God and the Sandy Hook Shootings, Part I

I’ve been continuing to think about the recent school shooting, and more specifically how to respond to such an atrocity.  I think what we “do” in response to such an event is less important, in the grand scheme of life, than what we believe in response to the event.  For example, some beliefs about this tragedy might be:

None of those victims deserved to die.
Guns are bad.
Schools are not safe.
God should have stopped this from happening.
Some of the victims must have deserved to die.
God allowed this to happen.
God is bad.
God is good.
God is distant.

I am not going to support or refute any of these potential responses, nor is my intention to present the model response.  I hope to explain my own understanding of who God is, because a large majority of the questions asked after a tragedy revolve around God.  I find it interesting that an event of such magnitude with such great loss does tend to rouse within us very strong and distinct views about other people, about our culture, about ourselves, and about God.  Those views, however, are not simply born from hearing of or witnessing a tragic event.  Our views may be affected over time by such events, but our immediate response is more likely born from the views that we held prior to the event itself.

In my last blog, I started to unpack my own beliefs about God.  What I realized in thinking through my response to the recent school shooting is that I believe that God is good.  I hope that this does not sound trite.  I do not hold this belief without challenge or circumstances that beg me to doubt, in my own life and in the lives of my family and friends.  Despite many apparent indications of the contrary, I really do believe that God is good.  One of the key foundations of what I believe has been the Bible itself, God’s word to us.  God’s word is a relationship builder.  It’s not a self-help book, though it can be used to help oneself.  It is not a rule book, though there are laws and rules laid out in it.  It’s not simply a history book, though there is a lot of history found in the Bible.  As a whole, the Bible tells a story, and the point of that story is God’s covenant with his people and His unconditional, undying love for His people.  The intent is that we would know who God is, and not only that we would know who God is but that we would know Him.

God tells us this in Jeremiah 9:23-24:

This is what the Lord says: “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom or the strong man boast in his strength or the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast about this: that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord, who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth, for in these I delight,” declares the Lord.

If we know God, and we know that he delights in and pursues kindness, justice and righteousness, it’s hard to blame God when tragedies occur.  It doesn’t mean that we know the answers.  I don’t know all the answers, but I do know this God.  And in knowing Him, I know that he’s not vengeful, he’s just.  I know that he’s not cruel, he’s kind.  I know that he’s not evil, he’s righteous.  And because I know those things, I’m comforted when there are times of suffering or questions that I can’t answer.  I think in those moments, when I don’t understand, it is the heart of man that is hard to trust.  I know who God is.  And the God that I know is good.

I don't want to ignore the reality of unanswered questions, but this is my starting point.  In the spirit of my blog's new headliner quote, I do intend to continue pursuing the discomfort of thought as I unpack my thoughts about why God allowed something like the Sandy Hook Elementary shootings to occur.

Why I Have a Hard Time Writing...

I was asked recently when I would write another blog.  My answer, "I don't know, probably soon".  What I thought in my head was, "I write blogs almost every day, but they are never actually written down."  They are streams of thought that I have as I am driving, or working on something with my hands, or cooking, or watching tv, or drying my hair, or raking leaves....  I think all the time about everything, about God, about people, about politics, work, family, being single, the past, the future, the beauty of leaves.  I can't not think.  This is a horrible trait to have when it's time to get some rest, as I'm sure many of you can relate to.  As soon as your head hits the pillow: what am I going to wear tomorrow, what do I have to do tomorrow, did I buy that thing today, I forgot to mail a card, I have got to book that flight, etc etc etc.  Yet, somehow, despite all the thinking that goes on, taking a few minutes to sit and type out those thoughts seems an astronomical task.  Where do I start?  What did I think about today that I want to share with others?  Will they care?  Do I care if they care?  Does anyone have time to read thoughts?  Why would they?  Oh, I don't know where to start.  Maybe tomorrow.  

And THAT, my dear faithful few friends, is why I have a hard time writing.  So today I tried something new.  On my way from point A to point B, I used my iphone memo app to record my thoughts.  When I got to point B, I stopped, after 8 minutes, 27 seconds.  When I got home, I typed it out, literally word for word.  No editing, with the exception of not typing every time I said "um".  Be assured, I have no intention of continuing to type out my "memos" word for word, but I thought this first one would be interesting to share.  It shows just how tangential my mind can be, despite trying to focus on one cohesive subject: responding to last Friday's shootings and the questioning of God's goodness that follows.  From now on, I will use the memo app to help focus my thoughts so that I can then edit them into an actual cohesive blog.  Until then...

