Note: Can I Say This at Church is produced for audio listening. If able, I strongly encourage you to listen to the audio, which has inflection, emotion, sarcasm where applicable, and emphasis for points that may not come across well in written word. This transcript is generated using a combination of my ears and software, and may contain errors. Please check the episode for clarity before quoting in print.

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Thomas 0:00

I usually don't try to nuance the phrase “God is in control” because I simply don't think it's true. I don't think God is in control and I find that to be a great sense of relief. And I think most victims do as well. That is, if God is truly in control, that means that every rape, torture, (and) genocide in the world, are somehow caused or allowed by God. And the way most Christians think about it is that it's somehow a part of a master plan, because God's in control. I just can't live that way. And most people I know, can't live that way. Now, sometimes people use the phrase God is in control and by that they mean something like God's still working in this situation. I'm totally on board if that's the meaning that people have, because the God I believe in never gives up anytime. And we're never totally on our own. God is always present, always empowering, always acting for good So if that's what God is in control is supposed to be meaning then I'm on board with that. I just want to get away from the notion that God either could (have) prevented some evil or God was actually the cause of the evil I think that undermines a coherent view of divine love.

Seth Price 1:41

Hey there, everyone. Welcome back to the Can I Say This At Church podcast, January is about over, I'm Seth your host, and I'm excited that you're here. Before the show gets underway. Thank you so much to each and every one of you that support the show on Patreon and if you have not yet done that, click the button, do it. You're going to get some free stuff. Honestly, what Paul helped create with the four part series on Oscar Romero, I've gone back and listened to a few times it is really beautiful. Every once a while, you'll get some of my writings which have no author, but maybe one day. A few videos just BONUS stuff that you wouldn't normally get. Just you're on iTunes, we'd love to give that to you. And so thank you to our newest supporters, another recent uptick over the holidays. And so I appreciate every single one of you, I know that every dollar that you have is well earned, and hard earned. And I am humbled by your support.

If I asked you, is there anything that God can't do? Most people in America would have that normal answer. Of course not! God is all powerful. God is omnipotent. God is omnipresent. God exists outside of time, God can do whatever he wants to do because God is God. I've come to think that that's wrong. There's a lot of things that God can't do, and it's because he limits himself by his love. And that sounds odd to hear out loud but as I've wrestled over these past few years with what the concepts of God are, for me, what love looks like for me, what that changes in my life and how I fail at it constantly, I've realized a beauty and a linkage between love, between fear, between anger, and between pain. And anger and pain are always part of the equation. It's almost like they balance everything out. But that leaves you raw, and it leaves me raw. And it makes me feel like life is often unfair.

Thomas Jay Ord is a theologian he's a professor, he's a lot of things. And he has a book that just released here at the beginning of January called God Can't: How to believe in God and love after tragedy, abuse and other evils. So the topic you're going to hear today in the conversation today is a lot about the problem of evil and the problem of pain, how we deal with that, how we work through it, what we're called to-in it, and honestly, from the bottom of my heart, this book needs to be in every home and every house. hospital and every church library. This book, man it is powerful. And I'm not explaining it well and so I'm going to stop trying. Let's roll the tape on this conversation with Thomas Jay Oord.

Seth Price 4:41

Thomas Jay Oord, I'm so happy to have you on the show be so when I spoke with Mark Karris on prayer, he referenced you in his book so often that I bought it and then I gave it away. There's a small group of people on Patreon I correlate with some of the donations books and I send them books each month and so two months ago, I believe in over By the time this comes out, I sent about eight people your book and and got some great feedback on it. So not not that not the newest book, not the book coming out, right? But uh, but yeah, and so I love what you're doing and I'm so happy you've been able to come on.

Thomas 5:16

Thanks so much for hosting this chat.

Seth Price 5:19

I like to start with a bit about you. So in two or three or five or seventeen, if you do seventeen minutes though I'm going to edit it down, just kind of what brought you to where you're at in life, kind of, you know, the faith of your childhood, how that kind of impacted you growing up and then what brought you to do what you do now?

