Sovereign God – Proverbs 16:4

In 1525 Martin Luther published his by-letter debate with Desiderius Erasmus, On the Bondage of the Will.  Erasmus argued that “the doctrine of predestination conflicted with the teachings of the Bible…and he held that the doctrines of repentance, baptism and conversion depended on the existence of free will.”  Luther, on the other hand, argued that “sin incapacitates human beings from working out their own salvation, and that they are completely incapable of bringing themselves to God…As such, there is no free will for humanity because any will they might have is overwhelmed by the influence of sin.”  Needless to say, this issue has been a source of disagreement of the most emotional kind from the beginning of history, with these two debaters being only that era’s iteration of the argument.

The LORD has made everything for its purpose,

even the wicked for the day of trouble. (Proverbs 16:4, ESV)

If you make this statement straightforward it says, “Yahweh has made the wicked for the day of trouble.”  That doesn’t sit well with us somehow.  What does it mean?

It doesn’t mean that God takes responsibility for human sin.  Romans 9:19–20 is our base passage:  You will say to me then, “Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?”  But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, “Why have you made me like this?”  God finds fault with wrong human decisions.  We might question why, but that is not within our purview to question.  It is what it is.

It does mean that God is in sovereign control of His world, including human sin.  “No one resists His will,” and this is where we have so much struggle.  How can God be the ultimate determiner of all that happens and not be personally responsible for our sin?  Again, Paul tells us, this is not within our purview to question.  He is the One who is in charge and makes the rules.  But we need to know that He is in charge.

So here in our proverb we are seeing that the wicked do not take God by surprise and that He has a plan for them that includes the day of trouble, the time of judgment.  You don’t, therefore, want to be in that company.  Simple enough.