Sermon Tone Analysis

Big Idea of the Message: If God is all-good and all-powerful, why is there so much evil and suffering in the world?

PRAYER

A - God in Heaven I praise your Holy Name.

I acknowledge that you are Right and True.

To you belong all power and glory and honor forever and ever.

C - LORD I come before you now to lead our humble gathering in confession.

We confess our sin before you.

We confess our selfishness, our arrogance, our pride, our foolish attempt at wisdom apart from you.

As we gather to tackle a old topic I confess my feeble inadequacies to contain or explain all that is your right to do and allow as you are the creator and we merely your creation.

T - We thank you LORD that you have given us a better teacher in Your Spirit.

We thank you that you have given us all we need to know in this book which is your most holy word.

We thank you that you are patient and longsuffering, abounding in grace and mercy.

And that it is your desire that those who seek you will find you.

S - Therefore LORD we have every hope that You, by Your Spirit, in Your Word would speak to us, and teach us this day.

We ask that you would strengthen our faith and resolve for you and in you.

I ask that as we wrestle with this very real, sometimes very painful question that the answers given would be biblical, sufficient for today, pleasing to you, and edificatious for your people.

Big Idea of the Message: If God is all-good and all-powerful, why is there so much evil and suffering in the world?

INTRO

Pain is real, Evil is real

We should not minimize pain, suffering, or evil

Christians will and do experience pain & suffering

Why is their pain?

How do we deal with pain?

What is the end of pain?

Epicurus (341-270 BC) - David Hume (1711-1776)

The logical problem of evil, as articulated by Hume and his followers, runs as follows: (1) given the biblical God’s all-good and all-powerful nature, God could not know and care that there is evil in the world yet at the same time fail to act powerfully in order to stop it coming about.

Yet, (2) there is evil in the world, (3) therefore an all-good, all-powerful, and all-knowing God cannot exist.

THEODICY From the Greek words θεός (theos) (God) and δίκη (dikē) (justice), translating to “divine justice.”

The attempt to defend God’s omnipotence and goodness in the face of the problem of evil in the world.

Theodicy is based on the belief in an orderly universe which is created by a beneficent God.

It seeks to answer how a benevolent, omnipotent, omniscient God allows suffering and pain in His creation.

Big Idea of the Message: If God is all-good and all-powerful, why is there so much evil and suffering in the world?

God is working his long game of redemption.

Our hope is in trusting the character of the God who made us and loves us.

The Problem of Pain - C.S. Lewis - 1940

MESSAGE

God is God

God is Good

God is steadfast lovingkindness

God is patient and longsuffering

God extends mercy and grace

God is Powerful

God is active

God is able

God is unstoppable

God is Wise

God knows the best outcome

God knows the best path

Humans Perpetrate Evil

Original Sin

Genesis 2:16–17 “16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, 17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.””

We Experience Sin

Rom 5.12 “12 Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned—”

Jam 1.13 “13 Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God,” for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one.”

God does not sin nor tempt anyone to sin

We Engage in Sin

Romans 3:10–12 “10 as it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one; 11 no one understands; no one seeks for God. 12 All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.””

Ephesians 2:1–3 “1 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— 3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.”

sin of omission

sin of commission

Alber Mohler - The Briefing - January 10, 2023

A woman who was recently convicted very late in life, a 97-year-old woman by the name of Irmgard Furchner, who was convicted of being a teenage shorthand typist at a concentration camp, and thus to be complicit in the deaths of thousands of the Jewish people at that camp.

And by the way, the numbers are staggering.

Some estimate that 65,000 Jewish people were exterminated, that's to use the German word.

They were killed in mass murder in that one camp.

Irmgard Furchner's trial began back in September of 2021.

It concluded just before the end of last year.

And by the way, when her trial began, she went on the run from a retirement home.

That's right.

At age 95 or 96, she went on the lamb, actually physically running from her retirement home in order to evade prosecution.

She was eventually found by police as the BBC reports in the German city of Hamburg.

The International Press, particularly in Europe, noted that the historical significance of Irmgard Furchner's trial is that it might be the very last of a German figure who is accused of war crimes and genocide in connection with the Holocaust during the years of World War II under the Nazi regime.

And the reason for that is simply the calendar.

Time is running out.

Irmgard Furchner is herself 97 years old.

There were those at the time that she was convicted at the end of last year who said that justice had been cheated by the fact that she was convicted at such an old age.

As the BBC reported, "Furchner's trial could be the last to take place in Germany into Nazi era crimes, although a few cases are still being investigated.

"Another quirk here, Irmgard Furchner was convicted in a juvenile court, because according to the law in Germany, at the time the crimes were committed, she was considered to be a juvenile.

And all that was taken into consideration.

Another very strange twist in this moral tale.

Here we have a 97-year-old woman now convicted lawfully in a court of having been as a teenager complicit in tens of thousands of deaths.

By the way, in one of the saddest commentaries about the trial, Irmgard Furchner never came clean or took responsibility.

All she said was, and I quote, "I regret that I was in Stutthof at the time.

That's all I can say."

God Has, Is and Will Deal With Evil

God Dealt With Sin In The Past

Adam, Cain, Noah

Gen 6.5-7 “5 The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

6 And the Lord regretted that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart.

7 So the Lord said, “I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens, for I am sorry that I have made them.””

Gen 8.21-22 “21 And when the Lord smelled the pleasing aroma, the Lord said in his heart, “I will never again curse the ground because of man, for the intention of man’s heart is evil from his youth.

Neither will I ever again strike down every living creature as I have done.

22 While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.””

Divine judgement over those who are against His will

Israel, Philistines, Babylon, Etc.

In Christ!!

Eph 5.2 “2 And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.”

God Deals With Sin Now

Pro 24.12 “12 If you say, “Behold, we did not know this,” does not he who weighs the heart perceive it?

Does not he who keeps watch over your soul know it, and will he not repay man according to his work?”