Suffering and Evil

TNG Radio, where today's culture and timeless truths come together.

It's reasoned, relevant content apologetics, worldview, and answers to the questions that you need to know. From Alex McFarland Ministries, this is Truth for a New Generation Radio. And now the man who preached in 50 states in 50 days, speaker, writer, and advocate for Christian apologetics, Dr. Alex McFarland. He's a Republican minister named J.C. Ryle. He was very well known. He's been passed away more than 100 years.

But J.C. Ryle said one day in hell would be worse than a lifetime of carrying a cross. Let me explain a little bit about that, and I'll welcome you to today's edition of TNG Radio, Truth for a New Generation. Alex McFarland here, and I'm coming to you from the studios of American Family Radio Network. I'm down here on the road in Tupelo recording radio with my friend Bert Harper for the other program we do, Exploring the Word. You don't know the names Devon Patrick or Carl Peets, but you ought to because we're very indebted to both of these guys.

Very often I'll send Carl some audio that's just barely usable, and somehow or another he makes it work. And Devon Patrick has carved out some time in his day and is recording me, and so I'm grateful to all. It's a team effort.

It really is. And so speaking of team efforts, let me tell you about Carla McGlynn. Now some of you that are longtime attendees of Truth for a New Generation, you know who Carla is.

Carla has just been a wonderful team member for 20 years. Our conferences, my speaking schedule. And we've got a very special thing coming up. March 8 and 9, we're going to be at Ridgecrest. Ridgecrest is a Baptist conference center outside of Asheville, Western North Carolina, right there on I-40. Super easy to get to.

In fact, if you go I-40 across North Carolina, you'll pass Ridgecrest. Sunday night, March 8, we're going to have an event that we call a strategy briefing. And I want you to be there. And we're going to have some great music by Cindy Johnson, who does music for us around the country, and I'm going to speak. We're going to have a time of prayer, and we're going to talk about how we must reach millennials for Christ. And not only the gospel, but just, frankly, moral American living, not socialism.

And so it's enough of a challenge to do the spiritual work of reaching and discipling young people, but nowadays we've got secularism, socialism, transgenderism, a lot of isms. So if you want to join us on March 8, Sunday night, we're going to begin about 5.30, and I'll be teaching. We'll have Q&A, we'll have prayer. You can stay the night, and I'll teach on Monday morning, March 9 as well. But you can email Carla, C-A-R-L-A, Carla at alexmcfarland.com. C-A-R-L-A, Carla at alexmcfarland.com.

We would love to have you at this strategy briefing. Well, one of the questions when I travel and I speak is, you know, why is there pain and suffering in the world? And the quote I gave by J.C. Ryle about one day in hell, he said, would be worse than an entire lifetime of carrying the cross.

It is true that much of life, especially for Christians, does involve struggles and stresses and suffering and bearing one's cross. And maybe as a Christian you've been tempted to kind of throw in the towel. And you think, you know what, I'm weary, I'm tired, I have apologized to that person for the last time, and I give up. Maybe you've felt like, you know, I can't just go another day. Or maybe you've even kind of bailed out on church. You know, why go to church?

It's just, you know, you get up, you get dressed, is it even worth it? And maybe some of you, God forbid, but you've pondered bailing out on your marriage, bailing out on your family. Listen, as a Christian, sometimes we do have to work hard, swallow our pride, give space and give grace to people that don't deserve it. We don't deserve grace, but God gave us grace. Let me just say this, part of the life of a believer is bearing a cross. In 1 Corinthians 15 Paul said, I die daily. And let's say that for years, maybe even decades, maybe many decades, we've heard stories, of course, of people that loved an unloving spouse for 50 years, people that have had physical infirmities and diseases for a long time, financial struggles.

Maybe. I've got a friend that was telling me about how a business partner caused their company to go bankrupt. And he was a quarter million dollars in debt, $250,000. It took him nearly 20 years to pay it back. But he paid back every penny because it was the right thing to do, even though he suffered for the misdeeds of another person. But here's the thing, no matter how long you live for Jesus, no matter how heavy the cross you bear, all that we do for the Lord is not nearly as painful or burdensome as one hour in eternity without God.

J.C. Ryle was right. A life of bearing a cross is not nearly as bad as one day in hell. And so my point in sharing this is one of the apologetics issues that people deal with is what we call the problem of pain and suffering. If God is good, if God is wise, if God is powerful, why is there pain and suffering and struggle and injustice in the world? Why is there evil?

