God’s mysterious ways
I heard someone say that bad things happen because each person has a choice between good or evil. Yet, it is my understanding that Luther argued cogently from Scripture that human will is in bondage to sin and therefore not free. It is only through God's grace that any are able to belong to Him. Yet, being human, we are troubled by this question of why. Must we, like Job, just accept that God's ways are so far above us that we should cease with our questions and accept that some things are a mystery?
By nature, my free will is limited to making decisions about my earthly life. By nature, my will in spiritual matters is only that of sinning and rejecting God. When God brings me to faith, he gives me a new heart (Ezekiel 36:26). I am a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17). I now have a new self that desires to live in harmony with God’s will (Ephesians 4:24). I now want to love God and others as God instructs (Romans 7:22). However, I still have a sinful nature that opposes anything good and godly, and that creates struggles in Christian living (Romans 7:15-25).
As a child of God, my free will is much different than before my conversion. Now my new self wants to use the means of grace to strengthen my faith; now I want to follow God’s law as a tangible way of showing my thankfulness to him for my salvation in Jesus his Son. However, even when I, as a child of God, want to do those things in life that are good and godly, I recognize that it is God working in me: “It is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose” (Philippians 2:13).
Our lives as Christians will be more peaceful when we realize that, yes, there are mysteries of our faith and that it is not up to us to understand everything about God and his ways. The apostle Paul’s doxology in the book of Romans directs us to stand in humble awe of God when we are confronted by God’s mysteries: “Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! ‘Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?’ ‘Who has ever given to God, that God should repay them?’ For from him and through him and for him are all things. To him be the glory forever! Amen.” (Romans 11:33-36)