Why Do Bad Things Happen?
Brian Bill
4/22/01
I like puns. Here are two are my favorites.
Two boll weevils grew up in South Carolina. One went to Hollywood and became a famous actor. The other stayed behind in the cotton fields and never amounted to much. The second one, naturally, became known as the lesser of two weevils.
Two Eskimos sitting in a kayak were chilly, but when they lit a fire, it sank. Proving once again that you can’t have your kayak and heat it, too.
Beth and I used to enjoy watching Home Improvement. One of the best parts of the show would come at the end when they would run the bloopers from that particular episode.
There’s something very funny about watching other people mess up. But let’s face it; real-life problems are nothing to laugh at, especially when they happen to you. Like “bloopers,” some pretty awful things have made an unwelcome entry on the screen of your life.
If you’re not going through a hard time right now, just wait -- you will. That’s the nature of living in a world like ours. Pain is guaranteed for anyone who takes on the task of living. Some of you are in the furnace of suffering right now. Others of you have just come out, and the rest of us will be there sooner or later.
Going through bad times begs a couple questions, “What have I done to deserve this kind of treatment?” “Why does God allow this to happen?” And so we wonder. Did God just make a blooper? Is this all just a bad pun? A big cosmic mistake?
The topic we’re tackling this morning is the most commonly asked question about God -- it’s been referred to as the “Achilles Heel” of Christianity. George Barna, the public-opinion pollster, conducted a national survey in which he polled adults: “If you could ask God one question, what would you ask?” The top response was, “Why is there pain and suffering in the world?”
In a story that appeared in the New Yorker this week, it was reported that CNN founder Ted Turner was suicidal after the breakup of his marriage to Jane Fonda and losing control of Turner Broadcasting. Interestingly, Turner told the magazine that his marriage to Fonda broke up partly because of her decision to become a practicing Christian.
Turner is a strident nonbeliever who is filled with bitterness not just because of his marital and business problems, but also because his own father killed himself when Ted was 24 and then his sister later died from a painful disease. When asked about these tragedies, Turner responded, “I couldn’t understand how someone so innocent should be allowed to suffer so much.” (Associated Press, 4/16/01).
This is not just an intellectual issue to be debated in sterile academic arenas: it’s an intensely personal matter that can leave us with spiritual vertigo. One writer referred to the problem of pain as the “the question mark that turns like a fishhook in the human heart.”
Reasons for Bad Things
The Bible helps us see that there are at least four reasons why bad things happen.
1. Our Personal Sin. This explains why there is so much moral evil in the world. In order to understand this, we need to go back to the first book in the Bible, the book of Genesis. We read here that God created Adam and Eve in His image. That doesn’t mean they looked like God, but instead that they were given the ability to make rational choices.
God did not create evil. Rather, He created the possibility of evil when He created human beings. We have actualized that potentiality. God gave Adam and Eve some moral parameters and very clearly told them what they could and could not do. But they chose to defy and disobey His standards. Ever since that day, every one of us have been born with that same ability to make choices -- and with the same rebellious bent for sin. We can make decisions that either build others up, or tear them down. In other words, our actions often have a direct impact on other people.
Luke 13:1 tells us about a group of people who came up to Jesus and asked Him why Pilate murdered some men and women while they were worshipping in the Temple. After killing them, he took their blood and mixed it with the blood of their sacrifices. Our entire country asked a similar question after Larry Gene Ashbrook went on a shooting spree at Wedgewood Baptist Church in Fort Worth, Texas on September 16, 1999, killing seven people. Both groups of worshippers were murdered because of the sinful choices made by two different men separated by almost two centuries – Pontius Pilate and Larry Ashbrook.
You may wonder at this point why God doesn’t step in and prevent people from doing bad things to others. He could have made Timothy McVeigh have an accident before he arrived at the Mura Federal Building in Oklahoma City. Except then we’d be robots. You see, our freedom gives us the ability to hurt others.
Rabbi Harold Kushner wrote a best-selling book several years ago called, “When Bad Things Happen to Good People.” His title is deceiving because the Bible says that there’s no such thing as a good person. God’s image has been tarnished. We’re good stuff that has gone bad. We’re a defaced masterpiece. A rebellious child. We’re not just imperfect people who need to grow. The Bible says that we’re rebels who need to lay down our arms.
When sinful people make decisions, God allows them to play out -- and sometimes those consequences result in some bad things happening to you, and to others. I am not suggesting that we always suffer in direct proportion to our sin. In Luke 13:2, Jesus addressed this when He says, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? I tell you, no!” What I am saying is that many bad things are related to sin.
2. Corporate Sin. The second cause of bad things has to do with natural evil. The Bible teaches that this is the result of our corporate sin. We live in a disease and death environment. Before Adam and Eve exercised their free will and rebelled against God, there were no earthquakes, hurricanes, natural disasters or diseases. They came rolling onto the scene after Adam and Eve sinned against God.
When Adam and Eve told God to take a hike, He partially honored their request. Nature began to revolt. The earth was cursed. Genetic breakdown and diseases were unleashed to do their work of destruction. Pain and death became a part of the human experience. Listen to how God describes the consequences of their decision in Genesis 3:17-18: “Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you…” In the picturesque story of Genesis, disobedience results in shame, alienation from God and others, but also in the disruption of nature.
Romans 8:22 describes the present state of our planet: “We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.” Natural disasters and diseases are making inroads because the whole creation is groaning under the pressure of God’s judgment. This was all set in motion the moment Adam and Eve defied God’s parameters.
Jesus continues in Luke 13:4 by raising the question about 18 construction workers who died when the tower of Siloam fell on them: “…do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? I tell you, no!” Things are out of whack. Accidents happen. Rivers flood. Tornadoes touch down.
3. Satanic Influences. I want to briefly mention a third reason behind terrible tragedies. Many bad things are the result of the devil’s destructive designs. Satan is ultimately behind all the hatred, war, oppression, and evil in the world. He works behind the scenes to inflame our passions and to prompt us to make bad choices. He’s out to spoil God’s world in every possible way he can. Jesus referred to him as the murderer in John 8:44.
4. God’s Providence. The fourth factor is difficult for some of you to swallow. God is in control. He allows suffering. And, He’s a good God even when bad things happen. That goes right to the heart of the question, doesn’t it? If God is good, why does He allow evil? I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t fully understand this one but I know that God is good and I know that bad things happen. It’s all part of His plan somehow. God puts it this way in Isaiah 55:9: “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
There must be some reasons behind why God permits things to happen in our lives. Because He is a good God, there must be some practical benefits.
Practical Benefits of Hard Times
The Bible speaks of at least 4 good things that can come out of bad things.
#1, Hard Times Can Stretch Us. About 8 years ago, I experienced some chronic pain that lasted about 14 months. It was a very tough time -- and I wasn’t easy to live with -- just ask Beth! Dealing with this difficulty helped to stretch my character. I learned what it means to persevere, to hang in there even when I didn’t want to.
If you think about it, we can only learn qualities like patience and endurance if we go through some difficulties. If we always get what we want, and cruise through life with no problems, we’ll stay the same -- and our character won’t be refined. James 1:2-4 puts it this way: “Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”
#2, Hard Times Can Equip Us. The Bible says that another reason we go through difficulties is so God can have the opportunity to comfort us -- and then in turn, we can comfort others. Listen to 2 Corinthians 1:4: “The God of all comfort...comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God.”
I was on the receiving end of this after Rebecca, our third child was born. She had just been diagnosed with some breathing problems and had been hooked up to an apnea monitor in the hospital. I remember standing outside the nursery window with tears running down my face, when I heard a door open at the end of the hallway and saw one of the deacons from our church in Rockford walking toward me. He didn’t say a word; he just came up and hugged me. He understood what I was going through because he had recently gone through a tough time with one of his daughters. God had comforted him and now he was able to comfort me.
#3, Hard Times Can Teach Us. God may use the bad things you are experiencing to teach you something that He can’t get through to you in any other way. Hebrews 12:10 says that, “God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in His holiness.” When God wants to teach us something He allows us to go through some tough times.
In his book called, The Case for Faith, Lee Strobel shares an illustration about a bear in a trap and a hunter who, out of sympathy, wants to liberate him. He tries to win the bear’s confidence, but he can’t do it, so he has to shoot the bear full of drugs. The bear, however, thinks the hunter is trying to kill him. Then, in order to get the bear out of the trap, the hunter has to push him in further to release the tension on the spring.
