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03/06/2002 Entry: "Why?"

"If God loves me so much, how can he let all this happen to me?" It wasn't the first time I've been asked and I'm sure it won't be the last. Behind the question are many unspoken assumptions, the most compelling of which concerns the sovereignty of God. "God is in control, therefore whatever happens to me must have been caused by God," about sums it up. It's the same line of thinking that leads to all those "what have I done to deserve this?" questions.

But I believe with all my heart that God does not single out some for punishment whilst leaving others untouched. Yes, God is in control - but he will not act against his own nature, by which he has given freedom to men & women to act even in ways which harmful to themselves and others. Yes, sin results in suffering - but that's a long way from accepting that one persons sufferings are a direct result of their own sin. No such simple causal relation exists, as the New Testament makes clear.

What we can say with certainty is that suffering is never God's desire for us. His plan and purpose is always healing and restoration - salvation - and it is this purpose that reveals his love. Our understanding of God comes from his self-disclosure in Jesus, who declared his mission to be "to bring good news to the poor, sight to the blind, freedom to captives and to announce the year of the Lord's favour" and who entered our experience so completely that he suffers and dies for us so that we can enter the fulness of his life. That's love!