Thread: All things work together for good. Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.


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Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on :
 
I have a strong conviction about this statement from Romans Ch 8 :28 and I wonder how it is a principle of life for others here.

Obviously, 'All Things' means the good, the awful and everything in between but it is a faith statement that seems to me to acknowledge that whatever we go through as a believer, God is there with us whether we sense it or not.

Jesus did say "In the world you shall have tribulation but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world."

Without over analysing and becoming purgatorial I am really interested in how other shippies have been able to see the Lord's hand in the stuff we all go through.
 
Posted by Raptor Eye (# 16649) on :
 
Thank you Jamat, this sentence has been on my heart this week.

The faith journey is not easy, it's a struggle on an uphill road which at times seems to be an impossible slippery scree, and then someone we thought was a fellow traveller knocks us for six. We might wonder why God has put us on this cruel path, but suddenly we get a glimpse of the answer in the good that has come from it: in the ever closer relationship with God and the fruit of the spirit it's growing in us, the peace and love we receive and give through it, in the impact on those we meet, and in extra-ordinary 'coincidences' which happen around us.

We learn to trust that whatever happens God can and will bring some good out of it, and that God's love will conquer all in the end.
 
Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on :
 
Thank you, positive 'randomness' in life suggests a providential hand at times. One recent eg for me was a chance meeting with a friend where he needed my practical help. Nothing major but still significant.
 
Posted by Sir Kevin (# 3492) on :
 
Just as we were close to selling most of my investments to make ends meet, my lovely bride, Zeke on the Ship (she rarely posts anymore) signed a teaching contract with a real live school district. Also I had some unexpected stage work earlier this month. I really believe that. There was a similar passage from the gospel read out at mass recently.
 
Posted by Nicodemia (# 4756) on :
 
I'm sure many Shippies would, on reflection, find God's hand in some of the struggles of life.

But what if this doesn't happen? Don't like to be a spanner thrower, but my troubles have taken God so far away he's like a tiny dot of light on the horizon!

And please don't come back and preach at me. I KNOW he's supposed to be with me, only I push him away etc. etc. This is All Saints, Not Purg, after all.

But I wish I knew how you did it - stay with God, I mean through all the trials and tribulations of life.
 
Posted by Heavenly Anarchist (# 13313) on :
 
[Votive] Nicodemia I cannot give you answer but wish to stand with you, as I too have felt despair.
I was in my mid-twenties, and my dream job turned out to be a disaster as I had developed depression and confusion. I was knee deep in debts due to compulsive behaviour. A week after being diagnosed with bipolar disorder I found out my father was dying (he lived for 6 months and died while I was on holiday and uncontactable). Everything in my life fell to pieces and I sank into a deep depression.
What got me through this period was reading the psalms. Roy Clements' book on the psalms was especially helpful. It seemed to me that when I couldn't rely on myself any more I had to trust God to get me through, let go of myself as it were. I was also in a very supportive network of friends.
My experiences increased my trust in God but I'm not going to be glib and suggest that anyone who is experiencing hardship just needs to be patient. I do not know why we have these trials in life but they are very real and those experiencing them need support and love to help them through.
 
Posted by Raptor Eye (# 16649) on :
 
I don't think that there can be pat answers to how we relate with God at any one time, as we are unique as is our relationship with God, but four things help me to get through the hardest of times, to some extent:

Previous experiences of God;
The image of Jesus on the cross;
The faith of other people; and
Reading the Bible.
 
Posted by Welease Woderwick (# 10424) on :
 
This really is far more of a Purgatory thread than an All Saints one so I am going to move it there. As I do so I want to remind everyone that sharing personal stuff [within personal safety limits] is fine in Purgatory - it is not just a board for intellectual debate.

Please note the final comment in the OP:

quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
...Without over analysing and becoming purgatorial I am really interested in how other shippies have been able to see the Lord's hand in the stuff we all go through.
Thanks.

Welease Woderwick
All Saints Host

[ 30. July 2014, 16:36: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
 
Posted by no prophet (# 15560) on :
 
I have been forced to reject direct intervention. I was reluctant to say the least. Absolutely forced. I wanted to have this to be true always. But it is inescapably false. (And if it is true, I find must reject God and Christianity.)

I think magical thinking is a major fault with many religious people, and seeing hands of causation, jumping to conclusions where none are warranted or justifiable is an artefact of a different time, one we cannot afford to continue with. It is destroying the planet and all of God's creatures. Thus: companion, not miracle maker.
 
Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on :
 
I think this passage is so often used to support fatalism - that irrespective of what happens, it is part of God working for our good. This is crap because fatalism is not Christian. Fatalism is not what is taught in the Bible.

I suppose the best interpretation I can put on it is that, despite whatever happens, God can bring good things out of it. But I still think this is rather fatalistic.

The last part of it "to those who are called according to his purpose" is also used to oppress and condemn others - if it doesn't seem to be working for good, then clearly you are not one of the called. Which is utter bull.

I think it is probably far more a case of Paul being optimistic about problems, being encouraging, saying that God is always working for the good, despite what it may seem.

But I am with Nicodemia. In the end, life sucks, and people quoting this verse at me in a condemnatory or bland fatalistic way (usually with a cheesy grin) are liable to get a smack in the chops.
 
Posted by itsarumdo (# 18174) on :
 
OTOH through experience I believe firmly in direct intervention, and that it happens far more than people realise.

