Why Do Bad Things Happen (to good people)?

Why We Trust God’s Existence and the Resurrection of Christ

So we are back this week, we have been in our study answering the questions that you guys posed on the subject of the Christian faith. And we have been so far dealing with some of the most basic questions about the faith.

What was the first question that we dealt with? Anybody remember? Go ahead. How do you know that God exists? Or why do you believe that God exists? And what was our answer? You wrote it down, okay? Go ahead.

Okay, we said he can't prove he doesn't exist, that's one. That's right. Creation itself is evidence of a creator. In the same way a building is evidence of a builder, a painting is evidence of a painter.

When we look out in the world and we see creation, which in itself has evidence of intelligent design. How many of you have ever heard that phrase, intelligent design? Okay, that's an important term. We see evidence of intelligent design in creation.

And that helps us to believe that there was an intelligent creator or a designer. All right, now. What was the second question that we dealt with? I love that you have a notebook. Go ahead. How do you know your God is the right one?

On its way to being number one on our tsunami of lists. That's an important question. How do we know that our God is the right one? What was the answer? Do you remember? Yes. Okay. Faith. But what is it that makes us have that faith in the God that we serve?

Did you have your hand up or are you doing this? Okay. No one has to. Huh? We trust in the Bible. The Bible has evidence of supernatural authorship. What else? Yeah. A lot of other faiths have taken their ideas from Christianity.

Primarily what we said was there was a twofold reason for our faith. One is the Bible. The other is Christ. Jesus Christ is the very reason for our faith. If he had died and not resurrected, if he was still dead in the ground, then we would have no reason to believe that what he said was true.

But the very fact that he raised, there were witnesses to his resurrection, and those witnesses went on to proclaim that resurrection to the point of giving their lives for that. Not for something they believed, but something they had seen.

We have confidence that Christ is who he said that he was. So, the reason why we are Christians is because we believe that Jesus is who he said he was. And if Jesus is who he said he was, then of course everything that he said about God in the Bible is true.

So, people ask all the time, what is your faith wrapped up in? My faith is wrapped up in Jesus. If he's wrong, I'm wrong. That's just the way it is. Alright, so, what was the third question we dealt with last week?

Yes, yes, yes.

Why God Allows the Devil and Works All Things for His Glory

Why does God allow the devil to exist? And I didn't have a straight, quick answer for you, did I? I didn't have a nice little blurb that I had for the first one and for the second one. So, what was the answer, do you remember?

For his own glory. We always said that the answer to the why question will always be that. At the end of the day, the answer to the why question will be that God always does what he does for his own ultimate glory.

Because that is the motivation for what God does. He does what he does to glorify himself. The word tells us this. Because he's only being in the universe, he's deserving of that glory. As the creator and the sustainer of all things.

But when we said, why does God allow the devil to exist? We said God has a purpose in allowing the devil to exist. We don't always understand what that purpose is. We don't always understand why he allows the devil to do what he does.

But we know that in Romans 8, 28, the Bible tells us that God causes all things to work together for the good of those who love him or are called according to his purpose. So, even what he allows the devil to do has a purpose.

Even if we don't understand what it is. You had it. Who had it? You had it. Go ahead. You had it. The devil is under God's authority. That's a very important part of that. So, this leads us to today. And today we are going to take an even further look at the question of evil.

Because when you talk about the devil, you're talking about the most evil being in all of the universe. You're talking about the very father of lies himself. A murderer who was a murderer from the beginning, Jesus said.

He hates God. He hates God's economy. He hates God's life. He wanted to be in the position of God. That is the devil's purpose, is evil. But yet, we can take a step back and say, what about evil itself?

Why do bad things happen? Why is there evil at all? And the question that we're going to answer today is that age old question. All of us had asked it at some point in our lives. We've all experienced some kind of traumatic incident, some kind of bad thing.

