GIVE GOD A BREAK!
Anybody who has read this blog for any length of time or have perused my profile will no doubt know that I have a devout faith in the God of the Bible. I believe that God is who, AND what, the Bible clearly proclaims Him to be. However, there are time when God cannot get an even break.
Whenever something really terrible happens that results in loss of life, particularly innocent life, like the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School; the Aurora, Colorado Movie Theater Shooting; The Fort Hood shooting, etc; people are quick to hurl accusations against God, accusing Him of all manner of things or complaining that He is falling down on the job or that He simply does not care. They are in effect blaming Him for the incident as if He was the one who perpetrated these acts.
At the risk of appearing to be arrogant, I propose to offer some information in God's defense. I assure you that God is perfectly capable of defending Himself and does not need anyone, particularly me, to defend Him. Furthermore, God most certainly HAS NOT specifically commissioned me to speak on His behalf. I do so of my own volition.
When God created humans, He created them with free will. The Bible teaches us that God desires to have a loving relationship with all persons. God desires that we, by the free exercise of our free will, choose to respond to His infinite love for us by loving Him in return.
God took a great risk when He endowed all of us with free will. He created the possibility that some of us would exercise our free will and respond favorably to His love and out of appreciation for that love, would become obedient to Him and conduct ourselves as He would like us to do.
The other possibility was that others would exercise their free will and completely reject Him and the love that He so freely offers and would conduct themselves as they saw fit, often contrary to how God would prefer that they do.
Here's the question "If our will to act is truly free AND if every time we sought to exercise that will by doing something that was harmful to ourselves or others AND before we could consummate that act God stepped in and stopped us, is our will really free?
I respectfully submit that under these circumstances it is not.
If you decide, for whatever reason, to go out and drink yourself into a stupor and then you decide to get behind the steering wheel of your car and you crash into another car killing an entire family, Who killed that family, you or God?
If somebody else decides, for whatever reason, to get a rifle and a bunch of loaded magazines and walk into a shopping mall and then open fire, killing a large number of people, Who killed those people, that "somebody else" or God?
God does not take pleasure in the suffering of anyone, whether they be "good" or "bad." The reason why there is suffering in the world is a little three-letter word..."SIN." Sin came into the world when Adam and Eve chose to disobey God and partake of the forbidden fruit.
Again, was it God who sinned or was it Adam and Eve who, through the exercise of their own free will, who sinned?
God cannot commit evil! Evil runs completely contrary to God's nature. Holding God responsible for the actions of others, no matter how horrific those acts may be, is grossly unfair and unjust to God.
So I respectfully submit that the blame for these awful acts rests with those people who freely chose, by an act of their free will, to commit them.
I strongly urge you to really get to know the God of the Bible. He is truly good!
You will spend eternity somewhere. Please choose to spend it with God and not eternally separated from Him. Please ask me if you want to know how you can make that choice. Come worship with us at the Manchester church of Christ this Sunday!
God bless all of you!
Just as God is in this world, so is Satan. We blame the wrong person for evil.
ReplyDeleteWell put brother!
ReplyDeleteModern Christianity too quickly dismisses the idea that God could possibly be the architect of negativity, but I think we see from scriptures that that's very much not the case. And even if the All Mighty's hand is not the driving force, the action of non-involvement MUST be considered active involvement, otherwise He would not be All Mighty, and He would not be the One In Control. We cannot just label the bad things in life as "Not of God", because that would be like the potter removing his hands from his work while the wheel is still spinning. That is a far greater injustice than false accusation.
ReplyDeleteNow I have to ask: What if God DID cause the calamaties mentioned? What damage is done to His nature if he actively hardened the heart of those shooters, as he did the Pharoah of the exodus? What detriment is done to his character if his hand stirred up the winds of Katrina, as he stirred the agression of the nations against Israel? Does he become less good? Is his mercy then dissolved? If you believe what the scriptures say, that God is good, the only possible answer is, "No!"
The answer to the question of "Why?" needs to become less about defending The Judge with human morality, and correctly assigning blame, and more about understanding that regardless of what happened God has been and will always be in control. I can't claim to understand the reasons behind a fraction of the bad that happens, but if we don't seize the opportuntiy provided by it to run to The Architect of All and seek council, then there's no hope in understanding any part of it.