If a non-Christian were to ask us about any of the controversial topics that face many non-believers today, we probably would be ready to converse. Many, if not most of us, would be thrilled at the chance to discuss our beliefs on some of these subjects and the basis for them. Yet there is one issue, the one we are about to explore, that seems to tie our tongues more than any other, even among ourselves. This is the issue most frequently raised by atheists and other skeptics. They view it as our Achilles heel; no other reason has been more widely offered for rejecting the God of the Bible. That subject is why there is so much evil and suffering.

Einstein was neither the first nor the last to discover that the “problem of evil and suffering” is typically treated by Christians and adherents to other religions as an unanswerable problem, a mystery we can never in this life understand or explain.

Few have been so bold as C. S. Lewis in delivering public lectures on it. Some books and essays have been written about it, but in general, our silence is deafening. Reasons for this silence abound. Experience tells us that the person asking why a loving, all-powerful God would allow evil and suffering may have faced some horrific tragedy themselves. Our hesitancy to respond comes from recognition that a glib answer will only intensify their anguish and confusion. The person asking may also be seeking an argument or an occasion to try and embarrass us. Given the emotional charge attached to this issue, no wonder it proves daunting, even to the most learned students of Scripture.

A reply affirming that a good answer does exist may be the most helpful response when the question comes up, especially when the occasion does not permit a lengthy discussion. At least this reply opens the door for future dialogue and expresses the conviction that God did shed some light on this subject. His Word does address it from many angles, including head on, and we are able to see this if we step back a bit from the text to take a wide-angle look at God’s message. Where does it start? Where does it end?

The challenge we can take up ourselves and pass along to inquirers calls for a reading (or rereading) of the first few chapters of the Bible and the last few. This review of “initial conditions” and “final conditions” can give us a fresh perspective on what unfolds in between and can help us discover some good and necessary purposes for the evil and suffering God allows in this world. Not that such a view offers a comprehensive response to such a difficult question. But it does provide us with an important context to consider a more complete answer. A place to start, as it were.

First, one great irony must be exposed. Many who argue that the existence of evil and suffering proves the nonexistence of an all-powerful, all-loving Creator have no idea that it proves just the opposite. Naturalistic materialism, the notion that the natural world accounts for itself and needs no outside explanation, cannot account for the evil and cruelty we see among humans. Survival of the fittest does not result in the behavior humans exhibit all over the planet toward the land itself and toward plants, animals, and especially to fellow humans.

To Be Continued

Adapted and modified from the book by: Hugh Ross, Beyond the Cosmos: What Recent Discoveries in Astrophysics Reveal about the Glory and Love of God; chapter 15.
Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV © 2011 by Biblica, Inc.
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