No Heavenly Sweetheart
God's no heavenly sweetheart we're to ceaselessly croon romantic ballads about. (Don't you get tired of this saccharin God that fills so much of Western inspirational literature?) He means to redeem us from sin and fill us full of life and it doesn't matter to him that many of us don't want that. He wants it! If we spurn his love and persist in holding him in contempt we lose eternally but he gets no joy out of our loss (Ezekiel 18:23,32).
Furthermore, God may well use our sinfulness to gain his holy and generous purposes and still hold us accountable for our sins (see Romans 3:5-8). It isn't to our credit that God can make our wickedness serve glorious ends. He would rather that we serve him and our fellow-humans in righteousness but if he can't get that he will use our evil to bring about his good and still hold us accountable for our wickedness.
This truth holds true at the individual, national or international level.
If God chooses to chastise rebellious Israel to bring them back to himself and to life (see Amos 4:6-13) this is a generous and holy work of God. But if the instrument God uses to chastise wicked Israel is a wicked nation (Assyria, in Israel's case) then there are two purposes being carried out in the one event. Assyria doesn't mean to do God's holy and generous will but intends to do its own cruel will (see Isaiah 10:5-7). But in Assyria's evil purpose of self-service God carries out his own generous and holy act of redemptive chastisement. Assyria is accountable for her evil and God is accountable for his glorious goodness in restoring rebellious Israel.
The same is true in regard to Christ's cross. In our first century "fathers" and "mothers" we carried out our wicked will against God in Jesus Christ (Acts 2:23b) and we are accountable for it. But in our very act of evil God was carrying out his own glorious and generous will to redeem us all (Acts 2:23a and 4:25-28).
So when we say the suffering in the world is of God, we're not saying that God rises in the morning and, with a yawn, decides, "Think I'll hurt a lot of people today." No, much of the suffering in the world has man's evil stamp on it. But (and this is an important but) the suffering also has the gracious and generous holy hand of God in it. The wicked human intention doesn't mean there is no divine hand in it. Think again of the preceding paragraph and wonder at the wonder of it all.
You might find my Celebrating the Wrath of God, Waterbrook Press, of interest to you.)
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