EVIL AND GOD’S GRACE

• First, a comment about the response of the Amish to the mass murder of their children.  The Amish reached out to the Roberts family in love, bringing comfort to his wife and three children, even providing them with a fund through the money given to the families of the Amish children.  They forgave Roberts and evidenced no bitterness toward his wife.  It is difficult to imagine a more powerful example of the love of Jesus Christ than that offered by the Amish people of Lancaster County.  It is supernatural and stands in such stark contrast to everything we see in our culture, which is filled with revenge, bitterness and dysfunction.  When one looks at the Beatitudes in Matthew 5, the Amish manifested those eight character traits in how they responded to this evil.  They were indeed “the light” and the “salt” Jesus talked about at the end of the Beatitudes.  It was truly one of the most remarkable things I have seen in my entire life.  Horror and inexplicable evil became an opportunity for love and grace!

• Second, does our theology as Christians have an answer to where God was in this horror?  There is no easy answer to this question.  As Christians, we shun statements such as “God caused this event,” and instead choose verbs such as “God permitted or allowed this to happen.”  This seems wise because without question, God had the power and authority to stop Roberts from his rampage, but He chose not to do so.  To provide a precise answer as to why God chose not to intervene is impossible.  But, we do know this:  Ultimately, suffering and evil are resolved in Jesus Christ.  Let me explain.

• God is present with His people when there is suffering or evil perpetrated upon them.  Hebrews 4:15 and Hebrews 2:18 both state that Jesus was in all ways like us [as a human], yet without sin.  He also says in the Great Commission in Matthew 28 that He is with us unto the end of the age.  God’s attributes of omniscience and omnipresence both establish the presence of God, even when there is evil.  He is not an absentee landlord.  He intervenes and He is present in His world, especially with His people.

• God identifies with His people when there is suffering and evil.  From Isaiah 52:13 through 53:12, we learn that Jesus identifies with His people physically (see 52:14 and 53:7), emotionally (see 53:3 and 10), and psychologically (see 53:3, 6).  In addition, Jesus knew loneliness and abandonment unlike any other human being.  He knew the separation from His father and the abandonment by His disciples.  There is an old hymn of the church, “No one understands like Jesus.”  This is so true!  There is no other world religion that has God identifying with His people when they suffer or are the victims of evil.

• God resolves evil and suffering in Jesus Christ.  According to Isaiah 53:9, Jesus received willingly the evil, guilt and sin of the world as He was dying on the cross.  In addition, 53:4-6 and 8 explain that God the Father punished Jesus because of that evil, guilt and sin.  Finally, the mysterious exchange of redemption occurred at Calvary.  God put our sin, guilt and evil on Jesus, so that He could then place His righteousness on us through faith.  This is the heart of the gospel:  Our sin is placed on Jesus and His righteousness is placed on us—all by faith (see 53:11-12, 8).  In other words, God became the victim of monstrous evil (the cross) in order to eliminate evil from this world.  That is how God is doing it!  He resolves the problem of evil and suffering in Jesus Christ!  This profound truth does not answer all our questions when evil or suffering hit, but this profound truth does give us the ultimate answer.  In Jesus, evil and suffering are resolved, and when He returns, both will be forever abolished from this planet and the new heavens and new earth will know no evil or suffering—all because of Jesus.  Truly, no one understands like Jesus. 

See “Breakpoint” (11 October 2006) and Gene Edward Veith, Tabletalk (June 2006), pp. 6263.