Why does God allow innocent people to suffer? * ChristianAnswers.Net - 0 views
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While there is much evil in the world, there is even more that is good. This is proved by the mere fact that people normally try to hang on to life as long as they can. Furthermore, everyone instinctively recognizes that “good” is a higher order of truth than “bad”. We need also to recognize that our very minds were created by God. We can only use these minds to the extent that He allows, and it is, therefore, utterly presumptuous for us to use them to question Him and His motives. “Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?” (Genesis 18:25). “Shall the thing formed say to Him that formed it, why hast Thou made me thus?” (Romans 9:20). We ourselves do not establish the standards of what is right. Only the Creator of all reality can do that. We need to settle it, in our minds and hearts, whether we understand it or not, that whatever God does is, by definition, right.
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Having settled this by faith, we are then free to seek for ways in which we can profit spiritually from the sufferings in life, as well as the blessings. As we consider such matters, it is helpful to keep the following great truths continually in our minds. There is really no such thing as the “innocent” suffering. Since “all have sinned and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23), there is no one who has the right to freedom from God’s wrath on the basis of his own innocence.
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As far as babies are concerned, and others who may be incompetent mentally to distinguish right and wrong, it is clear from both Scripture and universal experience that they are sinners by nature and thus will inevitably become sinners by choice as soon as they are able to do so. The world is now under God’s Curse (Genesis 3:17) because of man’s rebellion against God’s Word. This “bondage of corruption,” with the “whole world groaning and travailing together in pain” (Romans 8:21-22), is universal, affecting all men and women and children everywhere. God did not create the world this way, and one day will set all things right again. In that day, “God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain” (Revelation 21:4).
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