The Problem of Evil
It is with more than a little trepidation that I even approach the problem of evil. The entire Bible, directly or indirectly, is devoted to the subject, as are all of the world’s major religions. And there are so many types and sources of evil from which to choose! There’s self inflicted evil (“you reap what you sow”), there’s evil that is inflicted upon us by others, and then there is generic “evil” that seems to come along “naturally”. Pain, death, floods, droughts, famines, typhoons, tornadoes, tsunamis, birth defects and diseases (both genetic and acquired), to name a few.
Along the way, I have learned that it is generally unproductive for those currently going through personal pain and suffering to question God’s actions, or, as the case may be, inactions. The inquiry degrades from “How can God allow evil in this hypothetical case?” to “Why me?” There is a barb attached to the inquiry; a bias in the questioning that rejects most valid answers as unacceptable, cold and without compassion, and thus not very “God like”.
But for those seekers/inquirers of God who honestly desire to reconcile the Bible’s description of a holy, compassionate and all-powerful God allowing rampant evil to pervade his creation, let’s open the discussion…
Hiding Behind Our Faith
I had a limited online “conversation” the other day on a blog discussing old earth/universe vs. young earth/universe viewpoints. It didn’t go as I would have expected. For background, I presently believe in an old earth/universe approach to creation, agreeing with the mainstream scientific community in affirming the age of the universe to be roughly 13.7 ± 0.13 billion years. As you might imagine, this creates some theological problems when reading Genesis 1-3, some of which I honestly haven’t worked out (but I’m working on it!). Most posters on the blog in question believe in a young earth/universe, roughly 6,000 years old, give or take. Many of these believe that scripture gives them no choice but to believe in six literal 24 hour days of creation. While this allows for maximum theological consistency, it does this at the expense of estrangement from the scientific community.
Now, if you think the purpose of this post is to criticize my young earth brethren for their position, you’d be mistaken…
A Very Happy Epiphyllum
This post has little to do with the theme of the blog, but I thought you might appreciate this beautiful scene. I photographed this epiphyllum flower in my back yard today. The colors only weakly approximate the vivid iridescence of the bloom. For the curious, here’s a link to the Epiphyllum Society of America, where you can see photos of some of the extant varieties.
Click on the image above to open high resolution version suitable for use as your desktop background – if can tolerate the distraction! Enjoy.
Failure is an Option
Failure is one of those topics that we don’t like to talk about. We would never consider planning for it, whether or not we believe the adage “If you fail to plan, plan to fail.” But failure is part of the human ethos, and understanding how and why we fail is important if we are to learn how not to fail. And how much more should we understand what can bring about the ultimate failure – the failure of a human life?
Most people think of moral failure in terms of explicit actions like lying, stealing, murder and greed, among others. They’ll pick and choose from lists such as the ten commandments, the seven deadly sins and the like. Steer clear of committing evil and your a “good person”. Jesus would likely say “Not so fast!”…
Musings on the Great Reversal, First Pass
Almost before my keyboard cooled down after the last post, I had that uncomfortable feeling of incompleteness. While most lawyers would say that the estate manager of the story was well within his rights to independently negotiate each worker’s wage, I was still left with that uneasy, gnawing feeling.
I had an experience recently that struck home. I’m an electronic engineer by profession, and I was getting pricing for an expensive integrated circuit. I got one price from the web site of the distributor ($670). I called the distributor directly and received a lower price over the phone ($530). I then spoke with my account manager, and she quoted a still lower price ($382). These are no small differences! Certainly they have the right to set whatever pricing structure they want, but I was a little miffed at the inconsistency…
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Thank you for taking the time to visit our site. Come join us in our discussion of the nature, extent and unmatched uniqueness of God's grace, and how it changes everything. Feel free to look around. Of course, we would love to find out what you think as well, so we invite your suggestions, comments and questions!
