How can you believe in a God who allows so much suffering?
This is the number one question I receive from both believers and unbelievers. I fully acknowledge it is difficult question to answer. Speaking to a skeptic one day, I was asked several rapid-fire questions: How could a God of love allow children to be sold into sexual slavery? How could He allow children to be abused? Why does He allow murder? How can He allow all of the unjust suffering in the world? His list of questions was a lot longer.
It seems to me, the best answer to the question is another question: What do you have if you remove God from the equation? Whether you believe in God or not, injustices in the world will not cease. And without God in the picture, why are these things so bothersome? If you insist on removing God from the equation, you are left with a brutal, hopeless, pointless world where the weak are victims of the strong. It reminds me of a bumper sticker I saw once: LIFE STINKS…THEN YOU DIE! In such a world, suffering is pointless and there will be no future judgment to right the wrongs and bring ultimate punishment to evildoers. It’s just a dog-eat-dog world where some have it worse than others do. That view offers no hope to anyone!
This is the number one question I receive from both believers and unbelievers. I fully acknowledge it is difficult question to answer. Speaking to a skeptic one day, I was asked several rapid-fire questions: How could a God of love allow children to be sold into sexual slavery? How could He allow children to be abused? Why does He allow murder? How can He allow all of the unjust suffering in the world? His list of questions was a lot longer.
It seems to me, the best answer to the question is another question: What do you have if you remove God from the equation? Whether you believe in God or not, injustices in the world will not cease. And without God in the picture, why are these things so bothersome? If you insist on removing God from the equation, you are left with a brutal, hopeless, pointless world where the weak are victims of the strong. It reminds me of a bumper sticker I saw once: LIFE STINKS…THEN YOU DIE! In such a world, suffering is pointless and there will be no future judgment to right the wrongs and bring ultimate punishment to evildoers. It’s just a dog-eat-dog world where some have it worse than others do. That view offers no hope to anyone!
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