Day 6 Don't Confuse Jesus with the Thief

"The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly." — John 10:10

In 2018, my brother died in a car accident. I had performed his wedding just two years before. And much of his church's response to his death was to say that it was all part of God's plan.

But I stood at his funeral and said: "This was not God's will."

There's a peculiar theological habit some people have developed, and it needs to stop. When something terrible happens—a diagnosis, an accident, a death—some scramble to make sense of it by pinning it on God. "It's all part of God's plan," they say, as if that makes the senseless make sense. "God is teaching you something." "This will form your character." "It will all make sense in heaven."

But what if we're getting the characters confused?