DIVINE PROVIDENCE?

A while back I received an invitation to the ordination to the priesthood of a colleague. The invitation announced that the bishop who was to do the ordaining was the bishop of that Bishop’s diocese “by Divine Providence”. I disagree. I also disagreed with another colleague who had been in the election process and was a final candidate to be called to be the bishop. When the elections results came in and he was not elected, he sent a kind email to all those who had supported and prayed for him saying that the result of the election was the result of the Holy Spirit – in other words, by Divine Providence.

As I said, I disagree on both accounts. Episcopal elections, the calling of Rectors, the choosing of the Pope, the election of the President of the United States, none of these are the result of Divine Providence. They are all the work and result of what we human beings do and not do. If we honestly and truly want to rely solely on Divine Providence in any election of any kind at any level, religious or secular, all we need do is place in a container the names of every individual qualified by age and then draw out one name. We would then conclude that the choice was the result of Divine Providence if we were believers. Non-believers might say that it was simply dumb luck.

The danger in believing that any election result is the work of Divine Providence is to conclude that everything that person then does must also be the will of Divine Providence as well. But we know better, or at least we should. I hope none of the congregations that have called/elected me to be their Rector ever thought that I knew God’s will firsthand and that everything that I said and did was in accordance with that will. I also hope they believed I was called not because it was God’s will but because I was merely the best candidate among a list of candidates. I may have also simply been the best of an extremely bad lot.

To be sure it would be wonderful if we knew what the will of God is for every decision we make. It would be even better if, knowing that will, we actually fulfilled it each and every time. But we do and we don’t. There are times when we know exactly what it is God wants us to do but we still refrain from doing it. That’s what sin is. Sin is knowing what we should do or not do and then not acting accordingly.

We in the Church really want to believe that our leaders have been specifically chosen for us by God. But we have seen our leaders do some of the most ungodly deeds – all in the name of God, of course. Somehow they must have come to believe that they were chosen by Divine Providence and not because they knew how to work the election game.

The Holy Spirit is indeed alive and well and works in deed in and through you and me. Nevertheless, we need be careful when we claim that the works we do are the works of the Holy Spirit ordered by Divine Providence. Enough damage has been done already by thinking that way and, even worse, actually believing it.