This is Greg Boyd’s final sermon on evil and suffering his preaching on Luke 13. He makes 3 KEY POINTS in this sermon:
#1. collapse the judgment–don’t blame the sufferer and don’t blame yourself for the suffering. We don’t know squat! As C.S. Lewis said to a colleague who was trying to comfort him with Lewis’ own theological answers to evil and suffering after his wife Joy died: ‘Shut up, it’s just a bloody mess.”
When we judge or look for blame for a tragedy, it forces us to conclude that God is just, and therefore we must blame the individuals involved in the tragedy. Or we must conclude that God is unjust, and we must blame God for the tragedy. But God doesn’t cause the messes; He brings purpose to the messes!
The one suffering often feels horrible and that they are to blame which causes us to label ourselves a murderer or a whatever and that makes us “not a verb that we did but a noun that we are!”
We must live in the now because God is in the now. No blaming but asking God how He can bring good out of this tragedy. Every mess is an opportunity to bring healing and something good out of it. In a time of suffering, we must be quiet, listen and ask how would you, God, have me respond to this mess?
#2. in the face of tragedies don’t judge, just respond–Are you turned and walking in the kingdom? Don’t try to figure it out! Just bring healing! HOW CAN GOD BE GLORIFIED IN THE MESS?
#3. God’s response to tragedy is always about healing never about condemnation–We live in a demonic war zone…demonic forces play a big part of suffering….