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Why We Suffer
George L. Faull
ANSWERING QUESTIONS FROM RUSSIA!
~ An Article written by George L. Faull as Published in “One Body” 1993 Winter Edition ~
It
is a pleasure to answer a few questions that are being asked by those in
Russia. These are not unique to our
Russian friends. These are universal
questions.
I
hope that the answers will be helpful, and I would welcome the opportunity to
answer other questions, if you feel these have been helpful to you.
I
pray that my readers will perceive my sincerity in wanting to be a help to you
as you search for God.
We
in America are so excited that you, the Russian people, are seeking answers to
the most important matter in the world, namely the salvation of your souls.
We
are not content to have you Russians as good neighbors. We want you to be our brothers and
sisters-in-Christ. We want to spend
eternity with you.
QUESTION:
If
God is loving and Just, why is there so much suffering?
ANSWER:
God
had a choice before the creation to make men robots or free moral agents with
the power of choice. He chose the
latter.
In
giving man free agency, it follows that there would be evil in the world. One cannot have freewill between good and
evil and not have some people to choose evil.
In fact, all choose evil to some degree. Here are ten answers to your question:
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We live in a fallen world, which is not
as God created it, but as it became, due to men choosing evil.
As
a result of choice, there is divorce, drunkenness, murder, illegitimate babies,
disease, famine and war, and all the pain that goes with these things.
Choice
cannot help but have a “cause and effect” reaction. This should not be seen as evil on the part of God, but grace,
for He allows us the power of choice to choose good or evil.
God
cannot prevent calamities that result from the choices men make, for to do so
would remove freewill and make us puppets.
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We live in a world of consequences.
When
God made gravity, it produced the possibility of falling to our death. When He made fire, it produced the
possibility of our being burned. When
He gave men the power to make and mix chemicals, it created the possibility of
explosives.
This
is not evil, for the constancy of these causes and effects are what make it
possible for us to invent and create aids to heal, to travel, fly, or any other
endeavor. Yet these same possibilities
can cause much pain, sorrow and death, both by accident and by choice.
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We live in a world of chance and operate
under the law of averages.
Do
not misunderstand me. God can
intervene, but normally speaking, chance happens to us all. Eventually we may fall, contact a germ, get
hit, or be killed.
This
results in pain and suffering.
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We live in a world of God’s chastening.
He
does judge, not only the individual, but also nations who forget Him. When His wrath is shown through acts of
nature, the innocent suffer as well.
Men
damn God if He does not bring judgment upon sinners, and He is damned if He
does do so. In either case, He is
accused of not being loving or Holy. He
does send judgments of plagues, sickness, disease, famine, wars and
storms. These produce pain and
suffering, but this is to prompt repentance, that men might look to Him and be
saved.
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We live in a world that is a battlefield
between a good God, who chooses to bless, and an alien devil that seeks to
destroy man.
Battlefields
are war scarred. Death, pain, sorrow,
disease, and cripples lay over a battlefield.
One would expect to find these on any other battlefield.
Satan
has taken men captive at his will on planet earth. Christ has come to set us free.
It is because many fight for their love of the world, the flesh and the
devil, that so many corpses and cripples are littered on the battlefield. We should be surprised if we did not find
pain and sorrow on a battlefield.
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We live in a world of positives and
negatives.
God’s
grace in sending rain is hated by the boy wanting to play outdoors, but the
farmer renders thanks. The contractor
wants sun; the skier wants snow.
God
is blamed for the weather He gives. God
has set in order His laws of nature, but man spoils God’s grace by abuse,
neglect, and disregard for others.
What
could have been a fruitful valley becomes a valley of drought. Man-made religions and doctrines produce
famine. Instead of dominating the
animal world, men worship the animals, and feed the animals instead of their
own families.
Think
of the fat “holy cows” of India. The
belief in reincarnation causes men not to kill the vermin, such as rats, mice,
and insects, that destroy their crops and food supply. They fear that they might be killing an
ancestor if they kill an animal. This
causes death and disease.
The
caste system keeps men from helping the sick and dying. Is God responsible for such willful
ignorance of man? Men have made God’s
positives into negatives. In a world of
free choice, this is inevitable.
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We live in a world with 6 billion other
people who have free will.
They
can do evil. They have accidents. They have religions and superstitions
contrary to what God has revealed. They
refuse advice. They spread disease by
their immorality. The righteous suffer
because of others’ choices, foolishness, and sin, as well as their own.
It
is impossible in a world of 6 billion freewill people that there would be no pain
and suffering! It reminds me of a man
saying, “If God is all powerful and can do anything, can He make a rock so big
that He cannot lift it? Of course
not! They are opposites and not even
God can do opposites.
Can
God give 6 billion sinful people freewill, and there not be pain and
suffering? The answer to the latter
question is as obvious as the former.
No!
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We live in a world that God is allowing
to ripen for judgement.
God
has not stopped the world’s pain and suffering yet because He wants man to see
the results of sin.
Sin
is a transgression of God’s revealed Will.
Mankind tramples on His commands.
By letting the fruit of sin ripen to its end, man will be able to see
two things:
FIRST: Why God gave the prohibitions He gave.
SECOND: The reason man is deserving of judgment.
The
seeds of sin have grown to trees of wickedness. The cub has become a bear, the kitten a lion, and the egg a
poisonous viper.
If
God did not allow sin to become full grown so men could see the end of choosing
evil, more men would be sinners. Surely
you can see that those who overdose on heroin have discouraged others from ever
attempting to take it.
Has
AIDS not curbed some immorality? If God
cut off pain and suffering caused by sin in mid-cycle, more would be emboldened
to sin.
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We live in a world that is temporary.
God
lives in eternity. He sees the end from
the beginning. He is not conscious of
time, but rather of His eternal purpose.
He knows that those who choose right are destined for a New World that
is far better.
He
sees a pain-filled world and knows that He has already provided a world free of
pain. God is like a father who sees his
son with a toothache, but knows he has already made an appointment with the
dentist to correct it. To curse an
eternal God for pain, when He has already fashioned a world free of pain for
those who choose righteousness, demonstrates neither faith nor reason.
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We live in a world that has rejected the
one hope for a sinful, painful, sorrowful experience.
God
does love the world. He sent His Son to
die that we might have life more abundantly.
The
majority of His creatures still choose to ignore the means of escaping much of
the pain caused by sin. Men are like a
mouse caught in a trap, which continues to enjoy the cheese it was after.
So
men often lay in their pain, enjoying the sins of the world. They continue to suffer guilt. They have not faith, and therefore no
hope. They curse Him who is the giver
of every perfect gift. They reject the
pain-free world to come. They refuse to
become a prepared people for a prepared place that is free of this world’s
woes.
CONCLUSION
Perhaps
recognizing these ten things will help you perceive the world of suffering, in
putting up with this sinful world, is not because He is powerless to correct or
because He is unholy or unloving or unconcerned. It is because He is longsuffering and is not willing that any
should perish, but that all may come to repentance.
The
longsuffering of our Lord is salvation to those who will not stumble over God’s
allowing sin to come to fruition. The
axe is even now at the root of the tree and every tree that brings not forth
good fruit is hewn down and cast into the fire.