Beginning on his first page of his chapter on “The Mystery of the Greater Good,” Ehrman relates his disappointment with God (125-126):
If (IF!) there is a God, he is not the kind of being that I believed in as an evangelical: a personal deity who has ultimate power over this world and intervenes in human affairs in order to implement his will among us. It is beyond my comprehension that there could be a being like that—in no small part because, frankly, I don’t believe that interventions happen. If God cures cancer then, why do millions die of cancer? If the response is that it is a mystery (“God works in mysterious ways”), that is the same as saying we do not know what God does or what he is like. So why pretend that we do? If God feeds the hungry, why are people starving? If God takes care of children, why are thousands of people destroyed by natural disasters every year? Why does the majority of the world’s population suffer in abject poverty? I no longer believe in a God who is actively involved with the problems of the world.
This is an egregious Ehrman error because I am an evangelical and much of what he wrote fails to accurately reflect what the Bible teaches. Of course some of it is right. I do believe in “a personal deity who has ultimate power over this world and intervenes in human affairs in order to implement his will among us” (125). But, from there Ehrman appears colossally confused as to exactly what God promised. After all, God was unambiguous that once Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil that they would “surely die.” God didn’t add “in your sleep at a ripe old age of natural causes.” God just said “you will surely die” and we’ve been attending funerals ever since. Whether by cancer, drowning, or starvation—death is horrible but the Bible is unequivocal that “all have sinned” (Rom. 3:23) and “the wages of sin is death” (Rom. 6:23). Also, the Bible doesn’t teach that there wouldn’t be poverty! Au contraire! Jesus said “The poor you will always have with you” (Matt. 26:11).
Therefore, there is no need to appeal to “mystery” as some do.
So when Ehrman wrote, “I no longer believe in a God who is actively involved with the problems of the world,” it appears that he believed things about God the Bible didn’t reveal. This makes me wonder, seriously, if he ever really understood many of the Bible’s teachings in the first place?
God is actively involved with the problems of this world, but, as I’ve written elsewhere, these “problems” should be taken as reminders of our ultimate destination and should lead men and women everywhere to repent so that they can have eternal life!
Dr. Ehrman asks, “If God cures cancer then, why do millions die of cancer?” and “If God feeds the hungry, why are people starving?” Those are worthwhile questions. Clay’s answer, “God never promised either to heal or to feed, ” is so completely wrong as to amount to a denial of God’s existence. The Bible is full of declarations of God’s goodness and his concern for the poor and the weak. Clay, you can accurately represent the horror of human sin without impugning God’s good character in this manner.
The correct answer is that God ordained that nothing occur on the planet except by the regents He appointed to rule it — Man. God will heal — through the hands of man, whether by medicine or by miracle. God will provide for the hungry — through the hands of man, whether by provision or by miracle. If a person goes hungry, it is because some other man has done something to take away his ability to feed himself, and no man has stepped forward to provide for him.
Our job, as Christians, is not merely to tell the truth about God; we are to be His hands and feet. He has no other agents here on earth, except those appointed to help us while we carry out His instructions. His instructions definitely include feeding the hungry and healing the sick. If there are hungry people, it is not God’s failure, but ours. If there are sick who have not been healed, it is not God’s failure, it is ours.
I’ve come to appreciate Dr. Ehrman’s candor about his evangelical background. I’m pretty sure he never did know God, but he’s asking the right questions and objecting to the right things. I pray that God introduces Himself to Dr. Ehrman, and that he comes to know Him in a way that he apparently could not in his home of origin.
I always hear or read “Why do bad things happen to good people?” Well why do good things happen to bad people? God is not a panacea. Would a person have a strong argument to state that humans are in a fallen world? That we are a result of free will?
As a Christian, I sometimes confuse what God does occasionally and specially with what he promised to do always. But the confusion is mine and not from the Bible. Thanks for the reminder Clay.