God Meant it for Good
As for you, you meant it for evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today” (Gen. 50:20 ESV).
Upon consideration, Joseph’s oft-quoted reconciliatory sentiment creates an apparent contradiction:
How can God accomplish His purposes through the sinful actions of human beings and still be holy, just, and good?
However, the Bible, being inspired by God, cannot contain such an error; for, was an infallible God to err, a greater contradiction would arise. Consequently, any mistake must be imputed to sinful, fallen readers. The “contradiction” can be thoroughly harmonized with an understanding of man’s fallenness, God’s attributes, and His redemptive plan.
Humans inherit a fallen nature from Adam, the first human. Apart from God, man is totally depraved.
None is righteous, no not one” (Romans 3:10 ESV).
Humans will never seek God and are slaves to their sin. But God is good, and He works with sinners. He directs both good and evil according to His will. In this, God is no more guilty of sin than Jesus was in dining with tax collectors. According to the definition of man’s nature, if God wills to work good in man, he wills to work good in sinners.
And God does will to work with sinners, which we know because of what has been revealed of his attributes. The Bible is abundantly clear that God is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent. In short, God is sovereign. God is also good, and his will is “good and acceptable and perfect” (Romans 12:2 ESV). If God is sovereign, nothing happens outside of his will. If his will is good, then “all things work together for good” (Romans 8:28). Therefore, God, though not the Author of sin, wills to work through sinful man to accomplish his holy purposes.
If God works all things together for good, will he not redeem man from his wretched state? When sin entered the world, God already had a plan, of which the first glimpse is given in Genesis 3:15. Justice by itself demands that sin be punished. But God is both just and merciful, and, in His mercy, desires to save His creation. And if, rather than abandoning humans, God wills to carry out His redemption, He must work with the sinners He is redeeming.
In other words, God’s work with sinners is not contradictory to His nature, for his work of redeeming mankind is the very manifestation of his mercy and justice.
Rather than contradicting God’s nature, God’s practice of working through sinners actually reaffirms God’s sovereignty, justice, and mercy. The Bible teaches that God is holy, just, good, and merciful. God’s mercy and justice, neither taking precedence, require a unique redemptive plan. Because of the Fall, God’s willingness to work through fallen men is essential to His salvific work.