If a loving God exists, why would he allow evil and suffering?

First off, I want to say this: hang in there with me tonight. When we look at all the terrible examples of suffering in the world (as well as in our own lives), our primary concern isn’t a rational one—it’s an emotional one.

We might ask, How cold God allow this person to die, or this accident to happen, or this natural disaster to occur… But, in all honesty, we’re not just looking to be okay with it intellectually. Deep down, we wish it wouldn’t have happened. Deep down, we want to feel peace instead of fear, joy instead of sorrow.

So, tonight, we’re going to start off addressing the “problem of evil” using our heads, but I want to promise you, we’re going to use that discussion to ultimately get us to where we all want to go—speaking to our hearts. Because the only way I can commend Christianity to you as a pastor and a follower of Jesus is that I am inviting you into a holistic relationship with a loving God who can holistically shape, strengthen, and sustain everything we think, feel, and do.

What is evil?

And with that, let’s begin with a fundamental question: What is evil? Regardless of our different backgrounds or perspectives, I think we can all agree that things are not how they should be in the world. A quick glance at the news just over this past week makes that abundantly clear. To me, it seems something has gone wrong. And that’s an important foundation for understanding the Bible’s depiction of evil:

Jeremiah 2:13 ESV

¹³ for my people have committed two evils:

they have forsaken me,

the fountain of living waters,

and hewed out cisterns for themselves,

broken cisterns that can hold no water.

Here, evil is defined in contrast to something—mainly, forsaking God for something else. Another way way to put it: evil is anything that is absent from and in place of the character and will of God.

ILLUSTRATION: “Evil” as a hole in a shirt

"You can be good for the mere sake of goodness; you cannot be bad for the mere sake of badness. You can do a kind action when you were not feeling kind and when it gives you no pleasure, simply because kindness is right; but no one ever did a cruel action simply because cruelty is wrong—only because cruelty was pleasant or useful to him. In other words badness cannot succeed even in being bad in the same way in which goodness is good. Goodness is, so to speak, itself; badness is only spoiled goodness. And there must be something good to first before it can be spoiled. We call sadism a sexual perversion; but you must first have the idea of a normal sexuality before you can talk of its being perverted; and you can see which is the perversion, because you can explain the perverted from the normal, and cannot explain the normal from the perverted."

—C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

Lewis’s point makes sense. Evil cannot stand alone as it’s own thing. It’s defined by being contrary to the good thing. It is “spoiled goodness.” It’s the hole in our shirt. This begs the question, though: If evil is what is contrary to the good thing, then how do we know what the good thing is?

What is the standard for making something good or evil? For example: people, regardless of cultural background, seem to despise murder. We believe people shouldn’t suffer, be discriminated against or fail to receive their basic necessities.

But an argument could made that a naturalistic worldview commends these outcomes. The idea of natural selection is predicated on death and the destruction of the weak by the strong. If these things are supposed to be “natural,” then why do we consider them so terribly wrong and unjust? Going, back to C.S. Lewis, he continues:

“My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of ‘just’ and ‘unjust’?… What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust?… Of course I could have given up my idea of justice by saying it was nothing but a private idea of my own. But if I did that, then my argument against God collapsed too—for the argument depended on saying that the world was really unjust, not simply that it did not happen to please my private fancies… Consequently atheism turns out to be too simple.”

—C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

On the other end of the spectrum, Dostoevsky acknowledged that,

“If God does not exist, then everything is permitted.”

—Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov

Now, why does he come to that conclusion? Whether someone believes in the existence of God or not, each one of us has to believe in a universal good in order to supply our understanding of what’s right and fuel our desire for justice in the world. If our world is random, then there is no set standard for what’s right.

Some would push back on this, saying that humanity defines the “common good” out of what will protect and provide best for our species. But, is this something we want to rest the foundation of our concept of justice upon? The notion of the common good and the improvement of mankind has also been the foundation for movements like eugenics and the Third Reich (not to mention it doesn’t account for the heartbreak we experience when we see cruelty to animals and other species). Even those flying the flag of Christianity have historically used their sense of “goodness” as the excuse for external evils, like in the Crusades.

So, where does this leave us? When a group of broken individuals are left to determine the common good, history has shown us that we often interpret what’s best for us collectively through the broken lens of what we desire most personally. We need a standard of goodness that doesn’t come from humanity but does deeply value humanity in order to properly guide humanity toward flourishing and away from destruction.

This is how the Bible depicts God—both loving and just simultaneously. Both righteous in character and patient towards us who have been created in his image but have rebelled against him. The biblical idea of God gives us all the mental furniture for understanding why have an innate sense of good and evil, why we long for justice, and why we’re heartbroken at suffering.