Why is there not only disease and aging and terminal illnesses, but why is there murder and killing? So let's talk about these things and let's see if there is a legitimate plausible answer. Stay tuned. We're going to continue on TNG Radio. We're going to talk more about this. And one of the apologetics issues that we must speak to as Christians, the problem of suffering.

Don't go away. In those millions of people, it's doubtful Moses even knew Solomon, but because Moses was faithful, Solomon was born and later he married Rahab and they had a son, Boaz, who married Ruth and they were the grandparents to King David. Jesus was not a descendant of Moses.

Jesus was a descendant of Solomon, whose new life in the Promised Land was made possible by what God did through Moses. So do not grow weary in doing good. The seeds we plant will blossom in God's way and in God's perfect time. Be bold, be faithful, be a watchman.

I am a watchman dot com. Christians don't necessarily agree with one another when it comes to questions of religious pluralism, homosexuality, the role of government, abortion and war. Too often we manage these disagreements by ignoring them. Yet we're called to engage the world for the sake of Christ. How can we be effective if we avoid society's most pressing questions in 10 issues that divide Christians? Alex McFarland challenges us to drill down to the biblical core of 10 current issues such as social justice, evil and suffering, pornography and environmentalism as he echoes the biblical invitation, Come, let us reason together. Only by engaging the scriptures deeply, thinking clearly and speaking truthfully can we and God's family address our differences and discover the peace that comes with unity of purpose. 10 issues that divide Christians.

Find this book and many others at Alex McFarland dot com. Engage magazine dot net. Post discussions that help you apply a biblical world view to your daily life.

Engage magazine dot net. At Liberty University, you'll earn more than a degree. You'll earn the satisfaction of seeing what you can accomplish and what God can accomplish through you. Choose from more than 600 degree options from an associate to a Ph.D. and study 100 percent online more affordably than you think. Discover God's truth through every degree at Liberty University, where we train champions for Christ. Go to Liberty dot edu backslash explore to learn more.

That's Liberty dot edu backslash explore to learn more. For apologetics resources, books by Alex McFarland and to find out where Alex is speaking, visit Alex McFarland dot com. In Amos 5 19, there's the story of a man who meets a lion and he flees from the lion only to meet a bear. And then he flees from the bear and he finds a house to hide inside.

But when he leans against the wall safe from both the lion and the bear, he leans and a snake bites him. Welcome back to the program. Alex McFarland here on TV radio. And we're talking about apologetics. We've talked about creation and God, and we've pointed out some arguments against evolution. But we're talking about one of the perennial apologetics issues. It can be phrased in a number of ways, but it's basically why does God allow suffering and evil?

Let's go back to the story from Amos 5. If you're being chased by a lion, you'd want to get away, but then you get chased by a bear. So you escape that and you get in the house and you put your hand against the wall safe, but you lean and you brush up against the snake and you get bitten. You know, I see so many parallels to this in life. If the lion represents suffering, so must the bear and even more so the snake.

And that's in what ought to be the safest place on earth, home. Even in our little sanctuary of home and house, evil and suffering are at times inevitable. To live in this world is to encounter both suffering and evil. And there's no escaping either one, and frequently evil and suffering are linked together.

And the mere existence of suffering and evil seems to create problems for believers and non-believers alike, concerning not only the existence of God, but the benevolence of God. Now the Bible clearly teaches that God is good. And without a doubt, anyone who has chosen to follow Jesus, and you have the Lord in your life, you agree that God's love is far beyond anything that we could dream of. And God's love in sending His Son to die for us is so amply proven. I mean, that in spite of our sin, God would send Jesus to be our Savior.

You know, a meme, M-E-M-E, these internet memes, some of them are funny and some of them are really bad. But somebody sent me one, and it was apparently from an atheist, and this person had said, you know, if I die and it turns out there is a God, He better beg me for forgiveness. And my blood ran cold when I read that. I mean, that's just so sad because the fact that we're even having this conversation shows that everybody knows there's a God. We know there's a God.

I mean, let's not play a game. We know there's a God. And I would assure everyone listening that when you leave this world and stand before the Almighty, any begging and groveling and genuflecting is going to be done on our part, not His. But God clearly demonstrated His love, His benevolence, His mercy, His grace, in sending Jesus to die for our sins. Listen, God's goodness is never questioned when things are going well. But as soon as the bills become difficult to pay or a child dies or a terrorist group kills hundreds of people, God's goodness lands under remarkable scrutiny and doubt. Now, thankfully, God has addressed the problem of pain and suffering in the Bible. Suffering and evil are really part of the main theme of the Bible, and God depicts through the writers that He inspired how the evil in the world and the goodness of God both coexist.

