Why does God let bad things happen to good people?

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To show bad people how good people react when they realize they do not control the universe and must submit to the will of God.
 
Thanks, but, some good people don’t act like ‘know it alls’ so, why should they be punished, they’ve repent and now they are born again. Why does bad things happen to them?
 
I wish I knew.

I guess because we can’t always see the good that can come out of the supposedly bad? That He has a plan that transcends our limited vision…?
 
So they might set an example of how one should live and hopefully lead others to Christ through their actions and lives?
Though, i’ve yet to see a bad situation where no happiness can be found…
Every cloud has a silver lining… If your willing to look… no?
 
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mama9103:
Why does God let bad things happen to good people?
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Define ‘bad things’.

Most bad things happen because of a decision the person made along the way. It isn’t a punishment, it’s the natural consequence for the choice they made. If they chose A then certain things would flow from that decision. If they chose B then certain things flow from that decision. Whenever we choose things which are against the will of God we can’t expect all good things to result from that choice. Yes, some good things will result, usually short term gains/joys, but in the long run the good wanes and bad surfaces.

Some bad things aren’t really bad things. They appear to be bad from a certain perspective, but from God’s perspective they are good.

As for God ‘letting’ bad things happen…He’s rather even handed. He ‘lets’ good things happen and bad things happen. It’s called Free Will. Ultimately the decisions are ours to make when faced with choices. We are free to love him. We are free to reject him.

Many saints loved God passionately and still bad things happened to them…bad from our perspective…but from their perspective, because God let them in on His plan for them, they saw the good which came from their bad so they opened themselves to the bad, just as Christ opened His arms on the cross for our good.
 
The question might be easier to answer if we first answer how it is that there is any good in the world at all? How do you know it is good? Why hasn’t evil and chaos completely taken over?

Scott
 
Wow, this is a very largely asked question. This is my understanding of the situation at hand for us today.

We once lived in a time where we lived according to our deeds. If we strayed from the path, we were punnished acordingly. Then God got to the point of seeing that there was so few people that were free of sin, and he wipped the slate clean (Noahs Ark) And found too, that this pattern followed, and God got angry at different indeviduals.

He decided to send his only son down here, to be a teacher and tell everyone he could about him and learned to pass the word from person to person. If this son did follow through with what was prophosised, then all of anyones sin would be absorbed…everyones! And in return, we were given the freedome to choose our own paths, we were also given the enormous gift of being able to ask for forgiveness at anytime, and if meant, it would be granted.Slate clean.

The difference is, with the freedome to choose meant that he no longer could come into your life…unless you asked him. Only then could he share the many gifts he has prommised us, and our journeys to be stronger.

Unfortunately, there is good AND evil…some many have chosen this path, and because we live in this world, innocent lives have had their paths altered by others wrong decisions.

For the beauty of the presciousness that Jesus dieing on the cross achieves for us, we can hardly repay him…except to follow his path as best we can. We can not truly understand the debth of sadness that God feels when he sees an innocent lost, or a child of god not hear him knocking at the door. Any one falling prey to such finality is saught after to be guided home with the utmost tenderness. We loos a friend, but he looses a child…and how he must ache.

I know this ache, as my son has passed away recently. If God loves us anywhere near how much i loved my son…he is mighty. He loved my son as much as any other presence on this earth. But like a parent frustrated over the fighting siblings do, the kids that know it all, etc…he understands, as he is a parent too.

This freedom of choice, along side of the graces that being able to be forgiven has its pro’s and cons. I believe that God is doing the best he can, and i trust his PLAN, as he knows more than i ever will, and he knows what is best for me, without my understanding why.
 
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mama9103:
Why does God let bad things happen to good people?
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We all get a cross to bear and follow after Jesus, if only the bad people got a cross to bear then what would the good people do to unite to His Cross?
 
It’s a very good question, I was actually just about to post one like it myself!

Yes, bad things will happen to good people. I think confronting evil is a part of the road to Heaven. It’s something we all have to confront to find God on the other side . . . if that makes any sense. The only thing that really matters in the end are the decisions we make, e.g. the decision to follow God.

I think we can define “bad” as something that causes us pain or suffering. There are two reasons for these bad things: 1) Nature. It’s just the nature of our world, which is not paradise. We can get diseases, hurricanes and earthquakes can strike, etc. 2) The confrontation with evil. We can get in physical fights, wars, terrorists want to kill us, which is rooted in other souls rejecting God. We must confront both of these really just because they exist, and we can’t stop them from existing. Part of being good is allowing evil to exist. Okay, that doesn’t sound like what I mean, but what I’m trying to say is that for good to exist, evil must also exist, and to know what good is you must know what evil is. Thus we are confronted with it, and it may cause us to suffer temporarily as we continue our search for God.

