Love's Ultimate Test

The reality of evil is a contradiction to the belief in a God who is both sovereign and good.

Or so people say.

But there is another dilemma.

If God is not both good and all-powerful, true justice can never be realized.

Why is that?

Because if good is not all-powerful, evil might win.

How can a good but limited God save us if the Devil gets the upper hand?

How can a good but limited God protect us when the demons slip past the angel defenses and drag helpless people down to their hellish holds?

How can a good but limited God ensure that at the end of all things evil will fall and goodness will shine into eternity?

How can a good but limited God heal all wounds?

He can't. Because the evil is just as strong as he is.

Perhaps in the end, if we're not lucky, cruelty and violence and sadism will win, and darkness and despair will reign after all.

And why not, since whether you serve goodness or evil it's all up to whichever side you feel like? Someone who feeds the children, or someone who mutilates them – just pick the style that thrills you.

But if good is all-powerful, evil beware. Do as you please for now, but you are destined to burn in the fires of righteous fury.

Evil may reign for a time, but ultimately can never win.

Where are the innocents who were taken from us? They are in paradise with God.

Where will all our pain go? One day we will shed it like an old garment and forget it in our eternal joy.

Where is all our guilt and regret? It is nailed to the Cross.

Then the question remains. Why has God allowed evil to reign over our world?

Because only in a world where love seems distant and foolish can it truly prove its depths and power.

Only the once abandoned can know the joy of being found.

Only the wounded can know the value of being whole.

Only if God let us wander and sink to a place of unimaginable darkness and denial could he show us how much he loved us in coming to our help.

He knew it would be painful for us.

But what we don't imagine is how painful it must be to him, if he loves us so much, to see us suffer.

It is a journey God knew that he and the human race must take together, in order for their relationship to be what it was meant to be.

The God of the Bible is not distant and cold. He is a God who weeps for his children, who burns at betrayal, who laughs at his enemies, who charges in with fury when those he loves are in trouble.

He is a God who came down and became like us, so he could suffer as we might suffer, so he could be punished for us even though he had done nothing wrong, in order to redeem us who have done wrong, because he loved us still the same.

Could this have happened if evil had never existed? But only because it exists can we come to experience just how great is God's love for us.

Are you in pain or in tears? God is there with you, hurting and weeping at your side.

Is he powerful enough to change things in a flash? Yes he is. But he chose not to help us this way, but to allow pain to enter into our lives and our hearts as well as his own heart, in order that our love may grow deeper and fuller and richer than it ever could had he fixed everything to begin with.

Are you mad at God for not sparing a loved one from an untimely death? For not fixing your life? For not taking away your hurt and frustration?

Or do you love him for suffering with and even for us? For loving us even when it seems no one else should? For standing with us even when we turn our backs on him?

Hate can only consume you, eat up your soul, and send you to your death.

Only by choosing love can life start anew.

Only by choosing trust can peace truly be gained.

Do we have enough reason to trust? In Jesus we have more than enough.

Linking up with #ThoughtProvokingThursday