What is impossible for us to do is to provide an intellectually satisfying answer to the “why” question. For asking such a question can only call for the answer, “Because God willed it to be so.” To the subsequent question, “Why did God will it to be so?” there is no further, illuminating answer. This is one reason that the pattern of divine providence will, in this life at least, always be a mystery.
In dealing with the providence of God, therefore, we are dealing with matters of ultimate significance for which there is no further explanation. This does not mean that God is arbitrary or capricious in his dealings with the created universe. What it does mean is that the will of God, and the holy and wise reasons that he has for the exercise of that will, are the highest court of appeal (highest in the logical sense). There cannot be a higher court, and so, unsatisfactory though it may be, we must rest content with the ultimate reference to the will of God.- Paul Helm, The Providence of God (Contours of Christian Theology)
(HT: John Starke)
1 comment:
There's an underlying assumption here that God does will all things to happen that I don't think is supported by Scripture. God allows things to happen because he has given us over to the lusts of our flesh (Rom. 1:18-31). He is not the cause of them, but, out of the love he expresses through allowing our free will, does let them happen.
David Bentley Hart's "The Doors of the Sea: Where Was God in the Tsunami?"
Post a Comment