To quote from the Bible:

“The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if only we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him. I consider that the sufferings of this present time are as nothing compared with the glory to be revealed for us. For creation awaits with eager expectation the revelation of the children of God; for creation was made subject to futility, not of its own accord but because of the one who subjected it, in hope that creation itself would be set free from slavery to corruption and share in the glorious freedom of the children of God. We know that all creation is groaning in labor pains even until now; and not only that, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, we also groan within ourselves as we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. For in hope we were saved. Now hope that sees for itself is not hope. For who hopes for what one sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait with endurance. In the same way, the Spirit too comes to the aid of our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit itself intercedes with inexpressible groanings. And the one who searches hearts knows what is the intention of the Spirit, because it intercedes for the holy ones according to God’s will. We know that all things work for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.” Romans 8:16-28

Whew, long quote! But sometimes it almost moves me to tears!

All suffering will end forever when we reach the gates of Heaven. 🙂 (And I am quite sure when we get to Heaven we will have a full understanding of why we had to suffer)
 
It’s hard to view the world with eternal eyes when bad things are happening to you. It takes real faith to surrender yourself to God’s plan…and ask God not “why is this happening?” but rather “how can I use this to your glory?”
 
Sometimes I think when bad things happen to good people, like when God takes a young life, He does it as an act of mercy. He must know in His wisdom that person will attain a higher place in heaven if He takes them now, rather than letting them live longer and risk losing their souls.

I guess suffering reminds us that earth is not our true home, and that we really belong in heaven. If we patiently resign ourselves to the will of God we gain greater merit for heaven. Maybe that’s why he permits the good to suffer. To sanctify us.
 
People often ask why God created a universe in which people suffer.

The assumption is that life should be good. But where would such an assumption come from? After all, it’s easy enough to posit that life should be bad. Why do we presume otherwise? Apparently because the human heart knows only too well that God is good and is stunned when things seem to contradict that.
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We are correct in our assumption that God in fact is good, and He created the world in order to “bestow good upon others.”
Do people suffer? Decidedly so. But that doesn’t deny God’s “ultimate” goodness. For His ultimate goodness touches upon things far beyond our material experience.

The underlying point here then seems to be that while we do indeed suffer and life does undoubtedly seem to be bad at times, we can nonetheless bask in God’s actual goodness to degrees on a spiritual, transcendental level by adhesing on to Him (and thus transcending material pain and suffering) as best as we can.
 
Bad things to good people? This world is fallen, or has anyone forgotten. Bad things happen, period. Why because of our own fault. Bad things happen to everyone because of Original Sin. Why did bad things happen to Jesus Christ, he was betrayed, humiliated, tortured, crucified…are you really asking why bad things happen to good people? Christ is God and bad things happened to him because of our original sin.
 
There are about a billion good books on this subject. One of 'em has the title (I think): *When Bad Things Happen to Good People *-- can’t remember the author. Another book likely to be excellent is by the well-known Evangelical child psychologist, Dr. James Dobson. The title is When God Doesn’t Make Sense.
 
Here are some other great books on suffering:

Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl
–Experiences in a Nazi prison camp

Hind’s Feet on High Places by Hannah Hurnard
–Story based on the Song of Songs about our faith journey

Suffering: A Key to the Meaning of Life by John F. Downs
–Small booklet written by a quadriplegic man with many quotes from saints
available at www.johnfdowns.com
 
(From something I wrote a while ago):

I don’t have a full answer to that question, but I have some ideas. I think that God has two basic things in mind for our lives: that our lives might be joyful, and that our lives might be meaningful.

Why joyful? Because I don’t believe in a God that would create conscious beings with the intention of keeping them miserable. He longs for us to be happy. “I came that you might have life, and have it abundantly.”

But abundant life is not only joy. It is deeper than joy, richer than joy. It involves tremendous sadness, and tremendous longing.

I choose to call this second aspect of life “meaning.” When do we experience meaning? For the most part, when things do not go our way. We have desires, and we have no way to satiate them. We have friends, and they abandon us. We have brothers, and they are brutally murdered.

Why would God create a world where such things happen? This is a terribly difficult question. But – because I have known the presence of a good and loving God – I need to answer it. I believe he wants to give us meaning.

If I am reading a novel, I do not judge the value of the novel based on how happy the characters were. A good author does not make his characters’ lives easy. Quite the contrary, he puts the characters in all sorts of difficult situations, and forces them to struggle. The interaction between the character and the world creates much of the meaning of the novel, much of its value.

In the same way, our Author does not keep us from experiencing evil. Every bit of suffering we experience is written into His book. He doesn’t necessarily cause it, mind you, but He allows it to happen.

Why? Because He wants to make our lives into a story. He wants our lives to be a wonderful story, a story of triumph in the face of doubt, a story of affirmation in the face of despair. He loves us, but He does not use His love to make us perpetually happy. He has deeper meanings in store for us.

He does want happiness for us, though. I firmly believe that. Once “this present darkness” has been lifted, you and I will experience a flood of happiness that will, quite literally, never end. But, till then, we struggle.

That’s the way He wrote the story. :bible1:
 
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