Thomas 5:39

Yeah, I grew up in a family of people who went to church a lot. My parents are Christians, my sibling Christians. They were not perfect parents, but they were probably above average. And I took Christian faith very seriously. I was one of those adamant door to door evangelists and in fact, I was a part of Campus Crusade for Christ for a while when I was in college. And about my senior year of college I got to the place where I could no longer make sense of faith and God and ended up turning to atheism for a short period of time because the reasons I had for believing that there was a god no longer made sense to me.

I came back to faith not because I was certain that there was a God, but it seemed to be more plausible than not that there was a God. And various factors were involved, but probably two or primary one was, I had this deep intuition that I ought to be a loving person, and that others ought to love as well. And I thought that belief in God provided the best overall framework to place that intuition. And secondly, and related, I believed that life must have some meaning, and I couldn't make sense of life having meaning if there wasn't a meaning maker, a “god”. And so I’m a theologian, married have kids. Probably the most important thing about me is that more than anything else in the world, I want to live a life of love.

Seth Price 7:18

You said two things there that I want to break apart of it, and it's extremely relevant to your writing. So do you feel like if someone disengages from a belief in God, that they can't live a life of love or maybe that's the wrong way to say it? But are the two connected in the way that like two links on a chain are or can they stand apart?

Thomas 7:39

Some of the most loving people I know are atheists. The Dalai Lama would be one of them. The Dalai Lama doesn't believe in God. No you don't have to believe in God to be a loving person. But I do think belief in God, a certain kind of belief in God. I believe in a loving God can be a major motivation to not only love but also think that our lives are meaningful and that love makes sense overall. Maybe another way to put it is, belief in God provides a fundamental framework for making sense of the, I think, deep seated intuition that most of us have that we ought to be loving people.

Seth Price 8:22

the book that's coming out for God Can't and I cannot remember the subtitle, it's longer than I can remember.

Thomas 8:29

Yes, I make long subtitles

Seth Price 8:31

Yeah, I've three small children and subtitles…it's all I can do to remember which episode of Umizoomi that we're on for the three year old. And if any of you listening watch Umizoomi I'm praying for you and I hope I really hope that you praying for me and for my sanity. But the one that I sent everyone is all about the uncontrolling love of God. And so your new book, God Can't really builds or at least I think that it builds off of that. And so I think for those that have not really read that book and I do not want to make this interview specifically about that-at all. But I think that it is good to kind of baseline what you mean when you say that because I think if I said that in any church would be that, “of course God's love is uncontrolling”. And the same way that I would say, hey, how's your Tuesday and not mean anything by it? So what do you mean when you say that?

Thomas 9:20

Well, first of all, you're right to see the connection between the two books. The Uncontrolling love of God was actually published by an Academic Press. And although I tried really hard to make it understandable, it was still a little too sophisticated for some people's reading. The new book, God Can't with the subtitle, how to believe in God and love after tragedy, abuse and other evils is a much more readable book includes a lot of stories, and I really wrote it to be the kind of book that, you know, my mother could read and not feel like she had to have a theology degree. So I do think a lot of people like the idea of uncontrolling Love the uncontrolling love of God. But those same people will recoil in horror if you say God can't do something. And to me those are inextricably linked. And the idea is this that God's love is essentially are inherently self-giving and others empowering. And therefore God must give freedom to complex creatures, you know, who are complex enough to be able to express free actions, or agency and self organization to less complex creatures, even the mere existence or what we call the laws of nature are derived from God's love, and God must love in this kind of way. And if God must self give, and others empower, then that suggests that God simply can't overpower, can't control, can't, you know, be a sufficient cause, to do the philosophical language there.

