Two Pressing Questions

I have treated these issues previously, but someone brought them to my attention recently, so I wrote this summary of my answers.

First question: Why did Jesus have to die?

It is a part of a mystery, as Paul says several times (eg. 1 Tim. 3:16 and Eph. 3:1-11). Even now, few people fully understand what is involved in salvation. (See “It’s Not All About You”) When God created humans, He gave them a special place in creation. They were to be His “imagers” – representatives – on the earth. They refused to follow the rules and were kicked out of the perfect place God made for them and forced to fend for themselves. The condition they found themselves in was called death both literally and metaphorically. Their bodies began to literally die, and they were dead to God metaphorically as far as a relationship was concerned.

 He still loved His creation, so God made a long-term plan to bring them back into relationship. Ultimately, someone had to pay for Adam’s rebellion. Since everyone born after Adam bore Adam’s sin nature and thus deserved the penalty, God had to arrange for someone not in Adam’s line to pay the redemption price – the buy-back that earned the right to be in relationship with God again. The only way that would work is for a human without sin to take the penalty for the sin of everyone else. That’s why Jesus had to be both human and divine; human so He could stand in for Adam’s race and divine so He could live a sinless life. Human – born of a woman, and divine – conceived by the Holy Spirit (virgin birth).

The Cross can also be seen as a ransom payment to God’s arch enemy, Satan, because it was his deception of Adam and Eve that brought sin into the perfect world God had made. It’s like the enemy kidnapped the human race and demanded payment to set them free. Because a death-for-life payment was the requirement, God provided the ultimate death: His one and only Son. The surprise to Satan was that God planned to resurrect His Son after the payment was made.

So, justice was served; the penalty for human sin was paid, but God did it Himself out of pure love: John 3:16: “God so loved the world…” God is not some big meanie sending people to hell out of spite. Rather, Paul says that God, “wants everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” God wants people who trust Him – who rely on His provision for their sin: “… that whoever believes (trusts) Him will have eternal life.”

Second question: why do bad things happen to good people?

First, there are no “good” people. As I said in answer one, everyone is born under the curse of Adam’s sin. Paul said it: “There is no one who is righteous – not one” and Isaiah wrote that even human attempts at righteousness fall so far short that they are like filthy rags (literally menstrual cloths) in God’s sight. It is hard for most people to swallow, but every human ever born is headed for eternity apart from God because of what Adam did. Because of God’s goodness, He provides good things for all people: “The rain falls on the righteous and the unrighteous.” Rain here is obviously a metaphor for a positive thing: it makes it possible to grow crops.

In any case, when “bad things” happen, they are simply the result of the conditions Adam brought on the whole earth. Floods, hurricanes, wild fires, disease all are results of Adam’s fall from grace. The fall didn’t just wreck Adam’s relationship with God; it damaged his relationships with everything: God, nature, other people, and even with himself. “Bad things” are actually the natural state of affairs in a fallen world.

The better question to ask is why anything “good” ever happens to anyone. God does not shy away from the fact that everything is not all sunshine and roses with His creation. In fact, He takes responsibility for even the “bad things” as proof that He alone is God. (See “Ask the Right Question”) I take comfort in the fact that nothing happens that is outside of God’s sovereign control. If anything could happen that God did not have a hand in, then nothing He ever promised could be trusted. Think of Job’s measure of what was happening to him: “Even if he kills me, I will hope in him.” (Also see “Don’t Ask Why”)

Another reason God allows “bad things” in believers’ lives is to test them. Faith either grows in trials or else it is proved to be false. True faith realizes that God has promised, “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you…. When you walk through fire, you shall not be burned…. For I am Yahweh, your God, the holy one of Israel, your savior.” We are not promised deliverance from bad stuff; we are promised God’s care and comfort in the bad stuff. (See “The Goodness of God in the Bad Times”) That’s life!

Next question?