WHEN ABEL DAMINA PUTS GOD IN THE DOCK (PART II)

“Isaiah Was Not Confused, Abel Damina Is”

By Akin Ojumu

The central philosophical claim behind Abel Damina’s theology of suffering can be reduced to a simple equation:

If God ordains an event involving suffering, evil, or death, then God becomes morally responsible for the evil of that event.

It sounds compelling. Until you reach Calvary. 

Because if that equation is true, Christianity has a problem far larger than Calvinism, determinism, or theological debates about providence. The Cross itself becomes morally impossible.

Acts 2:23 says Jesus was delivered up according to God’s definite plan.

Acts 4:27–28 says Herod, Pilate, the Gentiles, and Israel did what God’s hand and plan had predestined.

Yet those same texts blame the human perpetrators for their wickedness.

Therefore, Scripture itself rejects the simplistic equation:

Divine ordination = divine commission of evil.

Genesis 50:20 gives us the category we need.

Joseph tells his brothers: “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good.”

Notice what Joseph does not say: “You meant evil, but God merely watched.”

He does not say: “You meant evil, but God had absolutely no intention regarding what happened.”

Nor: “You meant evil, and afterward God discovered a creative way to use the tragedy.”

Joseph says: “You meant it for evil. God meant it for good.”

Same event. Different intentions.

The brothers sold Joseph. Their purpose was wicked. God governed the event toward a good purpose.

Joseph does not conclude that because God “meant” the event, God must therefore share the brothers’ moral guilt.

Why?

Because that would confuse fundamentally different kinds of agency.

And Calvary is the supreme example.

Judas intended betrayal. The Sanhedrin intended elimination. Pilate intended political convenience. The soldiers carried out an execution. Satan intended destruction. God intended redemption. Christ intended self-sacrifice.

One Cross. Different agents. Different intentions. Different moral character.

To erase those distinctions and announce, “God ordained it, therefore God must be evil,” is not sophisticated moral reasoning. It is a category error.

Then comes:

Isaiah 53:10

“Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him; he has put him to grief.”

For any theology claiming that God can have no purposeful relationship whatsoever to suffering, this verse is radioactive.

The text does not say: “It was Satan’s will to crush Him while God reluctantly stood nearby.”

It says: “It was the will of the LORD.”

Does that mean God, sadistically, delights in suffering? Of course not.

Read the chapter.

The Servant bears sin. He becomes an offering. He justifies many. His suffering accomplishes redemption.

And that is precisely the point.

The presence of suffering does not, by itself, establish the wickedness of the one who purposes that suffering.

Purpose matters. Authority matters. Intention matters. Justice matters. Moral character matters. Redemptive design matters.

The argument, “God ordained suffering; therefore, God is evil,” has simply smuggled its conclusion into its premise.

Scripture does not reason that way.

Consider the logic.

A judge can impose a painful sentence without becoming a criminal. A surgeon can deliberately cut a patient without becoming an attacker. A parent can impose painful discipline without becoming an abuser.

The analogies are imperfect, of course. But they expose the faulty premise.

Pain itself does not prove evil. Death itself does not automatically constitute murder. The existence of suffering does not tell us everything about the moral character of every agent involved.

If a murderer takes life unjustly for wicked reasons, that is evil. But God’s relationship to Calvary is not morally identical to Judas’ relationship to Calvary merely because both are related to the same historical event.

Judas’ intention was betrayal. God’s intention was salvation. To make the two morally equivalent is like arguing that Joseph’s brothers and God must share the same guilt because Genesis 50:20 says both “meant” the same event.

Scripture explicitly distinguishes their intentions. Our theology should do the same.

There is another witness who complicates the claim that the Cross was simply something evil forces did while God remained uninvolved.

Jesus Himself.

John 10:17–18

“I lay down my life that I may take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.”

Jesus was not trapped. He was not overpowered. He was not an unfortunate casualty of Satan’s plan.

At His arrest He said:

Matthew 26:53–54

“Do you think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and He will at once send me more than twelve legions of angels? But how then should the Scriptures be fulfilled, that it must be so?”

Twelve legions available. No rescue requested.

Why?

“The Scriptures.” “It must be so.”

Christ voluntarily entered the suffering ordained for our redemption.

Ephesians 5:2 says Christ:

“…gave Himself up for us.”

Any theology of Calvary that reduces Jesus to Satan’s helpless victim has already collided with Jesus’ own interpretation of His death.

This brings us to the fundamental mistake.

God’s goodness is being defined as non-involvement.

God is good; therefore, He must never purpose anything painful.

But where did that definition come from? Certainly not from Calvary.

Biblical goodness is bound up with God’s holiness, righteousness, wisdom, justice, faithfulness, mercy, and perfect purposes.

It is not defined by the sentimental rule: “A good God would never…”

That phrase quickly becomes theology by intuition.

A good God would never judge. A good God would never ordain pain. A good God would never bring calamity. A good God would never decree death. 

And eventually: A good God could never have ordained the Cross.

At that point the system has eaten Christianity.

Forget the difficult Old Testament texts for a moment.

Forget Job. Forget Egypt. Forget the Flood. Forget Sodom. 

Stand at Golgotha. Here is the greatest injustice committed by sinful men in human history: the sinless Son of God tortured and crucified.

Did wicked men commit it? Yes.

Did Satan work through it? Yes.

Did Christ voluntarily submit to it? Yes.

Was it according to God’s predetermined plan? According to Acts 2 and Acts 4: Yes.

Was God therefore evil? No.

And if God can sovereignly ordain the Cross without becoming morally identical to Judas, Pilate, the Sanhedrin, the soldiers, or Satan, then the proposition, “God cannot ordain suffering without becoming evil,” is dead. 

Calvary killed it. The philosophical system collapses at the foot of the Cross.

Perhaps the strangest feature of this entire project is the apparent need to protect God from the language of His own Scripture.

Acts says “predestined.” Isaiah says it was “the will of the LORD.” Joseph says “God meant it for good.” 

But the theological public-relations department rushes forward: “Surely God cannot mean that!”

Why not?

“Because that would make God look bad.”

According to whom?

That is the question.

Who determines what divine goodness permits God sovereignly to do?

Abel Damina? Modern moral intuition? A philosophical theory? Or Scripture?

One may reject Calvinism. One may reject determinism. One may debate compatibilism.

Fine.

But those debates do not give anyone permission to erase the grammatical force of biblical statements because their implications are philosophically uncomfortable.

At some point, Scripture must be allowed to say something we would not have written ourselves. Otherwise, we are not interpreting the Bible. We are editing it.

God is not the defendant. Scripture is not on trial. The philosophical premise is.

And the witnesses have already testified. Peter has testified. The Jerusalem Church has testified. Joseph has testified. Isaiah has testified. Jesus Himself has testified.

The verdict is straightforward:

God can sovereignly ordain an event involving evil human actions without Himself becoming the evil actor.

The sinners remain guilty. Satan remains wicked. Christ remains the willing sacrifice. God remains holy. And providence remains providence.

So, when someone insists that Scripture must be rewritten, or as Abel Damina claims, “Isaiah was confused,” because divine ordination of suffering would necessarily make God evil, perhaps we have the courtroom backwards.

God does not need Abel Damina—or any of us—to rescue His reputation from His own Word. 

When philosophy and Scripture collide, put the philosophy in the dock. And let Scripture pronounce the sentence.