Also - thoughts themselves are spiritual forces. How can you expect spiritual help to be manifest when we constantly choose to focus on (think about) the effects of evil in our own lives and in the world? "You get what you focus on". Even if Grace is happening, which it is, it remains invisible simply because the focus of most individuals and most of the media remains on what is going wrong. This is really useful experiment in life - to deliberately choose to be aware of what is blessed and good, to be curious and focus on the sensation in your body that tell you that you feel some appreciation or gratitude - and to simply say to all the rest - this I do not want and I choose to give it no more attention than I absolutely need to.

We judge things like death as bad, but then say that heaven is wonderful - which way do you want it? Can't have it both ways - we are like butterflies, going in transition from one stage to another - we come here an then we return home. The pain is not for the spirit that has returned home, but for the people remaining here who cannot celebrate because they remain fixated by their own sense of loss. That may sound harsh, probably is harsher than I would wish, but nevertheless is worth considering.

All the destruction is not from God - we live on a planet of choice, and as long as we choose to give destruction energy by making it our focus, then it grows. Because we have unwittingly chosen to focus on evil, and so given it strength. We can instead focus on divine energy and Grace, and CHOOSE to absorb it. There is far more there than anyone can ever take in - it's not a deplete able resource, it's a free gift, it's Life, and if we give it a chance it will (finally) do its work, because we have chosen to welcome it with our creative minds.
 
Posted by itsarumdo (# 18174) on :
 
Great Film - Groundhog day
 
Posted by Gill H (# 68) on :
 
I personally really dislike that version of the verse. To me it smacks of fatalism, and seems to equal 'It'll all work out in the end' or 'everything happens for the best'. Or even 'everything happens for a reason' (yeah, and sometimes the reason is that you/someone else acted like a jerk...!)

I prefer the version that says "In all things, God works for the good of those who love Him..."

Not necessarily for their comfort, or their happiness. Their good. Which is sometimes impossible for us to see this side of eternity, and sometimes means life is still crap.
 
Posted by Freddy (# 365) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
I have a strong conviction about this statement from Romans Ch 8 :28 and I wonder how it is a principle of life for others here.
I have the same strong conviction.

The way it is worded in my denomination is that God does not permit anything to happen unless some good may come of it.

That is, God is in complete control of the universe. Nevertheless, He does permit evil things to happen for the sake of human freedom. Still, no evil thing is permitted to happen or exist except for the sake of some long-term good.

So all things work together for good - both good things, hard things, and evil things.
 
Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Gill H:
I personally really dislike that version of the verse. To me it smacks of fatalism, and seems to equal 'It'll all work out in the end' or 'everything happens for the best'. Or even 'everything happens for a reason' (yeah, and sometimes the reason is that you/someone else acted like a jerk...!)

I prefer the version that says "In all things, God works for the good of those who love Him..."

Not necessarily for their comfort, or their happiness. Their good. Which is sometimes impossible for us to see this side of eternity, and sometimes means life is still crap.
Even that I find rather patronising - "It is all for the best dear". It avoids teh reality that sometimes life is crap, continues to be crap, there is no reason or positive to it being crap, and we have to accept that the appearance is that God want it to be crap.

To my mind, it is far harder to take the line "Life sucks, and God seems to have taken a hike. I cannot understand or justify it. I will cry with you, and believe that just being there with you is all I can do - and I will sort out my faith later" than "God is doing something mysterious and wonderful in it, that we don;t understand".

I also think that a God who is acting in mysterious and obscure way is irrelevant. A God who is present in my sitting by others, when I seem to be doing all of the work, that is a God I can believe in. A God who is not in the shit is no God. Sometimes, God is in the shit because there is nothing else.
 
Posted by itsarumdo (# 18174) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Schroedinger's cat:
quote:
Originally posted by Gill H:
I personally really dislike that version of the verse. To me it smacks of fatalism, and seems to equal 'It'll all work out in the end' or 'everything happens for the best'. Or even 'everything happens for a reason' (yeah, and sometimes the reason is that you/someone else acted like a jerk...!)

I prefer the version that says "In all things, God works for the good of those who love Him..."

Not necessarily for their comfort, or their happiness. Their good. Which is sometimes impossible for us to see this side of eternity, and sometimes means life is still crap.
Even that I find rather patronising - "It is all for the best dear". It avoids teh reality that sometimes life is crap, continues to be crap, there is no reason or positive to it being crap, and we have to accept that the appearance is that God want it to be crap.

To my mind, it is far harder to take the line "Life sucks, and God seems to have taken a hike. I cannot understand or justify it. I will cry with you, and believe that just being there with you is all I can do - and I will sort out my faith later" than "God is doing something mysterious and wonderful in it, that we don;t understand".

I also think that a God who is acting in mysterious and obscure way is irrelevant. A God who is present in my sitting by others, when I seem to be doing all of the work, that is a God I can believe in. A God who is not in the shit is no God. Sometimes, God is in the shit because there is nothing else.
I find that a strange argument - it's taking an old testament God who demands slaughter an then emasculating him so that shit just happens to God too. The modern trend of looking for the human, weak and vulnerable side of Jesus so we can identify with that is something of a slippery slope.

If you believe that God created the universe - then you are dealing with something that can at least wield the power of billions of suns, with a known lifespan in our universe of billions of years. Something that is capable of creating life in all its complexity. And shit just happens. No. Shit happens because we allow ourselves to co-"create" with the destructive force by lending it our attention. Attributing evil to God and saying "He wills it" is again - maybe this is my personal predilection, a whim - but I don't think it's the God that Jesus asked us to worship. Does good come out of evil - yes - eventually. But why seek out evil or even tolerate it because eventually something good might come out of it? Again, this just does't make sense to my small bear-shaped brain.
 
Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by itsarumdo:
I find that a strange argument - it's taking an old testament God who demands slaughter an then emasculating him so that shit just happens to God too. The modern trend of looking for the human, weak and vulnerable side of Jesus so we can identify with that is something of a slippery slope.

If you believe that God created the universe - then you are dealing with something that can at least wield the power of billions of suns, with a known lifespan in our universe of billions of years. Something that is capable of creating life in all its complexity. And shit just happens. No. Shit happens because we allow ourselves to co-"create" with the destructive force by lending it our attention. Attributing evil to God and saying "He wills it" is again - maybe this is my personal predilection, a whim - but I don't think it's the God that Jesus asked us to worship. Does good come out of evil - yes - eventually. But why seek out evil or even tolerate it because eventually something good might come out of it? Again, this just does't make sense to my small bear-shaped brain.
No - it is taking a God who created the earth, and letting him be human, be a person. Like Jesus. It is keeping the Jesus-sized God there.

And the idea comes from my reading of Moltmann, that God suffers too, suffers with us. That idea works for me, helps me to make sense of suffering. It is God down to our size, but not reduced, just focused? concentrated? a projection of the God of the universe into our world? That sort of idea.
 
Posted by itsarumdo (# 18174) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Schroedinger's cat:
quote:
Originally posted by itsarumdo:
I find that a strange argument - it's taking an old testament God who demands slaughter an then emasculating him so that shit just happens to God too. The modern trend of looking for the human, weak and vulnerable side of Jesus so we can identify with that is something of a slippery slope.

If you believe that God created the universe - then you are dealing with something that can at least wield the power of billions of suns, with a known lifespan in our universe of billions of years. Something that is capable of creating life in all its complexity. And shit just happens. No. Shit happens because we allow ourselves to co-"create" with the destructive force by lending it our attention. Attributing evil to God and saying "He wills it" is again - maybe this is my personal predilection, a whim - but I don't think it's the God that Jesus asked us to worship. Does good come out of evil - yes - eventually. But why seek out evil or even tolerate it because eventually something good might come out of it? Again, this just does't make sense to my small bear-shaped brain.
No - it is taking a God who created the earth, and letting him be human, be a person. Like Jesus. It is keeping the Jesus-sized God there.

And the idea comes from my reading of Moltmann, that God suffers too, suffers with us. That idea works for me, helps me to make sense of suffering. It is God down to our size, but not reduced, just focused? concentrated? a projection of the God of the universe into our world? That sort of idea.
suffer - possibly - probably. But reducing it to human terms is still inadequate. Does God manifest on Earth as an unaware human just to test out what it feels like to be partly separate from creation? Maybe that happens sometimes. But as part of creation, we are each part of God anyway, all the time - there is no need to manifest as something that already exists because that is already in Its awareness. Why should Christ come to Earth? Surely not for a holiday in a human body? Imagine if you looked in a certain direction you were aware of not only landscape, but also the ringing of each drop of dew as it fell, the spectrum of sound from each insect wing, the life - past, present, future of everyone in that landscape - all at once. That would be suffering, given the thoughts and life of most humans, if it all passed - instantaneously - through the human sensory system.
 
Posted by Banner Lady (# 10505) on :
 
I suppose my version of "all things work together for good for those who love the Lord" is simply "Shit happens - but God is great with compost."

My challenge is always to not wade about in the shit, and to keep trying to shovel it over to God. Sometimes I'm not so great at that.
Especially when the shit keeps coming.

Should be a great garden eventually. [Roll Eyes]
 
Posted by no prophet (# 15560) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Freddy:
The way it is worded in my denomination is that God does not permit anything to happen unless some good may come of it.
Horse feathers. What denomination is that?

What good came of the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsumani where 230,000 people died?

Or the Bhopal chemical leak where 80K died?

What good came of the 11 children raped and murdered by Clifford Olson?

We could list thousands of additional events of which only sorrow, pain and suffering come. That we may find some goodness within some of the people we encounter amidst suffering and disaster has nothing whatsoever to do with God permitting it to happen. No. No. No.

[ 01. August 2014, 00:40: Message edited by: no prophet ]
 
Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Freddy:
The way it is worded in my denomination is that God does not permit anything to happen unless some good may come of it.
I'm with you Freddy. There is a lovely quote in Hamlet which I may get wrong as I am relying on memory where Hamlet says to Horatio

"There is a divinity that shapes our ends rough hew them how we will"

As has been pointed out you run the risk of flying in the face of suffering and being accused of belittling tragedy but our nature is to hope and it is perhaps no accident that hope is an abiding virtue of Christianity.

Cognitive behavioural therapy speaks to the stories we tell ourselves.I choose to tell the story of God's love and goodness.

Just as an aside I started this in All Saints and found it moved to here. No probs with that but I'm not participating here any more as what I wanted to engage with was a more devotional theme of how we find the positive in the midst of it all so I tried another style of Kick off in AS.

[code]

[ 01. August 2014, 05:07: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
 
Posted by ChastMastr (# 716) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by itsarumdo:
We judge things like death as bad, but then say that heaven is wonderful - which way do you want it? Can't have it both ways
Actually, I think it is both ways. As I understand it, death is bad, a curse, a result of the Fall; but through Christ, it has lost its sting, it has become the gateway to Heaven with Him, and to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord, and now with St. Francis we can even thank God for Sister Death.
 
Posted by ChastMastr (# 716) on :
 
As for how to take "all things work together for good," certainly I believe the world to come is relevant to that though it also has application here; I believe in general providence as well as the rare miracle; and as far as how God works goodness out of pain and suffering, I think we can only see tiny bits and pieces right now, and I must take the rest on trust.
 
