THE LAST TIME I WROTE ABOUT GETTING ANGRY, SOME OF YOU DIDN'T KNOW WHAT I WAS TALKING ABOUT WHEN I SAID THERE IS A RIGHTEOUS ANGER. LET ME ASK YOU, DO YOU FEEL BAD WHEN YOU GET ANGRY? WELL, YOU SHOULDN'T BECAUSE THERE IS A RIGHTEOUS ANGER. THERE HAS TO BE BECAUSE JESUS GOT ANGRY. IT WAS THE JEWS' PASSOVER AND JESUS WENT UP TO JERUSALEM. PEOPLE FROM ALL OVER THE LAND CAME TO CELEBRATE THE PASSOVER AND TO MAKE AN OFFERING....
Why does God allow suffering? Theologians and philosophers have struggled with this question for ages. After all, if God is all-powerful and all-knowing, can't he prevent or stop it? For some people, this is a stumbling block to faith and they never get past it.
I would not be so presumptuous as to claim an authoritative answer that others have missed. However, I do think there are some insights into this mystery, that God has provided in his Word.
The problem of suffering appears to be centered around free will. God created us (and the angels) with free will, and if he had not, we would be mere robots - not truly alive. He created us as free moral agents with the ability to choose right or wrong....
Romans 7 is one of the most hotly contested scriptures in the Bible. Early Greek Fathers saw it one way, Latin Fathers saw it another. Their views come down to us today wrapped in Arminian and Calvinist interpretations and there are brilliant scholars with alternative ways of looking at it as well.
Personally, I reject Calvinism strenuously for its Manichean fatalism, introduced to Christianity by Augustine and later adopted by Calvin. However, I agree with the Calvinist camp on this particular text, with a few caveats.
With Arminians, I would agree that a regenerate person should have new motivations and be no longer DOMINATED by the sin nature. However, I disagree with the extremists who deny that there is any...
