we also know that they could turn out to reject us. Why, then, have children? For most of us, the hope and desire for the love of children far outweighs the risk of their rejection of us.
We would not wish our children to be degraded to machines. Nor will God similarly degrade human beings. It is worth just pointing out in passing that there is a strong current of atheistic thought that does just that — it degrades human free will to an illusion.
C. S. Lewis wrote: “If God thinks this state of war in the universe a price worth paying for free will — that is, for making a live world in which creatures can do real good or harm and something of real importance can happen, instead of a toy world which only moves when He pulls the strings — then we may take it that it is worth paying.” 50
Why? What reason is there to think it is worth paying? Is the price not obviously too high?
I believe the answer lies in another, supremely costly, suffering —the cross of Christ.
THE MEANING OF THE CROSS OF CHRIST
Let me try, first of all, to explain one aspect of that answer by means of an experience I had some years ago when teaching in Eastern Europe at the time of the Cold War. I joined a group of visitors to be shown around a large synagogue. As we entered, I fell into conversation with a woman from South America, who told me she was there to try to gain some idea of her identity — perhaps to find out something about some of her relatives who had perished in the Holocaust. In the synagogue there was a special exhibition devoted to the festivals that were part of the calendar of the nation of Israel: from Passover to the Feast of Tabernacles. A rabbi was explaining these festivals, which are still celebrated today; and I was doing my best to translate for my new acquaintance. Concentrating on that task, I did not at first notice the mock-up of a doorway that stood in the centre of the exhibition. But when the rabbi reached that point in his tour, I saw not only the doorway but also the ugly words that stood above it: “ Arbeit macht frei ” (work makes free). It was a mock-up of the main gate to the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz — a place that I have visited several times. Behind it, that is, through this door in the synagogue, there were photographs of the horrific medical experiments carried out on children by the infamous Dr Josef Mengele in the death camp. At that juncture my acquaintance suddenly moved into the doorway and put out her arms to touch both sides of it. She said: “And what does your religion make of this?” — earlier she had discovered that I believed in God.
She spoke loudly enough for several others to pause and look in our direction. What was I to say? What could I say? She had lost her parents and many relatives in the Holocaust. I had young children at the time and could scarcely bear to look at the Mengele photographs, because of the sheer horror of imagining my children suffering such a fate. I had nothing in my experience or in my family history that was remotely parallel to the horror that her family had endured.
But still she stood in the doorway waiting for an answer. This is what I eventually said: “I would not insult your memory of your parents by offering you simplistic answers to your question. What is more, I have young children and I cannot even bear to think how I might react if anything were to happen to them, even if it were far short of the evil that Mengele did. I have no easy answers; but I do have what, for me at least, is a doorway into an answer.”
“What is it?” she said.
“You know that I am a Christian. That means – and I know it is difficult for you to follow me here – that I believe that Yeshua 51 is the messiah. I also believe that he was God incarnate, come into our world as saviour, which is what his name “Yeshua” means. Now I know that this is even more difficult for you to accept. Nevertheless, just think about this question – if Yeshua
We would not wish our children to be degraded to machines. Nor will God similarly degrade human beings. It is worth just pointing out in passing that there is a strong current of atheistic thought that does just that — it degrades human free will to an illusion.
C. S. Lewis wrote: “If God thinks this state of war in the universe a price worth paying for free will — that is, for making a live world in which creatures can do real good or harm and something of real importance can happen, instead of a toy world which only moves when He pulls the strings — then we may take it that it is worth paying.” 50
Why? What reason is there to think it is worth paying? Is the price not obviously too high?
I believe the answer lies in another, supremely costly, suffering —the cross of Christ.
THE MEANING OF THE CROSS OF CHRIST
Let me try, first of all, to explain one aspect of that answer by means of an experience I had some years ago when teaching in Eastern Europe at the time of the Cold War. I joined a group of visitors to be shown around a large synagogue. As we entered, I fell into conversation with a woman from South America, who told me she was there to try to gain some idea of her identity — perhaps to find out something about some of her relatives who had perished in the Holocaust. In the synagogue there was a special exhibition devoted to the festivals that were part of the calendar of the nation of Israel: from Passover to the Feast of Tabernacles. A rabbi was explaining these festivals, which are still celebrated today; and I was doing my best to translate for my new acquaintance. Concentrating on that task, I did not at first notice the mock-up of a doorway that stood in the centre of the exhibition. But when the rabbi reached that point in his tour, I saw not only the doorway but also the ugly words that stood above it: “ Arbeit macht frei ” (work makes free). It was a mock-up of the main gate to the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz — a place that I have visited several times. Behind it, that is, through this door in the synagogue, there were photographs of the horrific medical experiments carried out on children by the infamous Dr Josef Mengele in the death camp. At that juncture my acquaintance suddenly moved into the doorway and put out her arms to touch both sides of it. She said: “And what does your religion make of this?” — earlier she had discovered that I believed in God.
She spoke loudly enough for several others to pause and look in our direction. What was I to say? What could I say? She had lost her parents and many relatives in the Holocaust. I had young children at the time and could scarcely bear to look at the Mengele photographs, because of the sheer horror of imagining my children suffering such a fate. I had nothing in my experience or in my family history that was remotely parallel to the horror that her family had endured.
But still she stood in the doorway waiting for an answer. This is what I eventually said: “I would not insult your memory of your parents by offering you simplistic answers to your question. What is more, I have young children and I cannot even bear to think how I might react if anything were to happen to them, even if it were far short of the evil that Mengele did. I have no easy answers; but I do have what, for me at least, is a doorway into an answer.”
“What is it?” she said.
“You know that I am a Christian. That means – and I know it is difficult for you to follow me here – that I believe that Yeshua 51 is the messiah. I also believe that he was God incarnate, come into our world as saviour, which is what his name “Yeshua” means. Now I know that this is even more difficult for you to accept. Nevertheless, just think about this question – if Yeshua
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