Looking at recent natural disaster in Japan, it is a heartbreaking situation and comparable to Haiti, New Zealand, and Indonesia’s earthquake and tsunami years ago. I know many people (and even myself) sometimes ask "If God is a loving and powerful, why He allow disaster and tragedy happened in this world? To be honest, I really don’t know. No one can comprehend His mind & His plan because human has limited understanding.
When my mind made up every possible hypothesis after I saw my friend was posting "this question" on Facebook, KLove radio answered this question just in time! *yay* God hears my confusion! Here I also compiled the answers from www.carm.org. So everytime you encountered people who is wondering about it, you can share the answers. :)
1) Suffering is the result of human sin. The world is not the way that God created it and because of that, all are vulnerable to the effects of sin in the world. Why does one person suffer and another does not? Why do catastrophes happen to some and not to others? It is because sin is in the world. But there will come a day when the Lord will return and cleanse this world of all sin and all suffering.
"And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away," (Rev. 21:4).
2) It is possible that God has reasons for allowing evil to exist that we simply cannot understand. In this the Christian can have confidence in God knowing that His ways are above our ways (Isaiah 55:8-9). As the Bible says, the just shall live by faith (Hab. 2:4).
3) God may be letting evil run its course in order to prove that evil is malignant and that suffering, which is the unfortunate product of evil, is further proof that anything contrary to God’s will is bad, harmful, painful, and leads to death.
4) It's quite possible that God uses the suffering to do good. In other words, He produces patience through tribulation (Rom. 5:3). Or He may desire to save someone through it. Take for example, the account of Joseph who was sold into slavery by His brothers. What they did was wrong and Joseph suffered greatly for it. But, later, God raised up Joseph in Egypt to make provisions for the people of that land during the coming drought of seven years. Not only was Egypt saved, but also his family and brothers who originally sold him into slavery. Joseph finally says to them, "You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good" (Gen. 50:15-21). Of course, the greatest example of God using evil for good is the death of Christ. Evil people brought him to the cross, but God used that cross as the means to save the world.
5) My personal view : if everything in this world is perfect and there is no evil, how could God show His glory and power? Imagine if the world is full with good people and superhero, who need a superhero anymore? the same question, if the earth is not vulnerable to natural disaster and any suffering, who will even think for a second about God's existence and the need for 'someone more powerful' to cling on? people will be self-sufficient and think that nothing is stronger than themselves. I think we should not challenge or complaint to God about those things. Just walk by faith and not by sight. God bless.
read CS Lewis's "The Problem of Pain", an exquisite exploration of the topic. He suggests that pain is in the world to remind us that we are not of this world, in addition to the reasons you explored above.
ReplyDeleteNice insight. Thank you for the recommendation! :)
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