God does the same thing to us sometimes so that He can teach us what He wants us to learn. To us, it seems like God is punishing us, but actually He’s attempting to teach us and to free us. I love Lamentations 3:33: “He does not willingly bring affliction or grief to the children of men.” Hebrews 12:11 says, “No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.”
There’s one more benefit -- #4, Hard Times Can Reach Us. It was C.S. Lewis who said, “God whispers to us in our pleasures; speaks in our conscience; but shouts in our pains. It’s His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.” God can use the hard times to get our attention, to help eternal realities break through.
Let’s go back to Luke 13 for a minute. After bringing up those who were wiped out while they were worshipping and those who were killed in a construction accident, Jesus gives His answer to the question, “Why Do Bad Things Happen?” His reply is surprising and quite strong. He says it twice in five verses. Look at verse 3 and verse 5: “But unless you repent, you too will all perish.”
Here we see the heart of Jesus. He longs for us to change by repenting of the way we’ve been living. We think that we somehow deserve good things, that God owes us an easy life. Then, when things go wrong, we wig out because it wasn’t supposed to happen that way. Instead of wondering why bad things happen, Jesus reminds us that we are fallen individuals, living in a fallen word. We should be amazed and thankful that we are given another day to live, that we’re not killed or involved in a fatal accident. While there’s still time, Jesus calls us to repentance.
When I was 18 years old, I was living a pretty wild life. I thought I was invincible. At the end of my senior year of high school I was out swimming with some buddies. We were having a blast. That is, until one of my friends did something he shouldn’t have done, and drowned right before my eyes.
Then, a year later, the girl I was dating dropped me on my head. I went into a tailspin. I began to drink more than I ever had before. My emptiness was like a hollow pit in my stomach. It was shortly after that, due to the influence of my college roommate, that I started reading the Bible and eventually asked Christ to be my Forgiver and Leader.
I often wonder if my friend would not have drowned, and if my girlfriend had not broken up with me, whether I would have become a Christian. I really believe that God used these “bad things” to reach me. I wasn’t listening when everything was going fine. God needed to knock out some of the props in my life.
Where is Job When It Hurts?
One of the most vivid examples of suffering in all literature is found in the Bible. The story is a case study of human suffering, chronicling the life of a “good man” who underwent extreme misery. He lost everything: his job, his possessions, his family, his health, and his friends. His name is Job. The book that bears his name is the all-time classic on the problem of suffering.
Job’s trust wavered. He mourned. He cried. He protested. He questioned. He even cursed the day he was born. Job begged God to answer his questions. He desperately wanted to know why all these bad things had happened to him. God answered him, but the answer was not what Job expected.
You see, God’s answer to Job was unsettling. Instead of giving a direct response, God gave His longest speech in the entire Bible in chapters 38-41. He asks Job questions like, “Where were you when I established the heavens and the earth? Can you place the stars in the sky? Do you give the horse his strength or clothe his neck with a flowing mane? Will the one who contends with the Almighty correct Him?”
Job, after getting a theology lesson from God, broke down and said in 42:3, 5: “Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know...My ears had heard of you, but now my eyes have seen you...therefore I repent in dust and ashes.” Did you catch that? He repented. That’s exactly what Jesus challenges us to do in Luke 13.
Ultimately the only answer God gave to Job was Himself. It was if God said to him, “Job, I am your answer. Learn who I am. When you know me, you’ll know how to handle anything.” Job wasn’t asked to trust a plan but a person -- a personal God who is in ultimate control and knows what is best for us. This has been called the first rule of the Christian life: He is God, and we are not.
The main point of the book of Job is that life is unfair, that bad things do happen. The question really is not, “Where is God when it hurts?” Instead, the question is, “Where is Job when it hurts?” The most important battles take place inside of us. Let me personalize it a bit more. Where are you when it hurts? Where am I?
God’s answer to Job is instructive for you and for me. He basically challenged Job in the only thing he could control: his response. God moved the tragedy to the future -- now what will you do, Job? Blaming God got him nowhere; he needed to decide how he was going to respond. What was he going to do now? Was he going to shake his fist at God? Was he going to get better, or get bitter? His response was his responsibility. Likewise, we can’t change our circumstances, but we can change how we respond to them.