But that leads us to our question for the evening: If God exists, then why would he allow all this evil and suffering in the world?

The “problem of evil” defined

Historically, this has often been called the “problem of evil,” and we can understand it from two different angles. First, there’s what’s called the logical problem of evil, which is essentially arguing that Christianity (or theism, in general) can’t consistently hold it’s teachings on both the existence of God and the presence of evil.

In his 1955 work, “Evil and Omnipotence”, J.L. Mackie summarized the logical argument this way:

If any two of the following are true, then the third must be false:

1. God is omnipotent

2. God is omnibenevolent

3. Evil exists

Because 3 is true and 1 and 2 are integral parts of theism, God can’t exist.

—J.L. Mackie, “Evil and Omnipotence”

And this isn’t a new argument. Going back all the way before the birth of Jesus, Epicurus made the same claim:

God either wishes to take away evils, and is unable; or he is able and unwilling; or he is neither willing nor able, or he is both willing and able.

1. If God is willing and is unable, he is feeble, which is not in accordance with the character of God

2. If he is able and unwilling, he is envious, which is equally at variance with God

3. If he is neither willing nor able he is both envious and feeble, and therefore not God

4. If he is both willing and able, which alone is suitable to God, from what source then are evils or why does he not remove them?

—Epicurus

Essentially, the conclusion they’re making is the same: evil and suffering cannot coexist alongside a good, all-powerful God. That’s the logical argument.

On the other side of the coin, the evidential argument from the problem of evil takes a subtly different approach. It doesn’t claim that God and evil cannot coexist, but it looks to the world around us, noting that the presence of gratuitous evil with seemingly no discernible benefit makes it likely God does not exist.

Bart Ehrman, who is a professor of Religious Studies at UNC Chapel Hill, summarizes the evidential argument well from his own experience. He grew up attending church but became an atheist as an adult after studying the problem of evil. He says:

“The God I once believed in was a God who was active in the world. He saved Israelites from slavery; he sent Jesus for the salvation of the world; he answered prayer; he intervened on behalf of his people when they were in desperate need; he was actively involved in my life. But I can’t believe in that God anymore, because from what I now see around the world, he doesn’t intervene.”

—Bart Ehrman, God’s Problem: How the Bible Fails to Answer Our Most Important Question—Why We Suffer

Common responses

So, how should we approach this very real challenge to believing in a good and loving God? I want to be charitable here because there are a couple of responses that are often quickly given that someone skeptical toward Christianity might not find very convincing.

First, someone might say that God just has a divine purpose, or a sovereign plan, for evil that we can’t understand. And someone skeptical about Christianity might acknowledge they wouldn’t know an infinite God’s reasons for doing things the way he does, but they could still point to gratuitous evil that seems impossible to carry purpose (e.g., an animal falling into a pit and slowly dying in pain in a forest).

Second, someone might respond to the problem of evil saying evil simply exists because God created humanity with free will and we brought it onto ourselves. But that feels a little simplistic, and almost sounds like God chose a poor system for how he created us if it’s caused so much failure and destruction.

But the person skeptical to Christianity also can’t offer simple answers here. They might say that if God exists, he’s just not all-powerful and able to eliminate suffering. But, if that’s the case, a finite God shouldn’t trusted or worshipped (and that’s not the way the Bible depicts the Christian God, down to his victory of even death in the resurrection of Jesus).

Or maybe God exists, but he’s just not all-good. Once again, this isn’t the consistent witness of Scripture. Like in Psalm 136:1, the Bible tells us to “Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever.”

So, maybe evil doesn’t really exist. But, whether you consider yourself a Christian tonight or not, that’s not any of our personal experience or shared history (murder, for example, has always been bad, and it’s always occurred).

Or, like J.L. Mackie, Epicurus, and Bart Ehrman, maybe you just conclude from the problem of evil that God does not exist. But, like we mentioned before, without the existence of God you’re back needing to find an objective source of good that can justify the presence of evil (The very thing you’re saying exists that disproves God needs a God in order for it to exist.)

A rational response to the problem of evil and suffering

So, how does Christianity reconcile the presence of evil and suffering with the existence of a good and all-powerful God? I’m going to state the answer simply and then philosophically (since I know we’re all wired differently, and those of us wanting the simple answer need to hear that first). Although, you’ll see that the simply response begs the question for the more thorough, philosophical response.

First, the answer simply: Just because you don’t know an answer doesn’t mean there isn’t an answer. If both a good and loving God exists as well as evil exists, then that God must have a morally sufficient reason for allowing that evil (and you might not always see or understand what that reason is).

