly the message of Genesis 50:20. If ever any man had the right to get even it was Joseph. We get bitter because we doubt God's goodness and we don't see his invisible hand at work in our lives. We think God isn't involved in our situation and that's why we get angry and try to get even and hurt the person who has hurt us. If you really believe God is at work in your situation, you can just stand back and let God do whatever he wants to do.

2. Providence gives us a new perspective on our tragedies.

That perspective might be stated this way: God is involved with us even in the worst moments of life. I believe that in the great issues of life we will generally not have an answer to the question "Why did this happen to me?" That is, we won't know why our mate got sick or why we lost our life savings or why God didn't intervene when we were being sexually abused. Most of the time we are simply left to wonder why these things happen. Who would dare to say to a woman, "This is why your child was stillborn" or to a lifetime friend, "This is why you have Lou Gehrig's Diesease?"

But it is at this point that God's providence is so crucial. It doesn't tell us everything we would like to know about the mysteries of life, but it does assure us that God is there and that he cares for us. He is somehow involved even in our darkest moments in a way we cannot see—and probably wouldn't understand even if we could see it.

Because of God's providence we can keep believing in God even when things happen that make no sense to us. He can bear the burden of all our unanswered questions.

3. Providence gives us courage to keep going in hard times.

Because God is there, we know that he cares for us, even when life is tumbling in all around us. Recently I was in my basement study when a man suddenly knocked on my door and came in about 9:15 PM. He was weeping as he sat down. "It's over," he said, "It's over." I knew what he meant. He mentioned that he had been listening to a Christian radio station. They had been playing a song that has kept him going. It contains this seven-word phrase: "Life is hard but God is good." Then he quoted Psalm 115:3, "Our God is in heaven; he does whatever pleases him."

That's what the God's providence does for us. It doesn't answer ever question and it doesn't make our problems go away, and it doesn't give us an easy road. But it does tell us that at there is a pattern to the seemingly random events of life and that God is designing something out beautiful out of that which now seems to be only a chaos of clashing colors. Life is hard—make no mistake about that, but God is good. Both those statements are true all the time for all of God's children.

4. Providence forces us to make a choice by faith.

The older I get the more I understand that faith is choice, not a feeling. Many times we won't feel like believing in God. But faith is a personal choice we make to believe that God is good and that he can be trusted in every situation. Faith rises above feelings to choose to believe even when our circumstances may argue against it.

5. Providence helps us understand why Jesus died.

Listen to these amazing words from Acts 2:23, "This man was handed over to you by God's set purpose and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross." There you have both sides of the truth. Jesus died "by God's set purpose and foreknowledge." That tells us that the Cross was not an accident or some afterthought in God's plan. But who crucified him? Remember that Peter is preaching to the men who participated in that evil deed. "You, with the help of wicked men, put him to death." His death was no accident. God foreordained it from the foundation of the world. Yet the men who crucified him were guilty of the most heinous crime in human history. They were morally guilty, but what happened to Jesus happened because of God's divine plan.

God's providence leads us to Jesus and Jesus leads us back to the Cross.

He Maketh No Mistake

I close with a poem by A.M. Overton. Dr. Lee Roberson used to quote it often in his preaching. The poem is called "He Maketh No Mistake."

My Father's way may twist and turn,

My heart may throb and ache

But in my soul I'm glad I know,

He maketh no mistake.

My cherished plans may go astray,

My hopes may fade away,

But still I'll trust my Lord to lead

For He doth know the way.

Tho' night be dark and it may seem

That day will never break,

I'll pin my faith, my all in Him,

He maketh no mistake.

There's so much now I cannot see,

My eyesight's far too dim;

But come what may, I'll simply trust

And leave it all to Him.

For by and by the mist will lift

And plain it all He'll make,

Through all the way, tho' dark to me,

He made not one mistake.

In the end that will be the testimony of every child of God. When we finally get to heaven, we'll look back over the pathway of life and see that through all the twists and turns and seeming detours that "He made not one mistake."

I do not know why Ken Sibley should be chosen by God (I can think of no other way to put it) for his present affliction. I cannot think why it should have been him and not me, or him and not Bruce or Phil or Butch. It could have been any of us, or all of us, or none of us. Nor am I gifted in prophecy to foretell the future. Perhaps an amazing healing will take place. I pray fervently that it might be so.

But if not, and if the end comes, I wish to go on record as saying I have no doubts about my friend Ken. He has prayed that he might glorify God in everything and that even in this, Jesus might be magnified through his suffering. That prayer has been answered.

For Ken and for the rest of us, the best is yet to come. We will all someday stand in the presence of Jesus, swapping old stories, telling tales of long ago, recounting God's amazing grace to each of us. In that glad day Ken's tongue will be loosed and the chains broken once and for all.

Until that morning comes and the sunlight of God's presence fills our faces, we move on through the twilight still believing that though life is hard, God is good. And in the end we will say with all the children of God as we look back on our earthly pilgrimage, "He made not one mistake."