The father is sitting on the armchair. On the end table next to the armchair is his drink in a glass. His little 3-y-o daughter is sitting on his lap.

Have you ever watched a child play with the hands of a parent? The little girl was playing, lovingly, with her father's hand. She would turn the hand this way and that. She would bend the wrist. She would open and close the hand finger by finger.

Finally, in her play, she lifted her father's hand and arm, and moved it so that his hand was on the end table. She opened her father's hand, and wrapped his fingers around the glass that held her father's drink. Then, she lifted his hand and arm, and twisted his wrist. The glass tipped, and the drink went all over the floor.

Now, tell me. Who dumped the drink, dad or his daughter? Do you think that the little girl had any kind of strength and control to actually mover her father's hand the way she did? And her father certainly would not have intentionally dumped the drink if he had been sitting there alone, or if his daughter had not done the things she did.

God is all powerful. But, he has given us certain control and freedom, while maintaining His power to Himself. In other words, we can do nothing at all, except that God is there exerting Himself in ways that make us feel like we did it.

This whole universe operation is far greater than we think or imagine. The enemy, the Devil, Satan, is also like the little girl in that his entire ability comes from God. God, for His pleasure in giving us freedom, has allowed us and Satan to move his hands and fingers at certain times and in certain ways.

It doesn't affect God in the least how we use our freedom... except that He is emotionally distraught when we hurt ourselves. But, because He has set our freedom in place, through using some of His power to enact it (our freedom), God let's us hurt ourselves if we want. And He lets Satan hurt us to some extent, although if you look in the beginning of Job, you will see that God has limits even on Satan.

In the little story, above, the father has the ability to clean up the mess his daughter made (but, mother probably did it while disdaining the foolishness of the game her husband was playing with their daughter). In similar ability, God has the strength to clean up the mess that we and Satan made of our lives. But, this is where the similarities between the above story and the reality of life end.

In reality, God does things in the wisest way. We are allowed our freedom. God will clean up the mess at the end, in the judgment. The difference in reality is that those people who truly forsake God will be destroyed along with Satan (who has set himself entirely against God).

God maintains control, maintains His love without turning, maintains justice even though it will only be clearly exercised in the judgment, maintains a place appropriate for us His faithful followers in Heaven, maintains wisdom in the best way in how He does things.

There is a whole lot more to the operation of this life than is apparent on the outside.