Why Do Bad Things Happen To Good People?
There is a lot of pain and suffering in this world, and sometimes it seems that God just sits back and watches and doesn’t care. Why is that? I don’t know if we’re ever going to find an answer to that question while we’re still alive, but I’d like to give my opinion.
Why does it seem like God doesn’t want good things for me? Why wouldn’t he want me to have good health, and to be happy and safe? Why wouldn’t he want me to have enough income to pay my bills, help my kids with school, and go on a vacation once in a while? It doesn’t seem like these things are that much to ask for. I don’t think He’s that concerned with these things because there is something that is much more important to Him.
Dr. Larry Crabb is a best-selling author, counselor and psychologist. He’s written many popular books including “Inside Out”, “Finding God”, and “The Marriage Builder”. I’ve read some of his books and liked them, though the ones I read were really deep and kind of hard to digest.
I read a book by Larry Crabb recently that was quite different from the other’s that I’ve read by him before. This book was called “Shattered Dreams – God’s Unexpected Pathway to Joy”, and I think it was different because it was something that Dr. Crabb had personally experienced and very intimately touched him. The book was much easier to follow, in my opinion, than the others I had read by him.
The premise of this book is that joy and happiness are two distinctly different things. Most of us believe that the most important thing that we can have is happiness. Plenty of money, a loving spouse and obedient kids, good health, a good job, a nice house, etc. The list could be quite long. But my belief is that this isn’t necessarily what God wants for us.
God wants us to find joy in a different place – in relationship with Him. If you can achieve that relationship and still have the above-mentioned happiness, that’s great! I don’t think they are necessarily exclusive of each other. After all, God does want us to have good things. The Bible says “If you know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask Him!”.
You see, when we achieve that point of supposed happiness, where we have the earthly things that we desire, sometimes we become content with that and don’t seek God anymore. Or we might become so involved in hanging onto that happiness that it consumes all of our time, and keeps us from relationship with God. Therefore, God is willing to allow to experience some suffering to build that relationship. How we react to this pain is what determines whether we’ll have joy or not. Most of us will do whatever is necessary to minimize the pain.
Dr. Crabb writes in “Shattered Dreams” that we need to feel that pain, which might include mourning and grieving, to encounter God. It’s only in the middle of these tribulations, and when we get through them, that we are able to find the true joy that we seek in our heart and that God wants us to have. While it’s not any fun to go through this pain, Larry asserts that this is the only way we will experience true joy. This, I believe, is the reason that God allows suffering and why bad things happen to good people.
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