I don’t have all the answers, but I know an all-loving God

A recent letter responded to my letter that considered a relationship between disasters and the free will God has granted to all of us. The writer’s pejorative reaction reminded me of Scrooge’s “Bah! Humbug!” reaction to Christmas. Perhaps God might allow him to have such an experience as Scrooge endured.

The primary motive for my letter was to call attention to the book “Disasters: Core Concepts and Ethical Theories” and especially to the chapter

“Christian Theology and Disasters: Where is God in All This?” It looks at the question of why a loving God allows disasters from many different viewpoints. The effect of the free will he has granted us is just one of the viewpoints but I think an important one.

I may not have all the the answers, but I know we have an all-knowing, all-powerful and all-loving God. He so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. And although we rejected him and nailed him to a cross, God still did not reject us.

Nor will he reject us today if we abandon him to pursue the gods of this world or just because of our pride in self. We can come back to him and he will receive us. But he will not force us to come to him and if we persist in rejecting him, there will come a time when it is too late.

As the old hymn says, “Softly and tenderly Jesus is calling. … Why should we tarry when Jesus is pleading … come home, come home.”

If you haven’t responded to his call yet, won’t you consider it today?