I've started reading Tim Keller's book The Reason for God. I'm barely past chapter two but found it to be exceptionally well-written and beautiful. Then again, the gospel is beautiful. Resurrection is beautiful. Let me try and share a few excerpts from Keller's chapter entitled How Could a Good God Allow Suffering?
From page 32 . . .
The Biblical view of things is resurrection - not a future that is just a consolation for the life we never had but a restoration of the life you always wanted. This means that every horrible thing that ever happened will not only be undone and repaired but will in some way make the eventual glory and joy even greater.
From page 33 . . .
Just after the climax of the trilogy The Lord of the Rings, Sam Gamgee discovers that his friend Gandalf was not dead (as he thought) but alive. He cries, "I thought you were dead! But then I thought I was dead myself! Is everything sad going to come untrue?" The answer of Christianity to that question is--yes. Everything sad is going to come untrue and it will somehow be greater for having once been broken and lost.
And he closes with a quote from C.S. Lewis . . .
They say of some temporal suffering, "No future bliss can make up for it," not know that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory."
There's a lot of hope in those words. It's as Matthew 19.28 says: Jesus replied, “I assure you that when the world is made new and the Son of Man sits upon his glorious throne, you who have been my followers will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel." Jesus will return and one day the world in all of its brokenness and decay will be renewed, revitalized and healed. What a beautiful message!
