Why Does God Allow Haiti?

Excellently thoughtful article on why God allows suffering on the BBC website, here

 

At least as interesting as the piece are the responses to it. I find one particularly gut-wrenching. It begins:

"As an Anglican, I always had presumed that God is too big, if you like, too omnipotent to even vaguely notice humanity."

Hmmm, dealing with the age old, anguished, questions of suffering and evil by positing that God doesn't care about - or even notice - humanity, and identifying that as "Anglican". Praise God for my many Anglican friends and colleagues who deal with the issue with a good deal more biblical insight and pastoral sensitivity than that.

Signs and Wonders; Acts 19:8-21

Jesus is real. He is powerful over evil. The lesson I want to draw is not to expect miracles that were extraordinary even by the standard of Acts, but that Ephesus shows that becoming Christians means wholehearted life commitment. We don't leave ourselves routes out if God doesn't come through for us. Burn the scrolls, burn the bridges. No compromise, no turning back.
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Acts 13:4-12 Posing as an Angel of Light

A retired missionary friend recently asked me if my generation has forgotten that Jesus was revealed to destroy the works of the devil. I think he is right. He said that in his view the forces of wickedness work differently in seular Britain to where he worked for many years in the East. There he saw demonisation and terrific fear of evil spirits. Possibly a bit like in Acts 13. Here, he maintained, Satan is much more likely to pose as an angel of light, espousing relativism, denying the existence of God (and Himself - read Screwtape!), and insisting that nobody invite anyone else to come to Christ or challenge other people's beliefs, under the guise of tolerant neutrality and niceness. My friend's contention was that this is pretty much the same thing as the evil demonisation.
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