I recently heard Miroslav Volf say in an interview that the atheist/skeptic/doubter who rails against God because of the problem of suffering and evil in the world may actually be closer to God than some Christians.
Is it possible that the atheist/skeptic/doubter is taking the claim about God being good and loving more seriously than Christians who never challenge or question God, but instead sit around singing “God is so good to me” while the world around them goes up in flames?
Telling Stories, Asking Questions, Learning Lessons
Wade,
Excellent post.
I believe that is so true.
We have to ask the questions.
The church has got to be real with ourselves and others about God. We are to make a differnce in the new millenium we have God to deal with serious issues of our faith and who God is? We have to ask the questions that matter: If God is so loving how could he sit in heaven and watch children dying with AIDS and Cancer. If God is so loving and merciful how could sit back and allow a woman to be raped. Is God loving her to allow that to happen? Is he not all powerful? If God is the creator of life and we are fearfully and wonderfully made why would God make a baby with birth defects? Why would a loving God make a baby a conjoined twin, or no arms, legs, blind, retarted? Would a loving God do that? If so, what does that say about His love? Is God still good? Can we sing that song knowing what is going on in the world today?
I believe we as Chrisitans have painted a perfect picture of life and Christianity, in a world that is suffering. Do we now seem out of touch with the real world? Do we send the message to the world that once you become a Christian you don’t have problems?(Joel Osteen and other televangelists). I believe if the Church is to make a difference we have to be real and ask the questions that really matter, no matter how fearful the questions and answers may be.
Is this for real? I understand why you are asking the original questions, but this is God/Bible 101 stuff here.
As far as an answer to your original question: NO, they are not closer. A person close to God, as defined in the Bible, is someone who has been washed clean by the blood of Jesus. It has nothing to do with intellectual ability, curiosity, skepticism, mystical beliefs, or anything else. They can get all the facts right, and appear to be David and Jeremiah all rolled into one, as far as speech goes, but cannot be close to God without the blood of Jesus.
Preacherman: Why do we “HAVE” to ask those questions? I do understand that those are consequences of living in a fallen world that is under a curse, and that they are the results of abandoning knowledge of God, and choosing to worship other things (Romans ch. 1, etc..). I see no reason to ask those questions until an entire host of other things have been addressed. We can sit around and play theologian and philosopher all day long, but it won’t bring the first person to repentance and saving knowledge of Jesus. I think those questions are best reserved for a person’s prayer life and private study. David didn’t ask these questions in the public square, but in his prayers and psalms, and the questions are somewhat rhetorical at that. You speak as if we need to ask the questions to arrive at the answer. We have the answer, and that is the whole point!
Let’s stop the “navel=gazing” and start preaching the whole Word of God. Enough of the questions, start giving the answers!!!
Kerry,
“Let?s stop the “navel=gazing” and start preaching the whole Word of God. Enough of the questions, start giving the answers!!! ”
This comment sounds sooo condescending and is naive at best when understanding the role of theological reflection in being a people of faith.
If I were to assume the worst about you, I’d think that you’ve done some “navel-gazing” yourself in the past, but now you have everything figured out and are simply impatient with the rest of us who have yet to arrive. I’d also assume that you think that there is only one way to understand life with God, and that this would be born from having very little understanding of the history of the church, because if you did you would know that there have always been people who think differently, ask questions and remain orthodox.
But I don’t know you. So I’ll assume, that this post caught you on a bad day, and that you really do understand that every sentance you wrote with such authority about is born out “navel-gazing” and that someone simply can not follow christ without asking these kinds of questions, in private and public.
I hope my best assumption is not right. If it is, I hope you understand that people who write on blogs, using the jargon you use, more often than not compelete arrogant, borderline delusional and condescending. With the crazy twist that it’s for Jesus and that makes it somehow ok.
Doesn’t your last post about God’s hypernymity indicate that focusing exclusively on the theological questions in this life is a dead end? We need to keep exploring the issues, but if either the theological or the practical sides of spirituality dominate, we separate ourselves from either the work we’re called to or the God who’s calling us, respectively. Just my two cents. Thanks for finding this stuff to throw out there!
