Why Evil?

Have I blogged about this? I'm a little lazy to check.

A dear friend, concerned about the world as ever, asked me to give her a skinny on why an all powerful God stands by and watches boston bombing happen.
I gave her a non-answer, one that took me by surprise and.. an reply I was proud of.

I said, hey, if you're about to say that God is responsible for letting the bomb happen, then let me urge you to reconsider what you are saying. For you to take the view that God is to be blamed, you need to first develop a system for consistent blaming. Blame God for everything. Blame Him for how wonderfully the world was made, blame Him for how fearfully you were made. Blame Him, as I took it down to a more intimate notch, for the fingers with which you type, for the friend who responds in enthusiasm to an assault against his faith. For the friend who you met by coincidence and became reasonably good friends. For your pretty face, for the frown now with which you express your disappointment. Blame it all on God.

Now do you know why your question is important? Now do you understand how heartbreaking and mind bending  "How does a God who is infinitely loving permit evil to happen?"
As I typed my heart was wrung. A protest was growing louder within me.
why
why
why
WHY

As I thought of God's tender loving design in the world, His faithfulness in my life, I shudder. I know for certain He loves me, and even the pain in my life reeks of His loving design.
But can I say the same for the non-elect? I'm tongue tied.

But I know one thing. When disasters happen they remind us of one thing.
We are reminded that we were never in control. Not a moment of our control was ever established by our hands. It has always been the grace of God that when I slept, I woke the same man, sane and conscious. That when I studied I scored. When I ate I was satisfied, when I threw a frisbee it flew right.

As it stands, we often lapse into thinking that we are in control. We lapse into thinking that we have ultimate control of our lives. No amount of doctrinal talk can cause me to surrender, I turn my gaze at my cavity of my chest and I see a heart so awfully calloused it needs a hammer and a chisel.
I need disasters. I need them to happen. Otherwise I'm a dead man, forever lost to the illusion of self efficacy. Forever estranged from God, dead, hopeless.

And I turn my gaze back into the world. The bombing flashes before me. My heart leaps and says "such a thing, so horrid is able to quicken me, I admit my helplessness, I surrender all." And my eyes sink in sober realization.
Part of this is for me. For the calloused heart in me. For the calloused heart in us. These things happen and will happen again or we will never realise just how frail we are. The hardness of our hearts seems to mandate the horrors...

I wince and I shut my eyes. I say a lowly prayer.
Help me to be quick to learn dear Lord.
Help me to be quick to learn.