I read an article this week where the author questioned the intelligence of people who believe in God. He questioned those who believe God created the world because they can’t say who created God. He questioned the belief in an all-powerful, all-loving God when there are diseases and cataclysmic events like earthquakes and tsunamis. He questioned the morality of a God that commanded the genocides of the Old Testament. He questioned the belief in a God who answers prayers because millions die from horrible diseases.
The author wants god to be a supernatural being, a fairy godmother, or a genie in a bottle. A being that gives us perfect lives. He doesn’t want to have to have faith. He says that if someone wants to have illogical beliefs, that’s a good thing but ends his article with the statement, “more and more of us are doing just fine without it.”
He and I have huge fundamental differences in our thinking. I don’t think that those without faith are doing just fine. Honestly, I feel very sorry for people who do not want to consider that there is something bigger than they are, for those who do not want to recognize that life itself is about more than them.
But, he’s not alone in wanting a fairy godmother. Many professing Christians want the same thing. But like so many things with God, He turns the way we think upside down. As believers, the world isn’t here for us, we are here for the world, and when God allows us to suffer, to go through things that are inconceivable to us, He is giving us the opportunity to be a gift from God to the world. Does that make those times easier for us? No. But it does give purpose to them.
Hebrews 11:30-38