Posted by Welease Woderwick (# 10424) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
...Just as an aside I started this in All Saints and found it moved to here. No probs with that but I'm not participating here any more as what I wanted to engage with was a more devotional theme of how we find the positive in the midst of it all so I tried another style of Kick off in AS.
Jamat, I had already closed your new thread in AS on the grounds that it was duplicating the Praise and Thanksgiving thread before I read your post here. I think that if you are trying to get a discussion along the lines you state it will almost inevitably arrive back here in Purgatory.
 
Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Welease Woderwick:
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
...Just as an aside I started this in All Saints and found it moved to here. No probs with that but I'm not participating here any more as what I wanted to engage with was a more devotional theme of how we find the positive in the midst of it all so I tried another style of Kick off in AS.
Jamat, I had already closed your new thread in AS on the grounds that it was duplicating the Praise and Thanksgiving thread before I read your post here. I think that if you are trying to get a discussion along the lines you state it will almost inevitably arrive back here in Purgatory.
Oh dear, So sorry, I didn't realise.
 
Posted by itsarumdo (# 18174) on :
 
sometimes the titles of these zones are a bit unnerving
 
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :
 
The problem with this proposition, and it's similar to Julian of Norwich's
quote:
‘It was necessary that there should be sin; but all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.'
is that is subject to confirmation bias, people see God's working in things that go well for them, but that really isn't that great for people who really do live a horrible situation. Working with challenging kids and hearing their life stories it's very difficult to see God working in their lives. Traditional Christianity would see their lives as punishment for their sins, but for these kids it's the results of a whole range of issues.

A few years back I attended a course on Christian studies. One of the others attending was struggling with the story of Baby P and how God could have chosen not to act to protect that innocent child. Where on earth did anything in that situation work together for good?

<tangent>Jamat - one of the proposals for The Eighth Day board - which is a board for trialling ideas and experimenting - came from IngoB and he said:
quote:
My intention is simply to talk about personal (as opposed to liturgical) prayer/spirituality, whatever form that may take.
Maybe what you are hoping to achieve would fit within that board - but for that board to happen you'd have to propose it and get some others to back it.</tangent>
 
Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on :
 
Yes, Julian of Norwich was an 8/28 lady for sure. We can' t be like her without her assumptions. I have a book of her prayers and love the faith from circumstances of awful politics and dark ages mayhem. Another I love is Jeanne Guyon. She had a bottom line that couldn't be shaken but it was never, for either of these about this life or this world. Maybe this is the bottom line. God is about the long as in eternal term?
 
Posted by Nicodemia (# 4756) on :
 
Thank you, Heavenly Anarchist and Schroedinger's cat for providing a bit of support. Much needed I can assure you!

The verses that get me are from Isaiah v.7

I am the Lord and there is no other. I form the light and create darkness, I bring prosperity and create disaster; I the Lord, do all these things.

Either God today is a different God from OT times, or he is a God who has changed (there are dozens of quotes where it says God never changes) or he creates the shit in life.

And maybe some get some good out of it, but thousands don't. Where was the good coming out of it in the instances No Prophet quoted?

OK, you can say free will enabled man to build shoddy factories, rape and abuse children. But Tsunamis/earthquakes/avalanches etc.? And if someone tells me the world is broken and those things came from broken tectonic plates moving around, then I am totally not with you! We wouldn't be here but for tectonic plates creating land and sea as they move. (which is putting a whole science in a teeny nutshell!)

Shit happens to a lot of people, including Christians, and God seems a wee speck of light in the far distance as we try to deal with it.
 
Posted by Freddy (# 365) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:
quote:
Originally posted by Freddy:
The way it is worded in my denomination is that God does not permit anything to happen unless some good may come of it.
Horse feathers....We could list thousands of additional events of which only sorrow, pain and suffering come. That we may find some goodness within some of the people we encounter amidst suffering and disaster has nothing whatsoever to do with God permitting it to happen. No. No. No.
I can relate to that.

Clearly there are a number of alternative possibilities here. Are there other possibilities?

Any one of these is reasonable to an extent. All of them except number four, however, completely undermine the concept of a religion that has any credibility at all. Numbers two and three are really just versions of number one, in my opinion.

The problem with number four, though, is, as No Prophet points out, that it appears to be horse feathers.

It's not horse feathers, though. Here is why.
 This does not downplay the horror and evil of suffering as we see and experience it in this world, or of the pain of death and the tragedy of mass slaughter. It's a question of what is most significant over the long term.

I don't think that it is horse feathers. It is not that difficult to imagine the possible good that can come out of the world's worst tragedies. But it is very hard to understand why the strategy of allowing them to continue to happen is the best one.

The question for me is which of the four beliefs about God listed above is most conducive to ending suffering in this world and the world to come?
 
Posted by Freddy (# 365) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Nicodemia:
The verses that get me are from Isaiah v.7

I am the Lord and there is no other. I form the light and create darkness, I bring prosperity and create disaster; I the Lord, do all these things.

Either God today is a different God from OT times, or he is a God who has changed (there are dozens of quotes where it says God never changes) or he creates the shit in life.
I don't think that it is that God changes, but that human understanding has changed.

In ancient times it made sense that the God who brings good would also bring evil. Otherwise He wouldn't be omnipotent.

But to us a God who brings evil is not a God at all, so this explanation simply doesn't work.

The Old Testament God is therefore described as causing both good and bad in order to reinforce His omnipotence. But a more complete view is that this is only the way that it appears to us, and that we need to reconcile the existence of evil in another way.
 
