– Fyodor Dostoevsky
Dostoevsky was right about beauty and its saving power. In Jesus, we encounter an other-worldly, transforming beauty, and so can begin to see the world as God sees it. We can see beauty amidst pain and suffering and brokenness, including the brokenness of the Church. Beauty is in the eye of the Beholder–the divine Beholder. To behold as does this Beholder–this is salvation; this is the life of faith.
There's an old sermon illustration from Corey Ten Boom's The Hiding Place in which young Corey asks her father a difficult question. The Nazis have invaded the Netherlands, the two are traveling, and her father, responding to her question, asks Corey to carry the suitcase…
Today is the twentieth anniversary of the Columbine High School shooting. Today is also Holy Saturday.
In the wake of Harvey, and on the eve of Irma–not to mention dozens of wildfires in the west and an earthquake in Mexico City–the question of God's involvement in nature could not be more palpable. I offer here a few halting answers to what I think are the most pressing theological questions.
