Will Of God 15 – Why bad things happen (part 2)

Claiming to be wise, they became fools (Romans 1:22).

God never accepted a job description that dictates that God should always shelter me and make me healthy and safe. God does not manipulate life on this planet, and so we need not be surprised when evil strikes.

C.S. Lewis once estimated that 4/5ths of humanity’s suffering is inflicted by our fellow human beings. Human nature, left free by God to love God and be magnificent, but also to ignore God and be downright ugly, is the cause of unspeakable suffering and evil in this world. Wars, terrorist attacks, extramarital affairs, crime, feelings of being unloved: we do all this to each other. We need not blame God. Instead of asking “Why do bad things happen to good people?” we might ask “Why do God’s children sin?”

Even good things people do wreak havoc. When we invented the automobile, we signed an unwitting contract with death, because it’s just dangerous to hurl tonnages of metal down the highway at high speeds in proximity to other vehicles; driver error, mechanical failure… and you have suffering. God does not cause car accidents. How many human inventions unwittingly cause harm?

The march of science has postponed death, lengthening life – although at times we prolong life, understandably, but you wonder if it might be more merciful to let death take its natural course more often than we do, and allow the dying to say goodbye and bless the living. How interesting: it is only in modern times, when medicine has advanced astronomically, have we come to think of death as a reason to reject God. In ancient times, nobody doubted God if a young person died. Life expectancy was around thirty years; half your children routinely died at birth, as did one-fifth of the mothers. A century ago, infections were dumbfounding, and people died from simple cuts. Smart people devised antibiotics, and now we don’t think twice about infections. One day we will understand why cancer happens, and some medicine will fix it. No one will question God about cancer, any more than we do about infections today. But there will still be new diseases, new causes of our old nemesis, death.

When suffering or evil strikes, isn’t it cruel to chalk it up to God’s will? You say to someone who is reeling from shattering news, “God did this.” You isolate the person from God! Perhaps there is comfort in the notion that evil is God’s will, that God has it under control. But there is a better way to think of God’s presence and power in the hour of suffering…