TRFG - Doubt 2 - How could a good God allow suffering?
Some view the existence of evil and suffering in our world as evidence against the existence of God (or at least the Christian God who is all-powerful and all-loving). Others view the problem of suffering from a painfully personal point of view and refuse to believe in a God who would allow such suffering into the world as what they have experienced. While Christianity does not completely explain all of why evil and suffering exist in our world, it does provide some answers for people on the problem of pain.
Evil and Suffering Isn’t Evidence Against God
Many have argued that the existence of pain and suffering in our world disproves the existence of the Judeo-Christian God. That is, the God who is both all-powerful and all-loving. Their reasoning goes something like this, If God is all-good, he is not powerful enough to prevent evil. If he is all all-powerful he is not good enough to stop it. Philosopher J. L. Mackie put it this way: “If a good and powerful God exists, he would not allow pointless evil, but because there is much unjustifiable, pointless evil in the world, the traditional good and powerful God could not exist. Some other god, or no god could exist, but not the traditional God.”1
This argument initially seems hard to overcome. However, hidden beneath a well-worded argument is a big assumption. Namely, that if I cannot see or understand the purpose of the evil, then it must be pointless. It is a giant leap of faith in your own cognitive abilities to say that you won’t believe in God unless you can understand all the mysteries of the universe as it regards evil and suffering.
Alvin Plantinga illustrates the problem in a very clear way. If you were camping with your Saint Bernard and wanted to see if it was in your tent, it would be very obvious once you looked in if it was not there. However, say you’re camping by yourself and you look in your tent to check for no-see-ums (insects so small you can barely see them but they have a bite disproportionate to their size). Just because you can’t see the no-see-ums doesn’t mean they are not there. Plantinga goes on to explain that based on how bad the suffering caused by evil is in this world, we expect the reason for such evil to be as clearly visible as a Saint Bernard in our tent. However, why couldn’t it be that the reason for evil that we can comprehend is the size of a no-see-um?
I like this illustration for another reason. If you have a small tent, the presence of a Saint Bernard or a swarm of no-see-ums would make your night unpleasant (or even unbearable). In one case, you can see the cause of your problem, in the other you only feel the pain. Similarly, we often don’t know the reason for the suffering we see or experience in this world, we only feel the pain of it. That doesn’t mean however, that there isn’t a reason for it.
If you have a God powerful enough to be mad at because he has allowed pain and suffering, you have a God who is powerful enough to have a good reason for it.
Evil and Suffering May Be (if Anything) Evidence for God
Terrible suffering, while a problem for a believer in the Bible, is maybe even more of a problem for the atheist. C.S. Lewis explains the problem in Mere Christianity:
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.
As Keller says, “many modern objections to God are based on a sense of fair-play and justice. People, we believe, ought not to suffer, be excluded, die of hunger or oppression. But the evolutionary mechanism of natural selection depends on death, destruction, and violence of the strong against the weak — these things are all perfectly natural.” Lewis found that while he initially abandoned belief in God based on the unjust suffering he saw in the world. He quickly found that his sense of justice itself was hard to understand if there was no God. Where does my sense of justice (which I feel when I see inexplicable suffering) come from if not from God?
Thus far we have only considered the problem of evil from a very cold philosophical point of view. However, we must still be sympathetic to people who are suffering. For many people this is a deeply personal issue and not just philosophical. We must be careful to not dismiss the suffering of others. Along with this, it is important to realize that Christianity has a unique answer for those who are suffering. It can bring hope and encouragement instead of despair.
The Suffering of Jesus
The end of each gospel narrative shows Jesus the night before his death. He was not facing it with tremendous amounts of courage and self-assurance, like we might expect from a spiritual leader. Instead, we see a man who was demonstrating signs of physical shock (Luke 22:44). He even pleaded with God not to have to go through what he was about to experience (Mark 14:36, Luke 22:42).
This is nothing like the courage that was demonstrated by many of his followers facing death in the centuries to come. There are countless stories of men and women bravely facing torture and death for the sake of Jesus. Why is it that the followers of Jesus have been able to demonstrate so much more courage than their leader? What was so bad about the death Jesus had to endure that it caused him to go into shock while his disciples were later able to face even more excruciating suffering with confidence and assurance?
To understand why Jesus was in so much agony in anticipation of his death, we first need to understand who he was. The Gospel of John introduces Jesus as the triune Son of God. It explains how from eternity past he had been in perfect fellowship with the Father. Yet on the cross, Jesus experienced separation from the Father and the full wrath of God on himself. He did this to take the place of sinners who had brought about all the evil and suffering in our world and rightly deserved this punishment.
Losing an acquaintance through death is a sobering experience. Losing a friend who you have had for years is even more tragic. You may be able to imagine the unspeakable pain of losing a loved one who you have known for a lifetime. In his death on the cross, Jesus willing gave up perfect fellowship with his heavenly Father that had lasted for all eternity. The physical pain experienced by Jesus on the cross was nothing compared to the suffering induced by this separation. Jonathan Edwards summarized all of this:
The sufferings which Christ endured in his body on the cross … were yet the least part of his last sufferings…. If it had been only the sufferings which he endured in his body, though they were very dreadful, we cannot conceive that the mere anticipation of them would have such an effect on Christ. many of the martyrs have endured as severe tortures in their bodies as Christ did … yet their souls have not been so overwhelmed.
So while Christianity may not completely explain why God would allow evil and suffering, it does tell us at least one thing. The answer is not that God doesn’t care. God is intimately aware of the pain and suffering in this world. Christianity alone has the Creator God enter into his creation and endure suffering himself. He is not distant and indifferent to our suffering. On the contrary, he is all too aware of the pain caused by evil in this world and he has taken that upon himself.
Resurrection and Suffering
Another thing worth mentioning while on this topic of suffering is the hope that we have that not all of this sorrow and suffering is in vain. We know this is important because we see it all the time when a family loses a loved one due to a tragedy. They say “we don’t want his death to have been in vain” and they work to reform the things in the world that led to their loss. The Christian doctrine of heaven is unique in that heaven is not just a consolation prize for not having a great life on earth, but it’s a complete restoration to the way things are supposed to be. So while God is not the author of evil, somehow heaven will be all the sweeter having experienced pain and suffering in this life. C.S. Lewis wrote,
They say of some temporal suffering, ‘No future bliss can make up for it,’ not knowing that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory.
This is the ultimate victory. Not only will all evil and suffering be vanquished, but somehow having experienced it, we will have even more joy and fulfillment for eternity.
Question 1 Jane asks, If your God exists and he is both all loving and all powerful, why doesn’t he stop children from starving in Africa? How would you respond to Jane?
Question 2 Do you buy the argument that the absence of a clear answer to the problem of pain and suffering doesn’t rule out the possibility that a plausible — but hidden — explanation exists? Why or why not? Do you feel that claiming that God has reasons for his actions that are beyond human reasoning is a cop-out? Or is this a valid argument? Explain.
Question 3 Brad lost his mom to cancer when he was four. Now he wonders why God would allow his mom to die when he was so young. What would you say to Brad?
Question 4 In your own words, what can we learn about the problem of pain and suffering from the death of Jesus?
Question 5 How does the Christian doctrine of heaven help those who are suffering?