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :
 
But Freddy - there are several problems with a belief that the afterlife better than this life.


 
Posted by chris stiles (# 12641) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
I have a strong conviction about this statement from Romans Ch 8 :28 and I wonder how it is a principle of life for others here.
Though equally:

"If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied."

So therefore:

"I believe like a child that suffering will be healed and made up for, that all the humiliating absurdity of human contradictions will vanish like a pitiful mirage, like the despicable fabrication of the impotent and infinitely small Euclidean mind of man, that in the world's finale, at the moment of eternal harmony, something so precious will come to pass that it will suffice for all hearts, for the comforting of all resentments, for the atonement of all the crimes of humanity, for all the blood that they've shed; that it will make it not only possible to forgive but to justify all that has happened."

and whilst I've seen the effects of 8:28 in my life at times, if I didn't hold to the above I would be an atheist who hated God.
 
Posted by no prophet (# 15560) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Freddy:
Clearly there are a number of alternative possibilities here. Are there other possibilities?

Any one of these is reasonable to an extent. All of them except number four, however, completely undermine the concept of a religion that has any credibility at all. Numbers two and three are really just versions of number one, in my opinion.

The problem with number four, though, is, as No Prophet points out, that it appears to be horse feathers.
There is another. Free will. It pervades everything. For us as decision makers in our lives, we do this. For the nonconscious natural world, it means things happen in various ways due to natural influences and natural laws. I think it is likely that God doesn't directly intervene because then there is no faith, there is actually proof and, in a sense compulsion to believe. Do you think Thomas could doubt any longer after he was confronted directly with a risen man with obvious killing wounds? Thomas' freewill to doubt was gone at that point. From my perspective, we don't get interventions, miracles or anything else precisely so we won't be forced to believe anything nor to follow any particular path. This is the only way things make sense to me, both from examining the disasters and horrible happenings broadly in the world, and from personal experiences.
 
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on :
 
"All things work together for good" makes sense to me as an eschatological statement about creation as a whole. Creation has been redeemed at the Cross, and will experience at the end of all things, the glorification and sanctification by God, symbolically represented in Scripture as the New Jerusalem (Rev. 21).

When and how this happens, we may not know.

This statement however does not apply IMHO, to our individual lives. Otherwise it turns into a pollyannish and foolish optimism that is blind to genuine suffering and distress.
 
Posted by no prophet (# 15560) on :
 
Anglican_Brat: I had never thought of it that way. Very helpful. Thank-you. It accounts for my positive feelings when in pristine wilderness: I think about my perception of timeless goodness then, even when it is mostly mosquitos. I never put two and two together on this.
 
Posted by Ad Orientem (# 17574) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:
"All things work together for good" makes sense to me as an eschatological statement about creation as a whole. Creation has been redeemed at the Cross, and will experience at the end of all things, the glorification and sanctification by God, symbolically represented in Scripture as the New Jerusalem (Rev. 21).

When and how this happens, we may not know.

This statement however does not apply IMHO, to our individual lives. Otherwise it turns into a pollyannish and foolish optimism that is blind to genuine suffering and distress.
Coming in late in the thread, but I'd give my thumbs up to that. Well put.
 
Posted by Freddy (# 365) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
But Freddy - there are several problems with a belief that the afterlife better than this life.
Yes, it certainly can mean that, and I'm sure that it does for many.

However, the opposite is just as true, and is surely the intent of the teaching. It is that people will work twice as hard to live well and improve the world if they realize that they will be held accountable for their actions, and that they may have eternal consequences.
quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
It's a real cop out to say that lives of Baby P, for example, or the thousands killed in the 2005 Tsunami, are going to be rectified in the afterlife. That's the sort of the thing that made Marx describe religion as the "opiate of the masses" - a drug to keep the poor and downtrodden down and accepting their lot.
Yes, that's true also. It can be used as a cop out. But this isn't necessarily the case. More commonly it is used to give hope where there is none.

My real issue with these two arguments is that they deprive us of an answer without supplying one in return. So there is no God and no afterlife? How do the benefits of that answer outweigh the shortcomings of the one I described?
 
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :
 
It's probably why atheism is growing and people are walking away from churches: because so many churches don't have a theology of pain and suffering, and the afterlife really doesn't cut it when there's no experience of God in lives. Why would anyone believe in a God and afterlife if there's nothing in their life to help them put their trust in that belief?
 
Posted by Freddy (# 365) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
It's probably why atheism is growing and people are walking away from churches: because so many churches don't have a theology of pain and suffering, and the afterlife really doesn't cut it when there's no experience of God in lives. Why would anyone believe in a God and afterlife if there's nothing in their life to help them put their trust in that belief?
Yet Christianity continues to be the fastest growing religion on earth. It's only a segment of the Christian population that is declining.

I agree that this is probably most likely to happen among people who have no experience of God in their life. It is ironic that this should be the case among those who have the least experience with suffering. Populations where suffering is more common tend to also be more likely to believe.
 
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :
 
Are you sure about that Freddy? I thought, and Wikipedia seems to agree, that Islam is the fastest growing religion in the world.
 
Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Freddy:
quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
It's probably why atheism is growing and people are walking away from churches: because so many churches don't have a theology of pain and suffering, and the afterlife really doesn't cut it when there's no experience of God in lives. Why would anyone believe in a God and afterlife if there's nothing in their life to help them put their trust in that belief?
Yet Christianity continues to be the fastest growing religion on earth. It's only a segment of the Christian population that is declining.

I wonder if it's the Western (rather than the worldwide) church that has the poorest 'theology of pain and suffering'? But if that's the case, then it's because Western Christianity hasn't been forced to develop a good one. The need isn't there to the same extent it is in other environments.

