| Is God to Blame?: Moving Beyond Pat Answers to the Problem of Evil |  | Author: Gregory A. Boyd
Publisher: InterVarsity Press
Category: EBooks
List Price: $15.00
Buy New: $9.99
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Rating:  24 reviews
Sales Rank: 16630
Format: Kindle Book
Media: Kindle Edition
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 228
Dewey Decimal Number: 231.8
ASIN: B001HL0EXE
Publication Date: August 31, 2003
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Product Description
SPANISH EDITION. How to see a God who sacrificed everything for love.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 19 more reviews...
 Satan/Evil/Sin is to Blame! November 27, 2008
I have never believed that God has anything to do with the bad things that happen in my life - because I know Him. However, I didn't realize until I read this how very affected I had actually been by all the "God is in control" people...how very "anesthesized" I actually was to the spiritual battle going on around me...and how much I actually lived a life of blaming God for things just by the way I reacted to things, even though I would have said He wasn't responsible for it. This book was a good wake-up/reminder to me that God is not to blame...
 For Christians, God is not to blame. April 6, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This book deals with the book's title from a Christian perspective; stating that one must view Christ not as a part of God, but as God himself. Since Christ was never evil, or unkind, neither is God.
Our pain comes from the eternal struggle between good( God) and evil ( Satan) and stems from man's original desire to know the very nature of good and evil. Why good and evil exist together is to be known only to God; our attempt was ( in the Garden of Eden) destined to follow us for eternity, questioning God's love and kindness.
 No Two Biblical Interpretations May Coexist October 12, 2006
7 out of 11 found this review helpful
I open with a Bible verse from the Gospel of Matthew Chapter 5 verse 40, "and if anyone would sue you and take your coat, let him have your cloak as well;" Any Biblical literalist who is willing to put that verse into action, I am willing to listen to. In the meantime tremendous quantities of words by certain sectors of the self avowed Biblically correct have been spilled out upon this book in these reviews. A universal anger among certain of the devout permeates an assessment of how God allows free will to act. I am so glad that my fellow man feels free to impose his interpretations of Scripture on me as writ large by God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit and him or her self as the case may be. Amateur exegesis at this level is awe inspiring if for nothing more than its intolerant virulence. Obviously, a preponderance of the readers of this book as reflected in these threads are offended by Boyd's proposition that God is not the direct author of every evil event in the world and the cosmos.
Which leads me to the following observation. Boyd musters a plausible case for his theology backed by reasonable Biblical exegesis. Is this book a tour de force by a master theologian? No, but it does represent one possible Bible based exposition of the problems of the authorship and responsibility for evil in the world. The constant reminder that Jesus Christ is the revelation of the one true God who assumed human form for our salvation and edification is paramount to Boyd's knowledge of God. The radical egalitarian love of Jesus is constantly pointed out as the true reflection of God the Father. Other interpretations of scripture are assuredly available, and Boyd makes no exclusive claims for his theology. However, it is the certainty of the correctness of their theology on the part of many in the reviewing population that distresses me. Hidebound doctrinal arguments and positions of self righteousness are tearing the Church apart. The Church is the body of Christ on earth. What are we doing other than the work of Satan? Where is Christian love, tolerance and corrective spirit when needed? Boyd speaks for a kinder gentler God who allows us the freedom to cavort with the devil if we wish. However, he does not attribute responsibility for the results of our iniquity to a master plan of the Lord.
This is the first and last book I will be reviewing that deals with contemporary Christianity. This book came up for me to read in the context of a structured conversation on Augustine and free will. If one looks at my reviews, they will find them centered on the history of the early Church and antiquity. The early Church suffered through just such problems of division as we do today. And to its credit, the early Church always sought to reform and reintegrate the "holier than thou" as exemplified by the Mellitians and Donatists, and it attempted to rehabilitate and bring back into communion its heretics. Each soul and life is and was precious to God. It was only later that the Church burned dissenters and heretics at the stake. And please remember, the author of this book is not some "new age" liberal theologian. He is a respected scholar at a conservative mid-western theological seminary. He is also the pastor of a major evangelical church in St. Paul, Minnesota. And yes, he has lost over twenty percent of his flock because of his theology and writings. I can only suggest that one reads and reflects on this book and makes up their own mind as to whether Boyd is right or wrong. If the idea of God as author of all evil in the world as part of His inscrutable plan for His creation disturbs you, this book will present an alternate, albeit hotly contested, look at the issue. It was in 1919 when one of the most brilliant minds of the 20th Century, Bertrand Russell, at the end of World War One stated and I paraphrase, "If this war was part of your God's divine plan, I do not wish to know Him." Do not Christians wish God to be known to all men?
Not all things that happen are God's will May 24, 2006
13 out of 13 found this review helpful
Boyd explores the idea that not everything that happens in our world is God's will. He develops the thesis that we were created with true free will, which necessitates the possibility of things happening which God does not want to happen. The practical implication in regards to suffering is that when we suffer, God suffers with us, rather than causing our suffering for some higher purpose.
Another idea Boyd discusses is that rather than God's will being something which is inscrutable and creation being relatively simple, he suggests that God's will is easy to understand (it is demonstrated in Jesus Christ), but creation is incomprehensibly complicated.
Boyd emphaszies that our starting point in understanding God's character needs to be Jesus Christ. He is our starting point. Everything we need to know about God was revealed in Him. Starting from here, he seeks to develop a theology of suffering which is consistent with the picture of God which Jesus Christ presented.
A balanced view of Evil September 19, 2005
20 out of 21 found this review helpful
This is a great book with a balanced view of evil. This book is a shorter version of Satan and the problem of Evil, by the same author. This book presents a theology that explains the problem of evil in a way that the layperson can fully understand how a God of Love can also be a God of Wrath. It presents a realistic theology dealing with Satan and the fallen angels, and mankind's responsibility for evil in this world. This book does all these things while preserving and even expanding God's sovereignty, and demonstrating that men and women have a free will.
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