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Well in that case everything that happens, no matter how cruel and torturous to the person it's happening to, is God's will and therefore something we should accept. If you want to believe that, that's fine, but you're going to have an awfully hard time convincing anyone of that.

Either God is in control, or He sits in heaven, just wishing there was something He could do about evil.

Some people feel justified in using their own imaginations -- or, better yet, their superior human intellect -- to make Him into something they can feel comfortable with, something "reasonable." After all, 'God is love,' and we all know what love is. So, God must be [insert favorite adjective here]. That's the kind of thinking that leads people to believe something about how "God would never subject good people to eternity in hell, and I'm not a bad person -- I haven't ever maimed or even hurt anyone too badly, let alone murdered or raped anyone -- so, since I'm not so bad, I'm sure a loving God would forgive me and take me to heaven..."

Why, just a week or so ago, I read one FReeper's rant about how her God wouldn't do such-and-such; her God "is a loving God." A loving God would never cause [insert worst tragedy here]!

I can only wonder what such people do with the God who turned Satan's attention to Job ("Have you [Satan] considered My servant Job?" Satan quickly turned Job's life into what most would consider a 'living hell'). How about God who commanded the Israelites to destroy entire cities and all the inhabitants (including women and children)? Or, the God who flooded the entire world and wiped out all of humanity, save for eight people. Oh, of course; that's the God of the Old Testament! Well, guess what... God has not changed. Read the Revelation sometime if you want to see the real destruction yet to come at the hand of the Almighty.

I still think your logic is circular. If there's an evil out there, we're expected to confront it, to act, instead of resignedly sitting back and saying, Well, it's God's will. Our civilization (if I could even use the word) would be in some pretty sad shape if the latter attitude was the prevailing one.

The Bible does weigh in on this matter, by the way. From the book of James:

2:20 But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead? 2:21 Was not Abraham our father justified by works, when he had offered Isaac his son upon the altar? 2:22 Seest thou how faith wrought with his works, and by works was faith made perfect? 2:23 And the scripture was fulfilled which saith, Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness: and he was called the Friend of God.
2:24 Ye see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only.