Maybe you've lost a loved one. Maybe you've gotten very, very ill. Maybe somebody you know has gotten very, very ill. Maybe someone was in an accident. Maybe someone was hurt. Maybe something happened.

Or you saw on the news just this last week that there were people who were simply running in a marathon and there was an explosion and people died. And what is the question we have? Why do bad things happen?

Why is there evil in the world? And more so, why do bad things happen to good people? Before we go further, why do you think so many people add that qualifier then? Because they think they're good people.

That's a perfect answer. That's very good. That's good. They think they're good people. What's another reason why they add the qualifier? If it was why do bad things happen to bad people, they'd be like, well, duh.

Bad things should happen to bad people. Because there's an inherent feeling in all of us called justice. Now, I will go ahead and say that that feeling is marred. That feeling is misunderstood often. But it is part of what we call in theology terms the Imago Dei.

That is a Latin term. Anybody want to try to guess what Imago Dei means? What do you think Imago, English word? Image. And Dei, think of the word deity. Deity. The Imago Dei is Latin for the image of God.

Every one of us, the Bible says, is stamped with the image of God. Right? The Bible says we were created in His image and in accordance with His likeness. And a lot of people think that that means, well, that means God is a person like me.

He has a body, eyes, nose, ears like me. No, it doesn't mean image, physical. We are the spiritual image bearers of God. You are the only creature in the whole world that has the capacity to think, to emote, and to feel the way that you do.

You know, monkeys are pretty smart creatures. And you know, DNA wise, we're not that far off from the monkey. It's only a couple of percentage points as to the difference between our DNA. But you know what?

In those percentage points, we sent a man to the moon. In those percentage points, we created the steam engine. In those percentage points, we created the atom bomb. In those percentage points, we have Mozart's symphonies.

So you might say, well, monkeys are just 2%, 3 DNA wise. That is a major difference because we see in us the stamp of the image of God. We are different than all other creatures because of that stamp.

Yes, sir. Absolutely, 1 is still a ton of information. That's right. But part and parcel of the image of God on us is that we all have an internal understanding of right and wrong. The Bible is very clear about this.

It says this in the book of Romans, that God has written his law upon our heart. And what people do is that they suppress the truth in unrighteousness. Romans chapter 1 says that. It says that we suppress the truth in unrighteousness.

What that means is, as a child, we understand right from wrong. As we begin to grow into adolescence, we begin to want to do the wrong. So what do we do? We suppress that truth. We suppress that truth a little bit.

We push it down a little bit. This is what's so dangerous at some of your ages. Sixteen? Fifteen? Fifteen?

Are you there?

You're at that age where the harder decisions are going to come to you. More difficult decisions about who you are as a person and what you're going to believe in, what you're going to stand for. What kind of an adult you're going to be.

What happens with a lot of people is they suppress that truth. They suppress that truth that God has placed in them. That internal understanding of right and wrong. And then when they get to a certain age, they still have that.

It's like when you're a kid and you do something wrong and there's a voice shouting,.

Hey stupid! Don't do that!

And then as you get a little older, it's, Hey stupid! Don't do that! And we just keep pushing that voice down. And then a lot of people, you know what they do when that little bit of voice is still going?

They kill it with alcohol, with drugs, with sex, with all kinds of other things. They kill that sound. They kill that internal understanding of right and wrong. But here's the thing. Now we've not answered the question yet.

All this is building up. The reason why we ask this question, why do bad things happen to good people? It's because everyone at least has an understanding from a very basic level that bad people deserve to have bad things happen to them.

I mean, don't we? Do you agree that Hitler... How many of you even know who that is? Everybody here know? You're homeschooled. Good. Everybody knows Hitler? I'm serious. You go to public school. Hit what?

You're not supposed to hit her. No, seriously. I tell you, it's dangerous stuff. Hitler was responsible for the killing of six million Jewish people and another countless number of other types of people that he disagreed with.

