Why Does God Allow Evil and Suffering? Part 1 - A Conversation With God
<Too long to read? Here is the tldr>
Note this was written fours years ago, right after the Aurora, Colorado Tragedy...
- Man: So God why do you allow violence, suffering, disasters and crisis? Enough is Enough. Could you not have stopped what happened at Aurora, Colorado? Could you not have stopped the massacre before it happened? Why allow this senseless killing? Where were you?
- God: I appreciate your questions, and your search for answers especially in this time of grief. There is no disaster that occurs that I am not aware of. I am intimately aware of the invisible threads of actions and inactions, thoughts and motives that have lead to this. I am painfully aware of the all the death, carnage, and tragic effects on all the victims, their families and on the nation as a whole.
When a lion roars in hunger and kills to be fed, don’t I know about it? When a disaster strikes a city don’t I know about it. I not only know about it but indeed I have allowed it. It takes two to tango.
Does a lion roar in the jungle for no reason when he has no prey, or growl in is den when he has caught nothing[1]? How can a bird fall into a trap on the ground when there is no trap to begin? Will a trap normally spring if there is nothing to catch? When a disaster has come to a city like Aurora, isn’t it because of the actions of crazy men like James Holmes, but, yes, I am aware of it and I have allowed it to progress without intervening... - Man: Wow. I did not expect you to say you have allowed it. I though you would be like others who say that they speak for you, that it was Satan, or put the blame on someone else. So if you knew about it before hand, you should have stopped it. You did not only allow it; I say you are just as liable. You deserve some blame also.
- God: When I created man, I knew before hand that he would collapse and die. I presented him a choice of Life or Death. He needed to choose between Life that was available (even though good and evil had the potential to exist, but he must trust Me that good and evil will never taint his Life), or the other choice where he had the chance to independently determine what is good and evil on his own.
Death resulted as he chose to independently determine good and evil for himself. Death is always the result, even if he tries to work to gain enough knowledge on how to curtail it, suppress it, work around it, or use it to his advantage, to live, to survive. But it’s his choice. He was under the assumption that I was less than honest with him, or that I wanted to hold him back from his true potential when he needed to be dependent on my Life. He concluded that I held back from giving him everything he deserved and wanted to limit him.
But even though he, man made that choice, and I did not intervene, I know you would make one more observation. As you rightfully observe, I was the one who allowed the snake in the garden to test him. Under property laws, as owner of the garden, all land and even all of the earth, is mine, so I am ultimately liable so yes I am. I am not above my own law.
If a man digs a pit and does not take proper safety precautions by covering it, and if an ox falls into that pit, the one who dug it is liable by law to pay for the dead ox[2]. When you build a house and you do not put a railing around the porch or roof, you are liable if someone dies from the fall[3].
So too I am not afraid to full responsibility, because responsibility and liability comes with the territory of being the Owner, as the One ultimately in charge.
It does not depend on free will. Once again it takes two to tango, likewise, if a man lights a fire and it spreads suddenly, burning another man's crop, the man who lit the fire is liable[4]. In other words, James Howell is responsible, not the devil but the man James Howell, and he will be judged likewise. Satan is just a tool and obeys my bidding anyway[5]. However, because I take full responsibility, I already prepared a solution to this “crisis” long before the earth was founded, but more on that later. Are you surprised that I made myself ultimately liable since the beginning? That is what all good responsible owners and managers do.
Unfortunately many who claim to know me think they are protecting me from absolving me from all responsibility.
I know I am Sovereign. There is no need to protect me. All of creation is mine. All the land is mine.[6] Did you not know that all things live, move and have their being in Me.[7] I am the Lord of the Heaven and Earth who made the world and everything in it. I give all men life and breath. I made from one man every nation and determined when they were born and where they should live. I did this because you are my offspring so that perhaps you would seek me and perhaps reach out to me and find me.
Pretending to be independent of me is Death. I am not far away from any one of you even when a tragedy like this happens. Everything came out of me, and you know what? I am determined that everything comes back to me.[8] It will happen. I determine all outcomes, even if I allow crisis. To accomplish that everything has to go through me and my process, even every good and bad things. But please know my intention and my heart, for out of me are all things, through me all things and back to me are all things.
However I know, and I am very aware, that with your limited sight, reconciling the “through me” process with all the current and existing suffering and atrocities that exists in this life, is difficult for you to grasp. For how can all these things, good or bad be involved in the process through me. I will get to that. But I want you to rest assured so that you don’t have to question my Love and Resolve to restore all things, to bring balance or reconcile all things[9].
