What do you think?
Rate this book
Is This a God of Love?
Book by Wilder-Smith, A. E.
184 pages, Paperback
First published December 1, 1991
10 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
September 4, 2024
THE FAMED SCIENTIST EXPLAINS IN GREATER DETAIL, "WHY DOES GOD ALLOW IT?"
Arthur Ernest Wilder-Smith (1915-1995) was an organic-chemist, humanitarian, lecturer and an author on young earth creationism. He also wrote books such as 'Man's Origin, Man's Destiny: A Critical Survey of the Principles of Evolution and Christianity,' 'The Creation of Life: A Cybernetic Approach to Evolution,' 'He Who Thinks Has to Believe,' and 'The Natural Sciences Know Nothing of Evolution.' This book expands upon his earlier book, 'Why Does God Allow It?.'
He wrote in the first chapter of this 1990 book, "If God is almighty... why doesn't he stop all this chaos, all these wars, all the unrighteousness, injustice, misery and suffering in the world? Why did he ever let them start?" (Pg. 13) He adds, "the question is: if the same Being planned both the good and the bad, the beautiful and the ugly, the sadistic and the loving, then all serious, logical, reasoning thought about him becomes impossible with our thinking faculties." (Pg. 19)
But he points out, "at least parts of Holy Scripture do not appear to sympathize greatly with the intellectual difficulties discussed here. The Bible says a look at nature should be enough to make a person a convinced, thankful, worshiping believer." (Pg. 23) He asserts, "The very fact that man has never succeeded in devising a formal proof of God's existence shows how completely God can and does hide himself and his limits from our eyes." (Pg. 101)
He cites the example of the raising of Lazarus [Jn 11]: "[Lazarus'] personal resurrection, reduced the hopelessness and meaninglessness of his suffering to meaningfulness... For surely, if a short term of suffering is the method by which eternal non-suffering or bliss is to be attained, then Lazarus was in for a bargain... and reasonableness is restored to apparent unreasonableness." (Pg. 45)
He suggests, "In leaving open a chance for seen and unseen creation to return to the ultimate good, God did not 'stop the bad.' The free choice was still left open, leaving ruination and its cause still intact. That is the reason why God allows it---to provide a genuine chance for the return of love in general." (Pg. 94-95)
After quoting from C.S. Lewis's book, A Grief Observed, he states, "Plainly, this means that if we believe in God at all, we must believe that it is consistent with his perfect nature, kindness and love to hurt us and to leave us wallowing in our own blood, as it were, right up to the end." (Pg. 127)
In the concluding chapter on Predestination & Free Will, he says, "a position of free will existing happily side by side with plain predestination obviously cannot be handled by simple logic. From the ordinary human point of view one concept excludes the other... we must ask" '... is it our description of reality which is at fault?' To decide this point the following must be considered: Reality is multidimensional and probably eternal, whereas we are three dimensional and strictly temporal in our present state... if we were to maintain that the fact of free will cuts out the possibility of predestination or 'no free will' ... then we commit the same type of error as we would if we maintained that light, being a wave function, cannot be corpuscular... Thus, we maintain that free will is a reality and so is predestination." (Pg. 179-181)
Arthur Ernest Wilder-Smith (1915-1995) was an organic-chemist, humanitarian, lecturer and an author on young earth creationism. He also wrote books such as 'Man's Origin, Man's Destiny: A Critical Survey of the Principles of Evolution and Christianity,' 'The Creation of Life: A Cybernetic Approach to Evolution,' 'He Who Thinks Has to Believe,' and 'The Natural Sciences Know Nothing of Evolution.' This book expands upon his earlier book, 'Why Does God Allow It?.'
He wrote in the first chapter of this 1990 book, "If God is almighty... why doesn't he stop all this chaos, all these wars, all the unrighteousness, injustice, misery and suffering in the world? Why did he ever let them start?" (Pg. 13) He adds, "the question is: if the same Being planned both the good and the bad, the beautiful and the ugly, the sadistic and the loving, then all serious, logical, reasoning thought about him becomes impossible with our thinking faculties." (Pg. 19)
But he points out, "at least parts of Holy Scripture do not appear to sympathize greatly with the intellectual difficulties discussed here. The Bible says a look at nature should be enough to make a person a convinced, thankful, worshiping believer." (Pg. 23) He asserts, "The very fact that man has never succeeded in devising a formal proof of God's existence shows how completely God can and does hide himself and his limits from our eyes." (Pg. 101)
He cites the example of the raising of Lazarus [Jn 11]: "[Lazarus'] personal resurrection, reduced the hopelessness and meaninglessness of his suffering to meaningfulness... For surely, if a short term of suffering is the method by which eternal non-suffering or bliss is to be attained, then Lazarus was in for a bargain... and reasonableness is restored to apparent unreasonableness." (Pg. 45)
He suggests, "In leaving open a chance for seen and unseen creation to return to the ultimate good, God did not 'stop the bad.' The free choice was still left open, leaving ruination and its cause still intact. That is the reason why God allows it---to provide a genuine chance for the return of love in general." (Pg. 94-95)
After quoting from C.S. Lewis's book, A Grief Observed, he states, "Plainly, this means that if we believe in God at all, we must believe that it is consistent with his perfect nature, kindness and love to hurt us and to leave us wallowing in our own blood, as it were, right up to the end." (Pg. 127)
In the concluding chapter on Predestination & Free Will, he says, "a position of free will existing happily side by side with plain predestination obviously cannot be handled by simple logic. From the ordinary human point of view one concept excludes the other... we must ask" '... is it our description of reality which is at fault?' To decide this point the following must be considered: Reality is multidimensional and probably eternal, whereas we are three dimensional and strictly temporal in our present state... if we were to maintain that the fact of free will cuts out the possibility of predestination or 'no free will' ... then we commit the same type of error as we would if we maintained that light, being a wave function, cannot be corpuscular... Thus, we maintain that free will is a reality and so is predestination." (Pg. 179-181)
December 18, 2012
If you have always wondered about the problem of evil and why does God allow it, etc, and you are a Christian, then you need to get this short, simple and concise book.
It is simple, but not in the sense of simple-mindedness, but is easy to understand, and has some very profound and insightful thoughts on this subject. This short book helped me immensely, every Christian library should have it, especially those individuals who expect to go to the university. Rather than lay your brain at the door, the Christian in today's world has immense intellectual challenges ahead in the school, and culture in general. I have been on different sides of the debate, but I personally believe the Christian worldview the most compelling in its fit with reality. This book brings extremely useful insights on subject of God's love and the existence of evil.
It is simple, but not in the sense of simple-mindedness, but is easy to understand, and has some very profound and insightful thoughts on this subject. This short book helped me immensely, every Christian library should have it, especially those individuals who expect to go to the university. Rather than lay your brain at the door, the Christian in today's world has immense intellectual challenges ahead in the school, and culture in general. I have been on different sides of the debate, but I personally believe the Christian worldview the most compelling in its fit with reality. This book brings extremely useful insights on subject of God's love and the existence of evil.
March 24, 2012
This is a tremendous response to the problem of suffering. A. E. Wilder-Smith uses the example of a cathedral he had visited in Germany before World War II. It was a beautiful work of art, but after the war it had been bombed so bad it was barely left standing. Dr. Wilder-Smith visited the cathedral after the war in its battered condition and realized that he was able to appreciate some of the architecture in ways that he hadn't before. He could see inside the walls and ceiling because of the holes the bombs had made. In a similar way our world has been battered by our sin, but because of the damage done, and the great solution, Christ' death for sin and resurrection defeating death, we can appreciate God much more than we could have if everything had remained innocent.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews