\u00a0to something else and the emotions die down? Then maybe we can have a meaningful conversation about responding to such events in a consistently biblical fashion. Till then, this \u201ccartoon\u201d from Joann Sfar, a former Charlie Hebdo cartoonist, reminds us of the fact that French society, by and large, has no interest in God, God\u2019s ways, God\u2019s laws, God\u2019s will, and, well, God in general. Might want to consider that\u2026after all the emotions have died down, that is.<\/span><\/p>\nFollowing this post was a cartoon rejecting prayer for Paris. Now, White claims that he is going to \u201ckeep his mouth shut,\u201d but then proceeds to give his opinion on the matter anyway. Unless I am reading this wrong (I see no other way to read these comments), White is arguing that we should discuss the attacks on Paris from a \u201cChristian worldview,\u201d which includes judgment and sin over the ungodly. White then proceeds to show that France is ungodly. The seeming argument here is that we must view the Paris attacks in light of the judgment of God over the people in France for heir rejection of God.<\/p>\n
I confess to being \u201cwrapped up in emotion\u201d regarding this situation. In fact, I think its rather disturbing if one is not emotional about the fact that so many people have been killed. I have been particularly emotionally connected to this situation because my sister was in Paris the day of the attacks. In fact, she was about a ten minute walk from where these attacks occurred, and could have easily been a victim of these bombings. She has spent the past few days with the people in France, including many who had friends and relatives who were killed or injured. So no, I cannot speak dispassionately about this issue, but Christians are not called to be dispassionate about suffering, evil, and death.<\/p>\n
There are so many problems with this response, but let me just begin with the basic pastoral one. Even if this were true, would this be the appropriate time to make such a response? Should I tell those grieving the loss of loved ones that their death was in fact the judgment of God? This is a basic confusion of law and gospel. When one is suffering from grief, loss, or anything else, that is not<\/em> the appropriate time to preach about God\u2019s condemnation under the law. In fact, times of grieving are a perfect opportunity to point broken people to the love and healing that comes through Christ. We don\u2019t need to pile more law on top of law. Perhaps this is easy for White to do because he\u2019s not personally \u00a0connected to anyone involved in this situation. But his audience likely includes some in Paris, and he needs to think about how they hear this kind of talk.<\/p>\nThe second major problem here is that White is placing himself in the position of an Old Testament prophet. Yes, God has judgment toward sin. Yes, there are times in Scripture where God punishes a whole nation for its sins. But when God does this, he sends a prophet to warn the nation of impending judgment, and then tells the prophet to speak of that judgment as it happens. Abraham didn\u2019t have to guess about whether the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah was an act of judgment. Unless God suddenly brings back prophets into the world who speak his word infallibly, we have no grounds for claiming any tragedy or violent act as a judgment of God.<\/p>\n
Third, White doesn\u2019t address the fact that there are indeed Christians in France. As I said above, my sister and a friend of hers were visiting Paris at the time of the attacks. Both of them are Christian missionaries serving in China. On the Sunday following the attacks, they attended a church in Paris. In fact, it was even a Reformed baptist church (something White should appreciate). Yes, France\u2019s culture is largely secular, but God still preserves a remnant in that nation. Remember, God was willing to spare Sodom for ten righteous people. Surely there are more than ten faithful Christians in Paris, so why should we presume that God would judge them despite the presence of his faithful people? And how should the Christian church in France respond? Should they proclaim the comfort of the gospel, or tell their neighbors that the loss of life was the judgment of God? Also, what if Christians were killed in the attacks? Is their death a result of God\u2019s judgment as well?<\/p>\n
The final problem with such responses to evil in this world is that they are attempts to peer into the hidden God. We are always trying to look behind suffering, searching\u00a0for some kind of easy explanation as to why suffering happens. We like to have nice and tidy answers to these difficult questions. This is why conspiracy theories are so popular. It makes sense of seemingly meaningless evil. Open theists try to answer these questions with a philosophical Theodicy that seemingly protects God from the blame when evil things happen. Others, such as White, try to answer these questions by pointing to the judgment of God, and God\u2019s eternal decree. But, ultimately, God doesn\u2019t give us the answer to such questions. Think about the book of Job, where Job\u2019s friends spend he entire book trying to give him an answer to why suffering is happening. Notice that when God finally speaks to his servant Job, he never reveals the reason for the suffering Job faces, even though the readers of the book are given a glimpse of what is happening behind the scenes.<\/p>\n
Sometimes there is no easy answer to evil. We are not called, as Christians, to give those answers. What we are<\/em> called to do as God\u2019s people is point to where God has revealed himself in Christ. Suffering victims need to hear about the healing that God has promised to this world through his Son, and Christ\u2019s death where all the world\u2019s sin, evil, and pain was taken by the Son of God. It is only this word of gospel which ultimately needs to be preached in such difficult times\u2013not words of judgment.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This past week has been a very difficult one for people throughout the world. Nearly 150 Christian students were killed in Kenya, and around the same number of innocent people were killed in France due to attacks from radical Muslims terrorists. Since these attacks, I have seen a number of different Christian responses. Many have […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2176,"featured_media":2693,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[465,122,442,463,464,466,462],"class_list":["post-2692","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-evil","tag-gospel","tag-james-white","tag-paris-attacks","tag-prayforparis","tag-suffering","tag-theodicy"],"yoast_head":"\n
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<\/a><\/p>\n