Walking with God through Pain and Suffering

by Timothy J. Keller

In the past few decades, therefore, most Christian thinkers and philosophers have turned away from the very project of seeking full theodicies. Instead, they have increasingly (and to my mind, rightly) recommended that believers not try to formulate theodicies but rather simply mount a defense. A defense shies away from trying to tell a full story that reveals God’s purposes in decreeing or allowing evil. A defense simply seeks to prove that the argument against God from evil fails, that the skeptics have failed to make their case. A defense shows that the existence of evil does not mean God can’t or is unlikely to exist. In making a theodicy, the burden of proof is upon the believer in God. He or she must provide an account so convincing that the listener says to the believer, “Now I see why all the suffering is worth it.” But in a defense, the burden of proof is upon the skeptic.