How can there be good God and suffering at the same time?

Suffering is so universal, everyone experiences it. No one escapes it because everyone must go through the trauma of birth and the heartache of death. And then if our lives go beyond just these two experiences we are faced with a host of others that pierce us to the core... rejection, loss, sickness, betrayal, abandonment, divorce, etc.. These are just some of the personal experiences we might have with it, but what about the other forms of suffering that effects so many in the world as well... famine, disease, genocide, war? Sorry, I am not trying to get you to slit your wrists but simply point out that suffering is a real profound issue for everyone. Is it any wonder that many have concluded that God must not exist in a world so dramatically marked by suffering?

I believe the Bible has answers, and in fact the Bible tells us that what we do see is what we would expect to see. If the Bible is right, and it sure seems to match up with reality, then we should see death, disease, war and cruelty of all kinds. If there really was a "fall" and sin entered and tainted all of us with things like pride and selfishness and corrupted nature with a curse, then what we would expect to see is exactly what we find. This is one of the great things about the Bible...it matches reality. The Bible warns us to expect suffering and that is what we see.

This may seem like a cruel way of saying "I told you so," but that is not the way I mean it. Many think that God and suffering are incompatible...but the Bible does not have a problem with them...in fact it teaches that God so values every person's freewill that God allows us to make a mess of things. Plus, if God intervened and fixed it all and thus ended suffering it would undermine our ability to see the real problem...we need to be remade and restored by Jesus. If there were no consequences for our mistakes or no obvious problems with the world we would never be motivated to come to God and ask for help. In a sense we would getting a clean bill of health when we really needed emergency surgery for a life threatening aneurysm. Suffering then is the scratch that needs to be itched...it is what shows us that there is a deep seated problem in the world and it is here to help lead us to God.

So suffering actually ends up being a bigger problem for those who do not believe in God then for those who do. This is because without God they cannot explain the sense of injustice they feel about suffering. If there is no God then there is only "survival of the fittest" and "might makes right." Injustice would be the accepted norm all over the world rather than being so rejected by it. Why do we all instinctively have the opposite reaction about it? Instead of embracing suffering as the normal course of things, we reject it and know that this is not the way things should be. Where does that knowledge and sense of morality come from? This question then leads us right back to... God!

What do you think,

Mike





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