A good post, Wade. It makes me think that the man or woman singing, “God is so good to me” is often some sort of Christian version of Jeremiah, someone who knows something of hell on earth, but who also sings about the steadfast love of the Lord. And that person, when singing those words from the heart, is closer to God than both of the others.
Alot of time we don’t have the answers and the answer aren’t so simple as we might think.
I am “arrogant, borderline delusional, and condescending” because I post that we already know the answer to the question, “Is God Good?”?!?!?! If that makes me delusional, I’ll take it. What I call delusional is having the entire Word of God right there in your hands, and wasting time with questions that are ALREADY answered right there. I did not speak with “authority”, either, but with the knowledge of what is contained in God’s Word. I can READ, and I can UNDERSTAND, and it is pretty simple. If standing up for the authority of God’s Word gives you reason to ridicule me, then have at it.
“..someone simply cannot follow Christ without asking these kinds of questions, in private and public.” I’m sorry, but where in the Bible does it say that someone has to question the “goodness” of God in order to follow Jesus? I’m not saying someone can’t question it, but you say that someone “CANNOT” follow Jesus without asking that question. That is absolutely false. If you think being amateur theologians is a prerequisite to following Christ, then you don’t understand the gospel as I do. They had, and have, a word for what you have said: Gnosticism. It is more and more evident that this heresy is creeping into the churches of Christ, and you do nothing but confirm it for me.
You assume too much, as you admit with your own language. I respond that questioning God’s goodness just isn’t beneficial, and does not bring someone closer to God than those who don’t question, and you find reason to assault my entire spritual life. I said NOTHING about the spiritual life of those who question God’s goodness, but you spend three paragraphs slamming me for saying that God is Good!
I am not some ignoramus who never thinks about these things, or never ponders theological matters. You like to think that those of us on the other side of the aisle are just low IQ dolts who never ask a question, never think about what we believe, and all fall in lockstep with each other. Since you didn’t understand my first post, I’ll say it a little more simply: These questions, such as “Is God Good?”, are best reserved for private prayer and reflection. Maybe that is the way that Wade intended, and Preacherman intended, but it sure didn’t come across that way. The original blog entry, and Preacherman’s post, seem to indicate that the questions are asked without knowing the answers. When the answer is as simple as “Yes, God is good.”, it is not a matter of who is smarter, but “WHAT DO YOU BELIEVE?”.
Well–we’ve got ourselves a conversation going don’t we?
I don’t have much to add except to remind Kerry and others that this is not a “Church of Christ” blog. Riddle is not writing from the perspective of Churches of Christ and there are a number of other readers out there who are not coming from that background. So if we’re going to make generalizations, let’s make them as general as possible.:-)
Seriously, I hope these discussions, issues, and questions transcend the borders of my particular tribe, which just happens to be Church of Christ.
It’s hard to imagine someone who is doubtful of God or even doesn’t believe in God actually being closer to Him than a Christian. However, I think I know what Volf may be thinking.
I sometimes try to parallel Christian faith with a child’s relationship with his or her parents. As a child, I loved my parents, I ran to them with scraped knees and I wanted them near when I afraid or sick. In good times, my parents helped create my happiest childhood moments. However, there were times I was angry with them: when they would send me to my room, punish me for running into the street and so on. Of course, they were only doing those things for my own good, whether I agreed with their actions or not.
But still, there were times when I’d suffer from actions they didn’t cause, and there may have been times I became angry or doubtful of them in those incidences. For example, they offered me a lot of guidance when I was teenager, but where were they when I did some stupid, embarrassing things? Couldn’t they have stopped me? (That’s debatable.) And what about the difficult situations I’d find myself in that weren’t even the result of bad decisions on my part? Couldn’t they have protected me or warned me? The point is, my parents knew I had to make my own decisions and learn from life experiences, but they were always there for me when I messed up or when things got tough.
