I’m really glad this blog exists with comments so we can tackle some of the topics raised.

I appreciate the general idea behind this two-part post (with another to come?) - when life’s hard sometimes it’s actually easier to have faith because, as Peter says above, “where else are you going to go?” Likewise when life is easy and we have everything we think we need,  it’s actually easy to forget your faith, and forget God and that you have any need for him.

However, I want to suggest that this is one of those nice-sounding ideas that has little currency in reality, but has been repeated to the point people just assume it’s true. Furthermore I think it risks diminishing sin and turning sin into non-sin, which ignores the problem of evil - perhaps one of the most significant and important issues we face.

There’s a tendency in evangelicalism I think to see some paradoxical things in the bible and then take that approach to other aspects of life, as those there is some paradoxical nature to them that somehow makes bad good and good bad, and everything make sense.

I think this is one of those cases where we’re trying to spin bad to be good and good to be bad - why not just take them for what they are?

I find the idea of spinning bad to be good, especially when it comes to God, pretty distasteful, as it comes awfully close to ascribing the horror of sin, suffering and evil to God.

I’d rather see evil and suffering as a distinct phenomenon that God abhors as much as we do, hence the promise of heaven. Why turn it into God’s “loving embrace”?

For my 2c having experienced some of the harder side of life, I can say with some authority that when it comes to the church, there ain’t no loving embrace (though I realise you were talking about God not other Christians, but it reflects on their faith). You get ignored, forgotten, and left to your own devices, feeling discarded and not worth anyone’s time or attention. When you grow up your whole life hearing about how we’re meant to help the sick and suffering, and then find quite starkly that this is really just talk and not much more, how does this make faith in God any easier?

I think most people in our churches have life pretty easy, simple because they seem to have absolutely no idea what to do or think when someone is going through a long, tough time - they simply have no concept of it, and so it’s entirely off their radar, despite the lip service we pay to looking after the less fortunate (in health or wealth).

Perhaps this changes when people get older and then have some personal or close experience of hardship and therefore can act more compassionately, but I can only hope.

Anyway, when life squeezes the vice, there isn’t some magical mental gymnastics you can do to turn around and say, ‘Hey, this is actually great!’. It seems that we’re so uncomfortable with the harsh, brutal realities of life that we struggle to face up to them for what they are - harsh, brutal realities!

Sin is sin is sin is sin, and we have to face the very unpleasant side-effects. I just don’t understand why we don’t leave it at that, and instead try and twist bad into good as though God’s really doing you a favour.

If we can’t speak credibly about the realities of the world we inhabit, then we’re going to struggle to persuade people about the world to come.

My 2c anyway!