Suffering
When I went to PWOC (Protestent Women of the Chapel) yesterday our Bible study leader brought in some excerpts from the speech that Lee Strobel gave after the Aurora, Colorado shooting. There were some amazing points about suffering that really stuck out to me.
I personally have never really struggled with why bad things happen, but I know that many do, and for good reason. It is a very hard subject to wrap our heads around. Here are some of his points that he brought "to the table". However, these are not his points but they come straight from the Bible, from whence the should.
Many individuals ask the question, "If God is good, why did he allow good and evil". Lee states that, "God is not the creator of evil and suffering." God originally created a world without any suffering or evil. Genesis 1:31 says, "God saw all that he had made, and it was very good." The evil came after Adam and Eve chose to sin. Lee stated that there is moral evil and natural evil.
Moral evil "is the immorality and pain and suffering and tragedy that come because we choose to be selfish, arrogant, uncaring, hateful, and abusive." According to Romans 3:23, Paul says, "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." Think about this small example, we pay our sports teams millions of dollars to entertain us through sport while we want to say, "if God is good, why are there millions of people suffering through hunger or poverty"... they don't have to suffer but we choose to be selfish with our money and resources rather than distributing it so that there is no poverty or hunger. God is not choosing that, we are. Even when I think about me, I am to blame. I have nice things, a nice home, yet how much am I contributing to the poverty and hunger in the world through my own resources I am NOT distributing?
Then he says there is natural evil, "These are things like wildfires, earthquakes, tornadoes, and hurricanes that cause suffering for people" (Strobel). When Adam and Eve sinned in the garden because they wanted to be "like God" and be there own master, they caused not only man to die eventually but cause the demise of nature, "We know that the whole creation has been growning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time" (Romans 8:22).
One of the other, many, great points that Strobel brings to light is that God can use our suffering for good. Paul states in Romans 8:28 that He will "work all things for the good of those who love him..." This does not necessarily mean "our" good but His good. God does not cause the evil but for, many times, only reasons He knows, He does allow it and promises to "cause good to emerge"... There are many ways God can use what man means for evil, for good, "He can and He will. God can use our suffering to draw us to Himself, to mold and sharpen our character, to influence others for Him -- He can draw something good from our pain in a myriad of ways...if we trust and follow Him" (Strobel).
In our suffering, He is there, but we have to make the choice to run to Him and find solace in Him rather than be bitter or angry at Him. I love what Corrie ten Boone said about suffering, "No matter how deep our darkness, He is deeper still."
Advice from Strobel,
"So when tragedy strikes, as it will; when suffering comes, as it will; when you're wrestling with pain, as you will -- and when you make the choice to run into His arms, here's what you're going to discover: you'll find peace to deal with the present, you'll find courage to deal with your future, and you'll find the incredible promise of eternal life in heaven."