And so this new book really says it explicitly in the title, in part, because the first book generated lots of mail from people who have been hurt deeply, (have) been the victims of abuse, bad luck, accidents, horrible events. And that previous book gave them a way to think about God that allowed them to think that God didn't sort of stand by and not intervene to help them. So a lot of people have no problem saying God won't control others. But I'm going so far as to say God can't control others.

Because if God simply won't, sounds like God could, and victims of abuse are wondering, hey, where were you God? Why didn't you step in and help me out in the midst of my suffering?

Seth Price 11:48

Yeah, well, and that's a fair, if that's the God that we say that we believe in and the God that's preached on Sundays, that is a fair rebuttal to…I mean, I can't…if I'm God and one of my children is being harmed. If I do nothing, what kind of a father am I? And so it's an entirely fair criticism of what I think a lot of at least Western Christianity, characterizes God, quote unquote, as, or at least the people that I'm engaged with, in day in and day out the people that I talked with day in and day out, why can't God then? So if it's his love, I don't understand how that love restricts him from intervening in something that he created?

Thomas 12:38

Yeah.

So two things to keep in mind, first of all, is to claim that God's love is inherently uncontrolling. So that's sort of a you know, upfront claim that love just doesn't manipulate dominate, allow no free choice in response in return. But secondly, we sometimes can use our bodies to constrain the freedoms of others. You know, maybe you say you get kids, maybe one of your kids is about ready to step into the street and you reach out and grab him by the shoulder and or if you have a boy or not, so you grab your son by the shoulder and pull him out of the way of a car. Well, he was freely doing something and yet you constrained his freedom in some way by pulling him back. So one of the important points of the book is that God is a universal spirit without a localized divine body.

There's some things that you and I can do because we have localized bodies, the God simply can't do directly because God doesn't have a universal body. Now, of course, God can call upon you set the pull your son from out of the traffic and in that sense, you can be God's hands in that moment, but that's a little different from saying that God directly did it with the divine body.

Seth Price 14:32

So this is something, as I finished your book, it's actually something I wrote down so I'm glad that you brought that up this was a thought from it. So is the body, the corporeal body, (a) requirement of this? And so I guess my question is all the things that God can't do as we read through the book, because of the the nature of his of His love could Jesus subvert that since he was God, had a corporeal body could he be like now “No, we normally can't. But since I'm actually here, I am going to grab the shoulders of humanity”, or grab their shoulders of my son or pick a name, pick an instance. Does the body matter or do you mean that more as a metaphorical way?

Thomas 15:15

No, the body really does matter. Now, I think Jesus used his body in ways that help people out, you know, in, in obvious ways, but Jesus also couldn't do things because he was a localized person with the body. You and I can't do a ton of things, even though we can do some things. And so, you know, Jesus was unable to stop some horrific things, including the hurting people in some instances. In fact, he goes to his hometown and he says, he can't heal people there because they don't have faith and don't respond to him. But the claim that I'm making here in this book is that God's essential, we'll call it composition, the stuff out of which God has made his spiritual and it's universal. And Jesus is different.

Jesus has a particular body in a particular place. The kind of Christology I find most appealing is what scholars call a spirit Christology. And that's the idea that Jesus is truly a human. But because he responds to God's Spirit, the Holy Spirit in him, he reveals God's character, he's divine in that way. And so I wouldn't say I wouldn't I usually don't walk around saying Jesus is God. If by that we mean, Jesus had all of the attributes, we typically think God has, like, you know, knowing everything, being everywhere, all that sort of thing.

Seth Price 16:49

That’s fair. Yeah, because you never really addressed it directly in the book, but it was…the question bubbled up as I read. There's a lot of personal stories in this and so the question kept bubbling up and it was Usually around the problem of evil and if there's anything that I've learned this year, the further I intentionally try to connect with a beauty and a love of God, the more of offensive evil becomes and the more angry I get about it. And the more powerless I become—or the more I feel like I become I'm probably actually more powerful. I don't have the stones to act on it. So when you say tragedy, abuse and other evils tragedy, that makes sense, you know, a tornado or hurricane a tsunami abuse. I think I know where you're going with that. But what do you mean when you say other evils?