Yes, listen to this. Evil is real, but so is God. Sin exists, but so does God. Now, they have not coexisted forever.

They will not coexist forever. But right now at this time in history, the Christian worldview, we recognize the reality of pain and suffering, but we further acknowledge the existence of God. Now, listen very carefully. In responding to the problem of pain and suffering, we don't compromise the attributes of God or the characteristics of God. Some say, well, God does exist, but He's not powerful enough to eliminate evil. No, God is omnipotent. Well, God does exist, but maybe He's got a bad side. No, God is omni-benevolent. God is thoroughly good.

My dear friend Andrew Womack, I love what he says. He says, not only is God not mad at you, God's not even in a bad mood. So God is real, and God is good. And some say, well, maybe God is not wise enough to know what to do. No, God is all-powerful, God is good, and God is wise. And yet evil exists.

How in the world do we reconcile those two? All right, I want to talk about how God, the God of the Bible, and evil can coexist, and we'll talk a little bit about why they exist. Pain and suffering and evil can actually sometimes be the greatest experiences a Christian endures through their walk with Jesus.

Now, how in the world is that possible? Well, evil and pain and suffering remind us of how deeply we need the Lord. Evil and pain and suffering very often wean us off of self-reliance and pride. Let's just be honest, and I can only speak for Alex here, but it's oftentimes been pain and suffering that's humbled me, and the Lord knew I needed it, and I do need it.

But it shows us that Christ is our source on which we depend, and very often we learn things about the faithfulness, mercy, wisdom of God that we might not have known any other way. And when a Christian obediently, trustingly processes their pain, there's not only blessings in this life, but there's rewards in heaven. But when discussing evil and suffering, it's very important first to understand that God's original design was perfect without sin, evil, or suffering. Adam and Eve did enjoy a sinless, perfect, pure environment, a pure creation.

Man was perfect without sin. God had intimate fellowship with his creation. Adam and Eve had fellowship with God, fellowship with each other. But that fellowship was disrupted when the first sin occurred. And Adam and Eve ate of the forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. This is Genesis chapter 3. Sin entered the world, and fellowship with our Maker was utterly broken, and that holy union between God and humans had been contaminated by sin.

In that sense, at that moment, the very first act of evil was committed. Now stay tuned. We're going to talk more about this, and giving a response to the problem of pain and suffering and evil and sin.

When we come back, stay tuned. Truth for a New Generation radio is back after this. Alex has written many books to help you defend your faith. One of them answers questions from skeptics.

It's cleverly titled, Ten Answers for Skeptics. Today, skeptics are looking for authenticity, integrity, and straightforward truth. And in the book, Alex McFarland identifies the ten most common types of skepticism that plague doubters' minds and offers believers proven strategies for connecting intellectually and spiritually with those who are skeptical about the claims of Christianity. Learn how to answer intimidating questions, identify the root issue behind those questions, and dismantle the spiritual bombshells dropped by atheists.

Plus, find encouragement to face hostility by persevering in love. The ultimate apologetic Christians can offer as a witness to our loving God. Check out Ten Answers for Skeptics when you visit AlexMcFarland.com. If you're a Christian parent, you of course want to instill a biblical view of life in the hearts of your children. If you're a pastor, you want to offer ministry that draws young families to your church. This is Alex McFarland encouraging you to check out my new book and video curriculum, The 21 Toughest Questions Your Kids Will Ask About Christianity. Why do bad things happen? I interviewed hundreds of children, ages 5 to 12, and we address actual questions from actual children, the spiritual issues that are on the minds of your kids.

Did Jesus ever sin? The book and video lessons are great for groups of any size and was produced with the goal of equipping kids to stand strong for Christ in any situation. The 21 Toughest Questions Your Kids Will Ask, the book, study guide, and video series, you'll find it at AFASTORE.net. That's AFASTORE.net. In the midst of a culture obsessed with relativism, Alex McFarland is a voice you can trust to speak the timeless truths of Christianity in a timely way. You're listening to Truth for a New Generation Radio.

Welcome back to TNG Radio. Alex McFarland here. I do want to remind you that we're coming up on our great strategy briefing at Ridgecrest, March 8 and 9. We would love for you to be there. Email Carla, C-A-R-L-A, Carla at alexmcfarland.com.

If you'd like to be there with us March 8 and 9, email carla at alexmcfarland.com. Well, we're talking about the problem of pain and suffering. So let's put on our thinking cap here and let's talk about evil.