Regarding the afterlife, it's interesting that this is one aspect of Christianity that hasn't been entirely dismissed by a non-churchgoing culture. In some respects it's taken on a life of its own, though not among atheists, I suppose.

I too have read that Islam is growing faster than Christianity. I understand that Islam can be quite fatalistic, but I don't know to what extent its 'theology of pain and suffering' goes beyond that.
 
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :
 
There is more than one thing going on here. In the developed world, fewer people are religious. In the developing world, religions are growing. Maybe religion only works when people are fatalistic? When lives are cheap and people need to have a faith in an afterlife as the only way of living their lives.

Maybe in the developed world some of us are getting nearer to making heaven on earth and we don't need the afterlife as a carrot on a stick to help us believe?
 
Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on :
 
Thanks Freddy for the clear explication of the 4 possibilities and also to Anglican Brat for seeing that you can look at 8/28 in an eschatological rather than a personal sense. I had not thought of that either.

I do see it as personal in the context but certainly concede the point that you could cope with it by seeing it in a less personal way, viz that God 's good is beyond our perception of it or or comprehension of it. However, while any discussion of the verse hits the problem of evil head on, it also hits the problem of faith and lest anyone see faith as a blind leap I do not see it like that. I do not see it like that as I am too experiential. If faith is seen as blind then it is really only hope. Faith is knowing and I think this is where the verse is coming from. In spite of all the issues and certainly, without belittling them, I know that God is good and that my personal welfare and yours are his concern. Now if that means I or you suffer ,then there are two possibilities. One is that the suffering is redemptive, that without it I would not respond to God and be lost to him. The other is that my evil,my issues, my sin are separating me from his blessing.

In other words, suffering and God's goodness can only be reconciled if you are a Christian, ie you see the world in the grip of evil but God's redemptive power at work in it through Christ. I know this seems like preaching but it is where I come from so I put it out there. So when crap happens to me, I usually bleat and scream but I still trust and run towards that pin prick of light that Nicodemia mentioned above and sooner or later I figure out that either I have brought it on myself or /and, it is necessary for God to do what he has to to change me into his image a bit more and I trust him for the suffering of Baby P which is his to manage.
 
Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
In the developed world, fewer people are religious. In the developing world, religions are growing. Maybe religion only works when people are fatalistic? When lives are cheap and people need to have a faith in an afterlife as the only way of living their lives.

Maybe in the developed world some of us are getting nearer to making heaven on earth and we don't need the afterlife as a carrot on a stick to help us believe?
Probably true. But a study from a few years ago showed that a majority of British people still believed in some kind of afterlife.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7996187.stm

[ 01. August 2014, 21:23: Message edited by: SvitlanaV2 ]
 
Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
It's probably why atheism is growing and people are walking away from churches: because so many churches don't have a theology of pain and suffering.......
People have walked away from churches because of the realisation that they're just as happy , if not happier, by not banging on about God, Jesus and all that sin stuff . Also a culture shift that no longer gives Christianity the monopoly on Sundays has poked the final nail in IMO .
As for islam being the fastest growing worldwide religion , might that not have something to do with it's adherents having a rapid actual population growth as well ?

Getting back to OP, personally I believe in things working together for the good , that's despite being a person who is of the pessimistic and fatalistic persuasion most of the time.
 
Posted by ChastMastr (# 716) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
There is more than one thing going on here. In the developed world, fewer people are religious. In the developing world, religions are growing. Maybe religion only works when people are fatalistic? When lives are cheap and people need to have a faith in an afterlife as the only way of living their lives.

Maybe in the developed world some of us are getting nearer to making heaven on earth and we don't need the afterlife as a carrot on a stick to help us believe?
I... honestly think it's the other way around. I think, in the modern technological world, with a standard of living for many people that royalty in the past might envy, and with as much avoidance of the reality of death as we can muster, we're more distant from basic human reality than most people in human history, and people in the rest of the world. While there are large (and growing!) numbers of people in poverty and the division between the haves and the have-nots is growing, say, here in the US, I think our whole society falls into the category of "rich" and "wealthy" often described in Scripture as a very, very dangerous place to be. I mean, in Luke 12, isn't this basically us?

quote:
15 And he said unto them, Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth.

16 And he spake a parable unto them, saying, The ground of a certain rich man brought forth plentifully:

17 And he thought within himself, saying, What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?

18 And he said, This will I do: I will pull down my barns, and build greater; and there will I bestow all my fruits and my goods.

19 And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry.

20 But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided?

21 So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.
Except, of course, with the ability to fly through the air in planes, talk with people on the other side of the world in an instant, practically live through virtual reality video games, and lots of other things which would have been unavailable to even the most wealthy and powerful people on Earth for most of human history. "Woe to you who are rich"--what does that say about us? [Eek!]

quote:
Originally posted by chris stiles:
"I believe like a child that suffering will be healed and made up for, that all the humiliating absurdity of human contradictions will vanish like a pitiful mirage, like the despicable fabrication of the impotent and infinitely small Euclidean mind of man, that in the world's finale, at the moment of eternal harmony, something so precious will come to pass that it will suffice for all hearts, for the comforting of all resentments, for the atonement of all the crimes of humanity, for all the blood that they've shed; that it will make it not only possible to forgive but to justify all that has happened."
[Overused] Agreed!! [Overused] (Since it has quotes is this from another source? It's awesome regardless.)
 
Posted by Freddy (# 365) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
Are you sure about that Freddy? I thought, and Wikipedia seems to agree, that Islam is the fastest growing religion in the world.
Yes, Islam is growing faster.

