6. Why do bad things happen to good people?

Why do good things happen to good people? Why do good things happen to bad people? Why do bad things happen to bad people? Is it all just random chance? Is it all without purpose or end? Is it fate? Is it karma? Is it perception of what is good and what is bad? What is bad for one could be good for another. Some guy getting laid off may mean that the single mother does not.

Also, from a biblical worldview, there is no such thing as a “good person” (Ps 14.1-3, 53.1-3; Eccl 7.20; Rom 3.12). Christian and non-Christian are all equally guilty of sin and all are equally deserving of nothing but wrath and punishment for our crimes (see answer to question 3). That is why Christianity is not a religion based on morality or being a good person. Good people die and wake up in hell. Rather, what Christians aspire for is the grace of God provided through the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. That is the only atonement for our rebellion and dysfunction as God’s creatures.

Even so, there are happenings in our world that are tragic and they do happen to what we would call innocent people. And the question of why is timeless and fundamental to understanding our condition. When God created the world, he created it to be very good (Gen 1.31). Therein, he gave man and woman dominion over it and there was order and harmony (Gen 1.26, 28; 2.15). However, we became arrogant and proud and sinned. We decided that there was wisdom and life apart from God and what we found was confusion and death. God cursed humanity and declared,

“To Adam he said, ‘Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat of it,’ Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.” Gen 3.17-19.
What this means is that because of sin, life is a struggle and the world in which we live is working against us. We will fight to survive, working against the dirt, and in the end the dirt will win. We will die and the earth will mock us because it endures and we do not. Natural disasters like floods, earthquakes, tsunamis, fires will kill us and destroy what we have worked so hard to build. Diseases will ravish our bodies and we will be crippled by viruses and bacteria. No one is immune. No amount of knowledge or wisdom can preserve us, or save us. Every person who has ever lived has died and we will too and so will those who come after us (Heb 9.27). And in the mean time, our life will be plagued by struggle and heartache. Horrible things will happen to us; we will be betrayed by those we love and others will seek to harm us and destroy our lives. Drunk drivers will kill our children, perverts will molest our sisters and rape our mothers and we are left asking why? We live in a fallen, crooked and depraved world. It is a world separated from God by sin. And what I mean by sin is not simply moral failures, but rather the condition of humanity and creation that has resulted in the separation between creation (us and our world) and creator (God). Sin has corrupted and frustrated every aspect of our lives and God has laid this curse upon us, not because he is vindictive and hates us, but rather because he loves us. He wants us to look out upon our world and see what our separation from him has done and cry out to him asking for the grace and mercy needed to restore that initial community we shared with him in Eden. And although, that restoration has not come to pass fully, the hope for that day is found in the life, death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is a hope that one day, bad things wont happen. We will all be judged according to God’s holiness and he will condemn those who defy them and give grace to those who love him (Tit 3.7). It is then that Jesus will reign over the earth as king and lord. It is then that the concept of “shalom” or peace will be made a reality. A peace that is not simply the absence of conflict, but the presence of unity and love between people, the world we live in, and the God who created it all (Rev 21.3-4).