Pain and Evil

What does it mean to be a Christian?  Rather, how should a Christian think?  Who is God?  No really, who is the God of the Bible.  These seem to be the questions that we ask when in the midst of a great struggle, when we face heartbreak, or great sorrow.  Does God cause bad things to happen?  Some might suggest that God is directly responsible, or perhaps at least it’s a jump ball.  Either it is Satan or it is God.  Still, people want to know, “is Satan coming after me”, or “is God teaching me?”  I have cause to pause and ask a wholly different question, “is this the way that God operates?”  “Does God purposely cause trouble to enter into my life for his own purposes?”  Such an assumption is troubling.  This does not sound like the actions of a loving God.  Still, would we willingly suggest that God never exposes his faithful to trouble?  Or conversely, “is there ever a time that God causes trouble to come into our lives?”  

As a father, I ponder this very question.  Would I ever want my daughters to face trouble?  Indeed, I desire to direct her away from pain, as much as possible.  I want her to learn, grow, and become wise and understanding, but can this be achieved with some pain?  How many quotes can you recall which elevate the value of learning from failure.  I want my girls to learn from their failures, therefore, I have to be willing to allow pain at some point in their life.  Such activity is a sign of my love for them.  In order to prevent them from repeating their mistakes, I must allow them to experience the brunt of them on occasion.  Still, did I cause this pain?  No, my daughters did with their choices.  To be sure, it is my choice to carry out the punishment, but the punishment would be a sign of my love for them.  

So, I think again, is punishment the same as evil, or can pain be equated with evil?  There exists such a pain that is not necessarily evil.  The pain that is a result of correction is not evil, but the ultimate example of love.  In the same way, evil does not always have to come with pain.  I could choose not to correct my daughter when she does wrong.  To be sure, there is no pain, but this kind of activity is evil.  

I return to my original question, is God ever the cause of pain in a person’s life?  I entered this question with a presupposition, which I believe can be biblically founded, that God is not the cause of evil.  However, as we have noted above, the fact of pain does not necessitate evil.  Still, does God only ever allow pain, or is there ever a time when He inflicts pain upon a life?  In order to answer this, we again must reflect upon an observation made above.  Pain, when it is the result of a correction is not evil, but the expression of deep love, and painlessness when it is the result of a lack of correction is not love, but a heinous expression of evil.  We say that God is love, and this statement is true.  If there is a time when correction is necessary, and God is love, there are times when God is the cause of pain.  

One might ask, “well, why doesn’t God simply eliminate evil, then there would be no need of correction, and thus, no pain?”  This question, as good as it is, will be addressed in a future post.  So, keeping reading.