I
am questioning, "Is there
really a God at all?" As I look at the world around
me, all I see are problems, people suffering, killings, and
so on. If there is a God, why are these things happening?
If God is so great and mighty and loving, should he not protect
the young and innocent who have done nothing at all to him
or anyone else? So I ask, "God, if you are there, why
are our innocent babies suffering? Where were you when I
was being abused? What did I do to you at such a tender age
of 5 that you allowed me to suffer the way I did?”
You
are asking three important and difficult questions. I won't
try to make them seem easy.
In
the end, the existence of God is a matter of faith, not
of proofs. When we see, for example, extraordinary kindness,
like the love of a parent, we name
that as being of “God.” We could name it something else, and many
do exactly that. But to persons of faith, it only makes sense to name love,
life, hope, goodness and justice as being of God.
What
about suffering, despair and injustice? Those also exist.
Faith doesn't
blame them on God, but on humanity's fundamental waywardness, which God allows
but doesn't reward. You might want to read Rabbi Harold Kushner's excellent
book on this topic, When Bad Things Happen to Good People. Suffering
doesn't happen because God is punishing someone. Suffering just happens.
As
to where God was when you were being abused, I believe that God was weeping
with you. One of the fundamental attributes of God is that God suffers.
He suffers along with us. Why doesn't God fix it? Sometimes
God seems to intervene,
sometimes
God doesn't. The why of that is a mystery. My best understanding is that
goodness must be chosen, not compelled.
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What
nationality were Adam and Eve? How did
the other nationalities come about? Also, in
the Bible it says that it took Jesus five hours to
die on the cross. However, I heard that
scientifically it takes three days to die on the
cross. Could you explain this to me?
The
Bible doesn't ascribe any particular nationality or ethnicity
to Adam and Eve. The name “Adam” simply
means “human” and is a play on the Hebrew word
meaning “ground.” “Eve” probably
means “living.” The first suggestion of nations
(not in our modern sense of nation, by the way) comes in
Genesis 10, when the three sons of Noah are seen as originators
of the first tribes. Similar stories are told about the sons
of Abraham. From an historical perspective, by the time the
Israelites came to their first self-awareness, at the time
of the Exodus, tribes and nations were well advanced.
As
for the time it took Jesus to die, the Gospel of Mark says
that he was crucified at nine in the morning and that he
died at three in the afternoon, for a total
duration of six hours. The usual explanation for this relatively short time
is that he was in a severely weakened condition because
he had been scourged and
beaten prior to crucifixion.
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How do I know that the Bible is true?
It
depends on what you mean by “true.” If
you mean objective fact, scientifically or historically verifiable,
in the same category of definiteness as 2 +2 = 4, or ocean
water is salty, then you don't know that the Bible is “true.” These
are stories, not historical records and objective biographies.
They were told long ago by a large number of writers, nearly
all unknown, as a way of talking about the God whom they
knew and worshiped.
A
rough analogy might be the way a family of five talks about
a trip to Grandma's for Christmas dinner.
Same trip, but
five different perspectives on it, each
person noticing different things and interpreting events differently. Each
has a piece of the “truth,” but no matter how
fervently each might defend his or her perspective, none
has all of the truth.
Ancient
Israel's self-understanding began with the Exodus. The
Israelites wrote
a prehistory, a book of origins, to explain how they got to Egypt and what
it meant. That prehistory offers several perspectives: Adam and Eve sinned,
their
sons sinned, the entire tribe sinned, the sons of Jacob sold their brother
Joseph into slavery, a famine came. In each perspective, they described a
piece of Yahweh,
their God. They weren't writing science or history. They were explaining
their existence. A different people might tell an entirely
different story, as indeed
many did.
A
later event, exile in Babylon, elicited a similar array
of perspectives on what went wrong.
In
the Christian era, we receive four different accounts of
the life and ministry
of Jesus, as well as several others that weren't approved
for
the official
canon. Each tells the story differently. Some common details, but mostly
disparate details,
suggest that each author was writing for a certain audience and to answer
certain questions. Thus, in Luke the angel speaks to Mary, in Matthew
the angel speaks
to Joseph, and Mark and John know nothing of angels and birth in Bethlehem.
Each view of the birth adds another element of “truth”—not
verifiable fact, but meaning, a glimpse of God.
Fundamentalism
attempts to get around this reality by declaring God as
the author of Scripture.
But that is little more than one party in an
argument shouting
louder and claiming to be right.
The “truth” that Scripture
offers, then, is a kaleidoscope of images and insights into the God
who is beyond complete knowing. To a faithful Hebrew
writing in the time of David, it made sense to think of God as one
who walked in a garden with the first man and woman, and of the human
condition as grounded
in ego and laziness. We can learn from that perspective. It can open
our eyes to the “truth” of God's presence in our own day
and of the human condition.
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How
do you understand Jesus’ servanthood
through Filial, Ministerial, and Paschal?