I’m thinking our relationship with God is pretty similar. He lets bad things happen, and like children, we may become doubtful or upset. We may become downright angry or even skeptical of a God who would not do something to stop war, hatred, poverty, violence. When someone calmly sits by amidst these evils always singing “God Is So Good to Me,” maybe they should consider whether they’ve become like little children (Matthew 18:3).
Interesting thoughts.
I think we have a very me central thought process when it comes to God these days. Both questions seem born out of this me focus. Either God is good to me because I feel like things are good to me or God doesn?t exist because God hasn?t been good to me or isn?t being good to my next door neighbor.
I don?t see that much difference in the two views. Each looks from its place in the world and says what they say about God based on how the world looks from their street.
Are both a simplistic caricature of God that don?t come close to the heart of His true identity? I guess I will continue to ponder and read.
Go to youtube.com and watch the colbert report interview with Richard Dawkins. It might inject some humor into this conversation. It is more on the existence of God than the problem of evil, but still funny.
Good call Jay.
Here’s the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X1fTkvefu5s&eurl=
And the lesson we learn from Dawkins is: When you’re in an argument, rather than actually engage the questions with logic and sense, just make fun of them. Ridicule them. Call them names and compare them to idiots, fools or infants. Suggest that they might be retarded and that they inflict psychological abuse on their children. Do whatever you have to do to avoid answering questions with clarity of thought.
Oh wait….
Did we learn that from Dawkins or did he learn that from us?
Volf’s statement likely creates the same feelings in us (educated “mature” Christians) that the Pharisees felt when Jesus said that the tax collectors and prostitutes were entering the Kingdom of God ahead of them. It sounds ludicrous dosen’t it? I believe that childlike curiousity brings us close to the heart of Jesus… and I have to fight to keep my curiousity (otherwise I get jaded and I lose my “why?” and “how?”). But part of being a child is accepting the answers we are given… so I appreciate Kerry’s thoughts on “answers” as well. So is it possible for an atheist/skeptic/doubter to take God’s claims more seriously than someone who has an unexamined faith? I think it’s possible if they do so with a child-like curiosity. Is it the path to God that I would recommend? Hmmm. I’ll have to consider that further.
Not sure of what is meant by “atheists/skeptics/doubters taking God’s claim more seriously” than some Christians. If they took any of God’s claim seriously at all, they wouldn’t be atheists. It seems to me the first requirement of God has to do with the fact that “He is”. That’s got to come before anything else. Atheists don’t even get that far, and yet you’re saying, if you believe Volf, that they are somehow closer to God? You are going to have to give us a bit more here. What are we missing that atheists have?
One quick mini-rant here, maybe a micro-rant. Why do we try to, for lack of a better term, “romanticize” unbelievers by referring to them as “skeptics” or “doubters”? These “skeptics” and “doubters” are championed for their questioning, but their questioning isn’t coupled with a pursuit of God. Jesus never soft-peddled or romanticized these folks. Why don’t we speak of those people with tears?
Philippians 3:18-19 For, as I have often told you before and now say again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. 19 Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly things.
My prayer is that “atheist/skeptics/doubters” will conform to the image of Christ, not us conform to the image of them.
Kerry,
Where ya from? If you are in Tulsa, or ever in Tulsa, I’ll buy you a beer and we can talk more about this.
This is an interesting question…It seems to stem from a view that many Christians don’t care about social issues, and I think this apathy or, hopefully, ignorance, is true in many cases. However, I don’t know that these people’s lack of concern equates with a lack of closeness to God. On the flip side, I’m not sure that being angry at injustice and evil in the world in light of a God one doesn’t even believe exists draws one closer to God. In some ways this scenerio is like having the “right” doctrinal views about salvation, communion, the Bible, etc, versus being a good citizen, but also being a panthiest. Which one is closer to God? I’m not sure.
In reality, are either the Atheist who is angry about the evil in the world, or the ignorant “God loves me and that’s good enough” Christian doing anything about evil? If all we do is complain about evil, yell about it, legislate laws to combat it, how does that lump us in with the sheep to whom Christ said, “When I was hungry, you fed me…”? It seems to me that Christ says to both parties, “I was hungry and you did not feed me…”