First, here are some of my ways of thinking. I am not bothered by ambiguity, inconsistency, contradiction, changing viewpoints, a variety of options--none of which has to be "right." Perhaps this is why I am so comfortable reading the Bible. I don't have to be right. The Bible doesn't have to be right. I can change my mind on anything, just as the Bible can, and does. I am a bit bothered by inaccuracies-- much less by the inaccuracies in the Bible, much more by the inaccuracies by its interpreters.
Second, I am not a theologian but a Biblical scholar. In examining the question that is the subject of this blog, I am way out of field. We had in our church, in his last years, one of the great theologians of Methodism, Professor Geoffrey Wainwright, who died last week. He could have dealt with this issue far better than I.
Third, I am influenced by Process Theology, what little I know of it, mostly from the early writings of the theologian John Cobb. I find that Process Theology goes with the Bible exceptionally well. Here is the essence of it for me. God is dynamic. God is not the static, immutable, remote, uninvolved, high in God's heaven, looking down benignly upon the follies of humanity-- the god of Platonic philosophy, which is the understanding of God that most Christians have. No, I worship God who is literally and figuratively down to earth, makes humans out of mud, gets mad, is capable of punishing, and is intimately involved in the lives of God's people. God is fatherly and motherly, can discipline us and, yes, even reward us. Why do I think this? The Bible tells me so.
Let me pose a wild possibility. What if the Bible is actually right in its portrayal of God? What if God really was like that? What if God changes God's mind, as God so dramatically does in Exodus 32:1-14. God was about to destroy all the Israelites except Moses because they made and worshipped the golden calf. Moses talks God out of it. The story concludes, "And the Lord changed his mind about the disaster that he planned to bring on his people." (Exodus 32:14).
As I read through the Old Testament, I see God changing. The fierce avenger of Genesis through Joshua becomes more and more comforting as time goes along, and especially after the Babylonian Exile (586-538 BC). Read deutero-Isaiah (Isaiah 40-55). Feel the love of God pouring through this text.
I should note that in asking whether the OT portrayal of God might be right, I am not suggesting the OT, or the NT, is historically accurate in all its details. It isn't. Not by a long shot. That's ok.
Then comes Jesus, God incarnate, God palpable. God that is pure love. "God is love." (1 John 4:8). In my book, "Jesus and the Pleasures," I think my best sentence is this, "Jesus softened the heart of God."
Did God cause the Coronavirus? Along with Justin and just about every other Methodist I know, I say a strong NO. As I wrote in part 1, God created nature and established nature to run on the laws of nature. God can intervene in the laws of nature but mostly doesn't (although it is impossible to quantify God's interventions). God would rather have us use our good brains to figure out nature, to work within nature to cure what harms us and to do no harm ourselves. In the meantime God comforts us in our affliction and enables us to help each other, care for each other, and love each other.
Of course, I could be wrong.
Faithfully,
Christian
1 comment:
The trailer to the great movie "Contagion" pretty much shows the making of something like coronavirus. First, the humans cut down the forests, leaving the bats with nowhere to go. So the bats move into the pig warehouses, where they hang upside down and poop on the pigs. Then the pigs get butchered with no sanitation and the humans shake hands with infected pig blood on them. Then one of the humans gets on a plane, flies through Chicago where she infects the next patient, then goes home and a pandemic, one infinitely worse than this one, starts.
Where were we when God created them bat and the pig? But where were we when the bulldozers cut down the forest? God set the stage but we actors don't follow a script - I believe in free will, and human actions came together to make this happen.
Climate scientists have been warning of disaster for many years, and have been largely ignored until recently. Epidemiologists have seen this coming for many years too, but no one even knew what an epidemiologist was until the pandemic. There's this great meme that says:
Dear Epidemiologists, We feel you. Love, Climate Scientists.
The God of the Whirlwind, the God of Job, is showing that face again...
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