Thomas 17:39

Well, I think there's other things that happen in the world that aren't necessarily directly related to those first two. So like, let's say, sickness, you know, someone gets sick. This is tragedy. Well, maybe it falls in that category. If you think tragedy is anything that happens that wasn't caused by freewill people. Maybe another form of evil that I mentioned in the book is neglect. Maybe that abuse is big enough to put neglect under. But really that last “evil” is a catch all phrase to talk about any kind of pointless pain, or unnecessary suffering that occurs in our lives. I'm not making the claim in this book, that all pain and suffering is inherently or genuinely evil. I think sometimes we choose, in fact, to endure pain, we self sacrifice, because we believe in doing so we're going to, you know, bring about a better world or help somebody out or whatever. So I'm not making the claim that all pain and suffering is evil, but I do think some pain and suffering is evil. And I mentioned tons and tons of actual cases, but also just general examples like rape, torture, you know, war, etc.

Seth Price 18:57

And so is that what you're getting at you define something called genuine evil. And so is that what you're getting at when or is there a distinction there?

Thomas 19:07

Yeah, I like to say sometimes use the word genuine evil, genuine evil is an event that makes the world worse than it might have been had some other possible event occurred instead. And it's just a way of trying to admit that sometimes people use the word evil kind of loosely, and they will lump what is apparently evil with what is genuinely evil. And I want to say there's a difference between the two of those.

Seth Price 19:38

Do we need evil to have a concept of salvation or sanctification? If we could somehow remove evil from the equation would we even desire, do you think we would even desire will we have any need of a Savior?

Thomas 19:53

Yeah, I don't know that we need that, as if we have a choice over the matter, it's just the way that the world is and so given the world is like that, we also then bring in issues of salvation and the the search for a savior. I think maybe the bigger question is this: is it possible for God to create a world in which even the possibility for evil is not present? And I don't think it is.

I think every world God might create the possibility for evil is there. Now, not the actuality might have a hope that someday there will be no evil in heaven or however you want to talk about the afterlife. But even there, I think the possibility is there but creatures choose to cooperate with God's love.

Seth Price 20:44

So growing up Calvinist that doesn't jive with anything I was taught as a child (laughter from Thomas) because what I hear is God's not in control. If I'm hearing this as a person that's still on the fence of I like what you're saying, Thomas, I like uncontrolling love, I can understand that it calls me to action. I don't know that I'm comfortable with that. But I don't know that I can sit with God unable to create a structure that doesn't break itself because he set up the rules arbitrarily in such a way that he’ll let my son get hit by the car, because he doesn't want to control me, because then I don't love him. He's forcing me to do it. How do you? How do you nuance that for somebody that is still on that rigid fence?

Thomas 21:32

I usually don't try to nuance the phrase God is in control because I simply don't think it's true. I don't think God is in control. And I find that to be a great sense of relief and I think most victims do as well. That is, if God is truly in control, that means that every rape, torture, (and) genocide in the world, are somehow caused or allowed by God and the way that most Christians think about it is that it's somehow a part of a master plan because God's in control. I just can't live that way. And most people I know can't live that way.

Now, sometimes people use the phrase “God is in control”. And by that they mean something like, God's still working in this situation. I'm totally on board if that's the meaning that people have. Because the God I believe in never gives up anytime. And we're never totally on our own. God is always present, always empowering, always acting for good. So if that's what God is in control is supposed to be meaning, than I'm on board with that, I just want to get away from the notion that God either could prevented some evil or God was actually the cause of the evil I think that undermines a coherent view of divine love.