Handicapped people, gypsies. Anyone that he did not feel was part of his understanding of the way human beings were supposed to be. The Aryan nation. He had them slaughtered, killed, put into camps, and murdered.

And all of us say, very quickly, that guy is bad, and something bad happened to him, that's justice. We don't have any problem saying, you know, Hitler broke hell wide open. We all try to understand justice that way.

Here's the question, though. When we ask, why do bad things happen to good people, what is the assumption in the question? That's really good. That's going a little different direction than I'm going.

But what Noah's talking about is, sometimes a bad thing will happen to someone, and other people will say, well, that happened because you were bad. Huh? Yeah, yeah, like when Job, when he had the bad things happen to him, all of his friends came to him and said, look, Job, you know, the reason why this happened was because you did wrong, and you did this, and you did that.

So that's good. That's a little different direction than what I'm going. I'm trying to ask a question, though, in what is assumed in that question. Why do bad things happen to good people? Yes, the assumption is that there are good people.

Now, first of all, let me ask you, oh, this is going to be fun. Raise your hand if you're a good person. Thank you, Jonathan. You're a little young yet to understand this, but I'm glad I didn't get any hands.

Some of you know what I was going to say.

But even if you didn't, why did nobody raise your hand? And I tell you what, if I went to, hold on a second, if I went to the average college, and I stood in front of an auditorium filled with 20-somethings, and I said to all 20, all of the 20-somethings, I said, how many of you would consider yourself to be a good person?

95 of the arms would go straight up because part and parcel of natural man is the desire to proclaim our own righteousness. The Bible actually says that, that it's within us to want to proclaim our own goodness.

So when you ask, and I was surprised when I said, how many of you are good? No hands went up. I mean, either your parents have explained to you sin or you were just afraid to put your hand up. Hopefully it's the first.

So go ahead. Absolutely. Absolutely. That's how we know. Everybody turn your Bible to Romans 3. Romans 3 is the hardest verse, hardest section of Scripture for natural people. And when I say natural people, I don't know any unnatural ones.

Maybe I do, but Romans 3 for the for the natural person, it's hard to accept. I'm sorry. Verse 9, Romans 3, verse 9. It says this. What then? Are we Jews any better off? No, not at all. You see, what had happened was in chapter one of Romans, the apostle Paul had been explaining how sinful the Gentiles were.

And in chapter two of Romans, he was explaining how sinful the Jews were because the Jewish people were very good at standing back and looking at the Gentiles and saying they're the pagans. They're the bad ones.

They're the ones that are going to bust hell wide open. But we are God's chosen people. We're the sons and daughters of Abraham. We're the righteous ones. We're the Pharisees. We know what we're doing.

We're the religious elite. So Paul is saying here, what shall we say? Are we Jews any better off?

No, not at all. But yeah, absolutely.

They created an entire addition to God's law and made it very difficult. That's right. So he says here. What then? Are we Jews any better off? No, not at all. For we have already charged that all both Jews and Greeks are under sin.

As it is written, there is none righteous. No, not one. No one understands. No one seeks for God. All have turned aside. Together they have become worthless. No one does good. Not even one. Their throat is an open grave.

They use their tongues to deceive. The venom of asps is under their lips. Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood. And their paths are ruin and misery. And the way of peace they have not known.

There is no fear of God before their eyes. This is the hardest section of Scripture for most people to truly accept. Because it is the universal condemnation of all mankind. That not only is there none righteous.

But there is none that does good. Not even one. And I know what a lot of people think when they hear that. They say, but wait a minute. I know a lot of people that do good. My mommy does good. My daddy does good.

They both feed me. They clothe me. They take care of me. Daddy gets up and goes to work. Momma gets up and does what she's supposed to do. They work together. It's always there. Did I miss something? Well, I mean, some mommies don't work.

I don't want to assume your mommies don't have to work. Sometimes mom works at home. Does what she's supposed to do there. But the reality is. The reality is the Apostle Paul puts on mankind a very specific charge.

