Suffering, Justice, and Theodicy
The hardest pastoral question — and the Bible's honest engagement with it.
The mystery of suffering in a world created by a perfectly good and omnipotent God constitutes one of the most profound inquiries of the Christian faith. The historic Christian consensus does not attempt to solve the problem of evil—theodicy—merely as an abstract philosophical puzzle. Rather, the Church approaches suffering, justice, and theodicy through the concrete historical realities of the Incarnation, the Cross, and the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. At the centre of the Christian worldview is the confession that God is not distant from human suffering, but has intimately participated in it.
By the end of this lesson
- Name three biblical genres of suffering language (lament, protest, hope)
- Distinguish a pastoral answer from a philosophical one
- Sit with at least one biblical passage that refuses to resolve into comfort
Scripture
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