Seth Price 22:52

What do we do with…so when something bad happens what do we do with the trite responses and so this is I usually don't like to get very personal but so my, I have a family member that passed away and she had Downs Syndrome. And you hear a lot of people saying, Well, God got another angel in heaven or whatever, as if it's a way to placate me feeling better, because somehow I needed that. Is there any use for that type of thought process or that type of conversation with someone when they're grieving with evil, and they need something to hold on to? Because I can understand logically, God is still loving me and still working to make this whole and beautiful. And shalom, you know, he's still working for this. But I don't want to hear that right now. Because the parts of my brain that can think logically are turned off because I'm so emotional at this moment. And I just don't want to talk about that. And so is there any, is there any reasoning for placating like that Is it is it worthwhile or should we just not say anything?

Thomas 23:52

What I usually try to do in those situations is not correct what I think is bad theology, but respond with what I think is good theology. So if somebody says, you know, “God needed another angel in heaven”, I don't say, “Come on now, that's stupid. God's got plenty of angels” or whatever. I say something like God now, or I don't know what your name of your friend who had Downs Syndrome was, but let's say it is Jim, I can say, hey, “Jim's in a better place with a different kind of way of existing now”, or whatever.

And this brings up all kinds of questions about whether or not Downs Syndrome is inherently evil or not, or blindness or whatever. And that's a real, real interesting conversation in the disability community. In that kind of scenario, I typically respond to theology that I think is bad by giving a response that I hope is reassuring, but also theology I can believe in.

Seth Price 24:52

So my wife is a nurse. And so she deals with a lot with with loss and grief. And I have to think in your line of work, I mean, a lot of your work is evil and pain and theodicy and grief and angst and I find the more and more that I do this, people ask me questions that I'm wholly unequipped to answer at all, and I just usually say, I don't know, which is the best answer, I can say. What is the the role of empathy? And I feel like you had what was it called? You said something called the Crimson Rule, I believe, and it was, yeah, empathy, and then God feels that pain. And then there's a distinction between what an empathetic God actually is.

Thomas 25:36

Well, in the Crimson Rule, I was contrasting that with the contrast thing, I was supplementing it with a golden rule, which is, of course, “do unto others as you would have them do unto you”. And the Crimson rule is that “we should feel with others as we would have them feel with us”. In other words, we should empathize with them. Unfortunately, many formal or classical theologies have portrayed God is unaffected by what happens in the world. The impassable God is the classic phrase.

Fortunately, most Christians, most believers, have rejected the formal view of God on that point. Most people really do think that God cares about us has compassion and responds to our grief, and empathizes. So I spent one chapter expressing what that looks like, and how we can believe that God really does suffer with us.

Seth Price 27:03

What Scripture, specifically, just four or five, can support this view of God? Because I want to be clear on that. Because a lot of the pushback that I get often is I talk a lot about concepts. And then I talk a lot about theology. And then we don't always relate it back to Biblical Scripture verses. And so for the view that you're holding, and I do know, just based on some research on you that your view has not always been popular in the circles that you've run in, and there's been. So I mean, we can have that conversation. But that's easy enough to Google.

And so as people engage in this they need some meat to take away. And so what Scripturally and why can we read Scripture in a way that that supports this view of a non controlling God and that God can't do things?

Thomas 27:53

I do think that a lot of people are taken aback by any kind of claim that says, “God can't” do something. But I like to quickly point out that there are several passages in the Bible itself, that explicitly say God can't do some things. So, for instance, the writer of Hebrews says, it's impossible for God to lie. James says God cannot be tempted. The Psalmist says God can't grow tired. The passage that I like best is one in which Paul is writing to Timothy and Paul says, when we are faithless, God remains faithful, because God can't deny Himself. And I joined with many, many Christian theologians throughout the centuries, who have said there's some things that Gods simply can't do, because to do them would be to deny God's self.

So for instance, most theologians have said God can't stop existing. God exists necessarily, and so God simply can't choose to just disappear and no longer exist. Or they'll say God can't decide that God won't be in New York this weekend because God's omnipresent, God is present everywhere, etc, etc. And then there's most theologians have said God can't do is logically impossible. I don't know if you had philosophy in your lifetime, but a lot of philosophy classes, they asked the classic question, “Can God make a rock so big that even God can't lift it?

