Tag: evil

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The Uncultured Saints

Ep. 3: A Horse Named Sin

When we change the clear words and teachings of Scripture to make things more palatable for sinners, the meanings change too. We actually begin to believe we can say things better and more logically than God’s Word. Applied to the doctrine of original sin, the way we talk about sin affects the way we talk about God. If God wants things to be this corrupted, sinful way and does nothing about it He’s an evil god. But if He wants it to be better, and doesn’t want to just burn it all down and start over, He works through brokenness and sin to bring about good for us.

 

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Categories
As Lutheran As It Gets

14: The Hidden God with Dr. Robert Kolb

In another attempt to try your patience, Pr. Riley and Gillespie discuss the article before actually discussing the article. In our Upside Down, this makes complete sense. Some might call it inductive, others probably chaotic. If you’re so inclined, we’d suggest reading the excerpt first as a sort of secret decoder ring.

Our Text: Bound Choice, Election, And Wittenberg Theological Method: From Martin Luther To The Formula Of Concord (Lutheran Quarterly Books), Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2005.

“Luther took the hidden God seriously for a number of reasons. Without the admission that there is more to God than meets either eye or ear, God could be tamed, measured, managed within the realm of the human ability and possibility to judge. From the human perspective God remains God because human creatures are creatures as well as sinners, and it is not possible for the product of God’s creative words to master knowledge of the Creator.

“…In the Heidelberg Disputation Luther had focused first on the blank wall created by the impossibility of the human creature’s, to say nothing of sinner’s, conceptualizing of God, just to prove that with fallen eyes no one can see God. With fallen human ears no one can return to the Edenic hearing of his Word. Then Luther focused very sharply on God in his revelation of himself (John 1:18): no one has seen God, but Jesus of Nazareth, God in the flesh, has made him known: a God with holes in his hands, feet, and side; the God who has come near to humankind, into the midst of its twisted and ruined existence” – Robert Kolb, Bound Choice, pg 36.

Rev. Dr. Robert A. Kolb Biography

Extraneous References: 

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Categories
Higher History

Concord #19: Augsburg Confession (The Cause of Sin)

The cause of sin Christians

Article 19: The Cause of Sin

The philosopher Aristotle didn’t have a Bible, but by reason he concluded there was a god of some sort. He reasoned that everything has a cause, and those causes also had a cause. Thus, there must be a First Cause, or else you would have an infinite string of causes going back forever with nothing causing any of them to be. The logic also gets applied to finding the cause of sin.

 

The Problem of Evil

As attractive as his argument may be for trying to show that the God of Scriptures exists, there are several problems that arise when you try to approach God by way of reason and philosophy. One of the most difficult is: if God is the cause of everything, then that means He is also the cause of sin. The history of theology is full of people trying to solve this problem. How can God be good when evil exists?

The unfortunate answers to this question that philosophy supplies are either that God is not good, and created evil as well as good, or that He perhaps inadvertently introduced some sort of fatal flaw into His good creation. In either case, He doesn’t make for a very good God.

But God is not a philosopher. He specialized in foolishness. And Scripture is very often contrary to our reason. In answer to the question of evil, that is, to the cause of sin, we confess very simply:

Of the Cause of Sin they teach that, although God does create and preserve nature, yet the cause of sin is the will of the wicked, that is, of the devil and ungodly men; which will, unaided of God, turns itself from God, as Christ says John 8:44: When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own. (Augsburg Confession XIX)

 

The Cause of Good

God causes only good. The cause of evil, the cause of sin, is the devil. This is not something that you can arrive at by rational investigation. It must be revealed. Jesus testifies to the origins of sin when He teaches about the devil. Here’s the whole verse in another translation:

You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies. (John 8:44 ESV)

 

The Solution for Evil

But here’s the rub. Since God causes only good, even the devil’s and our own introduction of evil and sin into the world cannot undo God’s good cause. By sending His Son Jesus to bear our sin, God took the devil’s most evil act—the murder of Truth incarnate, the Son of God—and caused the world’s greatest good. And so, with St. Paul, “we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose,” (Romans 8:28 ESV).

You can read the Book of Concord at http://www.bookofconcord.org

 

“Concord” is a weekly study of the Lutheran Confessions, where we will take up a topic from the Book of Concord and reflect on what we believe, teach, and confess in the Lutheran Church. The purpose of this series is to deepen readers’ knowledge and appreciation for the confessions of the Lutheran Church, and to unite them “with one heart” to confess the teachings of Holy Scripture.

Rev. Jacob Ehrhard is pastor of Trinity Lutheran Church in New Haven, MO.

Categories
Christ on Campus

Christianity’s Answer to the Problem of Evil

Article PDF | Bible Study PDF | Leader’s Guide PDF

Rev. Ian Pacey

Introduction
Of all the questions Christians encounter as challenges to our fundamental beliefs, the problem of evil is without a doubt one of the most popular. Why do we suffer? Why do terrible things happen to my family and friends? Why do horrors like 9/11 or Auschwitz take place? Why are “natural” disasters allowed to bring forth death and destruction? If there is a God, why do these things happen?

The Question or “Problem” of Evil
Formally, the question or the problem of evil (the typical term) goes something like this: Christians, on the basis of Scripture, believe God is omniscient (all knowing), omnipotent (all powerful), and omnibenevolent (all good). If God is omnipotent, He can do all things. If God is omniscient, He knows all things. If God is omnibenevolent, He desires to prevent all things that would frustrate or corrupt good. In other words, He would eliminate the very possibility of evil.

Let’s put this together: If God is who the Christians say He is, evil should not exist. Nevertheless, evil does exist. Therefore, as the argument goes, the God of Christianity does not. If there is any “deity” out there, because evil exists, he is not all powerful, or he does not know, or he does not care. In any case, He is not god as Christianity declares and He is not worthy of our concern.

Answer the Question!
As we begin, it is necessary to remember some ground rules. Too often, when we Christians are faced with this question and others like it, we often respond with nothing more than a challenge of whether those asking the question can even know good from evil. If the questioners cannot know good from evil, then they are in no position to ask the question. It is true that, without objective standards, the knowledge of good and evil is an utter impossibility. Nonetheless, this is not an acceptable answer. In fact, it is not an answer at all. What we need here is a real, truthful response to the problem of evil.

Defining Good and Evil
For Christians, the first part of our response is establishing basic, Biblical definitions. The claim we are countering is: The Christian view of God and evil cannot coexist. For this reason, we must first define what we mean by God and evil. Establishing the Christian view of God is fairly simple. For brevity’s sake, let’s go with something like the “supreme being.” When it comes to evil, things are a bit trickier. This is because evil is all too often identified as anything that causes pain. When it comes to evil, Christians do not narrowly define evil as what causes pain, but as any thought, word, and/or deed that is not in accord with God’s moral will.

Philosophical and Existential Problem of Evil
With God and evil defined, an answer can now be worked out. At the core, there are three basic points the Christian must make: 1. God is not the author of evil. He cannot go against His own will; 2. Evil exists because of human sin, or human desire to reject God’s will; and 3. The existence of evil does not necessarily preclude the existence of God. Man, not God, is responsible for evil. God could or does have reasons for allowing evil to happen.

Again, the charge skeptics make here is that it isn’t logical for God and evil to coexist. These three factors, taken as a whole, dismiss the logical problem of evil. The problem we now have is many who struggle with evil are not addressing it logically. Instead, they are working on the emotional or existential problem of evil. People in this situation see evil in the world and their gut level response is: “This cannot be right!”

The True Answer to Evil: Jesus
For those struggling for an answer at the gut level, the one answer, the best answer the Christian has to offer, is Jesus! Jesus as revealed in His life, His death, His resurrection, and His eternal promises. Jesus as summarized by what we call the Gospel. It may sound trite. It may sound cliché. But, overuse and abuse notwithstanding, Jesus is the best answer; He is the ultimate answer to our struggle with evil.

With the coming of Jesus in the flesh, what we have is nothing less than God coming into our world and declaring His war against sin, death, and the devil; against all evil. Follow this up with our Lord’s life, death, and His resurrection, by which He paid the debt for sin, and the reality is an actual, true overcoming of evil in this world and in the world to come. Does this mean evil will cease to exist in this life? No, it is not quite that simple. Scripture is clear on that point. What we learn in Christ is the fact that God is not indifferent to our troubles. By becoming man, Jesus has entered into our suffering, and in His death and resurrection, He has removed both the power and the problem of evil forever.

Rev. Ian Pacey is an LCMS Campus Chaplain at the University of Arizona. He can be reached at revpacey@yahoo.com