Is it sometimes God’s will for believers to be sick?

Response

The biblical teaching on the sovereignty of God affirms that God is all-powerful. He has complete authority over everything—past, present, and future—and nothing occurs outside of His control. He either directly causes or permits all events. However, there is a distinction between allowing something to happen and actively causing it. For instance, God created Adam and Eve as perfect and sinless beings, but He permitted them to disobey Him. He did not force them to sin, although He could have prevented it; instead, He chose not to interfere for His own purposes and to fulfill His perfect plan. Their rebellion led to the emergence of various forms of evil—evils that were not instigated by God but were permitted by Him to exist.

Illness represents one aspect of the two main categories of evil—moral and natural. Moral evil encompasses acts of cruelty among humans, while natural evil includes phenomena like natural disasters and physical ailments. Evil itself is a distortion or deterioration of something that was originally good but is now lacking. In the context of sickness, it signifies the absence of good health. The Greek term for evil, “ponerous,” conveys the idea of a harmful influence that corrupts a state of well-being.

When Adam transgressed, he brought upon all humanity the repercussions of his sin, including sickness. Romans 8:20-22 explains, “For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.” God—the one who imposed this frustration on creation after the Fall—has a plan to ultimately free creation from its enslavement to sin, just as He liberates us from.

That bondage through Christ.

Until that day, God uses sickness and other evils to bring about His sovereign purpose, to glorify Himself, and to exalt His holy name. At times, He miraculously heals sickness. Jesus went through Israel healing all manner of sickness and disease «And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people. », (Matthew 4:23) and even raised Lazarus from the dead after illness killed him. At other times, God uses sickness as a method of discipline or as a judgment against sin. King Uzziah in the Old Testament was struck with leprosy (2 Chronicles 26:19-20). Nebuchadnezzar was driven to madness by God until he came to understand that “the Most High rules in the affairs of men” (Daniel 4). Herod was struck down and eaten by worms because he took God’s glory upon himself (Acts 12:21-23). There is even at least one case where God allowed disease—blindness—not as punishment for sin, but to reveal Himself and His mighty works through that blindness (John 9:1-3).

When illness does come, it may not be the result of God’s direct intervention in our lives, but is rather the result of the fallen world, fallen bodies, and poor health and lifestyle choices. And although there are scriptural indicators that God wants us to be in good health (3 John 2), all sickness and disease are allowed by Him for His purposes, whether we understand them or not.

Sickness is certainly the result of the fall of man into sin, but God is very much in control, and He does indeed determine how far evil can go (just as He did with Satan and Job’s trials—Satan was

Not allowed to exceed those boundaries). He tells us He is all-powerful over fifty times in the Bible, and it is amazing to see how His sovereignty unites with the choices we make (both bad and good) to work out His perfect plan «And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose. », (Romans 8:28).

For those who are believers and suffering with sickness, illness, and/or disease in this life, the knowledge that they can glorify God through their suffering tempers the uncertainty as to why He has allowed it, something they may not truly understand until they stand in His presence in eternity. At that time, all questions will be answered, or perhaps more accurately, we will no longer care about the questions themselves.