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‘How can God exist – look at the evil and pain in the world!’ The challenge of evil and suffering. Dr. C.K.Tan BPharm MSc PhD MRPharmS PgCertMedEd St. James’ Church, Audley, Stoke-on-Trent. Introduction. A very complex and sensitive subject
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‘How can God exist – look at the evil and pain in the world!’The challenge of evil and suffering. Dr. C.K.Tan BPharm MSc PhD MRPharmS PgCertMedEd St. James’ Church, Audley, Stoke-on-Trent
Introduction • A very complex and sensitive subject • Topic needs to tackled, not just intellectually, but emotionally • There is no one who is an observer; everyone experiences pain and suffering to varying degree.
… introduction ‘How can God exist – look at the evil and pain in the world!’ Underlying this statement are two very different questions: • The first question asks whether or not we should say that God exists considering the suffering we can see. Is God there? • The second question asks about God’s nature - how can He be said to be good - in the light of the problem of evil and suffering. Is God good?
Is God there? How can there be a God when there is so much evil and suffering? A. The existence of evil in itself does not count against God’s existence: • God exists whether you believe He exists or not • God exists whether there is suffering or not in the world. • There is no logical reason why the presence of suffering excludes the existence of God.
…. is God there? • But it is a problem only if you believe this God is an all-powerful and good God. But this assumes you believe that ‘God’ corresponds to the Biblical God. • Most of people’s problems are with the Christian God!
…. is God there? B. If you say evil means God cannot or does not exist, does that also mean that the presence of good proves that God exists? • When bad things happen, you rail against God. When good things happen, do you thank and praise God? • If not, why not? • Why so selective? • Augustine: ‘If there is no God, why is there so much good? If there is a God, why is there so much evil?’
… is God there? C. The existence of evil can be evidence FOR the existence of God Paul Copan: When you define evil you can define it in two ways: (1) The absence, lack or corruption of goodness (2) A departure from the way things ought to be.
… is God there? 1. Evil is the absence, lack or corruption of goodness • This presupposes there is a standard of goodness (from which evil is a deviation from it). • Put another way. How do you know something is evil? • You can do so only if you believe there is such a thing as an absolute and objective moral law, from which something falls short of. • But if you believe there is such a law, does that not mean there is a moral lawgiver who gives that law? • Does that not mean that there is a God, since only God can give such a perfect moral law.
… is God there? • Does this not point to God whose very character is the very standard of goodness? • It doesn’t prove there is a God but it’s evidence that points to a God
… is God there? Greg Koukl A moral atheist is like a man sitting down to dinner who doesn’t believe in farmers, ranchers, fishermen, or cooks. He believes the food just appears, with no explanation and no sufficient cause. This is silly. Either his meal is an illusion, or someone provided it. In the same way, if morals exist – as the reality of evil proves – then some cause adequate to explain the effect must account for them. God is the most reasonable solution.
… is God there? 2. Evil is a departure from the way things ought to be. • There is sense of ‘oughtness’ about good and bad, and from which we feel guilty when we trangress them. • This presupposes there is a design, a plan. • Does this not point to God who is the designer of the universe? • Does this not suggest that we were made to live in a certain way?
… is God there? C.S.Lewis: My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I gotten this idea of just and unjust? A man does not call something crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line.
Is God good? How can He be said to be good in light of the problem of evil and suffering. The dilemma for the Christian is summed up in the following propositions: I. God wants to abolish evil, but cannot. • He is impotent • God is not all-powerful • But you Christians claim God is all-powerful!
… is God good? II. God can abolish evil but does not want to • He is wicked; he is not good. • God is, therefore, not holy. • But you Christians claim God is good and holy! III. God cannot abolish evil and He does not want to • Therefore, God is not all-powerful and God is not good. • But you Christians claim God is almighty and also good!
… is God good? IV. God can and wants to abolish evil • Then, how come all the evil and suffering in the world then? • ‘CONCLUSION’: The Bible and your Christian beliefs about God are WRONG!
Sources of suffering, pain and evil Human limitations • Accidents, limited knowledge (faulty designs), inadequate foreknowledge (hence need for hindsight) Human sin • Pride, anger, vengeance, jealousy, hatred, selfishness, etc • Much of the evil and suffering in the world are caused by man • Gandhi on hunger: The world has enough for everyone’s needs, but not for everyone’s greed!
… sources of suffering, pain and evil • When The Times invited several eminent authors to write essays on the theme "What's Wrong with the World?" G.K.Chesterton, a renowned Catholic journalist and theologian wrote one of the most famous and shortest of all letters: Dear Sirs, I am. Sincerely yours, G. K. Chesterton
… sources of suffering, pain and evil Natural disasters • In some, human involvement is a factor – e.g. global warming (industrial pollution, cutting down of the forests), floods as a result of building golf courses (e.g. severe widespread floods in Jakarta). • In many, as far as we can fathom, there is no human involvement – earthquakes, tsunamis, hurricanes • There is something dislocated in the world.
… sources of suffering, pain and evil Diseases • Some just are • Others are connected with human behaviour – sexually transmitted diseases, bad lifestyle, wars • There is something dislocated in the world.
… sources of suffering, pain and evil God’s judgement on evil • According to Walter Kaiser, there are eight types of suffering found in the Old Testament. • One of these is retributive suffering, that is, reaping what one sows. • It is “one of the fundamental principles by which God governs the world”. • Choices have consequences, and bad choices (sin) invariably meet with negative consequences.
… sources of suffering, pain and evil Trials and evil for our good • Educational or disciplinary suffering • God can use hardships and trials to perfect us, to mould our character, and make us more like him • God is not the author of evil but can permit or use evil for good ends.