Okay, now to several of you, that might just sound like a slightly wordier version of, “God has a plan.” And you’re not wrong! Which is why we also need the philosophical answer to help flesh this out…

First, we need to define what it means that God is all-powerful. I would put it this way: The God of the Bible can do whatever is logically possible and does not contradict his divine nature. What do I mean by that?

Logically possible—God can’t make a squared circle (because he created each shape as distinct)

Within his nature—God can’t sin (because sin and evil is defined in contrast to the character of God, if God were to embrace something sinful, it would by definition no longer be sinful. He cannot do something that is not in his nature (just like we can’t… humans can’t be dogs. We can’t fly. It’s against our nature).

Second, with that definition God as all-powerful in place, we need to acknowledge that no one can be held morally accountable for failing to do what they couldn’t do or for doing what they couldn’t fail to do. In other words, no one is morally accountable unless they act freely.

Third, regardless of how you understand the world came into existence, when God there in creation, he had to choose between including in it either one or the other of two good, but mutually contradictory, things. And because the two goods are mutually contradictory, God couldn’t include both, because God cannot actualize a contradiction, given our definition of what it means for him to be all-powerful. Now, what were those two options:

a. Option 1: Remove all evil

b. Option 2: Create non-glorified human beings in his image. Or, to put it another way: create people specifically the way he created us (with distinctions, abilities, and autonomy)

If God had chosen to remove evil, he would have done something very good. Yet, the option God chose (e.g., creating us the way we are) is a value of such magnitude that it is at least as valuable as removing evil, which means God has done nothing wrong in his choice.

“A good God will eliminate evil as far as he can without either losing a greater good or bringing about a greater evil.”

—Alvin Plantinga, God, Freedom, and Evil (author and has been a distinguished professor of philosophy at University of Notre Dame and Calvin College)

And that’s the argument of the Bible: God chose to put a value of the highest order into our world, and did not do what he couldn’t do (i.e., actualize a contradiction by simultaneously removing evil) which fulfills his moral obligation. He is a good God.

John Feinberg, Professor Emeritus of Biblical and Systematic Theology at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, who has been influential for me in providing language around understanding the dynamic between God and evil, summarized it this way:

“It is my contention that if God did what is necessary to rid our world of moral evil, he would either contradict his intentions to create human beings and the world as he has, cause us to wonder if he has one or more of the attributes ascribed to him, and/or do something we wouldn’t expect or desire him to do, because it would produce greater evil that there already is.”

—John Feinberg, Can You Believe It’s True?

The Christian understanding of God and evil is built on the belief that God did a good thing when he made us as autonomous creatures bearing the marks of his personal creativity. In other words: Why would God allow all this evil and suffering in the world? Because God loves you, and you’re worth it just the way he made you.

I don’t want that to sound flippant or dismissive of the weight behind this concern that people have believing in the God of the Bible. Genesis 1:26 tells us that God made man and woman in his image. And that image came with all God’s autonomy and creativity as he directed mankind to rule over creation.

But, when we chose, in the freedom God gave us as his image bearers, to develop our own will and desires apart from him, our ability to bear his image developed a hole in our shirt. That’s what we call sin, and it distorted the picture of God that was reflected by the people of God to all the creation of God. So, what was the result, the hole in the shirt that was wrongfully reflected spread to a hole in the creation, wrongfully representing the good God that ordered all of it for us to enjoy.

Now, child-bearing was painful, bodies decayed, natural disasters occurred… all stemming from the hole in humanities shirt as we inaccurately reflected the natured of God as his broken image bearers.

So, when we ask why God would allow such frequent evils and suffering throughout the world, the Bible affirms this reality of a broken creation:

Romans 8:18–23 ESV

¹⁸ For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. ¹⁹ For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. ²⁰ For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope ²¹ that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. ²² For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. ²³ And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.

Think of an underground, subway system. Regardless of how you feel about using public transportation—and I’m a fan!—but regardless of whether you enjoy it or not, it’s quite incredible how a subway system is able to transport so many people. In a major city like New York, so much of it comes down to the signal system telling which trains go where to go, how fas to go, and when to get there. If that breaks—and it certainly does—then trains stop and the delays start to pile up.

From a Christian perspective, the natural order of the world and everything in it is broken. We read that in Romans 8. Just like a subway signal system, if one part of the interconnected whole of creation is not functioning as it was intended, then the whole system breaks down.

We were created, not simply to give credit to God for his handiwork, but to reflect his divine goodness in unique and creative ways to one another and to all of creation. When we chose to create an identity unrooted from that design and reflect our own autonomous desires instead, then the entire system of creation fragmented. Now nothing functions fully in the way it was originally intended.

