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Experts About Providence (continued) Elder Mark Green

ever overrules the acts of wicked men to accomplish his purpose today. He never

overrules evil for good. He did it in the Old Testament: "0 Assyrian, the rod of mine
anger, and the staff in their hand is mine indignation. I will send him against an hypo-
critical nation, and against the people of my wrath will I give him a charge, to take
the spoil" (Is. 10.5-6). Evidently, however, He never does that today, to hear some tell

it.

Other experts, speaking from a different perspective, imply that there is nothing that
happens "in the ordinary course of events." God is always performing some special

purpose in every event that happens in this world — good, bad and indifferent. I guess
God has sent them an epistle from heaven, for they seem to be as certain of that fact
as the experts of the other school are in their calculations. With them, God wasted his
time in making the laws of nature, for He was as especially and directly involved in

the sinking of the borrowed ax head as He was in its rising at Elisha's command.
These folks busily engage themselves in trying to ascertain why God does everything
that He does (and with them everything that happens is something that God himself
does directly).

God very seldom tells us why things happen, or why He does not prevent things from
happening; and we are presumptuous to think that we know it without his having
informed us. When there is a storm, or a war, or a terrible calamity, we do not know

if that is something that would have happened in the ordinary affairs of men, or if it
is a direct and special judgment of God. He does not tell us, and thus we do not know.
It might be a special judgment of God, but it also might not be. The thorns and thistles
(suffering) of this sin-cursed earth were the judgment of God in a general sense

because of Adam's sin, and thus sad and hurtful things — wars and tornadoes and
earthquakes and thorns - happen every day in the ordinary course of events without
any special intervention by God. God is not obligated to deliver us from any of them,
but I am convinced that He does deliver us from many of them.

Experts About Providence (continues)

Solomon's Song 1:7, 8 7. Tell me, O thou whom my soul loveth, where thou
feedest, where thou makest thy flock to rest at noon: for why should I be as one
that turneth aside by the flocks of thy companions? 8. If thou know not, O thou
fairest among women, go thy way forth by the footsteps of the flock, and feed thy
kids beside the Shepherd's tents.