The Absence of God

I finished reading Gerald Sittser's A Grace Disguised: How the Soul Grows Through Loss today. This is definitely a valuable book that I will come back to...and have a hard time lending out my copy, as it is well marked up.

Chapter 11 is titled "The Absence of God." This raises up the question of God's sovereignty. He writes: "Since suffering made belief in God more difficult, I decided to investigate the implications of unbelief. What would atheism do for me in my suffering that belief in God did not do or could not do?...If there were no God, there appears to be no ultimate reason why we should feel one way or the other, since emotions like grief or happiness have no grounding in a greater, objective reality outside the self. In an atheistic worldview, it becomes all but impossible to establish the absoluteness of truth and falsehood, or good and evil, or right and wrong...I realize that other people who have suffered loss have come to different conclusions from mine, and they are just as sincere and serious as I am. Some believe that we know good and bad through the operation of natural law, which governs the moral universe in the same way it governs the physical universe. Others believe that we have knowledge of good and bad through the influence of social convention. But these options seem to beg the question. Where did natural law originate? What is the source of social convention? These questions push me away from atheism and toward God...The implications of atheism are therefore intolerable to me. However difficult belief in God can sometimes be, belief in atheism is more difficult still." (pp. 138-140)

Sittser mentions 3 discoveries that helped him in the course of his wrestling with his tragedy.

"The first perspective has to do with an alternative way of understanding God's sovereignty. Prior to the accident...I was inclined to believe that God simply pulled the strings and manipulated the events of our lives as if we were marionettes on a string and God was a puppeteer controlling us completely...Since the accident I have been to question this perspective. ..My understanding of God's sovereignty...includes rather than nullifies human freedom...I can affirm God's sovereigny and still be a person instead of a puppet...Belief in God's sovereignty thus gives us the security of knowing God is in control, but it also assigns us the responsibility of using our freedom to make wise choices and to remain faithful to him. It assures us that God is transcendent without canceling out the important role we play. God's sovereignty allows us to believe that he is bigger than our circumstances and will make our lives better through those circumstances." (pp. 141-142)

"The second perspective concerns the peculiar relationship that exists between God's sovereignty and the Incarnation. God's sovereignty means that God is in ultimate control of everything. The Incarnation means that God came into the world as a vulnerable human being...God is therefore not simply some distant being who controls the world by a mysterious power. God came all the way to us and lived among us...The God I know has experienced pain and therefore understands my pain...No matter how deep the pit into which I descend, I keep finding God there. He is not aloof from my suffering but draws near to me when I suffer. He is vulnerable to pain, quick to shed tears, and acquainted with grief. God is a suffering Sovereign who feels the sorrow of the world...God understands suffering because God suffered." (pp. 142-143)

"The final perspective concerns the role of faith, whcih seems to be required of anyone who wants to know God...It is possible to see the natural world in a way that excludes God, to view history as empty of divine involvement, and to interpret Jesus as simply a great moral teacher, a radical revolutionary, or a deranged fanatic. We can live normal and productive lives on earth and dismiss God. We can choose to be atheists and get away with it." (p. 143)

"The point is that we have a choice. More than anything God covets our love. But real love can never be forced. Freedom is what makes love possible in the first place. Thatis why God will never coerce us into a relationship. Faith allows us to choose God in freedom. It is possible to believe in him, but it is also possible not to believe in him. If we believe, it is because we have chosen to believe, although even the opportunity to make a choice in itself is a divine gift." (pp. 143-144)

"Loss may call the existence of God into question. Pain seems to conceal him from us, making it hard for us to believe that there could be a God in the midst of our suffering. In our pain we are tempted to reject God, yet for some reason we hesitate to take that course of actions. So we ponder and pray. We move toward God, then away fromhim. We wrestle in our souls to believe. Finally we choose God, and in the choosing we learn that he has already chosen us and has already been drawing us to him. We approach him in our freedom, having minds that can doubt as well as believe, hearts that can feel sorrow as well as joy, and wills that can choose against God as well as for him. We decide to be in a relationship with God. And then we discover that God, in his sovereignty, has already decided to be in a relationship with us." (p. 144)