St. Aidan's Anglican Church
  • Home
  • Worship Online
  • The Preachers Blog
  • Bible in a Year
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Prayer Requests
  • Request Pastoral Care
  • Youth
  • Give
  • Statement of Faith
  • Video Archive
    • 2025 Videos
    • 2024 Videos
    • Real Lives
    • 2023 Videos
    • 2022 Videos
    • 2021 Videos
    • 2020 Videos
  • Sermon Audio Archive
    • 2020 Sermons
    • 2019 Sermons
    • 2019 Sermon Series >
      • Gospel Centered Eternities November 2019
      • The Real Joy of Easter - Holy Week 2019
    • 2018 Sermons
    • 2018 Sermon Series >
      • Gospel Centred Church Spring 2018
      • A Gospel Shaped Church Fall 2018
    • 2017 Sermon Series >
      • The Servant King Christmas 2016
      • The Saviour King Lent 2017
      • The Victorious King Holy Week 2017
      • The Living King Easter 2017
      • The Brother King Fall 2017
      • Worship the King Advent 2017
    • 2016 Sermon Series >
      • Real Obedience Lent 2016
      • Unity of the Church
      • The Servant King Christmas 2016
    • 2015 Sermon Series >
      • Real Gifts 2015
      • Real Mission 2015
      • Mission Discerned
    • 2014 Sermon Series >
      • Real Church 2014
      • Real Lives 2014
    • 2013 Sermon Series >
      • Real God 2013
    • Sermon Archive From 2014 - 2017
  • Christianity 101

the  Preachers  blog

Blogs are posted every Wednesday, except in July and August

God is Still Sovereign (by Les Kovacs)

5/5/2020

 
Tragedies are nothing new.  Whether natural disaster or human inflicted disaster, people have faced them from the beginning of time.  The current Covid-19 pandemic is just another in a long line of tragic events that have disrupted our lives, shut down the economy, and killed thousands of people at home and abroad.  And each time something like this happens we hear that familiar refrain from people without faith, “If God is sovereign and good, why does He let it happen?”  Among people of little or no faith, they think of God, when they think of Him at all, as one who is presumably loving and good, which means that He must want us to be happy all the time, and they don’t believe that such a God could be particularly demanding or judgmental.  Therefore, they don’t understand how He could possibly let such things happen.  Maybe He doesn’t really exist, or if He does exist, He doesn’t really care. 

At the heart of these questions is a misconception about the reality of God and our world, because both are far more complicated than the narrow understanding of their worldview.  The benign God of their imagination doesn’t exist and the world can be a very hard place in which to live.  The God of scripture, who really does exist, is very different from their imagination.  He is Holy, infinite, transcendent, glorious, righteous and loving, far above us and far beyond our comprehension.  He is good, but His righteousness wars against the sin of this world and demands judgement on it.  Yet, bound up with His righteous judgment is His unbounded love and mercy.

God created and sustains all of creation, and His sovereignty extends to every single detail of it.  He clothes the lilies of the field, feeds the birds of the air, and attends to every sparrow that falls (Matt. 6:26–28; 10:29).  Yet, this is a fallen world because of sin.  It is a world of death, transience, and futility.  This is a place where the devil roams free and where we can suffer calamity, including from diseases like Covid-19.  In its present fallen condition, the world is not supposed to be a secure, trouble-free, and always happy place.  And yet, God’s sovereignty mitigates that world.  Although bad things happen, in His sovereign will He continues to love His creation.  The many beauties, satisfactions, and pleasures of life that we enjoy are the deeper signs of God’s sovereignty.

So why doesn’t God just make everything good and perfect?  Well, He did, in the Garden of Eden, the paradise that we rejected, and He will again, in the eternal paradise that He has prepared for His people.  In the meantime, we must live in this very imperfect world.  But, remember that this is also the world in which God redeems us from our sins.  God entered into this broken world in the person of Jesus Christ, who subjected Himself to its sin and death in order to save us.  This is the world where we whom He has saved are called to do battle against sin, resist temptation, oppose evil, do good works, and experience all the trials and tribulations that can strengthen us in our faith and prepare us for eternal life.

In light of God’s sovereignty, tragedies like the pandemic should remind us to “lay up” for ourselves “treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal” (Matt. 6:19–20).  We should meet them with repentance (Luke 13:5); cling to Christ in faith (Ps. 63:8); pray for deliverance (Matt. 6:13); and live out our faith, particularly in our workplace, family, church and community (Matt. 22:36–40).  Because God is still sovereign, and always will be, we can stand on His promise: “We know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose” (Rom. 8:28).

Comments are closed.
    Picture
    Picture

    Preachers Blog

    In 2025, each week's blog is a follow-up reflection written by the preceding Sunday’s preacher to dig deeper into the sermon topic and explore engaging discussion questions.

    ​All past blogs remain available if you wish to catch up with any days missed.

    Archives

    May 2025
    April 2025
    March 2025
    February 2025
    January 2025
    December 2024
    November 2024
    October 2024
    September 2024
    June 2024
    May 2024
    April 2024
    March 2024
    February 2024
    January 2024
    December 2023
    November 2023
    October 2023
    September 2023
    June 2023
    May 2023
    April 2023
    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

    Who is Jesus?
At St Aidan's, it's our desire to know our Real God,
to grow as a Real Church and
​ to live Real Lives for Him.

Picture
St Aidan’s Anglican Church
274 Campbell Street | Winnipeg, MB R3N 1B5
Phone: 204.489.3390 Email: [email protected]
  • Home
  • Worship Online
  • The Preachers Blog
  • Bible in a Year
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Prayer Requests
  • Request Pastoral Care
  • Youth
  • Give
  • Statement of Faith
  • Video Archive
    • 2025 Videos
    • 2024 Videos
    • Real Lives
    • 2023 Videos
    • 2022 Videos
    • 2021 Videos
    • 2020 Videos
  • Sermon Audio Archive
    • 2020 Sermons
    • 2019 Sermons
    • 2019 Sermon Series >
      • Gospel Centered Eternities November 2019
      • The Real Joy of Easter - Holy Week 2019
    • 2018 Sermons
    • 2018 Sermon Series >
      • Gospel Centred Church Spring 2018
      • A Gospel Shaped Church Fall 2018
    • 2017 Sermon Series >
      • The Servant King Christmas 2016
      • The Saviour King Lent 2017
      • The Victorious King Holy Week 2017
      • The Living King Easter 2017
      • The Brother King Fall 2017
      • Worship the King Advent 2017
    • 2016 Sermon Series >
      • Real Obedience Lent 2016
      • Unity of the Church
      • The Servant King Christmas 2016
    • 2015 Sermon Series >
      • Real Gifts 2015
      • Real Mission 2015
      • Mission Discerned
    • 2014 Sermon Series >
      • Real Church 2014
      • Real Lives 2014
    • 2013 Sermon Series >
      • Real God 2013
    • Sermon Archive From 2014 - 2017
  • Christianity 101