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Let's play "You are God" and can stop any and all suffering and evil. Where would you draw the line?
Let's play "You are God" and can stop any and all suffering and evil. Where would you draw the line?
"Well, I'd stop all child rapists!" OK, but why not all rapists? Or people that run stop signs?
"I'd stop tsunamis that wipe out thousands of people!" But why not tornadoes this might kill just a few? Or fender benders?
"OK then, I'll stop all suffering and all evil anywhere." You see where this is going.....
Should You control all our actions and thoughts in order to prevent evil? Our words? That would be a Divine Dictator. At best we would be mere puppets on the hands of God. So then, do you allow theft but not murder? And if you allowed even the smallest evil, or fender bender why would you do so? Would not someone else judge your choice and call you unloving?
It's not so easy, is it?
Sometimes people ask, "If God is good how can He allow suffering or evil to exist?" They reason that either He's not all powerful and so He can't stop suffering and evil, or maybe He's not all good and does not care to stop suffering or evil.
The objection is that there is no "good" reason to allow suffering or evil, so God can't be both all powerful or all good. But this assumes that we ourselves can "see" all the possible good that might exist. In other words, "because I can't see it, it must not be." Is that so?
Some reasons for a allowing suffering are easy to see, such as a small child getting a life saving shot in the arm even when they don't want it in a big way. But does that mean all good reasons for allowing suffering are equally easy to see? Experience and the Bible tell us no.
Some of God's best suffered tremendous trials through no fault of their own. Take Joseph for example: sold by his brothers into slavery in Egypt, falsely accused and imprisoned for years. But he grows through all these experiences and his faith in God grew too, even while in jail. Then God uses him to deliver the Egyptians from famine as well as his own family, who don't recognize him in his Egyptian garb and in the number two position over all of Egypt. When Joseph does finally reveal himself he tells his brothers (Genesis 50:20),
"As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to preserve many people alive."
It would have been impossible for Joseph or anyone to have seen any good reason for the evil and suffering he experienced. But God saw, and in this case they eventually saw it too.
Many look back at hardships and realize it is what they needed for success later in life, though they could not see it at the time.
Let's go all the way back, to Adam and Eve. God created a world that was "very good." However the Bible teaches that suffering and evil are the result of the fall, man's sinful rebellion against their loving Creator in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3). But God provided the way out for mankind.
Someone has said that whatever the reason for evil existing, the Creator Himself stepped into the world and suffered that very evil in order to provide the cure. When God the Son, Jesus, came to earth He did so out of love, "For God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten Son, that whoso ever believes in Him will not perish, but have everlasting life" (John 3:16).
More on this topic......
Where did the idea of "just" and "fair" and "cruel" come from?
Where did the idea of "just" and "fair" and "cruel" come from?
As C.S. Lewis, Tim Keller, and others point out the problem of evil and suffering are an even bigger problem for the unbeliever and atheist. First, where does the notion of "fair" even come from if all there exists is the survival of the fittest? If the universe seems "cruel" and "unjust" how did you get this idea of "just?" Evolutionary development and natural selection "depend on death, destruction and violence of the strong against the weak" so on what basis does the atheist judge the natural world to be "unjust" (Keller, The Reason for God, p. 26).
As Keller puts it (paraphrased), if you have a God powerful enough that you blame Him for not stopping suffering in your life then can't that same God be powerful enough to have a good reason for allowing it? (p. 25)
Pain can have a purpose
Pain can have a purpose
Just like the nerves in your hand prevent you from burning it, so pain has a purpose in our world. If God prevented all consequences of the fall, prevented all pain, we would never know we need a Savior, that we have the terminal disease of sin and would slip into eternity unaware of our condition, unaware of our need for the cure Jesus Christ provided by His death for us.
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