God does not commit evil, but He ordains that it exists. The prophet Isaiah recorded, “I form light and create darkness, I make well-being and create calamity, I am the Lord, who does all these things” (Isaiah 45:7). Evil exists by God’s permission and through the foreordained choice of those whom He created. Otherwise, we’d end up with a separate power that causes evil, in which case God would no longer be sovereign. However, evil is not a glitch in God’s plan but rather an integral piece of God’s plan!
— Steve Swartz, Pastor, Bibellehrer und Buchautor
Related Bible passage: ISA.45.7
Topics: Suffering & the Question of God, Guidance & God's Will, God, Jesus & the Holy Spirit
Occasions: For Reflection
Steve Swartz
Steve Swartz ist ein US-amerikanischer Pastor und Autor, der die Grace Bible Church in Bakersfield, Kalifornien, leitet. Er steht für eine reformiert-baptistische Theologie mit versweiser Schriftauslegung und befasst sich in seinen Schriften unter anderem mit biblischer Seelsorge sowie Scheidungsgründen bei schwerem Missbrauch. Heutigen Bibellesern vermittelt er systematische Auslegungen reformierter Kernlehren und Hilfestellungen zu praktischen Glaubensfragen.
All quotes by Steve Swartz (17)
In our own woundedness, we can become sources of life for others.
Henri Nouwen
Ultimately mourning means facing what wounds us in the presence of One who can heal.
Henri Nouwen
C.S. Lewis
When we are crushed like grapes, we cannot think of the wine we will become.
Henri Nouwen
He has chosen not to heal me, but to hold me. The more intense the pain, the closer His embrace.
Joni Eareckson Tada
Etty Hillesum
God writes straight even on crooked lines.
Paul Claudel
God lets us walk no path that he himself has not walked, and on which he does not go ahead of us.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer