A. Opening illustration: “Our God who is omnipotent is also weak in that God has imposed limitations on God’s omnipotence to give us the space to have a real autonomy” – Bishop Tutu, “The only answer Christianity has is that God is a sadist” –Blogger, “God had nothing to do with the shootings.” Why did God let this happen?That is the wrong question. Here’s a better one. Why do people still believe in supernatural nonsense? The Bible was written by primitive men approximately 1700 years before the invention of the flush toilet. It is internally inconsistent and does not comport with reality. Yet millions still believe it and many will say their all-powerful god could have stopped the Virginia Tech massacre but did not because he has granted men free will. In other words, God did not want to interfere with the free will of the gun-wielding maniac. But what about the free will of the 32 students who were massacred and what about the free will of their decimated friends and family members? Would a loving and merciful god place the free will of a madman above the free will of all these innocent people? Of course not. So, theologians will once again fall back on the inane “God’s mysterious ways” explanation. And as the bloody bodies are removed from the campus our faith-based president goes on national TV to urge us to fall on our knees and pray to our loving and merciful God. It is absolutely surreal. I was stunned yesterday when I heard President Bush ask a "loving God" to comfort the family and friends of the victims. I wanted to ask him if this was the same "loving God" who had just allowed the massacre of 32 innocent college students. His speech was so surreal it could easily have been part of a
"Twilight Zone Episode!" You have got to be nuttier than the shooter, and more out of touch with reality than he was, if you believe that what happened had anything at all to do with sin, God, or your theology. Maria, do you really "believe if each person claiming to be "Christian" would practice the teachings of scripture, God would move and demonic acts like this and other ungodly acts would be minimized?" I sure hope you're wrong. A God who will only stop violence if people read and practice teachings from 1,000's of years ago sounds terribly petty and vindictive - much worse than the ineffective but kindhearted God described elsewhere in these discussions who can't stop the violence, but weeps with us or provides comfort after the violence has occurred. Then one writer hit it right on when he said that either God is sovereign, or He is not, either He could have stopped this or he couldn’t. You can’t have it both ways.
B. Background to passage: Just wanted to take some time to work through the theology of what took place this week. This is one of the places in scripture where God is potentially accused of injustice and wrongdoing. But it is high time that in our country, we stop using God as a whipping boy every time tragedy strikes, and never thanking Him for 10,000 days of mercy. And at the same time fall back to scripture to answer questions of responsibility and God’s ability, fearlessly affirming a sovereign, all-wise, and absolutely benevolent God. Now, I don’t stand here today with all the answers, but with the book with all the answers we need in my hand. My aim is to put a rock under your feet for the next time that your personal shooter comes into your life and kills and destroys those around you senselessly.
C. Main thought: This is our foundation for handling tragedy biblically.
A. Biblical Affirmations -- What does the Bible say?
1. God is good – Nah 1:7, Ps 100:5, 145:9, Becca’s funeral
2. God is all-wise – Job 11:7, Col 2:3, Rom 8:33,
3. God is completely holy and just – Isa 6:3, Ex 15:11, Deut 32:4,
4. God is purposeful – Jer 29:11, Isa 55:11, 46:10-11, Ps 33:11, Ex 9:16, Eph 1:11, Rom 8:28,
5. God is absolutely in sovereign – Pro 16:4, 9, 33, 115:3, 135:6, Amos 3:6, 2 Sam 12:10, Lam 3:37-38, Matt 10:29; This includes over the will of men. Can’t explain it, but I affirm it.
6. God is inscrutable and mysterious – Pro 30:2-3, Ps 139:6, 40:5, Job 42:3
7. Man is fallen, sinful, and responsible – Rom 5:12, 3:10-12, 14:12, 1:21-24, 2 Cor 5:10, Ecc 11:9, Ezek 18:30, Rev 20:12,
B. Theological Formulations -- How could this God all these things?
1. Talk about the text. The creature has no right to ask of a completely free and sovereign God why He does these things. Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid!
2. Don’t let experience determine theology
3. God never promised a pain-free existence or salvation
4. Sin, Satan, and Self might be the proximate cause, but not the ultimate one – Job. Now that we have said it – that God was in control and did allow the events of Wed afternoon, let’s talk about this God who does what He sees fit all the time, and that sometimes it costs the created beings their lives and welfares. Discuss how a God with this much freedom is offensive to us because of our warped sense of “good” and “fair” and our pride in thinking that God must conform to our ideas of good, love, and fair, no matter from whence they come. And most of us elevate human freedom to a level that trumps all that God wants to do, and make him far less than omnipotent, in fact limited. That’s an oxymoron! The clear teaching of this text is an absolutely free Deity willing to do all that He pleases. That doesn’t set well in the minds of modern democratic certain inalienable rights American Christians. Do not seek a God of your own design. The God of scripture is the highest, greatest, and most infinitely wonderful God that there is, believe in Him even when it is hard!
5. Just because we can’t think of a good reason, does not mean that one doesn’t exist
6. Robbing people of a sovereign God trying to protect Him from responsibility leaves those same people without a sovereign helpful God in the aftermath.
7. Christ invaded our world to bear our pain, His heart is broken, He alone offers strength and consolation
8. God does the greatest works after great tragedy.
C. Christian Response -- What do we do about it?
1. Repentance – Luke 13:1-3
i. Sin – be broken over the sin that clouds our eyes
ii. Pride – the question that we should ask is why we weren’t in front of that gun; justice for our infinite offense against an utterly holy God requires our punishment
iii. Bitterness and anger
iv. Demanding answers – “as if we weren’t going to let Him be God anymore”
v. Assaulting God’s character
vi. Ignoring God
vii. Lack of Worship – of the One Being that demands and deserves all praise
viii. Not receiving what God has for us – Sarah Edwards’ testimony
2. Compassion – Mark 1:41
i. Ministry – be willing to go be Jesus to them, or to others that are hurting
ii. Prayer – pray for these families, pray for those that mock our God
iii. Evangelism – sooner or later people want some answers. They need a rock.
iv. Weeping
3. Reaffirm faith – cling to Jesus
4. Choose timing (anger of bloggers) and avoid self-righteousness or know-it-all attitudes
5. Applies not only to this tragedy, but to natural disasters and to personal tragedy. So the next time you are faced with death, disease, divorce, unfairness, financial needs, and every other need; it is your calling to remember the centrality and sufficiency of Christ and turn to Him, embrace the rob, rest in His strength, go to Him with your pain, He loves you and nothing can separate you from His love!
A. Closing illustration: John Sanders vs. Steve Saint
B. EXALT the glories of an all-sufficient, absolutely sovereign God, who ALWAYS does what is best.
C. Romans 8:35-39 – Hope in Him, Trust in Him, 2 Cor 2:14
