Meditation on the Text of the Week

It's Always Personal

And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.
Romans 8:28

Christians believe in a universal personal world—which is to say that we believe that all of reality, past, present, and future is shaped by and ordained by God Himself. Further, in common language, we speak of “getting personal” by which we mean some actions or deeds come to one by design, person to person—as a deliberate message from one person to another, personally meant, personally focused, personally orientated. It often refers to something pointed or directed.

With respect to the Living God, Christians believe that God is always personal with every human being. He is always “getting personal” with each individual. Our text tells us that for those who have come to love God, having been called by Him, all that is, all that comes to pass in their lives, is a personal message and ministry from God to them as individual souls. It is universally intended by the Lord, planned by Him, executed by Him, caused by Him for their individual good and well-being.

Three comments need to be made, lest we misunderstand this glorious truth. Firstly, we are called and challenged to receive this truth by faith, not by sight. For many of our circumstances are hard and difficult. The Scriptures also are clear that through many trials and sufferings we enter the Kingdom of God. Oftentimes circumstances don't seem good to us: nevertheless, we are called in faith to believe that no matter how desperate or painful the circumstances or events of our lives, even in all of it, God has ordained every part, all of it, for our good, and therefore as an outworking of His beneficent mercy and goodness toward us. Of course, receiving this by faith helps us to be reconciled and thankful for even the most difficult valleys.

The second comment is that we must beware of frantically searching for the good in every circumstance. Sometimes the good that God intends will be immediately obvious to us. Other times, much less so. We have known immature souls work themselves up into a frenzy trying to discern the good in a difficult circumstance, struggling to see and understand, ending up very dispirited. This is not the walk of faith, but of sight. And sight is often inimical to faith.

Finally, we must not fall into the trap of looking for personal messages from God in our circumstances. That is not the kind of cosmic personalism intrinsic to the Christian faith. That kind of immaturity is a hangover from the superstitions of Unbelief, from pagan days and ways. “What is God trying to tell me?” is a question often found on the lips of young Christians, or of Christians weak in faith, when a difficult circumstance arises. But God has already declared to every Believer His personal messages to each and every one: they are found in the promises and declaration of the Scriptures—which are full, final, and complete.

Therefore, as “all things” in our existences unfold—each a unique cluster of circumstances combining with our unique combination of “nature and nurture”, we are to look not into the secret counsels of God, but to His Holy Scriptures. All of nature and circumstances draws us back to His revealed counsels that we might see the already declares things there more clearly, more perceptively, and more meaningfully.

But the universe is personal for the Unbeliever as well. The circumstances—all of the them—experienced by an Unbeliever represent a personal message from God to each individual. Does an Unbeliever experience the blessings of life—children, health, vitality, success? God is speaking personally to them of His mercy, His patience, His goodness. He is calling them to be thankful for His good gifts. Each Unbeliever has his own personally constructed message, calling him to depart from the life of sin and rebellion, and come to the Lord.

Does an Unbeliever experience great pain and suffering? It is the Lord's personal message to them, warning them that what they are experiencing is a mere foretaste, the barest taste, of the wrath that awaits, if they stubbornly refuse to repent. Or does an Unbeliever experience enslavement to alcohol or drugs? It is a warning, a mere foretaste, of an eternity to come without Christ.

The earth is not a machine, wound up, and left to run on its own. The earth, all of creation, is the outworking of the infinite Personal God. There is nothing absolutely or finally impersonal. Even what appear to us to be the most impersonal or random events, such as the lot, cast in the lap, represents the personal will of God. Every hair on the head is numbered. No sparrow can fall without it being the express and directive command of the Father.

For the Believer, it is all a hymn of love, manifesting the goodness of God for our good. For the Unbeliever, it is all a siren of warning and a hymn of invitation to come to God, turning away from sin before it is too late. All of it. Without exception.

He who has ears to hear, let him hear.