There's none good. No, not one. All is sin. No one does good. And we all sit back and we say, wait a minute. How can that be right? It's right. Go ahead. Absolutely. That's the point. In and of ourselves.

That's a very good thing. Because in and of ourselves. If we were righteous. And good. We wouldn't need a Satan. If we were good. We wouldn't need Christ. So. Let's go back very quick to the question.

Why do bad things happen to good people? Well, we can erase that part. Right? Because we know. Bad things happen to everybody. Because all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Because all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

Every one of us bears the marred image of God. Because the image of God that we have. Though it is still there. It has been marred by something. What has it been marred by? Sin. All right. This is where I wanted to go today.

Everybody turn back. To Rome. Or to Genesis 1. This is where I'm going to be tonight. Genesis 1 31. In Genesis 1 31 it says this very simply. And God saw what? Everything that he had made. And behold it was very what?

Good. Okay. So let's start at the beginning. In the beginning. Everything was good. Everybody agree? That the text says that very clearly. That God created everything and everything he created was good.

This is the sixth day. So he's already created man. He has already created woman. They are in the garden together. They are living in the garden. Enjoying garden living. And they are in a state of goodness.

Right? They are in a state which theologians call innocence. Because we hasten not to say that Adam and Eve were righteous. But we say they were innocent. They had done no evil. But yet they had also done no good either.

They were in a state of innocence. They are not evil. Okay? Now. Chapter 3. Of Genesis. Bring in something new. Something that up until that point had not ever existed. You've already told me what it is.

It is. Brings in sin. Right? Sin is brought in at chapter 3. Let's read just the first part of chapter 3. It says, Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast in the field that the Lord God had made.

Who is the serpent? Don't you ever forget that it's the devil. Snakes are the devil. Alright. He said to the woman. Oh, by the way. Maybe I want to mention this. For those of you who don't know. I know most of you know the story.

Just in case you don't know. God had commanded Adam that no one should eat of one particular tree in the garden. Okay? That is in chapter 2. And now Eve is by herself. The serpent has come to her and he said to the woman.

Did God actually say you shall not eat of any tree in the garden? And the woman said to the serpent. We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden. But God said you shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden.

Neither shall you touch it lest you die. But the serpent said to the woman. You will not surely die. So what did Satan automatically say? God's word is not true. That is an important part of the story.

The very task of Satan in the world. Is to convince people that God's word is not true. It started from the very beginning. God said you are going to die.

I say you ain't. God is wrong. And she believed him. As it goes on to say.

Verse 5. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened. And you will be like God knowing good and evil. You know. He uses that thing that we all want in one sense. And that is knowledge and power.

If you eat of that you will be like God. You will understand good and evil. She didn't need any other convincing than that. So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food. And that it was a delight to the eyes.

And that the tree was to be desired to make one wise. She took of its fruit and ate. And she also gave some to her husband who was with her. And he ate. By the way he was with her. He was with her. That is an important part often missed.

People often think. Hey he was there all by herself. He was with her. It is in the text there. Not necessarily right next to her. But they weren't too far from one another. Where he could have stepped in and made something happen.

But apparently he wanted some of that knowledge too. No, no. We are going to deal with that. We are going to get to that. But let's finish the first. Because I want to deal with this first. It says then the eyes of both were opened.

And they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together. And made themselves loin cloths. Alright.

So Adam and Eve were good.

They knew not evil. Exponentially. Meaning they had never experienced evil. They had to have some idea what evil was. Because if they didn't. When he says you will know good and evil. They should have went what does that mean?

They should have an idea that it meant disobedience of some sort. That having never experienced disobedience. As soon as they disobeyed what happened. They had a new feeling. It was a feeling like they never felt before.

Never needed to feel it before. And it's a feeling that I bet many of you. If not all of you have felt at some point in your life. It was a feeling. It starts with an S. Sin brought shame. I'm naked. Don't look at me.

