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Feb 24, 2019 |
| Why Does a Loving God Allow Bad Things to Happen to Good People | ||
After an enormous tragedy or great evil, both believers and unbelievers can sometimes ask "Why does a loving God allow bad things to happen to good people." We can be swayed by the number of people involved, the youthfulness or innocence of the victims, or by sympathy toward the group affected.
Many people ask this question without wanting an answer. For them, the question is really an accusation - a loving God wouldn't let this happen, therefore there is no God. Sometimes they also say "I would never worship a God like that." Usually, there is not much that can be said to them because they aren't open to hearing anything.
Their words tells us something about them though. They are looking for a God that is like them. In fact they are defining their own God. In the process they are declaring themselves to be god.
Question: How do we create our own god or declare ourselves to be god?
Teachers Guide: We create our own God by trying to make him fit into our ideas of what he should be. Instead of listening to what the Bible says we add to, or remove, things to fit that mold we created ourselves.
We do this so easily we may not realize we've done it. There are many people throughout history who have done the same and taught falsely about God. They have made him a god of money and blessings, a god who doesn't care how you live, a god who can be bribed or treated like a vending machine, and others.
Some people who ask this question want a God who will stop only what they see as evil actions. They don't want a God who would stop their own lying, stealing, and adultery.
Other people do sincerely ask this question. The first thing that needs to be understood is that God sees things differently than we do. We think something is more evil because it happens to "innocents" or because of the magnitude. For example 7 people killed seems worse than 1 person.
Question: Which is the greater sin, to kill a person or to tell a lie?
Teachers Guide: To God there are no greater or lesser sins. All sin results in separation from God. There is also no difference between committing many sins or committing one.
Hitler's sin of ordering the killing of millions of people is no greater than stealing office supplies from work. That can be said the other way around. Stealing office supplies from work is as bad as killing millions of people.
It's also true that, if Hitler had truly repented, God would have forgiven him and Jesus' atonement would have covered his sins and nothing more would be expected. That can often seem unjust to us. It can seem like he should suffer more for his sins. We need to understand that the same unmerited forgiveness and atonement covers our sins.
The first thing we need to understand about this question is that there is no one who is good enough to be exempt from bad things. If Jesus was mistreated and crucified, who are we that we should expect better treatment?
Trusting in God does not come with a promise of an easy untroubled life.
Understanding this only simplifies the question down to "Why does a loving God allow bad things to happen." The question is sometimes "Couldn't God stop people just as they are about to do something bad?".
This question still contains the earlier problems. We are making ourselves god by deciding what is good and evil. For example, not every killing is evil, executions for example. God also puts us through trials to build us up.
To fully answer this question, though, we need to have a better understanding of what God is up to. What is he doing with mankind? What does he get out of it? And even, what is God?
The book of Genesis starts at the moment of creation, "In the beginning, God created …." The book of John gives us a glimpse just before that moment, "In the beginning the Word had been existing …."
John goes on to say that nothing existed before creation. There was only God. There was no up or down, left or right, or back and forth. No dimensions at all. There wasn't even time.
That's an existence that is nearly impossible for us to understand. It is so strange it even makes it impossible for us to ask the question, what was there before creation. That's because there was no "before" before creation and also not a "where".
We are so accustomed to existing in time with it's before and after, and then and now, that we can't imagine a timeless existence.
Yet, that dimensionless, timeless existence is how God exists. Note that we can't even say "existed" because that implies a past and therefore time. Therefore God also does not have a beginning or an end. Both of those imply time. We don't have words to describe this. God just is.
Remember God's conversation with Moses:
Then Moses said to God, "Behold, I am going to the sons of Israel, and I will say to them, 'The God of your fathers has sent me to you.' Now they may say to me, 'What is His name?' What shall I say to them?" 14 God said to Moses, "I AM WHO I AM" (Exodus 3:13-14)
Many translations render those words as "I am that I am." They express God's eternal timeless existence and his unchanging nature.
One of the attributes (characteristics) of God is that he is complete. He does not depend on anything and he does not lack anything. That brings up a curious question, however. If God is complete, why would he bother creating anything? If he lacks nothing and needs nothing, what would he get from creating anything?
There is a deeper study to answer that question1, but it comes down to God being a trinity (tri-unity) of persons. To be unified and to be a God of Love, the persons must have a love for others, a love that was built into us as well.
That love is requited (returned) by the others in the trinity and therefore satisfied, otherwise God would lack love. But a love for others is an unbounded (unlimited) love, with room for other others. Therefore God created, because he could love what he created, not for what he could get from that creation.
Being a God of Love, God wanted his creation to love him back. But love is not love if it is not by choice. Therefore God decided his creation would have beings who could return that love and would do so of their own free will. God would give these beings the ability to choose God or not.
Question: Why must love be chosen to be love? Couldn't God have created us with a built-in love for him?
Teachers Guide:
God knew that some would choose to reject him and his ways, which he sees as hate and idolatry - sin. He wanted to show that love includes forgiveness for those who turn back to him and choose him. Therefore it would be necessary for these beings to have an opportunity to rethink a decision and change it (repent) and be forgiven.
Question: Why does God see rejection of him as hate and idolatry?
Teachers Guide: When we reject God we declare ourselves to be king over him and we despise his instructions by following our own desires.
His love also includes justice. He cannot tolerate those who reject him "in his face." Therefore there was a problem. If his created beings rejected him to his face they would be destroyed immediately. It would be necessary for these beings to be at a distance from God so they could exist long enough to rethink a decision and later change it.
Because some of his beings would choose him and others would not, some would not be tolerable to others. It would be necessary for them to have distance from each other as well.
So when God created everything, he created beings he loved and whom he wanted to return that love and wanted them to love others just as he does. He created a universe that was separate enough from himself to allow those who reject him to continue to exist and the time to rethink their decisions. In that universe, God, who knew neither time nor dimension nor separation from others, created all these things.
Now we have the answer to our question - why does a loving God allow bad things to happen. God wanted to show that he is loving, just, patient, and forgiving that we might have an example for ourselves. It certainly wasn't God's desire that the world would become this way but his plan made allowance for it.
He purposely doesn't step in to correct every wrong. This allows us to see the consequences of our actions. That should cause us to rethink and return to God and his ways.
Therefore it is not God's plan to stop evil before it happens. It is even necessary for people to be able to do evil. It's hard to wrap our minds around it but he doesn't stop evil because he loves us.
Even natural disasters are the consequence of mankind's rejection of God.
It won't always be this way, though. Jesus will return to be the king of this world. He will return to a world that is a complete mess made by mankind. Part of his purpose will be to put an end to rejection of him. At that time God and his people will step in to correct every little wrong, with a "rod of iron."
Ultimately those who have rejected him will be eternally destroyed from the face of God (2 Thessalonians 1:9). Jesus will live with those who chose to accept him.
1 "A Creating God" http://ourhope.site/2016-09-25%20ACreatingGod/ACG.html