Mary Winkler, the pastor’s wife who killed her husband Matthew with a shotgun on November 22, 2006, is now free. She was sentenced to 3 years in prison, but served only 67 days. Only 12 of those days were spent in jail; she spent the other 55 in a mental health facility. She will serve the remainder of her reduced 210-day sentence on probation.
Since the tragedy of the bridge’s collapsing in Minneapolis last Wednesday, there have been a variety of responses concerning how believers should think about tragedy and find comfort. The primary post of divergence is God’s relationship to the events and how that relationship should influence the counsel we give and the comfort we take.
Steve Camp, Mark Dever, Phil Johnson, Al Mohler, and John Piper all insist on affirming God’s complete and absolute sovereignty over the events. He willed them for His glory and the good of His people. This, they argue, is the only ground for the believer’s comfort. To give up God’s sovereignty is to strip away any basis for hope.
Michael Spencer, are concerned that we can perhaps be too God-centered in our responses. Rabbi Kushner goes so far as to say that God had no involvement in the tragedy at all; rather, He sat idly by, powerless to do anything about it.
Piper’s response to Kushner is powerful and helpful:
No, Rabbi Kushner. Your soft words offer no hope in the end. The foundation is false. And the consolation does not satisfy the God-given passions for truth and meaning in the human heart. May the Lord open your eyes to the One who died for your sins and rose again, Jesus Christ, so that if you would trust him, you would be saved from the wrath of God that your blasphemy and my contaminated anger deserve.
The eight-lane bridge on I-35W that crosses the Mississippi River in Minneapolis, MN collapsed on Wednesday evening around 6 PM plunging more than 50 vehicles into the water and onto the land as far as 64 feet below. Nearly 80 were injured, more than 20 are still missing, and four have been confirmed dead.
We need to pray for those involved in this tragedy—primarily that God would grant repentance to those who have been graciously given the opportunity to repent.
Below are links to news coverage, pictures, video, and—perhaps most important—theological reflection.
The Taliban has killed the second of 23 South Korean Christian hostages: another man, 29-year-old Shim Sung-min.
The body of a second South Korean Christian hostage killed in Afghanistan was found Tuesday as the Taliban’s new deadline loomed for the fate of the remaining 21 hostages.
The blood-stained, bullet-riddled body of a man was dumped in a field of clover in Arzoo village about six miles from the eastern city of Ghazni, according to Reuters.
Perhaps it’s nothing out of the ordinary. Thousands of people are murdered or die tragically every day. But for some reason it stood out to me and caused me to stop and ponder death: its entrance into the world because of sin, its defeat in the death of Jesus, and its final eradication when Jesus comes again.
What a glorious truth that death has lost all power over the believer because of his union with Jesus in His death and resurrection.
But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if many died through one man’s trespass, much more have the grace of God and the free gift by the grace of that one man Jesus Christ abounded for many. . . . For if, because of one man’s trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ. . . . Now the law came in to increase the trespass, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, so that, as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. — Romans 5
For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. . . . We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. — Romans 6
For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. — Romans 8
But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. . . . I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.” “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain. — 1 Corinthians 15
Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God, who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. — 2 Timothy 1
But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. . . . Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery. — Hebrews 2
Blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first resurrection! Over such the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him for a thousand years. . . . Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. . . . He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away. — Revelation 20–21
Assailants tied up three people at a publishing house that distributes Bibles in Turkey and then slit their throats Wednesday, adding to a string of attacks apparently targeting the country’s tiny Christian minority.The killings occurred in Malatya, a city in central Turkey known as a hotbed of Turkish nationalism and is the hometown of Mehmet Ali Agca, the gunman who tried to assassinate Pope John Paul II in 1981.
“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 5:10)
“I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the witness they had borne. 10 They cried out with a loud voice, ‘O Sovereign Lord, holy and true, how long before you will judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?’ 11 Then they were each given a white robe and told to rest a little longer, until the number of their fellow servants and their brothers should be complete, who were to be killed as they themselves had been.” (Revelation 6:9-11)
As Jews worldwide honored on Monday the memory of those who were murdered in the Holocaust, a 76-year-old survivor sacrificed his life to save his students in Monday’s shooting at Virginia Tech College that left 32 dead and over two dozen wounded.
Professor Liviu Librescu, 76, threw himself in front of the shooter, who had attempted to enter his classroom. The Israeli mechanics and engineering lecturer was shot to death, “but all the students lived—because of him,” Virginia Tech student Asael Arad—also an Israeli—told Army Radio.
In the deadliest shooting spree in U. S. history, an unidentified gunman killed more than 30 and injured more than 20 today on the campus of Virginia Tech in two separate shootings. Read about it from these major news sources.
Scot McKnight is reading Steven Keillor’s new book, God’s Judgments, and starts a discussion on the relationship between catastrophes and God’s judgment. McKnight opens his post with this:
Here’s my simple contention: if you believe God is in control of all, then you are driven to think either (1) that catastrophes are divine judgments or (2) that God has surrendered “control” to cosmic or human forces.
But does this really present all the options? Doesn’t this create a false dichotomy? Take Job for example. That God was in complete control of the tragic events in Job’s life is without question. Are we then forced to draw the conclusion that Job was being judged by God? Certainly not. That was the fundamental flaw of Job’s friends. If we learn anything from Job, we learn that there is another answer to the question of why bad things happen. God is in complete control, but He may bring hardship for reasons other than judgment.
Perhaps I’ve misunderstood McKnight’s contention. Perhaps he will clarify further in a later post. But so far, it seems to me that McKnight starts the discussion with too few options.
Read the first post at McKnight’s blog, Jesus Creed.
Mary Winkler, the pastor’s wife who killed her husband Matthew with a shotgun on November 22, 2006, is now free. She was sentenced to 3 years in prison, but served only 67 days. Only 12 of those days were spent in jail; she spent the other 55 in a mental health facility. She will serve the remainder of her reduced 210-day sentence on probation.
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The Taliban has killed the second of 23 South Korean Christian hostages: another man, 29-year-old Shim Sung-min.
Liviu Librescu, an Israeli professor at Virginia Tech, gave up his life yesterday to save his students. He died; they all lived.
Scot McKnight