I got to get me some designer fig leaves. And Calvin Klein leaves. And I got to cover up. Because I'm ashamed. Not just of my nakedness. I'm ashamed of what I've done. I got to hide. Later in the story.

God comes to them in the cool of the day. Walking in the garden. What do they do? They hide. Because they feel shame. Now. Had the world ended there. And God simply punished them. And said you are done.

Adam and Eve. That's it. I'm going to cut you off. I'm going to send you guys to hell. Because you've disobeyed me. Or I'm just going to kill you. And annihilate you from existence. Because you've disobeyed me.

And I'm going to start all over. Could God have done that? Absolutely. He's God. Could have done whatever he wanted. He did not choose to do that. But instead what did he do? Okay. Sacrifice an animal.

He clothed him. First sacrifice in scripture. Done by God by the way. It doesn't say in the text that he sacrificed. But he said he clothed him with an animal skin. You can't clothe someone with an animal skin unless they take the animal out of them.

Because that would be rough. It would be rough. You have a bear skin. The bear is still there. He took an animal. He made them animal skins for them to wear. He covered their sin. Ah. A picture of something that would happen much later.

When Christ's blood would cover our sins for all time. There's a picture of the work of God in that act. Covering up their sinful nakedness. But what did he not do? Even though he covered their sin, what did he not do?

Erase it. He didn't erase it. Is that what you're going to say? He did not erase it. And from that point on, everything else in all of history would be affected by that sin. All the way down to you and me.

All through history, we see the effects of sin in the world. Everybody turn. We're going to go to one last Bible verse. This is the end. And then I'm going to address Noah's question very quickly. Let's go back.

Go right back to Romans chapter 5 and verse 12. Romans chapter 5 and verse 12. Therefore, just as sin came into the world by one man or through one man. By the way, Adam is always considered to be the head of sin, not Eve.

Anybody know why? Because Adam was created first. That is part of it. And that's very close to where I'm going. Anybody want to go any further? He told Adam specifically. Adam was created first. Both of those are part of it.

Adam is the federal head of all the human race. Adam's sin affected all the people that came after him because he acted as our representative. That is a big theological idea of what we call federal headship.

That Adam acted in our place when he sinned. In the same way Christ acted in our place when he came and lived a righteous life. Died and was resurrected. He is our federal head. There are two heads. This is why in the book of 1 Corinthians, Jesus is called the last Adam.

Because there's only been two. The first Adam was the one who plunged us into sin. The last Adam was the one who raised us to new life. There's two people we can be in. We can still be in Adam or we can be in Christ.

And that's what that means. In Christ means we're under him. He is our representative head. He is our federal head. We talk about federal government. You know what federal government means? It means we elect people to represent us.

That's what a federalism is. And that's what we talk about. Christ is our representative. Adam was our representative. That's why it says here, just as sin came into the world through one man. It was because his act was on our behalf.

You might say, well, that's not fair. If you were there, do you think you'd have done any different? That's all. Seriously. Do you think you would have done better? That's a question. You don't know. But the federal, the representative acted.

And we all we all are a part of that. All right. So this is big. I'm teaching you guys really, really heavy stuff. I could draw a picture of Winnie the Pooh. You know, I don't know how. I don't know how to do this without telling you guys the real deal.

And I know it's hard for some of you, but this is the real deal. This is the stuff that most people don't get even in Bible college. I tell you, I know people in Bible college never heard the term federal headship, but it's a major theological concept.

That is, if you don't understand it, then really understanding theology as a whole becomes skewed. So anyway, get the back of it. Therefore, just as sin came in the world through what? Through one man.

And what came death through sin? And so death spread to all men because what? Because all sin. You see, we were all in Adam when he sinned and thus death has spread to all men. And you might say you could change this verse around, not that we should change God's word, but you could add a thought, an application.