An emotional response to the problem of evil and suffering

But we can’t finish our time this evening with just that conclusion. Because, like I said at the beginning, even though the question, “Why would God allow evil and suffering in the world?” sounds like a rational objection, for most of us it’s ultimately an emotional one. So, us justifying the possibility of God existing and all the world experiencing evil and suffering isn’t enough. We need to finish our time together addressing our hearts.

The Christian worldview neither minimizes the devastating reality of suffering nor discounts it as entirely purposeless. The late Tim Keller, who was a pastor in New York and ministered there until his death from pancreatic cancer a few years ago, wrote an excellent book called Walking with God through Pain and Suffering. In one of the chapter, he offers a summary for how Christianity approaches suffering in a way altogether unique from any other world religion:

“Christianity teaches that, contra fatalism, suffering is overwhelming; contra Buddhism, suffering is real; contra karma, suffering is often unfair; but contra secularism, suffering is meaningful. There is a purpose to it, and if faced rightly, it can drive us like a nail deep into the love of God and into more stability and spiritual power than you can imagine.”

—Tim Keller, Walking with God through Pain and Suffering

This sense of purpose in the midst of suffering begins with the gospel of Jesus: God the Father sending his Son to suffer in our place is the boldest statement made in the argument concerning the problem of evil.

Though God may not always choose to explain the why for your suffering, in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus on your behalf, he has ultimately demonstrated that he cares.

In the gospel, God demonstrates that his love for us as beings created in his image is a superior good over removing evil. He doesn’t minimize our suffering, and he doesn’t leave us to endure it alone. Alvin Plantinga, in A Christian Life Partly Lived, articulates this so well:

“It would be easy to see God as remote and detached, permitting all these evils, himself untouched, in order to achieve ends that are no doubt exalted but have little to do with us, and a little power to assuage our griefs. It would be easy to see him as cold and unfeeling—or if loving, then such that his love for us has little to do with our perception of our own welfare. But God, as Christians see him, is neither remote nor detached. His aims and goals may be beyond our ken and may require our suffering, but he is himself prepared to accept much greater suffering in the pursuit of those ends.”

—Alvin Plantinga, A Christian Life Partly Lived

Or, as the 20th century Methodist theologian and missionary, E. Stanley Jones puts it,

The cross is God sensitive to human sin and sorrow, so sensitive that it becomes his very own.”

—E. Stanley Jones (Methodist theologian and missionary, 1884-1973)

The Christian worldview presents a God who is big enough to conquer evil, good enough to want to,  sacrificial enough to take our place, intelligent enough to have a plan for our ultimate flourishing, and loving enough to continue walking with us each new day.

Conclusion

Now, this isn’t meant to put a bow on the question of God and evil in a way that prepares you to never doubt or struggle with suffering in the future. That was never the goal of this evening. But as we wrap up tonight, I do want to suggest two purpose the Christian who has placed their faith in Jesus can find in the midst of their personal suffering: Within the Christian worldview, suffering can produce community and produce character.

First, regarding community: The quickest path to intimacy is vulnerability. Think of a new, romantic couple growing and deepening in their relationship as they start to share their hopes and dreams along with their insecurities and failures.

The Christian worldview doesn’t merely provide a path for individual purpose; it creates a community to uphold one another in pain.

Galatians 6:2 ESV

² Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.

Our struggles in life reveal our need and provide opportunities for others to know and serve us, setting up a depth of relationship that should be present and visible in ever church community because we are regularly acknowledge our sin and need before our holy and loving God.

But second, regarding character. it was was Origen, the 34d century Greek scholar that said,

“Virtue is not virtue if it be untested and unexamined.”

—Origen, quoted by Henry Bettenson in The Early Christian Fathers (Origen was an early 3rd century Greek scholar)

The hard things we go through in life provide the opportunity to refine us as we look to Jesus rather than ourselves as our true and unchanging source of strength.

1 Peter 1:6–7 ESV

⁶ In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, ⁷ so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

Remember, when God promises he will be with you in your struggles, the cross of Jesus shows you how far he is willing to go to keep that promise. And because that’s the promise of the cross, and the cross is the central event of our faith and justification before God, any Christian discussion of evil must always begin and end there.

If the cross shows us God’s love for us in the midst of our sin against him, then following after Jesus will naturally lead us to be present with others as they go through any difficulties in life.

Perhaps some of you this evening are dealing with something challenging in your life right now. Our church desires to be a community that does just communicate ideas to each other but one that cares. We would love to know how we can serve you in the days ahead.