Children have a way of surfacing profound questions at bedtime, sometimes to bring closure to their day and other times just to postpone the “lights out” moment. My own kids used to review the entirety of creation at bedtime, it seemed, figuring that Mom and Dad couldn’t say a final goodnight if they kept having to field imponderable questions about God.
Last month, I received a one-line email from the mother of a nine-year-old in my congregation who had thrown a theological curveball her way one night. “Elliot wants to know,” she wrote, “if God is all-powerful, why are so many bad things happening in the world?” I haven’t answered Elliot yet because I’m looking for a helpful child-friendly response. I know what I’d say to his mother, however, the drift of which goes something like this.
The almightiness of God is indeed a central theme in Christianity. Not only do the hymns, prayers, and creeds of the church use the language Almighty God, the personal piety of many believers relies on the same. For the better part of two millennia, Western theology has been enamored with the idea that divine sovereignty places God in complete control of everything. Absolute dominion. Unrestricted power. Despite Paul’s celebration of God’s weakness, the church has long encouraged people to believe that this controlling of everything is a virtue.
