This post is part of a series of posts summarising chapters of the Jehovah Witnesses' booklet, "What does the Bible really Teach?", and seeking to evaluate those chapters against Scripture somewhat briefly. Those posts were introduced at the Introduction, and a contents page will be added to that entry once this run of posts has finished.
Chapter 11: Why does God allow suffering
It is a right and biblical question to ask: Why does God allow suffering, given he is “all powerful, loving, wise, and just” (106)
Why so much suffering?: Some people say that it is God’s will , or that God is mysterious. Better is to recognise: 1. That God is not the ruler of this world, Satan is. 2. We cause much of it by our rebellion. 3. God does not protect us, so we might “happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.” (109) “It is comforting for us to know that God does not cause suffering. He is not responsible.” (109). Nevertheless, we ask why he does not stop it.
A vital issue raised: Satan did not challenge God’s power in the garden; he challenged God’s right to rule. If God had simply destroyed all the rebels, his right to rule would not be vindicated. Instead, he had to show how Satan would rule the world, and then everyone can see that God is in fact that best ruler.
Why so long?: To be vindicated in this way, God couldn’t stop Satan presenting his case. Neither could he stop the suffering, for this would help Satan rule the world and would end up vindicating Satan’s challenge. Instead, he has to leave it – knowing that he is able to reverse all the effects of our suffering. So why not make Adam and Eve such that they could not rebel?
How will you use the gift from God? Because God made us with free will. We are happier if we serve God because we choose to.
Evaluation
We need to be very careful saying that God does not rule this world. If he does not, we lose the assurance that he will certainly be victorious in the end. We need to distance God from ever doing anything evil, because Scripture does (Habakkuk 1:13), but we need to be clear that he still rules. Isaiah 40-46 stresses that God can save and deliver his people, precisely because he does everything he wishes. In the first instance, this is a reference to bringing his people back from Babylon, so God is able to achieve every purpose of his within history, not just at the end of time.
Analysing the reason for suffering is difficult. The danger of the approach articulated here is that it leaves feeling that God worked to vindicate himself without any concern for us. Ultimately, God lives for his own glory. However the message of the love of God is that God chooses to seek out his own glory by pursuing what is best for us. This is why some writers look for God’s self-vindication in his need to avoid being defeated when it comes to his purpose to have humanity rule his world for him. His plan was for humanity to live in loving trust of him, ruling the world, and he won’t allow our rebellion to avert that.
However, no answer to the problems of evil and suffering will ever be complete. A great deal of humility is needed, and it would not be right to criticise this answer on the grounds that it is only part of the picture. What we must not do is misrepresent God. We must maintain that God really is all-powerful in the here and now, and that he really does love us.
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