Day 33 – indiscriminate suffering (II)
We are trained from birth not to question God. But why? Why a church? Why those little children? Why? Why? Why? –a CHURCH MEMBER in Piedmont, Alabama
We have discussed retributive suffering (brought about by our bad choices) and sacrificial suffering (brought about by our good choices). Yesterday we alluded to a third type of suffering independent of our freedom of choice. I call it indiscriminate suffering, because it shows no favoritism or partiality. No one can claim exemption from it. It does not take into account race, religion, sex, age, social status, or behavior. And it seems to shake its fist in the face of justice.
Natural disasters and many physical ailments are the classic vehicles of indiscriminate suffering. We all know what misery they can unleash, and we are aware that the most innocent among us are often the victims. I recall the little children in that Methodist church in Piedmont, Alabama in 1994 who were killed by a tornado while sitting in the front pews awaiting their chance to sing on Palm Sunday. I remember Taylor Vaughn, the eight-year-old son of one of my college friends, who died of lymphoma after a failed bone marrow transplant. To these two examples from my own experience could be added hundreds more that you and I have witnessed during our lifetimes.
Several questions immediately surface. Couldn’t God have acted to prevent this suffering? If He is all-powerful and the Creator of the universe, could He not have steered that tornado one hundred yards from that church and saved the lives of those children? If He is the giver and sustainer of life, could He not have kept lymphoma away from Taylor? Once diagnosed with it, could He not have cured him of it?
My answer is that, indeed, He could have. I firmly believe God has the power to harness a tornado and eradicate a lymphoma. I believe He has the wherewithal to control and manipulate, even to circumvent, the laws of nature and to work the outcome to our benefit. If He possesses enough power to create and sustain the universe, He certainly has enough power to manipulate the forces therein.
The plain reality, however, is that God does not usually use His power in this fashion. If indiscriminate suffering in the universe is used as evidence, the picture soon emerges of a God who possesses the power to stop it but seldom uses His power to that end. Deists (Voltaire and Thomas Jefferson among them) have for years asserted that God is passive in the universe and cannot stop this suffering. I disagree with them. I believe that He can so act and believe that occasionally He does, but I also believe that most of the time He does not.
I promised you that I would approach this subject honestly, and I meant it. I would love to be able to assure you that God will keep you safe from the fury of nature and the march of disease. But I cannot, simply because that is not what I see in the universe around me. To remain truthful, I must inform you that most of the time God does not alter the laws of nature, even in the face of impending death and destruction. He did not change the course of that tornado. He did not remit Taylor’s lymphoma. And that, we all know, is the general pattern. Other than those miraculous instances in history where He has chosen to act otherwise, God permits indiscriminate suffering to have its way.
Daily Quotation
Quoted in Fleming Rutledge, Help My Unbelief, 212.
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