Seth Price 29:35

Yeah, I remember that question.

Thomas 29:37

Yeah. theologians have said, Nope, God cannot. That's simply impossible. It's logically impossible. And there's other things as well.

Seth Price 29:45

I can go without getting so mad at that question in my intro to philosophy because, you know, arrogant me. I was like, Oh, yeah, I know this answer. And the more I think about it, the more angry I get just so mad at that. I hate that stupid question!

Thomas 30:00

(laughs) Yeah, if you look at the history of theology, most Christian theologians have said, there's things God can't do because either they're logically impossible, or they go against God's nature. And I'm taking that second one and saying God's nature's love and that love is self giving, and others empowering, and therefore that means if God always does that, God can't control those he gives this power to or this freedom or agency. So it's kind of just a logical, laying out of the implications of saying, love comes first in God and love is this certain kind of action.

Seth Price 30:40

Big word time so that that view of God is what we call “open theism?” Correct, or am I wrong on that?

Thomas 30:47

Well, it's actually some open theists wouldn't agree with what I just said. What I call that particular view is essential kenosis. But open theists believe that the future is open for God and so the future isn't yet knowable so there's an unknown future.

Seth Price 31:06

And then say those other two words again. So how does that distinguish versus essential kenosis?

Thomas 31:12

Yeah, so I'm I'm both an open theist and an advocate of essential kenosis. I think God necessarily self gives and others empowers and God simply can't control others. But some open theists think that the future is open and God can't know it, but they think God could control others if God wants to. In fact, maybe sometimes God does. So I'm a little bit different than some of my open theist friends on that particular issue of God's power.

Seth Price 31:43

Does…should it matter that God, no…I'm saying this wrong…So I wanna, I can't say this right, and then my brain’s not at work. Okay. So in the last chapter of your book you talked about we need to cooperate with God and I, I struggle to figure out how to do that most days, I can talk a big game, and I can play a big game and I can feel like I'm doing it. And then at the end of the day, sit down and realize, nope, still not doing it. And so what is our role in cooperation to help repair things to help do what God has called us to? To help do the things that possibly God can't do because it needs to be us doing it with him? How do I…I can't make it work. Most days I can't make it work.

Thomas 32:33

Well, I think every day you love your children, you're cooperating with God. Every day you are kind, every day you go to work to do what's helpful for your family in the world you're cooperating with God. Every time you turn on your left blinker at an intersection are that straight in front of you so that they don't get in a wreck you're in cooperating with God. I think it's a lot easier, perhaps in some situations, and we normally think we normally think of cooperating with God, oh, that means I've got to go down and you know, I'm no, picket some unjust factory. Well, maybe that's the case, sometimes. But most of the time, our moment by moment decisions are fairly mundane. They're fairly usual. And God's calling us to do something in every single moment, and it's not spectacular. And when we cooperate, then God's will is being done in our lives and in the world. And I think God requires that kind of cooperation. If the world is going to be the kind of loving place and if we're going to be the kind of loving people God wants.

Seth Price 33:42

Did somebody cut you off in traffic today?

Thomas 33:47

(laughts) No, they did not but that's a good question. (laughs)

Seth Price 33:50

That was awful specific. So there's so many stories of you know, near death experiences, which I don't know how much credence I get to that. I felt like a lot of that has got to be chemical in the brain. And I'm not a scientist, but I don't know that they sound great. They're really fantastical and mystical and beautiful if they work for other people. But there are so many countless stories of God intervening in a way that kind of seemed to contradict the premise of the book. So what do I do with those?

