God doesn’t will tragedy. God doesn’t will that children suffer. God doesn’t will what is happening in Darfur or what happened a few weeks ago on the campus of Northern Illinois University. God grieves with all of us when tragedy strikes. God loves so much that the children of God live in an environment of autonomy and freedom in which good things can and do happen—and bad, evil, painful things. What our faith promises is that God is present in whatever circumstances befall us, that there is nowhere we can go that our God is not with us. “Even if I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me,” the psalmist wrote centuries before Jesus. That is what we believe. That is the bedrock of our faith—and Jesus’ faith. He was in that valley as he prayed in the garden. He would go deeper into the valley of the shadow of death in the hours ahead. And the assertion of our faith is that God was there, with him, every step, every moment, every dying moment.

John M. Buchanan

March 2, 2008

Full Sermon

https://www.fourthchurch.org/sermons/2008/030208.html