God is…Omnipotent
That God is omnipotent means He is all-powerful. Job 42:2 succinctly captures this attribute:
I know that You can do all things,
And that no purpose of Yours can be thwarted.
God is not only able to do all things according to the counsel of His will (Eph 1:11; Psa 33:11), He actually does all things according to the counsel of His will. He is supremely and uniquely powerful such that we can say power belongs to Him (Dan 2:2).
God made everything, and so He has control over everything and owns everything. And He has ordained the end from the beginning (Isa 46:10) – all before Gen 1:1 in eternity past.
1 Chron 29:12 says, “Both riches and honor come from You, and You rule over all, and in Your hand is power and might; and it lies in Your hand to make great and to strengthen everyone.”
God raises people and even empires, and He brings them down. He ordains prosperity and paucity. He ordains good and calamity. These are all a part of His plans formed long ago, and He will faithfully execute them without fail (Isa 25:1).
But evil and suffering – are these a part of the counsel of His will? How can they be? If they are, doesn’t that mean God is complicit in sin?
This is a question that has troubled people since the Fall. To answer this question properly we have to admit from the outset that there is no answer that will perfectly satisfy us because our minds are finite, limited, and tainted by sin. But God’s mind is perfectly and infinitely wise and holy.
We then have to realize that God never tells us “how” omnipotence and evil mesh. We are not privy to the specific inner-workings of God’s plans. Instead, He gives us the “why.”
That is, though we may never fully get how an omnipotent and holy God ordains sin and suffering to occur in a universe He created, God tells us that in working out His plans, He will be glorified in everything (Isa 43:7; 1 Cor 10:31).
And He will be supremely glorified in the end when we see how He caused all things (including evil) to work together for our greatest good – which is our Christlikeness (Rom 8:28-29).
What’s even more amazing is that He will have caused even our sins against Him to work out for our good and for His glory…as the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus shine in and through us forever and ever (Eph 2:7).
That’s how powerful God is.