The most formidable problem against Christianity isn’t whether or not God exists, but rather if He does exist, then why it is that He allows evil and suffering to continue to cast its overwhelming shadow over our world.
This issue provokes our judgment against God, the verdict rendering that He has allowed something awful to happen to us, and that He is wrong in doing so.
The problem of evil is very real, especially for those going through immense pain, and it is a very legitimate issue to raise. The reality of evil has provoked an interpretation of God’s character to many people, and admittingly, it sounds accurate and reasonable at first glance.
It goes like this:
If God is all-good, then He can’t be all-powerful; otherwise, He would stop the evil in this world. Furthermore, if God were all-powerful, then He can’t be all-good, because He allows too much evil in our world.
This argument is well and good, but a few variables are missing.
What if we inserted that God is all-wise and all-loving, as well as all-good and all-powerful? What if we assert that God is infinite, and evil only exists within a certain amount of time? How quickly we raise our fists to God for accountability, and how quickly we dismiss God holding us accountable for our actions.
Yet, the very reason evil is so prevalent in our world is precisely because we’ve put it here.
It has nothing to do with God. God made the world “good,” and what have we done with it?
Does Got not have more of a right to ask us why evil exists in our world?
Are we not the ones who choose evil?
Do we not choose to gossip, to slander, to betray, and to back-stab one another?
Don’t murderers and rapists choose to do so?
Everything evil in this world has everything to do with us and nothing to do with God.
We’re sinful in our thoughts, our words, our actions, and our motives. We’re unleashing evil every day in countless ways. If God were to rid this world of evil, at which point would He stop? If God officially ended evil in this world, then none of us would exist.
An annihilation of evil would call for an extermination of humanity, because we’re all evil.
God allows evil in the world because God allows life, period. Moreover, God is not detached or personally uninvolved from our pain and suffering because, in Christ, he meets us in our suffering by suffering on our behalf, in our place. God suffers so that one day we longer will.
We may not understand the presence of evil and suffering in the world, but at least we for sure know what it can’t be. It can’t be that God doesn’t love us, and we understand this when we take ourselves to the foot of the cross, where He willingly put himself to embrace our evil, to let it overwhelm him to the point of death.
His love for us shows us that God is involved in our pain.
God’s wisdom is this: He defeats evil with love precisely by dying for his enemies. Jesus taught us to love our enemies, and he lived this out by dying for them. His work on the cross was both the ultimate act of evil and love in one. Death no longer has the last word for us because of Jesus’ resurrection.
So, we can have confidence that the evil in this world is being dealt with by a God that has taken it upon Himself to suffer with us and for us, to become a curse so that we might have life.
Where do we turn in our pain and suffering?
Casting God out of the equation is no help. When life falls apart, we need someone present with us to be with us. So, this is where Christianity doesn’t just offer philosophical answers, but rather, provides a Person. Thoughts and ideas can’t bring meaning, peace, hope, and comfort. Only a person can do this.
Here Jesus meets us in our pain with promises for something greater. He meets us with a plea to come and see that He, the Lord, is good. He knows of our suffering because He welcomed it to ransom us.
He is with us in the truest sense of meaning, to give us a life-giving relationship with a God that secures us in the infinite worth of eternity and will fulfill His promises to free us from evil, pain, and suffering, fully, in the life to come.
We look back to God’s promises and see how at the cross He is with us in our pain.
We look forward to the day all will be made right.
We look into the gospel to see that evil will not have the last word, but that God has a better plan to give us joy, love, peace, goodness, and life eternal.
God’s goodness and power can be seen in this: That we inflicted evil and suffering upon Jesus, and God used it to save our souls and restore our humanity.