Jesus Is Our Hope
What’s your response to the bad things that happen in your life? Don’t give up and become passive or become bitter and hardened like Ted Turner. God is no stranger to your pain. The great news of the Bible is that God is a suffering God. Jesus Christ died a horrible death on a rough cross to provide you with the ultimate solution for suffering and death. No, he can’t take away all your pain, or protect you from bad things, but He can walk with you through them. He may not shield us from all of life’s storms, but He does shelter us.
You have a choice. You can accept the bad things that come your way, and allow them to stretch you, equip you, teach you, and reach you -- or you can live as a bitter and hardened person.
Sometimes we choose to believe because of what we see, often we believe in spite of what we can see. As I look at the world around me, many things remain mysterious and unanswerable. But if there is no God, or if He is not good, then nothing at all makes sense.
When we hurt, we really have only two choices:
• We can hurt with God, or
• We can hurt without him.
If you are hurting today, you may feel like you’re at the end of your rope. I pray that you will hang on to the Lord. If you turn away from him, things will only get worse.
This past Friday was the two-year anniversary of the tragedy at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado. An editorial in The Pantagraph called Columbine a “defining moment” for our generation. People will never forget it. I was amazed when I did an Internet Search and discovered that there are over one-quarter of a million sites devoted to what happened on April 20, 1999.
First Service Conclusion
One of the students who was murdered that day was Cassie Bernall. When she was asked if she believed in Christ, she boldly declared, “Yes, I believe.” And then she was killed.
You and I might not ever face a gunman who asks us a question about our faith but we will face difficulty and struggle and pain and heartache. What will you say? Make this your defining moment. Put your faith in the God who loves you.
Cassie’s martyrdom was even more remarkable when you consider that just a few years earlier she had dabbled in the occult, including witchcraft. She had embraced the same darkness that drove her killers to such despicable acts. But, several months before she was killed, Cassie had dedicated her life to Jesus.
Cassie’s brother Chris, found this poem that Cassie had written just two days prior to her death.
Now I have given up on everything else
I have found it to be the only way
To really know Christ
And to experience the mighty power
That brought Him back to life again,
And to find out what it means to suffer
And to die with him.
So, whatever it takes
I will be one who lives
In the fresh newness of life
Of those who are alive from the dead.
Are you ready to do whatever it takes this morning to trust God and His goodness, no matter what has happened, or what will happen? Are you willing to receive the free gift of forgiveness and eternal life? Make this your defining moment.
Let’s stand and sing our closing hymn, “Have Thine Own Way, Lord.”
Second Service Conclusion
We want to close this morning by showing a music video by Michael W. Smith called, “This is Your Time.” He wrote this song in honor of Cassie Bernall, who when asked if she believed in Christ, boldly declared, “Yes, I believe.” The first section of the video is an excerpt from a film project that Cassie did. It was played at her funeral and 70 teenagers came forward and prayed to receive Jesus.
Play Video
It was a test we could all hope to pass.
But none of us would want to take.
Faced with a choice to deny God and live.
For her there was one choice to make.
Friend, this is your time. You and I might not ever face a gunman who asks us a question about our faith but we will face difficulty and struggle and pain and heartache. What will you say? Make this your defining moment. Put your faith in the God who loves you.
Cassie’s martyrdom was even more remarkable when you consider that just a few years earlier she had dabbled in the occult, including witchcraft. She had embraced the same darkness that drove her killers to such despicable acts. But, several months before she was killed, Cassie had dedicated her life to Jesus.
Cassie’s brother Chris, found this poem that Cassie had written just two days prior to her death.
Now I have given up on everything else
I have found it to be the only way
To really know Christ
And to experience the mighty power
That brought Him back to life again,
And to find out what it means to suffer
And to die with him.
So, whatever it takes
I will be one who lives
In the fresh newness of life
Of those who are alive from the dead.
Are you ready to do whatever it takes this morning to trust God and His goodness, no matter what has happened, or what will happen? Are you willing to receive the free gift of forgiveness and eternal life? This is your time. Make it your defining moment.
Closing Prayer.