Do I just write it off as “Yeah, those people over there a bit crazy. And we let them believe that because it makes them feel good” or what place should that hold those experiences those miracles, for lack of a better word, that don't really have any other? It seems like God went in and pulled the kid out of the road like, Nope, it's coming back. It's not happening or you know, people will. I mean, there's a movie coming out here soon. I saw a trailer for that a produced by Steph Curry where a kid goes under the water. He's frozen. It's based on a true story. He's down underneath frozen water for like 15 minutes and he comes back to life and he's got this beautiful story. I'm sure I'll go see it in the movies because there's not a lot else coming out around the holiday. So how do we sit with interactions like that, and stories like that, that you hope that everybody's not making them up? And I don't think that they are. So how do I reconcile those with a theology that says, Well, yeah, God really can't do that.

Thomas 35:16

Yeah, so I really do believe in miracles. I really do believe that God is working at all times and in all places, and sometimes miraculous, spectacular things occur—things that were unexpected. So saying, God can't control others, does not mean you have to give up on miracles. But you have to understand miracles differently than one might who thinks that God is controlling. What you have to do is think about other factors, other actors, other cooperations or conditions that are a part of the environment that make the miracle is possible.

The movie you just mentioned, I haven't seen it either. I haven't even seen the trailer. But the idea that someone could be dead for 15 minutes because they've drowned and come back to life. I mean, that's it's happened many, many, many times in history, people have been dead for hours and cold because they've drowned in cold water and come back to life. Now, I think that's totally explainable in a view that says God never gives up on anybody at any time. And when creation cooperates, even at the smallest levels, the cellular, the lungs, the organs, they have a capacity to cooperate or not and when they cooperate, incredibly miraculous things can happen. But I also want to make sure I add in there that these kinds of miracles are made possible because of God's acting first, and then creations response. And sometimes the conditions are not right. Sometimes creation does not cooperate. creatures don't cooperate, and miracles don't happen. To me, that's just as important as affirming miracles, because there's lots of instances in which people are prayed for, and don't come back to life. And if those are part of the world in which we live, and we want to give an account for the hope that we have within us, then we have to ask the question, okay, if God helped some people and doesn't help others, is this a loving God; or can we think God helped everybody? But the conditions were right in some cases and not in others?

Seth Price 37:31

I wanted to end with this. So for those that are driving, and they haven't been paying attention for the last 10 minutes, because someone cut them off in traffic, and now they're angry. Nobody signaled the blinker there-in two to three minutes what is the biggest takeaway that you want someone as they dive into the book and into into into the theology behind it? What is the biggest takeaway that you feel like someone can take and with agency act act upon to further I guess the kingdom of God like to further things to be better?

Thomas 38:09

In terms of this book, you mean?

Seth Price 38:10

Yeah, yeah, like if we take this this thought and and everything from it and we roll it together. And what is when someone closes the book, they set it down, they walk across the room to their wife or their husband or their mom or their neighbor and they say, “Hey, I just read something”. What is it that you want them to hear? Like, what is the ninety second pitch of “Hey, Grandma, you need to look at me in the eyes. I need to tell you something”.

Thomas 38:37

One of the cool things about this book is that I have sent the electronic copy to quite a few people for reviews and podcast interviews like I'm doing with you. And the vast majority of people are blown away by this book. The vast majority of people have heard the tried and true and trite and unsatisfactory answers (that) people give to why a loving and powerful God doesn't prevent the horrific things, the injustice, the pain and suffering, that's unnecessary that we or our loved ones have gone through. And people I think are tired of the you know, “it's all a part of God's plan” or “God is punishing you” or “God just is at a distance and is not involved”, whatever the kinds of answers they've been given. This book solves the problem of evil. I know it sounds cocky to say solve, but I'm not messing around with this book. I'm not sort of throwing out little, you know, cliches and these answers that never made sense. I'm going right to the core. I'm saying God loves you all the time always. But God simply doesn't have the kind of power to control you or your circumstances. And that's good news not bad news! It's good news because you don't have to blame God. You don't have to worry the gods pissed at you, but Because you did something and is now punishing you, you don't have to look at the world and see all the evil and say, well in some mysterious way, it's really good and God's plan. You can look at the world be realistic believe in a God of love and as you finish reading this book saying now this is a God I can actually believe and actually can worship.