Not only has death spread to all men, but disease has spread to all men. Suffering has spread to all men. Pain has spread to all men. Bad moods have spread to all men and women because we all live in a body which has been infected or affected by sin.

That is why bad things occur. The Bible says two things happened when man said God gave judgment, actually gave three judgments. He judged man, he judged the earth, and he judged the devil. We say the devil, we knew.

The devil is already under judgment. Man, we received the judgment. Man received the judgment. But we don't think about the earth. The earth was also judged. You know, in the garden there were no earthquakes.

Prior to sin, there were not even thorns on the trees. So if you ask me, why do bad things happen? Badness entered the world because sin entered the world. That's the simple answer. Philosophers don't want to hear that.

Modern secularists will mock at that. But the Bible is clear. The reason why there is bad in the world is because there is sin in the world. That does not mean, however, that just because someone experiences bad, that they're worse than someone else.

Because badness is shared by all of us. Those people that were standing at the end of that finish line, who experienced that bomb, they weren't standing there because they did something worse than you and me.

The question is, why were they there? Why them and not me? That's a question we don't always know the answer to. And sometimes, and oftentimes, we don't. We don't know why the tragedies happen the way they do.

But Jesus made it very clear. We're not going to read it. But if you want to read it when you get home, Luke chapter 13. Jesus made it clear. Somebody came to him, and they said, Jesus, a tragedy happened.

There were men who were killed by Pontius Pilate. And they said, a tragedy happened. And Jesus said, unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. What does that mean? What he was saying to them was very simple.

In life, we all are going to face tragedies at some point. We're all going to face some difficulty. We may even face terrible tragedies. But unless we repent and trust in Christ, we all have the same end.

We all have the same end. Because sin takes you where? You can say it, it ain't a bad word to say it in this context. Where does sin take you? Sin takes us to hell. It does. The Bible says the wages of sin is death.

And it's not just talking about physical death. It's talking about death and hell. But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. We all know we deserve hell. We all know we deserve punishment.

We all know that we're not good, no, not one. But the gift of God is eternal life through the Lord Jesus Christ. So that is the reality. As I said, there are only two types of people in the world. There are people who are still in Adam.

They're still in their sin. They're still in their shame. They are still headed towards hell. And there are people who have repented and received the Lord Jesus Christ. And only them have the confidence of eternal life with Christ.

Alright? Now, we don't have a lot of time. Let me address Noah's question. I don't know. No, no, no, no, hey. Are you laughing? Okay, good. I meant to make you laugh. But I want to tell you the truth.

There is one question which the Bible never addresses. And that is why God put the tree there. Why God allowed the devil there. And it really doesn't even address much about Satan's fault. But we know this.

What was the answer to last week's question on the why? It's always for God's glory. He did it for his own glory. However he did it, we know he did it for his glory. But the answer of why the tree is there, the Bible actually uses a very interesting term.

When it talks about iniquity, iniquity is sin and badness. It calls it the mystery of iniquity. Because there is a point at which, if you go back far enough, where it does become a mystery. Why did God allow this?

Why did God allow Satan into the garden? Well, he allowed him there as a tempter. We know God doesn't himself tempt, but he allows Satan to be a tempter. Why? I don't know the answer to that question.

Other than to say that God had a purpose in all things. I'm satisfied to say I don't always know. But I know why there's evil in the world now. Because man sinned. Why do bad things happen? Because we live in a sin-fallen world.

That's why bad things happen. And there's the simple answer. I know you like the one-liner. Why do bad things happen? Why do bad things happen? Better grammar. Because we live in a sin-fallen world.

Yes. Oh, yes. The Proto-Evangelium, which is the Genesis 3 .15. Where he says that you're the seed of the woman which would crush the head of the serpent. Yes. Very true. All right, my friends. Well, I hope you enjoyed that.

Let's have a short prayer. Father, thank you for this opportunity to study together. We pray that you'll bless it and encourage the children to do it. In Jesus' name. Amen.