Suffering.

I've always contemplated this question. This question, being one of the most talked about, debated topics, that deals with the existence of a loving God. If there is a God out there, why is there suffering in this world? Why does God "allow" evil?

Well. I know that the existence of evil proves the existence of God. You may ask, why would that be true?

If there was no evil, then there would be no real, moral laws. There would be no good. There would be no evil. Everything would just be the same, I guess you can say, neutral.

But since there is an evil, there has to be something that opposes it, a good. And where would that good come from? Surely, there must be a definite good, and it must come from somewhere, a Creator. God made good.

But you may ask, isn't God the creator of all things? (Colossians 1:16) If He created all things, surely He must have created evil?

Let's define evil then. Yes, God did create all things. But, evil is not a thing created. Evil is a departure from the way things God intended it to be. It is non-conformity to God's Will. It's not something God created.

God gave us free will. An ability to decide on our own between doing good, and doing bad. Unfortunately, mankind has misused their freedom from the start, and evil became the result of it. Think about it, you may say your an all-around nice guy, but everyone has done something, at least one thing wrong, and fell short to the glory of God. (Romans 3:23)

You may ask, why does God give us free will, if we're just going to misuse it?

If there is no freedom, then we would all have no control on our decisions. There would be no real love, no consistent option to choose good over evil. Love is not meaningful with out the freedom to choose to love. If we're forced to love because we have no choice to, no freedom, it is not love at all.

Freedom, free-will, allows the highest good, love, to take place. Unfortunately, freedom also leads to suffering.

You may also ask, why doesn't God just take away evil once and for all?

Revelations 21:4-5 states that God has the ultimate plan to wipe out evil and suffering. But if he were to do it now, to take out evil, that means he would have to take away everything containing evil. And that includes human beings. We were made good, but we all have made a sinful choice. But in God, we are good, and God wants as much people to believe in Him, and live for Him, before He wipes away suffering.

Again, you may ask, well what about the natural disasters? Tornadoes, storms, earthquakes, tsunamis that have the potential to kill?

Long story short, the Earth was created in God's goodness at first. Rivers were running, birds were flying, disease was unknown to man. Man lived paradise, with a face to face relationship with God. (Genesis 3:8) But then our original father and mother sinned against God. As a result, as a direct consequence to sin, the earth was "cursed". (Genesis 3:17)

The Great Flood, as we all know about Noah's Ark, was the direct judgment. (Psalm 104:6-10) The text indicates that the waters which caused the Flood derived from two sources: (a) “the fountains of the great deep”; and (b) “the windows of heaven” (Genesis 7:11). Water fell for forty days and nights (Genesis 7:12,17), and eventually covered “all the high mountains that were under the whole heaven” (Genesis 7:19). New, higher mountains and lower valleys were created by God after the flood. Approximately 71.9% of the Earth’s surface remained covered with water. Temperature changes occurred, producing seasonal variations unlike any before. No doubt other factors were involved.

Natural laws were established at the Creation (ex. if someone steps off a building, gravity would take over). The same laws that govern gravity, matter in motion, or similar phenomena also govern weather patterns, water movement, and other geological/meteorological conditions.

We need rain to water the plants. We need earthquakes to keep the earth from exploding (just found about this recently, haha).

What about earthquakes? Does God just decide to kill many people? Like the recent one in Haiti?

Well, a 7.0 earthquake struck Haiti, resulting in an estimated 300,000 casualties. However, a 6.5 earthquake struck northern California, in January, and no one was killed. Why is that?

More specifically, Haiti is a country arguably full with corrupt politicians, while the U.S. values life. Haiti's government, not caring about the safety regulations and structure of building, as well as many other things, compared to the U.S.'s concern on the safety and structure of buildings for earthquakes, explains the comparison of casualties between the 2 events. More factors of course explain this difference.

It was not God's decision for the government of Haiti not to have a concern of human life and to make corrupt decisions, but their own free-willed decision to stay corrupt. The politicians themselves decided, with their own free will, to not provide the safety and protection from earthquakes. That is just like sticking your shoes outside when you know its raining, and expecting that it will not get wet.

You may ask, well why doesn't God try and stop these tragedies?

I believe God helps prevent natural disasters (Deuteronomy 11:17, James 5:17), as well as many other tragedies, such as deaths, crimes, etc. Life could be a lot worse, with more deaths, more crime, more violence. But to the average person, they would not notice God's preventions to save lives. We would all just be living life if someone avoided a car accident, or something like that. The world could be a lot worse, but we just don't see how worse it could get.

We should remember that our time here is temporary (James 4:14), and with God’s help we are able to overcome whatever comes our way (Romans 8:35-39; Psalm 46:1-3). In the end, the most important question is not, “Why did this happen to me?,” but instead, “How can I understand what has happened, and how am I going to react to it?”

As a result of this whole discussion, we need to keep in mind that God uses suffering for many reasons: To help advance the Gospel (Philippians 1:12-13), to train you to live a righteous life (Pslam 119:67,71,75), to keep one humble and to humble the proud, to help build perserverence, character, and hope (Romans 5:3-4), to help one develop compassion, kindness, and sympathy to others (2 Corinthians 1:3-4), to help bring praise and glory to God (John 9:1-3), and to help keep others from suffering (Genesis 45:5, 50:20).

I always try to keep this in mind, that God allowed evil actions to help accomplish His goal in making a way of salvation possible for you and me.