Faced with so much suffering in the world both physical and moral, how can a loving God can stand idly by? How, at the massacre of 6 million Jews remain inactive? How does the Almighty can not prevent a tsunami? Why so many suicides, depression in our society?
A very difficult question. The book of Job in the Bible, seeking this answer for 42 chapters. Job, yet is one of the servants of God's most faithful, has lost everything: his children died, he was very rich and suddenly becomes very poor, he is suffering from cancer. He asks God "why?". And God, at the end of the long book ... does not the question!
What does the Bible say on this issue?
Jesus held this conversation in Jerusalem, reported in Luke: "At this point, some people who were there told Jesus what had happened to the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with that of the sacrifice. Jesus answered them "Do you think these Galileans were worse sinners than all other Galileans because they suffered such a fate? No, I tell you. But if you do not change your attitude, you will all perish same. Or the 18 people on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed her, do you think they were more guilty than all the other inhabitants of Jerusalem? No, I tell you. But if you do not change your attitude, you shall all likewise perish. "
What can we say?
- first, the suffering caused by men - the murder - is on the same footing as the suffering caused by "fate": the collapse of a building
- then suffering is not related to the sin of the people. If someone is suffering, it is no more a sinner than someone who is good Health
- finally, Jesus repeats every time "But if you do not change your attitude, you shall all likewise perish." Suffering we see, we feel that we alert our impending death, she reminds us of our fundamental condition of sinful man. Pain warns us about our need to completely change their behavior, to return to God and be united to God by acknowledging our weakness and our absolute dependence on him. This is the alert message of a God of love.
CS Lewis, author of Narnia, described the suffering: "God whispers in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts to us in our pains: it is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world." It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world! Suffering is the message of God's warning: Beware, if we do not return to God, he'll get worse than the present suffering.
When you touch a stove, your nerves send a message to your muscles to remove it, it's a warning. But if you keep your hand on the plate despite the burn, then the suffering will come much worse than the present suffering.
God is Almighty well, although a God of love. We launched an SOS through suffering. I encourage you to be sympathetic with the suffering around you, and make an opportunity to witness this world to wake up deaf. Enjoy a difficult time to talk God, because that is where he will speak best.
