A mass shooting is once again in the headlines in what has, by now, become a familiar pattern. The problem of evil is one that we want to solve, and it is right that we should try, but we can’t agree what the solution is. Here are some of my reflections on the time, last year, when it became personal. (Part 1 in a series.)

October 24th, 2014, my phone rang: my boss from church. The conversation went like this:

“Hello?”

“Hey there, it’s me.”

“Oh my God, I saw on Facebook. I’m so sorry.”

“Thanks. So I need to go home for the weekend. You can handle the service?”

“Yes, yes, yes– definitely. We are praying for all of you.”

Two hours earlier, in his high school cafeteria, her little brother had watched as several friends sitting at his table were shot point-blank in the back of the head, by another one of their friends. That day, a small town called Marysville, Washington became the latest in a grim litany of place names like Columbine and Sandy Hook and Aurora— places you never heard of until they became synonymous with unthinkable tragedy.

That we react to evil with horror may be the first, best evidence of God’s image in us. Click To Tweet

The knowledge that we live in a fallen world, that horrible things happen every day, is not new. And yet, for many, the first question is, “Why?” Why do people perpetrate such monstrous evil, and why does God allow it? We don’t all answer those questions the same way, some assert there are no answers, but the shared humanity, the innate revulsion towards evil, is undeniable. That fact— that nearly all of us are fundamentally incapable of inhabiting a worldview in which human slaughter is unremarkable— may be the first, best evidence of God’s image in us: eons out of mind, we remain better adapted to Eden than to the place where we actually live.

At the same time, we remain fascinated with tragedy. It dominates the news and inhabits every form of our self-expression, from Sons of Anarchy and The Walking Dead to Madame Butterfly and Faust. We visit with evil during playtime, but are shocked when it follows us home. “Do not give the devil a foothold,” warns Christ, probably because he knew how readily we do so.

Yet Christ is unique in that he offers, not just a warning against, but a solution to the problem of evil, by offering his own life as a ransom for many. The redemption song is loud in our DNA— whether in Marguerite’s delivery from Faust’s demons or in Rick’s reunion with Judith, the voice of the angels will be heard. The power of God cannot be gainsaid. The redemption song is loud in our DNA. The power of God cannot be gainsaid. Click To Tweet

The message of Christ’s resurrection is that, come the worst this world can deliver, this world is not the end of the story. It is easy, on any day like this, in any place newly joining that sad roll call, to think about the lies the devil tells and the death the devil threatens. On a day like that, even as we battle to write such horrors out of the book of our public life, it is worthwhile to look inside our own hearts and remember that there is always one chapter more: a chapter all about the one who is, in the end, the way, the truth, and the life.

Read Part 2 of this series: “How to make peace with God after loss.”