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Why Do Bad Things Happen To "Good" People?
This is no doubt one of the most difficult questions in all of Christian theology. God is eternal, infinite, omniscient (all knowing), omnipresent (all present), and omnipotent (all powerful). Why should human beings (who are not eternal, infinite, omniscient, omnipresent, or omnipotent) expect to be able to fully understand God’s ways?
Isaiah 55:8- "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord."
The book of Job is an excellent example that deals with this issue. God had allowed Satan to do everything he wanted to Job except kill him. What was Job’s reaction? “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him” (Job 13:15). “The LORD gave and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD” (Job 1:21). Job did not understand why God had allowed the things He did, but he knew God was good, just and Holy and therefore continued to trust in Him. Ultimately, that should be our reaction as well.
Why do bad things happen to good people? The biblical answer is there are no “good” people. Jesus said,"Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God..."(Matt. 19:17) {Jesus was not denying His own Deity: Jesus is using a penetrating question to push the man to think through the implications of his own words, and to get the man to see his own lack of goodness/ or God.} The Bible makes it abundantly clear that all of humanity is tainted by and infected with sin (Ecclesiastes 7:20; Romans 6:23; 1 John 1:8).
A better question would be “Why does God allow good things to happen to bad people?” Sometimes bad things happen to people who seem undeserving of them. Likewise, sometimes good things happen to people who seem undeserving of them. But God allows things to happen for His reasons, whether or not we understand them.
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