The following "Question" was asked by a member of the congregation at Grace Community Church in Panorama City, California, and "Answered" by their pastor, John MacArthur Jr. It was transcribed from the tape, GC 70-15, titled "Bible Questions and Answers."  A copy of the tape can be obtained by writing, Word of Grace, P.O. Box 4000, Panorama City, CA 91412 or by dialing toll free 1-800-55-GRACE. Copyright 1994 by John MacArthur Jr., All Rights Reserved.

Question

I was reading your book, Our Sufficiency in Christ, and I have just a couple paragraphs to read. It talks about the spiritual warfare--who’s after whom, God’s sovereign purpose, why things happen. And it says here, “Why would God allow the devil, an already defeated enemy, to continue to trouble believers? Scripture does not attempt to answer that question; it only assures us that God’s purposes are always righteous, holy, good, and ultimately for our benefit.” And it says here, “Paul wrote of the divine purpose in the messenger of Satan that troubled him with the thorn ‘to keep me from exalting myself’”--that’s in II Corinthians 12:7. "And here in Job, perhaps the earliest of all the books in the Bible, is a classic Old Testament study in how God uses Satan’s diabolical efforts to accomplish his own divine purposes. There was no one else like Job on earth; God himself testified to that. He was a blameless and upright man, fearing God and turning away from evil. And here Job lost everything: his children were all killed, he suffered painful and humiliating diseases. He struggled with doubts, depression, discouragement. And here Peter, in the New Testament, was also personally attacked by Satan with God’s permission." My [question] is, as Christians today, does God allow these things to happen in our lives to strengthen our faith? Because Peter went through circumstances like that, and God told him that you’re going to go through it because you’re going to strengthen the church. Does this still happen today? Does God allow Satan to buffet us for us to be stronger in the faith?

Answer

I think He does. I don’t see any reason to assume any difference. You can go all the way back to probably the oldest book in the Bible, Job, which we could discuss about its authorship--it may have even been written before the Pentateuch. You can go all the way to the time of the tribulation in the book of Revelation, and Satan is going to be heaping everything on believers then, right? You can see it in the life of Paul, you can see it in the life of Peter. I don’t see any reason, since it's there at the very beginning and it's there at the very end, in the redemptive plan of history, why it shouldn’t be running through the whole middle. So, I would assume that the answer is yes, that the Lord does turn Satan loose on us at His own purpose and discretion, or turn demons loose on us for perfecting purposes, to accomplish His own ends in our lives. There’s nothing in the Bible to convince us other than that. 

Added to Bible Bulletin Board's "MacArthur’s Questions and Answers" by:

Tony Capoccia
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