God – Why don’t You intervene?

This is part 2 of 3 of Lesson 3. Click here to go back to the introduction to Lesson 3 The Bird Cage. 

In the last section, God’s Mysterious Ways we investigated the reasons why Jesus didn’t intervene in John’s case.

The reasons given were comforting in that we see that God had his angels looking after John even in prison – although there were still times where John doubted and probably felt isolated from God. And even Jesus was not unmoved by John’s case, it was that

But we’re still looking for other evidence, so next we’ll look at Lazarus’ case.

You can read about the story of Lazarus here in John 11.

Lazarus was suffering and dying, and yet Jesus deliberately let this occur. Why?

Look at Jesus’ own words, when speaking about Lazarus’ death and why He didn’t make a faster trip to be there at the time:

And for your sake, I am glad I wasn’t there, because this will give you another opportunity to believe in me. Come, let’s go see him. John 11:15 NLT

Once again we see that comfort on this earth is not Jesus’ priority, it is eternal joy that Jesus is trying to secure for all. Following on from this, in Desire of Ages p528, we get a few more insights into why Lazarus and his family had to suffer:

• Lazarus’ resurrection was going to be one of the most convincing pieces of evidence of Jesus’ divinity – that in deed He was the ‘resurrection, and the life’. He wanted to crack through the hard exterior of some of the Jews who had resisted him to date.
• Jesus knew this would be a ‘crucible’ or a ‘bird cage’ experience for Lazarus’ sisters:

Christ knew that as they looked on the dead face of their brother their faith in their Redeemer would be severely tried. But He knew that because of the struggle through which they were now passing their faith would shine forth with far greater power.

• The miracle would show Satan’s lack of power over death
• The miracle would help inspire the disciples in their mission to share God’s grace to all the world.

In a similar vein to the comfort provided to John in his ordeal, Ellen White also states that Mary and Martha were similarly comforted:

When Lazarus died, they were bitterly disappointed; but they felt the sustaining grace of Christ, and this kept them from reflecting any blame on the Saviour. DA 526

It would therefore appear that trials are often accompanied by pain, suffering and uncertainty, but also with a special presence of the Lord.

The final thought for this section is that often today you will hear the sceptic’s challenge. If God was all powerful and all good, there’d be no evil in this world. And because there’s evil in this world, then God must either be not all-powerful or not good.

Well, the Pharisees took a similar tack to the sceptics of our day:

During the two days Christ seemed to have dismissed the message from His mind; for He did not speak of Lazarus. The disciples thought of John the Baptist, the forerunner of Jesus. They had wondered why Jesus, with the power to perform wonderful miracles, had permitted John to languish in prison, and to die a violent death. Possessing such power, why did not Christ save John’s life? This question had often been asked by the Pharisees, who presented it as an unanswerable argument against Christ’s claim to be the Son of God. The Saviour had warned His disciples of trials, losses, and persecution. Would He forsake them in trial? Some questioned if they had mistaken His mission. All were deeply troubled.

You could be led down the sceptics path if you don’t have the faith to peer behind the veil and uncover the higher purposes that God is trying to accomplish. And more so, to remain confident that God desires our best and has the power to bring it to pass.

The two stories we’ve looked at this week can give us confidence that God is working for good amidst the seemingly chaotic events of this world.

So these are some interesting insights. But what about trials where it appears that people are ‘burned’ in the crucible, rather than ‘refined’ by it?

To this topic we’ll turn our attention in future weeks…!

Once again, let us know your thoughts on this.

Back to the start…