For the church, a podcast for the flock of Zion Presbyterian Church in Columbia, TN. We want to help you think biblically about everyday matters.
Zion Church exists to join Jesus in his mission to reach people with his gospel, and then to equip his people to worship and serve.
I am Paul Joiner, the Senior Pastor back with my regular conversation partner and friend, Jon Kelly.
This season we are going to focus more on theological topics that are important foundations for the church. These will be theological topics that need to be deeply installed as bedrock truths for the followers of Jesus.
In our last episode, we talked about God’s sovereignty — his rule over all of creation, his ordering of whatever comes to pass according to his eternal plan — his kingly decree.
But — this quickly brings up the question, “What about evil?” If God ordains whatsoever comes to pass, how is he not the author of evil? Or — if God is sovereign, and evil exists — why doesn’t he do something about it…and the tension seems to be that either he isn’t sovereign or he isn’t good.
We often call this a "theodicy" (compound of the Greek words for God (theos) and justice (dikē) -- which carries the sense of putting God on trial and vindicating him).
This is the heart of the book of Job -- a theodicy, God on trial. Isn’t interesting that the first book of the Bible — that is the oldest book — is dedicated to this question. It is probably one of the deepest and most difficult questions that we ask. Eventually, in suffering, we ask “Why?”
We aren’t going to say everything — we just simply can’t — I have had the privilege over the years of sitting with people who have been deeply sexually abused or experienced evil at the hand of another. And when they ask, “Why did this happen to me? Why didn’t God do something about it?” The only answer I have to give is, “I don’t know.”
Zion Presbyterian Church — www.zioncolumbia.org
