The “Fallen World” Explanation versus The “Mystery of God”

We’re back once again with Mark McIntyre at the blog Attempts at Honesty. Click the title below to read at source.

Allowing God to be Mysterious

Someone recently asked me about how to respond to a man whose family was killed by a drunk driver. The questioner wanted to know how to break through this man’s grief and explain why a loving God would allow this.

From a big-picture standpoint, Christians believe that all bad things happen as a result of the fall of man. We rebelled, wrecked the world and have to live with the results. But this explanation provides little comfort to those who are dealing with tragedy in their lives.

As I have grown older, I have become increasingly comfortable with allowing God to be mysterious. This has relieved me of some of the pressure to provide explanations for particular events.

I believe that Scripture supports me in this. God told Habakkuk:

“For I am doing something in your days that you will not believe when you hear about it” (Habakkuk 1:5)

Through Habakkuk, God announced that he was going to use Babylon to punish Israel for her rebellion. When we read this 2,500 years after the fact, we can lose touch with what went on. Really, really bad things happened to people when they were conquered by Babylon. The fact that God announced it ahead of time does not make this event less tragic for those who were wounded, killed or taken captive.

In a sense, in the quote mentioned above, God is telling Habakkuk that he won’t get his head around what God is going to do and perhaps he shouldn’t even try.

In the same way, when we are speaking with someone who is forced to endure a difficult situation, we can lose sight of the fact that the pain is real and that no explanation will alleviate that pain.

We are doing everyone a disservice when we try to explain God’s motives for allowing a particular event.

In the book Embodied Hope, Kelly Kapic draws from John Swinton to highlight three negative consequences of attempting to explain why God allows an event.

1. The explanation often ends up justifying or rationalizing evil. By doing so they end up calling evil or suffering “good.”
2. The explanation often silences the voice of the sufferer. The danger is that we can “smother the wounded with useless and often inaccurate explanations.”
3. Explanations as to why the evil has occurred “can actually become evil in themselves, promoting further suffering rather than providing genuine comfort.”

So, when a friend, family member or church associate is struggling to deal with a difficult situation, understand that it is not your job to explain it. By attempting an explanation, the most likely outcome is that you will misrepresent God and hurt the person you are attempting to help.

When It Doesn’t Make Sense

In theory at least, collecting and preparing these C201 pieces constitutes my own personal devotional and Bible study time; but on the days when some devos have been pre-scheduled I still need something just for that day. My own default devotions come from DailyEncouragement.net, in fact I try to make that the first website I click on when the computer is warmed up.

Today’s thoughts appeared this week at the site in a longer version. Click the title below if you want to read it there.

“When It Just Doesn’t Make Sense”

Listen to this message on your audio player.

“Godly men buried Stephen and mourned deeply for him” (Acts 8:2).

“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:28).

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God” (2 Corinthians 1:3,4).

…Years ago Dr. James Dobson wrote a book titled, “When God Doesn’t Make Sense”. That’s sort of a titillating title, but for many of us it does express well our own experience in the mysteries of God’s providence.

Sometimes circumstances are very personal for our family and close friends. Virtually all of our readers can scroll back through their memory and recall such a time. My first exposure was as a child when one of my cousin’s was in an accident and his wife died. I so poignantly recall my grandfather wailing. But there have been many “It Just Doesn’t Make Sense” experiences since then and of course in regard to our pastoral and chaplaincy ministry we console frequently those going through various traumatic situations when it just doesn’t make sense.

The most recent national news that is senseless is the mass murder of six women and three men during a prayer meeting in Charleston, South Carolina [Wednesday] night. The gunman came in and sat down among the congregational members. Those of us who attend church are always welcoming to a visitor, but we would never expect that visitor to draw a gun and randomly shoot those who are there to worship Jesus, the Prince of Peace.

People, at any given time, are experiencing a heartache of some type that just doesn’t make sense. Due to the size of our planet many never make the news or at most only the local news. I’m so glad there’s a newsline to heaven not just at the instant the news takes place but even before we are to experience it.

For many, events like this either becomes a crisis of faith (for believers) or an excuse not to believe (for unbelievers).

Consider Stephen who stood boldly for Christ and was stoned. Afterwards, “Godly men buried Stephen and mourned deeply for him” (Acts 8:2). Have you ever really pondered this verse? Surely the emotions were no less intense for them than they are for us in our losses. To “mourn deeply” has the sense of great lamentation. The literal Greek meaning is “to beat the breast in grief”.  Did they “understand” any better than we do? Surely they did not.

Consider John the Baptist.  He was specially called to serve God from his very conception. He had prepared the way for and even baptized Jesus.  He had taken a bold stand for truth and righteousness before an ungodly king and was beheaded as a result.  Consider his disciples. They had the grisly chore of taking his body and burying it.  What were they thinking?  What a great test of faith they endured. Surely, like us, they wondered, “Why did God allow this to happen?”

Above all, consider the Lord Jesus Christ, who endured such opposition from sinful men and murdered on our behalf.

Some of you have experienced great loss in your life.  I myself have had some deep hurts and disappointments in life that I still simply don’t understand. The life of faith is tested, sometimes greatly.  Jesus forthrightly told us, “in the world you will have tribulation” although we are generally surprised when we do experience tribulation!

But at times of tribulation like this, faith is also demonstrated in such a powerful way. I saw a news report concerning the first Sunday the church in Reading gathered after the accident that killed their pastor’s wife and seriously injured their pastor. Already some amazing things are happening in the aftermath of this tragedy, although perhaps not reported beyond our area as the “newsworthiness” of the event passes.

Today, may those of you impacted by situations that “make no sense” find great peace in these words from the apostle Paul, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God” (2 Corinthians 1:3,4).  He is indeed “the God of all comfort.”

Finally let us again recall the great statement of assurance many of us have memorized in Romans 8:28: “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose.” In some cases we’ll just have to wait for the other side to see how it works for the good. Through it all, let us stay faithful and have a rich assurance of God’s steadfast love!

Stephen & Brooksyne Weber

 

Timothy Keller on Joy

This 5-minute clip from the pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City, Timothy Keller, is part of an online promotion for a series of CDs produced by Oasis Audio — the books on CD people — who have recently discovered the wealth of sermon audio material out there.  This excerpt is from “When Life Isn’t Perfect” which features full sermons by Timothy J. Keller, John Ortberg, Mark Mitchell, and Mark Buchanan