Still, Christianity is growing rapidly, not shrinking, and it is by far the largest world religion:
quote:
At slightly less than 2 billion, Christianity makes up about a third of the world population and approximately the same as the two next largest religions combined; Islam and Hinduism. Christianity is also the only religion represented in all 238 surveyed countries.
From:"What is the fastest growing religion?"

Anyway, the point is that Christianity is not the dying religion that some have suggested it is.
 
Posted by Nick Tamen (# 15164) on :
 
ChastMastr, I think you've hit the nail on the head.
 
Posted by Brenda Clough (# 18061) on :
 
I am with chris stiles. I cannot imagine how God will do it (the Middle East seems impossible) but the Master Plotter can wind all the threads back, tie them off and tuck the ends in. I can do it in a very small way, so I have no difficulty believing that someone wiser and more powerful than I can harmonize the plot.
 
Posted by no prophet (# 15560) on :
 
These are emtionally reasoned thoughts, providing facile comfort and senses of elation. We have forcefully told off people who have attempted to comfort themselves at our expense with such sloppy explanations of our tragedies. I agree with Curiousity on this.
 
Posted by Jude (# 3033) on :
 
Sometimes I think life would be better if I were an atheist. It would be so much simpler.

But I cannot believe that there is no god. It would be easier to believe that there weren't because this god seems to be so powerless, or just callous. But I have this feeling that won't go away, that there is a god, a God, who keeps on calling me, telling me that there's a heaven, that His kingdom will come upon earth. He has overcome death, and death is only the gate to something else.
 
Posted by ChastMastr (# 716) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:
people who have attempted to comfort themselves at our expense
I believe it is true, but unless the circumstances are appropriate, I think it's extremely unhelpful to start going on about it to someone else who is struggling or grieving. I think our job is indeed to "mourn with those who mourn" in that case--and, again, I think it is true even on an individual level. Perhaps the key phrase is the one you use above: people attempting to comfort themselves at the expense of the person who is really hurting. If someone (who believes as I do, of course) who is grieving is able to say, "This terrible thing happened, but I trust that God is making even this work for good," that may be a level of heroic faith, but it's often damn unhelpful to say this to someone else who is struggling or just doesn't believe it.
 
Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by ChastMastr:
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:
people who have attempted to comfort themselves at our expense
I believe it is true, but unless the circumstances are appropriate, I think it's extremely unhelpful to start going on about it to someone else who is struggling or grieving. I think our job is indeed to "mourn with those who mourn" in that case--and, again, I think it is true even on an individual level. Perhaps the key phrase is the one you use above: people attempting to comfort themselves at the expense of the person who is really hurting. If someone (who believes as I do, of course) who is grieving is able to say, "This terrible thing happened, but I trust that God is making even this work for good," that may be a level of heroic faith, but it's often damn unhelpful to say this to someone else who is struggling or just doesn't believe it.
What you point out here is that such a belief viz that All things will work ultimately in favour of good, is really not something that someone in one circumstance should quote to another in a reduced circumstance as it is heartless and naive however well meant.

But when one is oneself in a straitened circumstance or a bind and can quote it with faith to oneself, there it can be a comfort. The battle is to believe it for oneself as part of an internalised God story based on an understanding of a loving creator/ redeemer who indeed, in the words of Julian of Norwich, ultimately, 'makes all manner of things well.'

[ 03. August 2014, 03:22: Message edited by: Jamat ]
 
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :
 
Brenda. He won't wind anything back, only forward, redeeming everything from the past. For everyone. Ever. Forever. And ever.
 
Posted by Fineline (# 12143) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:
"All things work together for good" makes sense to me as an eschatological statement about creation as a whole. Creation has been redeemed at the Cross, and will experience at the end of all things, the glorification and sanctification by God, symbolically represented in Scripture as the New Jerusalem (Rev. 21).

When and how this happens, we may not know.

This statement however does not apply IMHO, to our individual lives. Otherwise it turns into a pollyannish and foolish optimism that is blind to genuine suffering and distress.
I agree with this. And not just with regard to suffering. I think a danger of individualising it to details of each person's life is that, taking it to its logical conclusion, you'd have to say every little thing in your life was working together for good - the fact that you decided to wear blue socks today, the fact that you had cornflakes for breakfast, or even the fact that you couldn't be bothered to do something you promised to, or that you lost your temper, etc. It becomes meaningless and potentially dangerous to apply it to individual details of our lives.
 
Posted by Evensong (# 14696) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Jude:
Sometimes I think life would be better if I were an atheist. It would be so much simpler.
Sometimes I wish the opposite. That I did believe everything that happens works for good. So much easier.

But then I'd probably be a Muslim ( God's total sovereignty)

The Christian story however is different. Not everything that happens is good because creation and we ourselves are fallen.

Anglican Brat is correct:

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:
"All things work together for good" makes sense to me as an eschatological statement about creation as a whole. Creation has been redeemed at the Cross, and will experience at the end of all things, the glorification and sanctification by God, symbolically represented in Scripture as the New Jerusalem (Rev. 21).

When and how this happens, we may not know.

This statement however does not apply IMHO, to our individual lives. Otherwise it turns into a pollyannish and foolish optimism that is blind to genuine suffering and distress.
Sometimes suffering can be good. It helps us develop and change things. Other times it is simply bad and not part of God's plan at all.

That, IMO is what the verses in the same chapter is saying.

Romans 8:38-39 For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Shit happens sometimes. But it doesn't mean it's God's punishment. It doesn't mean you deserve it or need it. It just is.

