Professional Documents
Culture Documents
The
Limits of
A few years ago, after being politely asked to depart early from yet another speaking engagement for giving the wrong answer to a question about
the limits of Gods mercy, I decided it wasnt fair to keep sneaking up on
unsuspecting Evangelicals.
trange as it seems to me, I know all too well that to proclaim a God
compassionate enough to seek the rescue of every one of his childrenand powerful enough to pull it offis a dangerous scandal to
such folks. In a very real way, they dont even hope for universal salvation. After all, without the fear of their unsaved loved ones eternal
damnation, how would they motivate one another for outreach and missionary
service?
And yet, almost everywhere I go, I meet peopleespecially young people
who are not motivated at all by such fear. On the contrary, these people are
utterly horrified by the notion of a Heavenly Father who essentially says to his
children, I love you, but if for any reason you fail to accept that fact before your
mortal body expires, I will kill and torture you for all eternity. Especially if that
same Heavenly Father holds in hand all the reasons the children do or dont accept in the first place.
These are the people who ask me the questions that used to lead to my early
departures, and who write me letters and emails like this one:
S
September/October 2006
www.thejournalofstudentministries.com
Dear Bart,
This might be kind of weird, but I have a question for you.
I lived and worked among the poor with Mission Year in
the inner-city of Atlanta last year. When you came to visit
my team, you told a story about how when you first started
working in rough neighborhoods, you got to know a girl who
was gang-raped as a nine-year-old andafter her Sunday
School teacher told her God must have allowed it for a reasonrejected God forever. Because you believed God was
indeed in control, and because you believed that girls lack
of faith doomed her to eternal damnation, you decided that
God must be a cruel bastard. You sort of said the words
inside my head out loud, words I had wanted to say for a
long time.
Anyway, after putting this off for almost a year, I want to
know how you reconciled that. How did you make it from,
God is a cruel bastard back to I can trust him? I cant
seem to make that leap. Sometimes I begin to really trust
him, but as soon as I think about my past abuse and those
I know and love who are bound for Hell, it just doesnt add
up. I want to know the God you knowwho apparently allows for horrible things in this world to happen, yet remains
pure and holy and trustworthy and faithful and loving.
I dont know if any of this makes sense to you, but as
I was wrestling with it again today I was reminded of you
and hoped you might be of some help.
Sarah
Dear Sarah,
Thank you for writing to me. Over the past few
years, I have become convinced that yours is actually the single most important question in the
world. As Rabbi Harold Kushner observes, Virtually every meaningful conversation Ive had with
people about God has either started with that
question or gotten around to it before long. While
I am sure my answer will not be as eloquent as his,
I will do my best.
First of all, while I certainly believe my most
cherished ideas about God are supported by the
Bible (what Christian says otherwise?), I must admit they did not originate there. On the contrary,
most of these ideas were formed during that difficult time I described to you, when I was suddenly
disillusioned by the suffering and injustice I discovered in the inner-cityI suddenly did not trust the
Bible at all. At that point, for the first time, I realized that peoples lives dont depend on whether or
not they believe in God, but rather on what kind
of God they believe in. I also realized, for better or
worse, that the only evidence I could rely on was
that which I saw for myself.
What I saw then, and still see now, is a world
filled with dazzling goodness and horrific evil, love
and hate, beauty and ugliness, life and death. In
September/October 2006
www.thejournalofstudentministries.com
September/October 2006
And I stay in the inner city, in spite of all the suffering and injustice I see here every day, because
I can. No longer do I blame God for what is beyond
his control or hate God for so much pain his little ones
endure. Even in the midst of such ugliness, I can stay
here because I am full of faith. I may not be sure of
what I know anymore, but I am absolutely certain of
what I hope for, and most of the time I manage to live
in that direction.
I stay here for one more reason, of course: In places
like this, nobody asks you to leave early because you
cant find the limits of Gods grace. z
www.thejournalofstudentministries.com