Thoughts on the Assassination Attempt

It may be months or years before we get definitive answers on why the gunman opened fire on former and potential future President Donald Trump. Like most of you, I was shocked and saddened by this horrific event. I am asking what motivated this young man to do it? Was he acting alone? How could a security failure of such magnitude happen? What is the meaning and implications of all of this? How do we process what has occurred?
 
This has caused me to consider the sovereignty and providence of God. God is the creator and sustainer of all that exists. He has endowed his creation with certain laws of nature that are regular and constant. Further, he has created people with volition to make free choices based on what they desire. God can intervene and use the laws of nature to his own end without violating those law of nature. Further, God has created people with free agency to do what their hearts desire. God hinders their actions or allows their actions to occur in accordance with his sovereign will. If he so chooses, he can suspend those laws of nature to accomplish his purpose. He is also able by his grace through the work of the Holy Spirit to supernaturally enable people to do what they could not do on their own such as have faith, repentance, or holy affections. Whoa, this got deep quickly! I better move on because I am losing you. What does this have to do with the events of Saturday?
 
First, we don’t know what God is doing. God’s hand of providence is at work both indirectly through the choices he allows people to make and directly by intervening actively. God is directing all human history. However, we don’t know why things happen a certain way and not another. I am sure that some will see what happened this weekend and think that they know exactly what God was doing in allowing this to transpire and in orchestrating that Trump not be assassinated. Does this mean Trump will definitely be the next president? Did God spare his life for a completely different reason? Might this be what God uses to lead him into a truly saving relationship with him?
 
To all these questions, we don’t know. Even at the best of times we can see a small fraction of what God is doing but, if we are honest, most often we have little or no idea why God has providentially allowed something to happen or not happen. It is a dangerous thing for a person to presume to know the mind of God on such matters. I recall after 9/11 several prominent pastors declared that this was divine judgment on the nation for a specific sin. Now, surely it could have been, but we are not able to declare that or know it with any degree of certainty. Not every tragedy is particularly divine retribution.
 
Since God’s hand of providence governs and guides all things, we can say without a doubt that God spared President Trump’s life. Literally, another inch to the right or if he had not turned his head a millisecond before the round struck him, he would not have survived. Was it a misjudgment by the potential killer or a breeze that blew the bullet off course enough that spared the former president’s life? We do not know exactly what the dynamics were that caused the shooter to miss hitting the president, but we know that it was God’s special providence.
 
As believers this is true in our lives as well. We know that everything that occurs in our lives is permitted and guided by the hand of our loving Father (Romans 8:28). He is also a God that answers prayers and his Spirit stirs our hearts to seek after him. We may never experience a situation like what occurred on July 13, but we can have confidence that nothing, absolutely nothing happens by chance or without a purpose.