Does the problem of suffering make God go away? Why do we suffer? Where is God when we need Him? Why doesn’t God do something about all the evil in the world?
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EVIDENCE AGAINST THE EXISTENCE OF GOD?
Perhaps the most common reason people give for not believing in God or for not searching for God is the problem of suffering. If there really were a God, goes the reasoning, there would not be so much suffering in the world. Some people find an alternative faith in eastern religion or philosophy as a way around this question. But if the way of the universe and of nature is both good and evil working together for the same outcome, or if you’re reincarnated almost endlessly to work out the bad in you, the suffering is still there, no matter what you call it or how you describe it. There’s no going around it in any honesty or truthfulness, or without using twisted logic and euphemisms.
So here we are, in bodies and minds of such complexity that you really have to dumb yourself down to believe it was not all designed, and yet suffering anyway. I’ve discussed several times why I believe there is a God in the form of a person, and that His son, His only Son, is Jesus Christ. So here I’m looking at the problem that not only unbelievers and skeptics struggle with, but which we as believers all, at times in our lives, struggle with also.
THE ARGUMENT OF SUFFERING DOESN’T WORK AGAINST GOD
The existence of God, despite the complaints of people like Sir David Attenborough who gave suffering as a reason for his own atheism, doesn’t go away by invoking this problem. After all, God may be pernicious and unloving. He may be uncaring. He may be somewhere else and not able to help us yet. He may be using suffering for his own purposes. However, when you really know and believe the causes of suffering as discussed in the Bible, you actually have a great start on understanding how there can be a loving God and suffering at the same time.
WE DON’T KNOW IT ALL
It isn’t always enough or even the right thing to give answers to the suffering and heart-broken of the world from Scripture, or to attempt to soothe the sufferer with an apologetic, because there are times when we are so overcome that no logic or explanation is enough. When terrible things happen, we’re tempted to dismiss any reason offered. Such was the experience of Job when his friends tried to stop his complaining with trite and half-baked reasoning and false encouragement.
Sometimes there is no answer good enough. And I think we need to take to heart the fact that when God finally addressed Job himself, He didn’t give an explanation for what had happened. He simply put Job straight on the fact that He is God, and Job was not. God is God, and we are not. He knows and understands all the facts and processes and outcomes, and we do not. Neither is it His duty or obligation to inform us. Our duty, as subjects of the King of all things, is to trust and obey.
THE PROBLEM IS BIGGER THAN WE WANT TO BELIEVE
It’s been occurring to me more and more lately that we, even as believers, don’t take seriously enough what we’re up against. Perhaps we take too lightly what know and have heard about why things are the way they are. More likely in many cases, is the fact that multitudes of professing believers either don’t know what God’s explanations for suffering are, don’t take them into consideration, or worse, don’t believe them.
When you look at the book of Revelation, for example, you see enormous and cataclysmic upheavals as future judgments and actions against the enemies of God and all who have sided with them. This is no game that we’re in-it’s an earth-shaking, soul-shaking process: the most profound that ever could be. Why else would our Creator send His only son, to die on a cross at the hands of evil men?
WAR IN-A BABYLON
We are, as I noted last week, in a war-a spiritual war against our own fallen nature, and against those who seek to destroy us and hope (vainly) to bring down God. And we make a huge mistake by not believing that fact or by intentionally not being aware of it. The temptation, especially in the West where we’ve had it so good, is to imagine and plan our lives as though the world is, after all, built for our pleasure and profit. It isn’t.
GET REAL
We need to “get real”. I’m not talking about living in fear or in depression, but about looking at the world as God wants us to see it. He has given us explanations for our troubles, has instructed us to fight the good fight in courage and expectation of victory, and He has also told us not to worry. Why not worry? Because He is in ultimate total control of all things and the outcome of all things and events. He knows the end from the beginning. He knows and has promised us that the end result will be endless life, and perpetual peace and righteousness for all who have chosen Him. This is where faith comes in, so that while we see suffering all around, we believe and trust that the Creator of all things has an end-game, a destination, a fulfillment and consummation of all that we see and feel going on.
WAITING FOR GOD
Why the wait, you may ask? I ask my God that question regularly, particularly when I see the most evil, corrupt people in the world running our government and our media outlets. Then, after varying lengths of time, the answer comes to me (or perhaps I should say one of the answers: I can’t pretend to know them all). I thank God, having been taught to believe the Judeo-Christian Scriptures-the Bible-I do know some of the answers…. enough to keep me going.
I’m speaking of God’s Church. By “Church” I mean all true believers in Jesus Christ, and others of past ages. If you have a question about all those who’ve never heard the gospel or never heard about the God of the Bible, I believe there’s an answer to that also. You could check out my post “What Happens to People Who Never Hear the Gospel?” (The search box is top right of this page).
In waiting for a time to judge the earth, and to bring an end to suffering, the Lord is raising up for Himself a multitude of people who will populate His heaven and His eternal kingdom. Yes, we are a ragged, unruly, questionable multitude, but God loves us anyway, and loves what He knows we will become. And He loves those who have yet to accept Him. Unfortunately, not everyone loves God or His son Jesus Christ, and we live in a corrupt, degrading, fallen and sometimes evil world. However, If God were to judge the earth now, not all those who He has foreseen will join Him will have done so. If He judged the earth a hundred years ago, you and I would not be included in His eternal kingdom of peace and love and justice. By living you and I also unavoidably allow others to live who hate God and who only have their own selfish goals in mind. So, we live alongside those, in a fallen, problematic world.
WHEAT AND TARES
Jesus Christ gave a parable to this effect. It’s a remarkable passage of Scripture, overlooked and ignored too much, but very illuminating. You can read it for yourselves, but I will summarise it here.
A farmer sowed seed in his field, but his enemy sowed destructive weeds among the wheat. The farmer told his workers not to pull up the weeds, because in so doing they might pull up wheat by mistake.: you can’t always tell the difference until plants are mature. He told his workers to let both grow together. At the harvest, he said, the weeds would be thrown into the fire, and then the wheat would be taken into his barn (Matthew 13:24-29 and 36-40).
Here then is Christ’s simple but beautiful explanation for the fact that we, His elect, have to live in a fallen world alongside those who are corrupt, evil and destructive, and who have no time for their Creator.
There are other reasons for suffering besides this. I’ve attempted in my own way and my own words to outline them in previous posts (some links below).
The next question then, is just how long God-the Farmer-will wait for the harvest. We don’t know the answer to that one, except that He did give us signs to look out for. If you don’t believe or read the Word of God-the Bible-you won’t know them, or you may believe some of the nonsense false prophets or false “experts” come out with. My sense is that we’re almost there-i.e., within a few decades at most. I could be completely wrong, but for me personally, it is a few decades whether Christ comes to me or I go to Him. Either way it’s a win-win situation, and as Paul said,
“I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us” (Romans 8:18).
MY POSTS ON SUFFERING
Here are a few links, up to episode 4. You can search in the box above for the rest of the series (Suffering 5; Suffering 6 and so-on up to episode 9).
https://nickyfisher.com/2022/01/03/why-do-we-suffer-part-3-human-nature-2/
Fuel for Faith, Food for Thought 