The church is not just for those who have seen God’s goodness by Pastor Jerrell Williams

The Salem-Keizer, Oregon community is blessed to have Pastor Jerrell Williams leading Salem's Mennonite Church. We have posted at least two articles by him in the recent past. These have come from Anabaptist World. In a recent article in Anabaptist World Pastor Williams says the following:

Disappointment with God is a reality we need to recognize. As the church testifies to God’s faithfulness, we have to remember that not everyone has experienced God as faithful.

We have to be prepared to walk with those who feel God has not been faithful to them. As a pastor, I have had the honor to accompany those who are struggling and doubting as well as those who are solidly sure of their faith.

I have sat with people as they have asked me why God wasn’t there for them or for their friends or their families. Though I am tempted to interject my own experiences and ideas, there is nothing I can say that dulls the pain.

At this point we are left with a reminder that so much of modern atheism---at least in my circles---is founded on disappointments and suffering, and it should be fully understandable to people of faith that this occurs and gains momentum and forms of expression. There is also an atheism that develops from the capitalist reality that we all live in. How does anyone manage to maintain faith when every activity is weighed for what it produces and its cost? A competitive and hierarchical system, gendered and racialized and exploitative in its fundamentals, is bound to produce atheism. Pastor Williams does not take these questions up directly, but they are there in the background.      

So Pastor Williams is taking up a large slice of our human condition in a short article. Where does he go with this? The entire article can be read here.