Why doesn’t God stop all the suffering in the world?

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Notes

Suffering is the most frequently raised objection to the Christian faith:

Suffering on global scale: floods, famine, earthquakes, and wars.
Community suffering: Aberfan disaster, 116 children and 28 adults killed.
Individual suffering: bereavement, sickness, handicap, broken relationships, loneliness, poverty, injustice, depression etc.

Why is suffering a problem for Christians? Because we believe God is both good and powerful.

Biblical insights into this problem

Human Freedom. Suffering is not part of God’s original created order; no suffering in the world before humanity rebelled against God. Suffering is an alien intrusion into God’s world.

If all suffering is a result of sin why did God allow sin to enter the world?

Because He loves us and want to give us free will. Love is only love if there is a choice. Given this freedom men and women from the beginning have chosen to break God’s laws and the result has been suffering. Some suffering is a result of our own sin, that is breaking God’s laws.
Suffering is a result of breaking the physical laws of nature. Put your hand in a fire and it gets burned; pain acts as an early warning system when we exercise wrong choices.
Suffering as the inevitable consequence of sin. God’s world is built on moral foundations and there is a natural connection between sin and its consequences; for example excessive drinking may lead to alcoholism, drug abuse may lead to addiction, sexual promiscuity may lead to STIs.

Similarly selfishness, greed, lust, arrogance, bad temper often lead to broken relationships and unhappiness of one sort or another.
God’s active judgement. The Biblical flood was suffering on a global scale caused by sin resulting in God’s judgement (Gen. 6:5, 6).

Sodom and Gomorrah is a community disaster caused by God’s judgement on sin. Gehazi (2 Kings 5:27) is God’s judgement on an individual’s sin. Zacharia (Luke 1:20), Man healed at pool (John 5:14), Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5:1-11), or Holy Communion (1 Cor. 11:30).
Obviously not all suffering is a result of personal sin. For example Job’s friends thought that his suffering was a result of his own sin, but they were wrong (Job 42:7-8).

Jesus expressly repudiates automatic link of sin and suffering. Also natural disasters are not necessarily a form of punishment from God (Luke 13:1-5).

Peter draws distinction between suffering as a result of our own sin (being beaten for doing wrong) and unjust suffering (no connection with our sin) or even suffering for doing good (1 Peter 2:19, 20).

While it is appropriate to examine our own hearts when we are suffering it is not necessarily appropriate to make judgements on why others are suffering. They usually feel enough guilt as it is. They project it onto themselves, others or God.

Global and community suffering

Most suffering in the world is a result of other people’s sin:

War

Human selfishness, pride and greed

Starvation

Unequal distribution of world’s resources, consequences of civil war

The Aberfan disaster was not a natural one. A five-month enquiry headed by Lord Justice Edmund Davies ruled that the Coal Board was responsible.

“I raged against God but then I realised it had happened because of man’s greed and incompetence”.

Individual suffering

The sins of others: murder, adultery, theft, unloving parents, reckless or drunken driving, slander, unkindness and selfishness. Some have estimated 95% of world’s suffering can be accounted for in this way.

What remains?

A small proportion of suffering can only be explained as a result of the fact that we live in a fallen world where all of creation has been affected by the sin of human beings. It is the result of Adam and Eve’s sin that ‘thorns and thistles’ entered the world (Gen 3:18). Ever since that time ‘the creation was subjected to frustration’ (Rom 8:20). Natural disasters are a result of this disorder in creation.

God works through suffering

Suffering is never good in itself but God is able to use it for good in a number of ways.

Suffering is used by God to draw us to Christ. Suffering is ‘His megaphone to rouse a deaf world’ C. S. Lewis.
God uses suffering to bring us to Christian maturity. Even Jesus ‘learned obedience from what he suffered’ (Heb 5:8)
God uses suffering to build characters. New Testament images: the discipline of children (Heb 12:10, 11), metal worker refining silver and gold (1 Peter 1:6).
God uses suffering to make our lives more fruitful. Jesus’ image of the gardener pruning the vine (John 15:2).
God often uses suffering to bring about his good purposes. ‘In all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose’ (Rom 8:28), for example the life of Joseph (Gen 37:50).

‘The suffering of this world may seem a tangled web but behind it all is the love of God.’

God more than compensates for our suffering

We see the evidence for this in the lives of Joseph and Job. Despite this, the New Testament never leads us to assume that this will always be the case. Rather every Christian is promised something greater, the hope of heaven. Paul said ‘I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us’ (Rom 8:18).

The New Testament is full of promises about how wonderful heaven will be. All creation will be restored and Jesus will return to establish a new heaven and a new earth (Rev 21:1).

‘We live in a materialistic world which has almost entirely lost its eternal perspective. We need to take a long term view and understand the suffering of this life in the context of eternity.’ Nicky Gumbel

God is involved in our suffering

Although there is no definitive answer to the ‘Why’ of suffering, we must remember that God is a God who suffers alongside us. The ‘Crucified God’ shows us in the cross of Christ a God who is not immune to suffering (2 Cor. 5:19). When we suffer, He suffers with us.

How do we respond to suffering?

When we suffer we are not always able to work out why. God never told Job why he was suffering, but he told him there was good reason and Job had to trust God. The book of Job is not so much about why God allows suffering as it is about how we should respond to suffering.

The questions we need to ask are:

Is the suffering a result of my own sin? In which case repentance, God’s forgiveness and cleansing are needed.
What are you saying to me through this?
What do you want me to do?

We need to hold on to our hope. This life is always a mixture of battle and blessing, and in times of battle we need to remember they do not last forever. We cannot have heaven now (Heb. 12:2)!

How do we respond to the suffering of others (Rom. 12:15)?

What was Jesus response to suffering in others? For himself?

Conclusion

Only in the cross of Christ can we begin to understand why a God of love should allow suffering.

Although humans abused their God given freedom by choosing to nail Jesus to the cross, God used that very abuse to enable Jesus on the cross to pay the price for that sin through all time.
Here we see God working through suffering. Those who nailed Jesus to the cross intended it for evil, but God intended it for good.
God more that compensates for suffering. Jesus ‘who for the joy set before him endured the cross’ saw ahead to His resurrection and as a result of that to our own resurrection and eternity with Him.
God himself is not removed from suffering.

For further reading, see Searching Issues by Nicky Gumble.

Stephen Walker

May 2004