One of the hard things for many people to come to grasp with is the fact that God is sovereign, and He can do whatever He chooses, even when it seems unfair or not right to us.
A key illustration of this is found in Luke 4:25-27. Jesus was speaking in the synagogue, “But in truth, I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heavens were shut up three years and six months, and a great famine came over all the land, and Elijah was sent to none of them but only to Zarephath, in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian.” Of all the widows during the three and a half year famine in Israel, God only sent Elijah to ONE of them! Of all the people struck with leprosey during the time of Elijah, God only chose to heal Naaman, and he wasn’t even a Jew, he was a Syrian.
Of course, as many people today respond to these truthful facts, the people in that synagogue that day didn’t like what He said, and tried to kill Him. “When they heard these things, all in the synagogue were filled with wrath. And they rose up and drove him out of the town and brought him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they could throw him down the cliff. ” (Luke 4:28-29)
J. C. Ryle (1816-1900) wrote this about the subject, “Of all the doctrines of the Bible none is so offensive to human nature as the doctrine of God’s sovereignty. To be told that God is great, and just, and holy, and pure, man can bear. But to be told that “He has mercy on whom He will have mercy”–that He “gives no account of His matters,” that it is “not of him that wills, nor of him that runs, but of God that shows mercy”–these are truths that natural man cannot stand. They often call forth all his enmity against God, and fill him with wrath. Nothing, in short, will make him submit to them but the humbling teaching of the Holy Spirit.
Let us settle it in our minds that, whether we like it or not, the sovereignty of God is a doctrine clearly revealed in the Bible, and a fact clearly to be seen in the world. Upon no other principle can we ever explain why some members of a family are converted, and others live and die in sin–why some quarters of the earth are enlightened by Christianity, and others remain buried in heathenism. One account only can be given of all this. All is ordered by the sovereign hand of God. Let us pray for humility in respect of this deep teaching. Let us remember that our life is but a vapor, and that our best knowledge compared to that of God is unmixed folly. Let us be thankful for such light as we enjoy ourselves, and use it diligently while we have it. And let us not doubt that at the last day the whole world shall be convinced, that He who now “gives no account of His matters” has done all things well.”
Remember Psalm 103:19, “The LORD has established His throne in the heavens, And His sovereignty rules over all.” God owes us nothing, and can do whatever pleases Him. All that we should be concerned about is bowing before Him in complete trust and obedience, and allowing Him as our Sovereign KING and LORD to rule and reign in our lives!