Paradox (only maybe two cents)

http://benjaminwblog.com/2014/07/paradox-only-maybe-2-cents/ 

There is a lot of paradox in life, or seeming-paradox. Immediately, you wonder how can God be good, and the world so rife with war, agony, injustice; how can non-time create time from particles that exist pre-particles, and when do such particles start moving if there is no time? Why not (what is) before? To become the greatest, we must be the least; to see, we must be blind; to truly live, we must die – we love and hate these dichotomous paradoxes, and we claim to understand them, but they are hard questions, hard callings.

And even as we are called to faith, we are called to press our doubt, to seek out furtherance of our understanding of a God who is beyond knowing. No one has seen the invisible God, yet we are called to seek and to find God. Religion was made for the boundless, but I am a creature of chains, fences, and guarded borders. I can’t always tell when I’m called to move beyond the containment and into glory, or to stop, kneel, and lay beside the stillness of the waters, resting in the lushest of grasses.

These questions are hard, no? I had one troubled person tell me once about his own interaction with the question of divine intervention and a perfectly good God. He said, if every time an accident was about to occur, God reached out a hand and prevented it, a semblance of free will would be revoked every time an atrocity was occurring. The problem with this is, why does God fix some things and not others, and this is also a frightening pathway into a very deistic view of God, a view incredibly commonplace in American religious culture: God exists, but he’s sleeping, or distant. And this is not the God I believe in.

Another viewpoint is that God works through the hands of his followers, which means that every time I witness a terrible situation, more of the guilt lands in my hands. That’s not particularly a comforting picture, but perhaps it’s closer to the uncomfortable truth.

Yet we often claim God for the good things, as though God had his fingers in every blessing pie, but ask why God isn’t around for the bad things. It’s easy to see God in the valleys, the wildflowers, the rivers, the dance and the music of the world, the beautiful – how do you see God in the hospital room in the gaunt face of the afflicted, in the suffering, in the malnourished? How do we bring God’s love there?

Belief

Amid other deep or casual conversations yesterday, I was asked at one point, "Do you ever find it difficult to believe in God?" I responded no, with a little explanation, but it's actually quite a difficult question. There are a couple of ways this can be interpreted, even, so I'll start with how I responded. (These are my answers, and not indicative of actual apologetic arguments. I'd have to write a book to explain everything, not a paragraph)

1. Do you have trouble believing that God exists?

No. I've read numerous essays and books on apologetics, from Christian, Jewish, and Muslim writers. From ontological arguments to arguments of design and existential arguments and arguments from morality and meaning - all of these and more I've delved into, searching for various proofs. I've been moved by each, and I certainly have been affected by some more than others. I've even read their counter arguments, and arguments from the problem of evil or chaos or arguments on why there does not have to be a being beyond existence, beyond time, beyond space for such things to exist.  But at the end of the day, my experience and my belief and the things I've seen and heard and felt propel me deep into the heart of God and knowing. I don't have any trouble believing that God exists, but that does lead me directly into the next question.

2. Do you ever have trouble having faith in God?

I think one of the biggest cultural blows to religion was at our nation's foundation, when our nation spurred our culture in a very individualistic, deistic direction. I remember a story I was told, about a missionary who went into a small third-world country devastated by famine, war, and sickness. When he was helping at the church, he struggled every day with the hardship, the pain he saw, and asked the priest, "How do you stay faithful when you see such pain? How do you endure when surrounded by such trials?"

The priest was a bit surprised, but responded, "How do you have faith when you want nothing? And culture tells you happiness is simply another toy easily within your grasp? How do you have faith when it is harder to see what you are being saved from?" Sometimes I do have trouble having faith. Not often, but it happens. I heard once that if you do not doubt, you are not asking enough questions. Sometimes, doubting can spurn you into greater wisdom or into seeking more fervently after answers. Yet if doubting turns you bitter, perhaps you are more angry than curious.

If Christ spent an anguished night in prayer, if He burst out from the Cross, 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?' then surely we are also permitted doubt. But we must move on. To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation.

~Yann Martel Life of Pi

3. Do you believe that God cares? Or believe in God's interaction in your life?

This comes back to the topic of deism. Yes, I do believe God interacts with me on a personal basis. I have some different perspectives than many American Christians, but I very fervently believe that God loves ME and died so that I could be sanctified by his blood unto salvation. So do I believe that God interacts with me and my life? Everyday. Do I believe that God cares? Absolutely. Do I always feel comfortable in that belief? Certainly not in the most difficult circumstances.


There are difficult times, and there are less difficult times. Sometimes it is like when I have a runny nose or stomach aches. Whenever I suffer such symptoms, I regret not being thankful when I am in good health. You only remember how difficult times are when they are difficult, and how much of a struggle doubt is when you are doubting. The wider view is the tougher one.