The document discusses the problem of suffering and how it relates to beliefs about God. It notes that an all-powerful and all-good God would presumably want to prevent human suffering but that suffering exists, posing a challenge. It considers several Christian perspectives on why God might allow suffering, such as that it results from human free will and moral choices or that God works through suffering for a higher purpose. It suggests suffering will ultimately be addressed when God ends all suffering in the future.

1. Suffering
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3. tsunami wreckage
© United Nations, used under a Creative Commons licence

4. © Marco Dormino: The United Nations, used under a Creative Commons licence

5. The problem
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6. • A good, all-powerful God would not want
people to suffer and would be able to
prevent them from suffering.

7. • A good, all-powerful God would not want
people to suffer and would be able to
prevent them from suffering.
• Suffering exists.

8. • A good, all-powerful God would not want
people to suffer and would be able to
prevent them from suffering.
• Suffering exists.
• Therefore, God lacks either goodness or
power, or both – the good, all-powerful
God of the Bible does not exist.

9. As for those who believe in an all-good,
all-powerful agent-God, we've seen that
they face a question that remains pressing
after all these centuries, and which is now
horribly underscored by the horrors in
Haiti. If a deity exists, why didn't he
prevent this?
David Bain, BBC News Magazine

10. Suffering / evil are not
evidence against God
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11. assumptions about God

12. 1
God may have good reasons
to allow suffering

13. who knows what will be
good in the long run?

14. As the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways and
my thoughts than your thoughts.
Isaiah 55.9

15. suffering = context for the
highest human values

16. 2
Suffering is a consequence
of human freedom

17. free will do good or evil

18. relationships require freedom

19. wrong choice

20. some actions
directly cause suffering

21. some actions
compound suffering

22. all suffering results
from the Fall

23. How can God prevent
suffering?

24. over-riding free will

25. destroying evil

26. 3
God works through suffering

27. ultimate purpose of life

28. not to be happy

29. to know God

30. What do people mean when they say, ‘I
am not afraid of God because I know that
he is good?’ Have they never been to a
dentist?
C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed

31. God whispers in our pleasures, speaks in
our conscience but shouts in our pain. It is
his megaphone in a deaf world.
C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain

32. 4
God will eventually end
suffering

33. Suffering and evil may
be evidence for God
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34. There will be no major solution to the
suffering of mankind until we reach some
understanding of who we are, what the
purpose of creation was, what happens
after death . . . Until these questions are
resolved we are caught.
Woody Allen

35. Atheism

36. suffering / evil = meaningless

37. Eastern worldviews

38. bad karma

39. illusion

40. Judeo-Christian

41. Suffering / evil = result of
rebellion

42. Only the Christian worldview
offers an answer to suffering

43. The God of the Bible is not compelled to
answer questions. He loves us, yes, but
with a white hot intensity, with the hot
breath of a lion. Like Aslan of Narnia, He is
not a tame lion. His love may be the most
dangerous thing about Him, because He
swears to love us literally to the death of
ourselves.
Faith Hopler

44. Though he brings grief, he will show
compassion, so great is his unfailing love.
For he does not willingly bring affliction or
grief to the children of men.
Lamentations 3.31–33

45. God suffers too

46. crucifixion there are bigger
things than suffering

47. 'There cannot be a God of love,' men say,
'because if there was, and he looked down
upon the world his heart would break.'
The church points to the cross and says, 'It
did break'. 'It is God who made the
world;' men say, 'it is he who should bear
the load.' The church points to the cross
and says, 'He did bear it'.
William Temple

48. I have nothing to say that makes sense of
this horror – all I know is that the message
of the death and resurrection of Jesus is
that he is with us.
John Sentamu, Today Programme

50. resurrection God will deal
with suffering evil

51. new heavens & new earth

52. Let us examine our ways and test them,
and let us return to the LORD.
Lamentations 3.40

53. www.tonywatkins.org
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