And God still loves you through it all.

But only at the end of the age in the new creation will all be well and all manner of things be well.
 
Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on :
 
Has anyone ever read Corrie ten Boom's memoir 'The Hiding Place', about a Dutch family that was caught hiding Jews during WW2? I often think about this book when this topic comes up. Corrie had a sister who firmly believed that even a concentration camp could offer perfect opportunities for God's will to be done. But for the rest of us, to suggest the same thing would somehow seem scandalous.
 
Posted by ChastMastr (# 716) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Fineline:
I think a danger of individualising it to details of each person's life is that, taking it to its logical conclusion, you'd have to say every little thing in your life was working together for good - the fact that you decided to wear blue socks today, the fact that you had cornflakes for breakfast, or even the fact that you couldn't be bothered to do something you promised to, or that you lost your temper, etc. It becomes meaningless and potentially dangerous to apply it to individual details of our lives.
I don't agree--and critically I don't see how that makes it untrue. God can bring good out of all of those things, but that doesn't mean it will necessarily be fun for us (such as bringing good out of our sins). What He will do about the blue socks or cornflakes, I have no idea, but since He's the God not only of humans and galaxies and archangels but of atoms and smaller, I trust He knows what He's doing re the cornflakes. Perhaps each Cheerio is a wee galaxy that we know nothing of until the New Creation... [Biased]
 
Posted by Fineline (# 12143) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by ChastMastr:
I don't agree--and critically I don't see how that makes it untrue. God can bring good out of all of those things, but that doesn't mean it will necessarily be fun for us (such as bringing good out of our sins).
How it makes what untrue? I don't think the verse is untrue - but my interpretation of it is similar to Anglican Brat's idea that it is describing a wider perspective than individual details of our life. Not that God can't bring good out of all kinds of details like my scratching my nose, or having a haircut, or eating a packet of crisps, but to my understanding those things aren't what God is concerned about, and are not what this verse is about - those things can tick along on their own just fine, but I think the verse is about the wider perspective, and doesn't literally mean every individual little thing that happens.

I agree that God can work good out of negative things, and that it can be difficult for us. Saying that the verse isn't about every single tiny detail in each of our lives isn't the same as saying that God can't and doesn't work good out of painful things.
 
Posted by ChastMastr (# 716) on :
 
I suppose how focused God is on the tiny things is something we can disagree on without problem, LOL. I suppose I think of it as being like the fall of the sparrow or hairs on one's head being numbered, only down to (and beyond) every nanosecond of all of time and every quark (and beyond) of all of space and ... anything else out there. I believe that atom #934065903746589734653289756324897562a in the center of an undiscovered planet whose star went nova before the dawn of mankind groans in travail with the rest of creation for the new world to come, and that God loves it as well...

(I know, I'm weird.) [Hot and Hormonal]
 
Posted by Fineline (# 12143) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by ChastMastr:
I suppose how focused God is on the tiny things is something we can disagree on without problem, LOL.
Yes, I was thinking the same. I suspect it's a case of the blind men describing the elephant - we can never have a complete view of how God's mind works and what he is doing. It's all using human analogy.
 
Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
Has anyone ever read Corrie ten Boom's memoir 'The Hiding Place', about a Dutch family that was caught hiding Jews during WW2? I often think about this book when this topic comes up. Corrie had a sister who firmly believed that even a concentration camp could offer perfect opportunities for God's will to be done. But for the rest of us, to suggest the same thing would somehow seem scandalous.
I know that book well as I used to teach it to year 10s. It is interesting that of the two sisters, Betsie had the stronger faith and Corrie was the survivor. The finding of God in the midst of evil is sublimely illustrated there. Thank you for bringing that up.

Regarding the small things. Jesus tells us in the gospels that God is aware of the fall of a sparrow and also that the hairs on our heads are all numbered.
 
Posted by Evangeline (# 7002) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
Has anyone ever read Corrie ten Boom's memoir 'The Hiding Place', about a Dutch family that was caught hiding Jews during WW2? I often think about this book when this topic comes up. Corrie had a sister who firmly believed that even a concentration camp could offer perfect opportunities for God's will to be done. But for the rest of us, to suggest the same thing would somehow seem scandalous.
I have read that book quite some years ago, and yes, it would be scandalous for the rest of us to suggest what Corrie's sister does. It comes across fine in the book because it is the sister reporting that viewpoint so it's less cloying than if the narrator preached it PLUS and this is the big thing, Corrie and her sister risked their lives and more by hiding and helping Jewish families and they were sentenced to time in Concentration camps, so yeah they can say what they like about moral courage and suffering and people should listen.

Unless you've walked the talk though you should keep your mouth shut and just help where you can and weep with those who weep.
 
Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Evangeline:
quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
Has anyone ever read Corrie ten Boom's memoir 'The Hiding Place', about a Dutch family that was caught hiding Jews during WW2? I often think about this book when this topic comes up. Corrie had a sister who firmly believed that even a concentration camp could offer perfect opportunities for God's will to be done. But for the rest of us, to suggest the same thing would somehow seem scandalous.
I have read that book quite some years ago, and yes, it would be scandalous for the rest of us to suggest what Corrie's sister does. It comes across fine in the book because it is the sister reporting that viewpoint so it's less cloying than if the narrator preached it PLUS and this is the big thing, Corrie and her sister risked their lives and more by hiding and helping Jewish families and they were sentenced to time in Concentration camps, so yeah they can say what they like about moral courage and suffering and people should listen.

Unless you've walked the talk though you should keep your mouth shut and just help where you can and weep with those who weep.
Agreed. Well said.
 


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