God's Problem is Our Suffering

Terri Gross of NPR's Fresh Air recently interviewed Bart Ehrman, author of God's Problem: How the Bible Fails to Answer Our Most Important Question--Why We Suffer (also author is Misquoting Jesus). 

Ehrman was a "born again believer" and is now an agnostic.  It's an interview worth hearing as we consider how to respond to those around us who suffer and find no satisfactory answers. 

Comments

[cavman]

I'll have to come back to this and listen. But his premise seems quite untenable, unless you don't read the Bible. Which he has.
I tell my little girl, it all goes back to Adam's disobedience.
And there is a bit more after that.

[jason allen]

Thanks for the link.

Ehrman is taking part in a debate on Thursday at Midwestern Seminary. Should be interesting.

[James Gordon]

Steve,

I am guessing that you have already made it to the chapter on suffering in Keller's The Reason for God. I think he does a tremendous job at doing what a lot of Christians fail to do, namely, admitting that the problem of evil is a problem for Christs while at the same time asserting that it is a problem for unbelievers as well. I love how he then proposes that the gospel is an adequate solution because God visits his people and suffers with any among them. Another great treatment of the problem of evil is Feinberg's The Many Faces of Evil, but it is a little more in depth. Thanks for the link.

[Nick P.]

Here's a link to the interview.

The only other interview I have heard from Ehrman is with Stephen Colbert. =-P

[Steve McCoy]

Thanks Nick. I changed the photo and it erased my code. Back up now.

[Paul Merrill]

We can't understand God.

If we did, we'd be God.

I'm not trying to be simplistic - but I think when one tries to understand everything about God and expects that this is possible, there is a problem.

[Charles]

Lot's of "born again" "believers" think that becoming "born again" means they're never going to suffer or have to answer a tough question.

That's because we've dumbed down being "born again" and "believing" to mean ... "I cried and went forward and felt really bad about my self for some reason and decided to take out fire insurance with God by going forward".

Perhaps the "born again believer"-ness from which he apostatized was deeper, but we have to admit that more personal rigor is required to join the Rotary than to join an evangelical church.

So this type of lament isn't really surprising is it?