Because I knew before hand, I prepared the solution since the foundation of the earth, and I will accomplish what I have resolved.
- Man: I really don’t want to question your Love and Resolve. I never really heard before that you want to restore everything. Actually, all I hear about is that you want to destroy everything. Help me understand how all of life with both its beauty and misery can be “through you”. What really are you up to?
- God: I am really determined to restore all things and to take creation out of the futility I subjected it to. There was a reason I subjected it to futility in the first place.[10] What is the reason? What is my resolve?
Just as a sparrow reproduces after its own kind, I intend to reproduce myself after my own kind with sons and daughters fully endued with my DNA, nature, power, sense of justice, mercy and love.
Apples reproduce other apples starting from a seed which dies, and then becomes a mature tree and then bears fruit. Animals also produce after their own kind also. Sheep reproduces sheep as lamb to becoming mature, and then bearing fruit.
So too men and women were always destined to be changed, to become fully mature sons and daughters, to become greater than the angels, to be changed from glory to glory, starting from a humble seed form from which you were formed, as my own offspring, to become mature sons and daughters of righteousness through me, being presented finally come back to me in full stature, bearing the fruit of my nature, looking and acting like me, but retaining individuality.
But how did we get here, to this point where a single man can accomplish such a senseless act? Man has rejected my process from the beginning. All of creation and its sufferings are like groans in my ears, including the shootings at Aurora. The whole of creation is groaning for something better. But those groans are also labor pangs to produce something new, something not filled with mindless bondage to corruption and contamination.
Who is it that judged man to die when he rejected my process, my life? I did. Yes man chose, but I judged. When man rejected, I placed creation into chaos, but it was also subjected with the hope that there is something better than this, something better that what man has chosen. This subjection to futility is a reminder that man will only frustrate himself and remain always dysfunctional, contaminated, when he insists on trying to be gods his own way and masters of his own destiny, but which unfortunately always results in death. He will always miss the mark. Good and evil will always master him. There is a better way. My Life. My Life must be accepted and not rejected. Man cannot manipulate, control and overcome the dual bind of good and evil without tragic results.
You are collectively learning that the hard way. It cannot be contained by itself. My Life puts good and evil in proper perspective to always hit the mark. I form light and create darkness. I make peace and create evil and calamity. I the Lord do all these things.[11] Have I purposely and directly before judged nations and cities with disasters? Yes I have. Was Aurora such a case? Of course not. Some of my own people don’t know the difference. I do not need to use psychopaths to send a message.
Yet at a larger sense, I have made myself liable. Man also has the ability to do good and evil. He has a choice just like when I created him, and when he exercises that choice, those affected are either enriched or suffer. So we both exercise that choice. The difference? I can guarantee that while there may be some suffering, some correction, I will not miss the mark.
It is all towards the final resolution where man and all creation would be free from the consequences of their original choice that placed them in bondage. All creation is groaning to be set free and they are awaiting with abated breath to see the first signs of these sons who have matured, who can never die, who can and give an indication that my process is working and has worked. A harvest always starts from a seed, and there are also the firstfruits that bud first. No amount of laws, education, technology advancement will save man from himself and the ability to live always at the level of good and evil. Why? Man is not his own life source. All his actions are contaminated and will ultimately result in death. He intuitively knows that I can do good and bring about evil and he thinks he needs the power to do the same without accountability. You call it free will. Yet I posses that choice and I tell you that I take responsibility for my actions. Do I have to? If I am good, yes I do. But this is the process by which all things will be restored, all life will be renewed, where there will be no more dying, crying or suffering, when I will dwell visibly among men in an uncontaminated, uncorrupted environment.
- Man: Ok, so this is surprising. You are not running away from the fact that you do good and also cause calamity. You know that you are not helping your case. But I like the fact that you seem determine to restore everything, and that it seems you are using the fall and mess we find ourselves in to your advantage and as a way to get us out. I admit I don’t see an end to man’s way and to the never ending cycle of good and evil, beauty and the horrifying, laughter and sadness, peace and war, rest and suffering. Tell me how your way will work and don’t forget Aurora. I still think you should have stopped it.
[1] Amos 3:4-6
[2] Ex. 21:33,34
[3] Deut 22:8
[4] Ex. 22:6
[5] Judges 9:23; 1 Sam. 16:14-15; 1Kings 22:23; Job 1:12
[6] Lev. 25:23
[7] Acts 17:24-31
[8] Roms. 11:36
[9] Col. 1:19-23
[10] Roms 8:20
[11] Isa. 45:7
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