The Question of Evil, again…
Last Sunday, a registered sex offender confessed to killing 3-year-old Sarah Lunde, saying he got into an argument with her and choked her to death in her home. He then dumped her body in a fish pond. Oh, yeah, he also dated Sarah’s mom.
As I read the article on FOXNews.com, I was struggling with many emotions and I began to pray. I prayed for David Onstoot, the 36 year-old previously convicted rapist and now confessed killer, that God would bring him the gift of repentance and save his soul from hell, and that God would be publicly glorified by that conversion. I prayed for Sarah's family. I prayed for the members of Sarah's congregation at the First Apostolic Church in Ruskin, Florida. And I thanked God for that little girl's death. I thanked God for taking her to be with Him. Don't get me wrong, I don't go around praying that God will kill people, but when the Sovereign Lord of the universe decides to end the mere breath of a life of one of His children in this world to bring them to eternal glory with Him in heaven, be absolutely certain that I rejoice.
From the small amount of evidence I've gathered, Sarah was a Christian, the only one in her house, a house which she ran away from to her church on several occasions. At her church she found love, people that cared for her and something that made this young girl want to give up her time off from school to walk around town, knock on people's doors and hand out Bibles. What do you think that was? Of course I can't be certain, and I strongly suspect it was the saving love of Jesus Christ.
And so the question will come up again, as it always does, and unfortunately from so many people in the church: "Why do bad things happen to good people?" This is a theologically inaccurate question. It is built on the premise that there is such a thing as a good person. The right question would be, "Why do good things happen to anyone?"
A biblically accurate view of the world recognizes that all people - I mean all, even 13 year old girls, even 13 month old girls, even a little baby girl that just took its 13th breath - are sinners, vessels of God's wrath and worthy of destruction. Yes, even the newborn is lumped in with the whole sloppy mess of the rest of us sinners. It's called Federalism, it's the doctrine that says one man can be the perfect legal representative for all others, and it is absolutely necessary if you are to be saved from your sin. Because in the same way Adam is our federal representative in sin, making all humanity guilty in God's legal, judicial eyes, so also is Christ our federal representative in righteousness making all of God's elect perfectly pure and worthy of love. You can't have one without the other.
People will also ask the question, "Why did God let such a terrible thing happened to this young girl if she was a Christian and he is a God of love? Why did God let her die?” These questions also are built on a premise of theological ignorance. Forgive me if I am sounding harsh right now, but this is a question that the church should not need to answer to its own flock because we should know the answer already. We need to know the doctrine of suffering, and recognize that Christ didn't die on the cross to give us a happy-go-lucky carefree life in this world. He died to give us a blissful eternity after this life, specifically after we die in this life.
This life is a breath. In Sarah's 13 years she received the most important gift a human being could ever receive, adoption into the family of God. Becoming a Christian doesn’t mean you get a free ticket to die peacefully in your sleep, surrounded by your family at the ripe old age of 86, without ever suffering from gout, or Alzheimer’s or having been beaten or raped. It means that whatever God does to you in this life is for your discipline and your good, not your punishment.
To be honest, I envy Sarah. She is with Jesus, and I want to be with Jesus. She will never suffer a single pain, not even a splinter in her finger, forever. Brothers and sisters, we need to have an eternal view. Otherwise, when God takes our wife or husband or child or parent, we will not have a right attitude of heart, we will not fall on our knees and worship Him as he deserves, but will shake our puny fist at the Sovereign God of the universe, and incur His wrath.
As I read the article on FOXNews.com, I was struggling with many emotions and I began to pray. I prayed for David Onstoot, the 36 year-old previously convicted rapist and now confessed killer, that God would bring him the gift of repentance and save his soul from hell, and that God would be publicly glorified by that conversion. I prayed for Sarah's family. I prayed for the members of Sarah's congregation at the First Apostolic Church in Ruskin, Florida. And I thanked God for that little girl's death. I thanked God for taking her to be with Him. Don't get me wrong, I don't go around praying that God will kill people, but when the Sovereign Lord of the universe decides to end the mere breath of a life of one of His children in this world to bring them to eternal glory with Him in heaven, be absolutely certain that I rejoice.
From the small amount of evidence I've gathered, Sarah was a Christian, the only one in her house, a house which she ran away from to her church on several occasions. At her church she found love, people that cared for her and something that made this young girl want to give up her time off from school to walk around town, knock on people's doors and hand out Bibles. What do you think that was? Of course I can't be certain, and I strongly suspect it was the saving love of Jesus Christ.
And so the question will come up again, as it always does, and unfortunately from so many people in the church: "Why do bad things happen to good people?" This is a theologically inaccurate question. It is built on the premise that there is such a thing as a good person. The right question would be, "Why do good things happen to anyone?"
A biblically accurate view of the world recognizes that all people - I mean all, even 13 year old girls, even 13 month old girls, even a little baby girl that just took its 13th breath - are sinners, vessels of God's wrath and worthy of destruction. Yes, even the newborn is lumped in with the whole sloppy mess of the rest of us sinners. It's called Federalism, it's the doctrine that says one man can be the perfect legal representative for all others, and it is absolutely necessary if you are to be saved from your sin. Because in the same way Adam is our federal representative in sin, making all humanity guilty in God's legal, judicial eyes, so also is Christ our federal representative in righteousness making all of God's elect perfectly pure and worthy of love. You can't have one without the other.
People will also ask the question, "Why did God let such a terrible thing happened to this young girl if she was a Christian and he is a God of love? Why did God let her die?” These questions also are built on a premise of theological ignorance. Forgive me if I am sounding harsh right now, but this is a question that the church should not need to answer to its own flock because we should know the answer already. We need to know the doctrine of suffering, and recognize that Christ didn't die on the cross to give us a happy-go-lucky carefree life in this world. He died to give us a blissful eternity after this life, specifically after we die in this life.
This life is a breath. In Sarah's 13 years she received the most important gift a human being could ever receive, adoption into the family of God. Becoming a Christian doesn’t mean you get a free ticket to die peacefully in your sleep, surrounded by your family at the ripe old age of 86, without ever suffering from gout, or Alzheimer’s or having been beaten or raped. It means that whatever God does to you in this life is for your discipline and your good, not your punishment.
To be honest, I envy Sarah. She is with Jesus, and I want to be with Jesus. She will never suffer a single pain, not even a splinter in her finger, forever. Brothers and sisters, we need to have an eternal view. Otherwise, when God takes our wife or husband or child or parent, we will not have a right attitude of heart, we will not fall on our knees and worship Him as he deserves, but will shake our puny fist at the Sovereign God of the universe, and incur His wrath.
posted by Charismatic Puritan | 4/26/2005 08:44:00 PM
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