There's natural evil and there's moral evil. People ask, why are there tornadoes? Tornadoes, very often you'll hear great praise reports. Maybe there was a hurricane or a storm, a tornado, and X amount of land was wiped out but it didn't touch us.

Praise God. But then you hear tragedies and somebody was killed or maybe a child or an elderly person. And people will ask in the aftermath of natural evil, they'll say, well, why were innocent people impacted?

It's like if a tornado takes out a bar or a strip club, we're kind of glad about that. But if a tornado takes out a house or a church, we wonder why. Well, the Bible says that the rain falls on the just and the unjust. In a fallen world, one of the sad realities, and this is why we should desire righteousness, we should desire truth, sin is not a victimless crime. And the ripple effect of evil and sin often hits the lives of people that weren't perpetrators. We're in a fallen world. Now, we're all sinners.

We need a savior. Natural evil and moral evil are the two categories of sin. Natural evil refers to things where the physical world, man is at enmity with the rest of creation, from poisonous snakes to black widow spiders to poison ivy to earthquakes, landslides and tornadoes and tidal waves. These are ample examples of how we are at enmity with the rest of creation. But then moral evil is not man against nature, it's man against man. And so many, many things have been done because of our problem with sin. Now, let's talk about that first act of evil where Adam and Eve disobeyed God. They basically tried to set up their life and live independently of God. They trusted the word of the serpent and the instincts of their heart rather than the revelation of God.

There are people doing that even today. The word of God is very clear about life, truth, morality, salvation. And there are many people, maybe even you, listening to this program, you're trying to live life and face eternity, not based on God's word that says come to Jesus, but based on your instincts or maybe even some lies Satan is trying to whisper into your ear. Believe God.

Trust God. We're suffering because of our parents, Adam and Eve, that didn't trust God. Listen, evil is not, as many people might think, just a horrific deed. Evil can be anything that is against God, anything that is sin is evil. Evil is the antithesis of God and we're going to define it as such. So when Adam and Eve sinned against God, evil found its place in this world and has existed ever since then.

And the first evil, though there have been countless examples since, but the very first evil is why we now live in a sinful, fallen world. The Bible is clear that sin is rampant in the world and even refers to the fact that Satan reigns in this world, at least to a point. 2 Corinthians 4.4 calls Satan the god of this world, little g. Satan is not God, only the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, the eternal, triune God is the deity. But Satan, little g, is the god of this world, at least in the sense that he's disrupted the lives of people, he's been a wedge between people and Christ.

Satan has caused a wedge between people and each other, parents and their children, families, churches, entire nations have divided against themselves and tears have been shed, blood has been spilled, lives have been lost, an eternity impacted by sin and evil. And the Bible talks about sin being rampant and the Bible says that until Christ comes, evil men will wax worse and worse. Now let's go back to Adam and Eve and their children. Cain, for example, sinned greatly by murdering his brother Abel. Sin expanded its influence to the children of Adam and Eve and has continued to grow in its influence ever since that moment, really. And read Paul's account about the influence of sin. Paul wrote this, Therefore just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, so death spread to all men, because all have sinned. For sin indeed was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law. Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sinning was not like the transgression of Adam, but Adam was a type or a symbol of all those who were to come.

Adam was a literal person, but as the head of the race, listen carefully. And by the way, that's Romans 5, 12 through 14. Because of Adam, because scholars use a big fancy word, federal headship, Adam's sin was passed on to all of Adam's children.

That's you and me. Now, if you read Romans 4, you hear about the imputed righteousness of Jesus. But without that, we have the imputed unrighteousness of Adam. Now, why would God allow evil to enter the world through Adam and Eve's choice? Why would God allow one sin to so completely change humanity and make this such a dangerous place? The only way for us to have a relationship with God is if we have choice.

Without free will, relationship is not possible. God didn't make puppets. God didn't make robots. God did something that we might call dangerous. He gave us free will. But in that free will, there's opportunity for us to know Christ, for us to trust Christ, for us to experience the exuberant joy of being in a relationship with Almighty God. So understand the most severe struggle we'll ever have is this problem of sin, otherwise toxic and terminal.

Except through Jesus, we can have forgiveness and restoration. Jesus is as close by as a prayer. We encourage you to call on Him today. That's 877-YES-GOD-1.

That's 877-YES-GOD and the number 1. Or give online at AlexMcFarland.com. While you're there, listen to Program Archives, read Alex's blog, invite Alex to speak at your event, or contact Alex with a question or comment. AlexMcFarland.com. Thanks for listening today and join us again next time when we'll bring you more truth for a new generation on TNG Radio.