The Problem of Evil: Finding Solace in the Cross

After being wrenched and twisted, beat up on and mentally exhausted by my first philosophy class--I started to like it. We discussed the classic questions of life. Like, If God is good and all powerful how can evil exist? Pretty heady discussions in that well lit, air conditioned room. Outside the classroom, however, those questions have a lot more at stake.

Like my relative two years ago whose husband, having earned his Ph.D., left her to live with his girlfriend. She’s left in financial hardship with severe back pain and three kids in need of therapy. Depression always lurks nearby.

Or a minister friend whose son’s degenerative disease went undetected until he was five. His parents could only care for him and watch him die for the next ten years.

Or me. My mom died less than a month before my first child was born. She was great—a great person, a great Christian, a great “Meemaw.” My son recognizes her picture on the fridge, but he’ll never know the deep well of love and joy she felt for her grandkids.

Tragedies send many seeking comfort and answers. Believers may plead like King David, “How long, O Lord? Will you forget me for ever? How long will you hide your face from me?” (Psalm 13:1). No response comes. We sometimes sit in silent or sobbing isolation and ask, “Why?”

Efforts to answer that question invariably come up short. Sufferers often just see two options. As one theologian expressed the problem, “If evil is real, God is not good; and if God is good, evil is not real.”

The Bible rejects both those alternatives. The presence of evil and God’s goodness meet at the cross of Jesus. Nowhere was evil more real. Never was injustice so flagrant, its victim so alone. Yet, nowhere does the love of God come into clearer focus. Though unjust, the sacrifice was voluntary. Though undeserved, he undertook it to break evil’s stranglehold on us. Though we are unworthy, he saw in us eternal value.

The cross does not remove our pain or answer all our questions, but it does enable us to live—and even thrive—in a world where evil persists. God is undeniably good and loving. He is also a God who knows loneliness, betrayal, disappointment, weariness and grief. He understands and shares our suffering. He walks with us, carries us through and guarantees our triumph over it.

God does tell us one reason he delays the demise of evil. It is not because he’s unable or doesn’t care. His motive is mercy. “He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance” (2 Pet. 3:9). The earth continues spinning as it does because God is giving every chance for his creatures to return to him and know his gracious kindness. Perhaps he is waiting for you.

There is a lot we do not understand—but our Creator does. He can be trusted. We can live in hope, peace and even joy because we know there is an all powerful, loving God who is orchestrating the universe specifically for the good of his children (Eph. 1:22).

The universality of man’s struggle and its resolution is found in a German hymn written by Katharina von Schlegel 250 years ago:

Be still, my soul; the Lord is on thy side.
Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain;
Leave to thy God to order and provide;
In ev’ry change He faithful will remain.
Be still, my soul; thy best, thy heav’nly Friend
Thru thorny ways leads to a joyful end.