For your reading pleasure, or lack thereof, here is today's memo:

"What we believe about God when faced with trials and with tragedy is shaped by what we believe about God outside of that tragedy.  And what we believe about God is a combination of different inputs.  It’s a combination of what we’ve been taught, which we then filtered by our own life experience.  Some of what we believe about God - at least in my life - comes from reading his word, because I believe that the Bible is word that has been breathed by God to his people.  And what I believe about God from his word is shaped by my own view of what that word means.  I believe that it’s true.  I believe that if it’s written there and has survived for centuries on end has been translated and survived the original compilation of his word, I trust in the people of God that he chose, that it’s true.  I also believe that God’s word does not contradict itself, and I believe that if my life experience contradicts God, then rather than questioning God, I must question my own world view and my view of God.  That’s hard to do.  That’s not easy to admit at times, that maybe what I experience is tainted in a way, tainted by my own sin, tainted by selfishness.  My view of any given situation is interpreted by my need to feel loved, it’s interpreted by my need to feel accepted, it’s interpreted by my need to feel peace and comfort, and when those needs are challenged, I don’t want to believe sometimes the word of God which may make me uncomfortable, which may be at times hard to reconcile with what I want to believe about the world and about myself and about other people.  So, as I think about who God is and how I view events in this world, I want to go back and look at what God tells us about the world and about humans, people, his creation.  Because he tells us that we were created very specifically to display his glory, and when he did create man and woman, he declared that they were good.  And we don’t know the time frame I don’t think, but while man and woman were still only one man and one woman, they distrusted God.  He simply wanted them to reflect his glory, and in doing so, to know him intimately and to love him and be loved by him.... I guess first to be loved by him and to love him in return.  And that’s what he wants for all of his people, and yet in that setting where there was no sin, there were no tragedies to respond to, there were no evil people to make Adam and Eve distrust God, they questioned him because of their very nature.  Their nature was to want to displace God... I take that back, there was evil, because there was the existence of the serpent who knew the heart of man and woman and knew exactly how to lead them into sin.  The evil one simply suggested that maybe God did not want what was best for them, that maybe they should take ownership of meeting their own needs, and they gladly, quickly chose to do that.  So because God was intending to meet every last need of Adam and Eve, and because in doing so, he chose to protect them by limiting in some ways their access to certain things, specifically the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they chose to rebel."

There you have it, 8 minutes and 27 seconds of verbal stream of consciousness.  That's it, cut off by my arrival at point B.

Hope That Does Not Disappoint

I came across a verse today in the Bible and unexpectedly (which shows how strong my faith is) heard a truth from God in a new light. No, I did not literally “hear” anything, but my mind was distinctly opened to new insight as I read this passage. So, I asked a few more questions, found a few more references, and decided to share…

I went looking for this passage because I needed a pep-talk today, a really basic one, one that I could grasp not only because of it’s familiarity but because of it’s simplicity. This is the passage I went to:

“Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.” -Romans 5:3-5

What struck me most about this familiar passage was the last verse, where Paul describes exactly why hope does not disappoint. Think for a moment about your concept of hope. How would you define hope, in general? Now, how would you define hope as it is referred to in the Bible? What is it that we are to hope in? How can we know that hope will not disappoint?

In my experience, society in general presents hope as a desire that something specific will happen in the future. For example, we may hope to one day have children. If we have children, we hope that they will be successful adults. If we don’t have a job, we hope we can find one. Right? So let’s take these hopes and put a “Christian” spin on them. Now I am hoping for the same things, but I think that if I pray for them the right way, or frequently enough, or if God loves me (which I believe He does), then I will certainly get what I hope for. If you ask me point blank, I will deny that I can earn any favor from God, but deep down I tend to believe that I will get what I hope for. That’s what scripture says, right? “Ask and it will be given to you…” – Matthew 7:7 I believe that this concept of asking and receiving is often misunderstood, by myself as much as anyone else. I want to believe that I will be able to pray for and receive all that I hope for in this world, but now we have to ask again: what is hope and how can I know it will not disappoint? Another common tool we use in society (in and outside of the Christian church) is the practice of boosting our hope because of someone else’s encouraging story. I do not want to belittle the power of encouragement that we can and should take from hearing stories of perseverance, luck, healing, provision, or any other means of attaining certain circumstances or joys. However, as we look at this particular hope that does not disappoint, Paul is not referring to a hope that is boosted by the success or joy of other people. In fact, success and joy are not really required. Unfortunately, not everyone can experience the same encouraging stories, and sometimes what we hope for doesn’t happen. We know all too well the reality from Proverbs 13:12 that “hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.”

Thankfully, the truth does not end there. Two things that Paul says about hope stood out to me in the passage from Romans. First of all, hope does not originate from what we look forward to. Hope is the product of character, which is developed through perseverance, and perseverance is required as we experience suffering. Hope, then, originates from our past experiences. Paul does not say, “Well, life’s been pretty rough, but I can look forward with hope that it will improve.” Instead, he describes a hope that is grown through experience, a hope that has not been satisfied in this world and does not pretend that it will be. Yet, in the face of dissatisfaction, there is rejoicing. What? This is the second truth: hope does not disappoint. How? Paul clearly describes that the reason hope does not disappoint is because it is based on what has already been done, not on what is yet to come. “Hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.” As is often the case with God’s truth, this is totally counter-intuitive. Instead of looking to the future for our hope to be fulfilled, we must look to the past and even embrace the present. God has already poured out his love by the Holy Spirit, which he has already given to us.

I have often allowed myself to believe that hope is not meant to be satisfied in this world, not fully. Our real hope will be fulfilled in heaven. I think that is partially true but slightly misconstrued. Based on Paul’s explanation, we can fully experience hope fulfilled in this life if we hope in what God has already done. What must wait for heaven is a full experience of the glory of God.

“In His great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” -1 Peter 1:3