Seth Price 40:22

No, I agree. And it's and it's one that did receive the book. I want to be very clear. I walked away with that, that but I want to I want to try to give voice to those...

Thomas 40:34

Yeah. Oh, there's gonna be a ton of people. There are a ton of people who are going to look at the title of this book and say, You got to be kidding me. God, can’t! I know that

Seth Price 40:45

No, I like the title of the book. Yeah, there were many days that I would read. So I'll read while my wife balances a check register or whatever. And so I would read something I would look at her and she she's a nurse to pediatric Cancer kids. So when I said she was a nurse earlier, so it's not just cruel it's children like it's, yeah, it's hard. And it's…

Thomas 41:08

I've got a couple of endorsements from leading psychologists, therapists, and they say this is the book they want to give their clients because this is an answer to the deep questions people have, that most people are not willing to go in the direction I go, maybe it's not right to say they're not willing. I think most people have not even thought about this possibility. And so I think this is the kind of book that you can give somebody who is either in a caregiving capacity or in need of care and say, “Okay, this is the kind of book that can answer your toughest questions”.

Seth Price 41:49

Tom, as people hit end, and they go and they review the show, and they tell their friends to go buy the book, obviously it's on Amazon, but how do they get in touch with you, how do they email you with their thoughts with their questions with their concerns? I will ask everyone, there will be no hate mail or I will block you from downloading the show. I'm not sure how to do that. But I know people at the Google or whatever, but where do they go to engage with you to interact with you to interact with communities that are that are dealing with this?

Thomas 42:22

You know, I'm in I'm a lot on social media. So you could probably find me there. But the easiest way to get in touch with me is probably to sign up for my newsletter. You can go to my website, which is ThomasJatOrrd.com. And if you sign up for my newsletter, you can then just sort of hit respond or reply to a newsletter, and that's my personal email account, ask questions, make suggestions or whatever.

Seth Price 42:51

Nice.

Thomas 42:52

Also, I oftentimes give away free stuff and my newsletters are pointed to cool things and sometimes ask for help. For instance, this book is partly the contributions of people on my newsletter list to send me stories of how the and controlling love of God book helped them. And then I incorporated those stories into this particular book. So there's a lot going on in that, in that with the newsletter crowd.

Seth Price 43:20

Nice. Well, thank you again, so much, for making the time to come on.

Thomas 43:28

I'm enjoyed it Seth.

Seth Price 43:30

Yeah, I would love to talk with you again on a different day. There's a lot of things I'd like to pick your brain about, but we'll save that for a different time.

Thomas 43:33

Let's do it! I'd love to talk about some other things as well. So maybe, I don't know whenever you think is best for your for your schedules. Let’s do it.

Seth Price 44:14

I trust that each of you will wrestle with this topic whether or not you get a copy of the book, wrestle with it. I think I'm gonna give one away, I'm just gonna just gonna buy one and send it out to one of you. So as this show goes live, you know, retweet the episode, share it on Facebook, I'll keep track of those. And I'll have my three year old pick out a name as I write them down and put them in a coffee mug or a ball. And one of you I just want to send one to somebody, if you haven't yet done so we're closing in on about 100 reviews on iTunes and that's a small number, but it's definitely well below the amount of people of you that listen and so if you haven't yet, pause what you're doing rate the show on iTunes or pod bean or wherever you happen to be. I love reading those. They give me such joy and such pleasure to see how the show is resonating or not resonating with you. Be honest with me. Give me some feedback.

Today the music featured was from Becca Bradley. You'll find links to all of her music and a little bit about her in the show notes. You'll find today's tracks on the Can I Say This At Church Spotify playlist. We'll talk to you next week. Be blessed everybody.