I don't. Those terms mean
little to me. Jesus seemed to understand his servanthood
as flowing from
the prophet Isaiah's image of the suffering servant. See
Isaiah 42. The prophet saw the nation Israel as this “servant” whom
God upholds, who brings forth justice and doesn't grow faint
when people fight back. Jesus saw himself as that servant,
called by God “as a covenant to the people, a light
to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring
out the prisoners from the dungeon,” and to declare “new
things.” He called his disciples also to be suffering
servants, giving up their lives for God's people.
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I
just want answers to the following questions: What
are the rules in religion? Which rules are
more important to follow? Is faith alone enough to be part
of a religion?
The
Old Testament contains over 800 laws and commandments,
some large and some small, all designed
to help the Hebrew people live faithfully and successfully
in the Promised Land of Canaan. In addition, the prophets
articulated expectations that don't take the form of rules
but clearly were meant to guide human behavior.
The
Ten Commandments were intended as an overarching framework,
as was the call
to justice. Thus, a holy people would have
one God, worship him only, would not
engage in murder, adultery, theft, false witness, dishonoring of parents, and
would observe the sabbath. The prophet Micah put it this way: “What does
the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk
humbly with your God?”
Jesus,
in turn, contravened or redirected many of the laws of
Torah, such as the “law of retaliation” and rules
on observing sabbath. In his teaching, two commandments stood above all others:
love God, and love your neighbor.
It is never enough to prowl Torah (the first five books of the Old Testament)
to find individual statutes for addressing critical issues. For one thing,
from a Christian perspective, Torah has been superseded by the teachings
and ministry
of Jesus. For another, the prophetic witness in the Old Testament offers
better guidance for some modern issues than does a specific rule designed
to help
a nomadic people cross Sinai. Finally, the laws governing Israel's early
years are grounded in conditions and assumptions that no longer apply to
us, such
as
patriarchal norms governing the roles of women.
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What
is faith?
I think of faith as our response to God's love
and presence in our lives. It isn't something we are talked
into, or shamed into, or bludgeoned into, but is rather an
intuitive response to a being whom we cannot prove, and yet
we know; whom we cannot see face to face, and yet we believe
to be real; who is larger than anything we can imagine, and
yet is able to walk alongside us, speak to us, care for us,
know us by name, worry about us, believe in us; who is before
time and will be after time, and yet is present here and
now in this time.
Many call that being God; the ancient Hebrews used several
names: Yahweh, El, Adonai. It is my belief that other religions,
like Islam, point to the same God even as they use other
language. Christian tradition speaks of God as Father, Son
and Holy Spirit, three manifestations of a single being.
Scripture
reveals God to us, in the stories, remembrances and experiences
of people long ago. Scripture
doesn't say
everything to be known about God. Scripture is more a compass
than a complete compilation. Faith communities, such as your
local church, reveal God to us – imperfectly, of course,
because they are human institutions, and yet they are capable
of grace and mercy that could only come from God. Our own
lives reveal God to us—never the entirety of God, and yet
tangible enough to invite us into intimacy with God.
Faith leads inexorably to response on our part, such as
prayer, worship, servanthood and amendment of life. Faith
makes us new, and we, in turn, work with God to make creation
new.
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Today
is my birthday, I turned 20. I feel incredibly depressed…I'm
young I suppose, but I have a lot of responsibilities. I
have two kids, a husband, and a full-time job at a shelter
for immigrant
kids. I love them all. Somehow I
feel like I have been wasting my life, like I'm nothing special.
I feel like I am being ungrateful, but I can't help it. I
feel that God has put this adventurous spirit in me and…one
day twenty years from now, I'm gonna wake up and be nothing
special, a nobody or nothing important. That scares me to death…I
feel like my dreams are too big! I want to be important, successful,
I want it all. I want God to help me with this adventurous,
ambitious spirit that doesn’t let me sleep at night.
What do I do?
You are asking good questions, healthy and normal for someone
who is 20 years old. That can be an awkward age: still a child
in some ways, and yet feeling quite adult; not yet launched
in career and other adult capacities, and yet dreaming of making
a difference. Add to that the responsibilities you carry as
a wife and mother. I'm not surprised you feel overwhelmed,
perhaps wondering if life is passing you by, perhaps feeling
boxed in by your responsibilities.
Assuming that you and your husband have a healthy and open
marriage, I encourage you, first, to share these feelings
with him. You seem to be looking for room to blossom. A healthy
marriage can provide plenty of room for growth. So can motherhood.
Your children will benefit from your being as energetic and
dream-pursuing as you can be.
Second, I encourage you to pay special attention now to
your education. If you haven't had the opportunity to go
to college, this would be an excellent time to start. To
have a good shot at attaining your dreams, you will need
a college education. Colleges are flexible with students
who are married and parents. It might take longer than four
years, but you will find learning to be a great adventure.
Third, I encourage you to be patient with yourself. You
have many years to realize your dreams. You don't need to
do it all right now or even in the next twenty years.
Fourth, I believe God will help you. This would be a good
time to join a church or to become more involved in a church
you already attend. You will find other people in similar
situations. You will find outlets for your energy.