… sources of suffering, pain and evil John Frame responds to the charge that God may appear to be unjust in allowing some to suffer more than others: • “Grace is unmerited favour. That means you get something good that you don’t deserve. But if I don’t merit it at all, it can’t be unjust that my neighbour gets more grace than I do. In fact, God isn’t obligated to treat us with any kind of grace. That’s why it is grace and not justice.”
… sources of suffering, pain and evil • God is all-knowing – past, present, future – He knows how things will turn out in the end. • God, if he is all-wise, knows not only the present but the future. And he knows not only present good and evil but future good and evil. If his wisdom vastly exceeds ours, it is at least possible that a loving God could deliberately tolerate horrible things because he foresees that in the long run that more people will be better and happier than if he miraculously intervened.
… sources of suffering, pain and evil • He has demonstrated how the very worst thing that has ever happened in the history of the world ended up resulting in the very best thing that has ever happened in the history of the world. Re: the death of God on the Cross! • C.S. Lewis: God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains. It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.
Human sin and free will • The overwhelming majority of the pain in the world is caused by human choices. Peter Kreeft: • It is not logically possible to have free will and no possibility of moral evil. In other words, once God chose to create human beings with free will, then it was up to them rather than to God, as to whether there was sin or not. That’s what free will means. • God did not create evil; he created the possibility of evil; people actualized that potentiality.
… human sin and free will • It’s a self-contradiction to have a world where there’s real choice while at the same time no possibility of choosing evil. To ask why God didn’t create such a world is like asking why God didn’t create colourless colour or round squares.
… human sin and free will • If someone tells you that he/she loves you, those words mean something because they are freely given. • If you learnt that someone had told you that he/she loved you and that (s)he had been forced to do it, his/her words would not mean very much.
… human sin and free will God took a risk when He made man • Did you risk anything when you brought a child into the child? • Was there any guarantee that they will love you deeply and passionately all their life? Was there a chance they might hurt you and reject you? • You try your best to love them in such a way that they will return that love but have you ever tried to force them to love you? • Even if you could, that’s not love. • God took a risk when He made man.
… human sin and free will Some people question God’s wisdom in giving man free choice Dorothy Sayers put the problem of evil in the proper perspective: “For whatever reason God chose to make man as he is - limited and suffering and subject to sorrows and death - He had the honesty and the courage to take His own medicine.”
… human sin and free will “Whatever game he is playing with His creation, He has kept his own rules and played fair. He can exact nothing from man that He has not exacted from Himself. He has Himself gone through the whole of human experience, from the trivial irritations of family life and the cramping restrictions of hard work and lack of money to the worst horrors of pain and humiliation, defeat, despair and death. When He was a man, He played the man. He was born in poverty and died in disgrace and thought it well worthwhile.”
… human sin and free will Why doesn’t God intervene and deal with the evil in the world and let people get away with it? • People aren’t getting away with it! • Justice delayed is not necessarily justice denied. • “There will come a day when God will settle accounts and people will be held responsible for the evil they’ve perpetrated and the suffering they’ve caused. Criticizing God for not doing it right now is like reading half a novel and criticizing the author for not resolving the plot.” Peter Kreeft
… human sin and free will • God is delaying the judgement day out of His love and compassion. • 2 Peter 3:9, 10: ‘The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish but everyone to come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief…..’ • If God metes out the justice as we deserve, all our lives would be very, very, very, very brief indeed!
What if there was no God? • Suffering and evil is a problem for non-Christians too • All worldviews (atheism, agnosticism, Islam, Buddhism, Christianity) must give some explanation for the: Existence, origin and fact of evil A diagnosis A solution
… what if there was no God? Atheism may be able to solve some of the intellectual problems of evil by rejecting the existence of God. But this creates new problems: • It hasn’t removed the hurt and pain • It has abolished all hope; it makes suffering more difficult to bear • If there is no God then, what is evil? • If the blind chance and survival of the fittest in evolutionary thinking is true, how come there is so much good in the world? • If this life is all there is, how do you make sense of life?
… what if there was no God? “In a universe of electrons and selfish genes, blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won't find any rhyme or reason in it nor any justice. The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.” Richard Dawkins, River Out of Eden: A Darwinian view of Life.
What is the answer to suffering? • The answer to suffering is not an answer at all. It’s the Answerer. It’s Jesus himself! Peter Kreeft • Corrie Ten Boom’s sister: ‘No matter how deep our darkness, he is deeper still.’ • Quote from The Suffering God (Charles Ohlrich): pp. 92-93 • For the Christian, suffering has significance. God does not permit meaningless and pointless suffering.
… what is the answer to suffering? What do you say to someone who is suffering? • Nothing! (At least not initially). Enter into the other person’s pain. We would want to be Jesus to him/her. And learn from him/her. • Cartoon of two turtles: One says, ‘Sometimes I’d like to ask why he (God) allows poverty, famine, and injustice when he could do something about it.’ The other turtle says, ‘I’m afraid God might ask me the same question.’
… what is the answer to suffering? The Christian hope: • Justice in the future, if not now • A better world to come – Rev. 21 • Comfort now – God is with us
Is God good? • Referring to the Holocaust, the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and mass murders in American schools, sceptics often challenged the Rev. Peter Grant: • ‘I can’t believe in the goodness of God after things like that.’ • Grant: ‘I can’t believe in the goodness of man after things like that! It’s not God whom I lose faith in when tragedies happen; it’s man. God’s solution is the only antidote to man’s evil choices.’
… is God good? Is God good? A God who suffers with us, takes the punishment for our sin, promises justice, provides us meaning and significance in our suffering, comforts us in our trials, gives us a future and a hope is a GOOD God!
