Bad things happen in life. Bad things happen in life to everyone, and sometimes things are really, really bad. I sometimes get asked why God allows these things to happen. I have even been asked by people if God hates them. The reason is simple, yet very complex. God allows us freedom and freedom can cause pain. Let me unpack.
God allows you to make the choices to do what you choose. He allows you to choose to do good, to be kind. He allows you to love and support and care for people. He also allows you to do harm and make bad decisions. All of the bad things in life come as either a direct or indirect result of sin. I am going to use an example to help illustrate this point, our friend the brick.
If you take a brick and throw it straight up in the air and it comes down, it can hit you in the head. This is a result of gravity, a natural law that God put in place for many good reasons. Without it, we would float away and all die. Gravity is necessary, and God allows you to throw the brick. The natural consequences are that it comes back down and hits you in the head. You can blame God, but it is not God's fault, you have no one to blame but yourself. If you are honest with yourself, many of the issues in your life come down to your actions. The decisions you make, or sometimes your inaction, result in the situation. It may be harsh to say, but it is true. You threw the brick and it hit you in the head.
More sinister is when someone else throws the brick. People have the freedom to be awful, and often bricks get thrown. Bricks get thrown a lot, and sometimes we get blindsided by bricks flying out of seemingly nowhere. This is where a lot of our pain comes from. It can be easy to put this on God, but it is the freedom that God gives all of us. We can desire that God will limit the freedom of others, but none of us want God to limit our freedom. We each want the freedom to do what we want, but we expect God to stop others. We don't want others to lie to us, but do we lie? We don't want others to talk badly about us, but do we talk badly about others? Either we all have freedom, or none of us have freedom. If you want the freedom to do what you want, others get freedom and sometimes that freedom is abused and causes pain.
The last flying brick is the most complicated to understand. Sometimes in the course of life, bricks get thrown, tossed, knocked over, or flung great distances. It can seem like no one's fault, but the bricks suddenly come flying from nowhere and hit us. Illness, accidents, and hardships are not the direct action or result of us or someone else. These things exist because of the flaws in the world, flaws that result from sin. Death itself is a result of sin and all the negative things can be tied to sin, death, and the knowledge of good and evil. The world as it exists is filled with pain that can be linked to evil. For example, many cancers are caused by pollutants and chemical exposures, many of which are the results of companies cutting corners and causing pollution. These pollutants enter the air and water and as a result, people become ill. These indirect things cause us problems, but every one of them is the result of the fallen nature of the world. They are not necessarily the result of our decisions as individuals, but they are the result of the freedom of choice given to mankind. Everything ties back to the first wrong choice and escalates with every wrong choice that has been made since.
In fact, it is a miracle that anything good actually happens to us. With all the bad choices we make, with all the ways we hurt one another and ourselves, it is a gift of God that we have the blessings we do. God continues to give us good things, even when we do horrible things. Romans 5:8 says that while we were sinners, Christ died for us. We betrayed God, and He gave us a way to fix what we broke. That is amazing, and every blessing we have is a direct result of His love for us. Every bad thing in our lives is the result of the poor choices we make. I am not sure how I have so many blessings, since I made so many horrible decisions. I am thankful that I have so few bricks that come into my life.
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