Posted on 07/08/2025 2:48:33 PM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum
Christians are permitted to hate sin and death without explaining how they fit into some inscrutable providence of Almighty God.
The flooding in Texas that has killed at least 100 people, including dozens of little girls at a Christian camp on the Guadalupe River, is the kind of catastrophe that causes people to question the existence of God. How could a loving God allow this to happen? How can a system of Christian belief in a God of justice and mercy be reconciled with such suffering and devastation and death?
These questions aren’t new, of course. They regularly and understandably resurface at times of immense tragedy and suffering as a natural human reaction to the problem of evil and the pain of death. At such times, Christians in particular are called upon to explain how the existence of an omnipotent, omniscient God is consistent with a world beset by death and suffering.
The answers Christians often give in these circumstances are not always helpful, and are sometimes morally repugnant. During an interview on Monday, for example, Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas was asked why “God doesn’t make sense” in the face of this tragedy. Instead of denying the premise of the question and affirming the orthodox Christian view that suffering and death have been conquered by Christ, Cruz gave an unfortunate answer that nevertheless reflects how many Christians deal with the problem of evil: “We have a good and benevolent God, but God allows things to happen sometimes that defy human explanation, and that’s where we need love and where we need grace.”
This of course is deeply wrong — a feeble attempt to justify the ways of God to man, which fails so spectacularly in the face of the actual catastrophe that it could easily...
(Excerpt) Read more at thefederalist.com ...
That might be true but I’d sure love to have a clip of the “Come to Jesus” meeting those two CNN morons had to endure at the press conference this morning.
This area has been known to flood for hundreds of years.
You ever wonder why such prime country so near Austin has few houses and only camps with low cost buildings?
It’s because it can’t be insured as it floods regularly.
This is not anything new.
Mr. Davison has strong opinions.
God did no choose to put camp cabins in the flats alongside a river that is known for flash floods.
The difference between the idea that God uses suffering for His own good purposes and suffering having a positive role to play seems like a distinction without a difference.
Matthew 5:45
Luke 13:4-5
We have a good and benevolent God, but God allows things to happen sometimes that defy human explanation, and that’s where we need love and where we need grace.
I tend to agree with Cruz.
You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault? For who has resisted His will?” On the contrary, who are you, you foolish person, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, “Why did you make me like this,” will it? Or does the potter not have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one object for honorable use, and another for common use? What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with great patience objects of wrath prepared for destruction? And He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon objects of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory, namely us, whom He also called, not only from among Jews, but also from among Gentiles, Romans 9:20-24
Job didn’t get an explanation from God. God doesn’t have to explain Himself when he is sovereign over all things.
More like it came from Austin.
And “all Creation is in travail...”
You sure, cause if God looked down on US now we’d sure look debauched.
Not just Texas floods but God allows hurricanes and tornados to run amuck. It is His universe so anyone at any time can establish a relationship with Him and pray and ask Him why things are the way they are.
C. S. Lewis has books on such topics which was helpful to me.
Paging the heathens from Ps 2:1.
It is a hundred miles away, not even close in Texas terms.
“God’s plan” for ANYTHING is largely inscrutable to mere humanity, of whom only a very few may begin to sense the wider logic and strategy behind it. I tend to believe that this is but one of a vast multitude of acts of God that are sent, most of which are in reality some kind of test of men’s souls and their ability to respond to really severe trials of their faith and servitude to duty.
Humanity as a whole has been made the tougher and more resilient by repeated events of this kind, with historic lessons learned and reiterated, regarding the fickle nature of the Universe.
Quite simply God does not create natural disasters. God does not cause diseases. God does not magically cure diseases, other than through the God-given talents of doctors, researchers and providers.
God is most definitely interested in how we treat each other and how we treat ourselves.
Of course this goes for unbelievers too, though other than take a fatalistic view of things, I don't know how satisfying an answer they can come up with.
If your standard is the Bible, then your assertions are false, of course. Witness the flood, sent by God, destroying all humans except Noah and his family. Witness God curing diseases like leprosy. Just guessing that your standard is something other than the Bible, however.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.