Answer the Christian: Why do people suffer for a sin Adam committed long ago?
1. Adam’s sin introduced death into the world. God created the universe and began its human population by creating a man and a woman, whom He called Adam and Eve. They were given freedom to lives their lives with one restriction. They were not to eat of the fruit of a particular tree. If they transgressed the command they would die. They transgressed the command and died. Their deaths were spiritual (immediate estrangement from God), soulish (corruption of their nature), and physical (deferred decline of their bodies through aging and disease). This is how death entered the world.
2. People suffer the affects of Adam’s sin because all human beings were present in Adam’s loins when he sinned. This is known as natural or seminal generation. Each child is made up of living cells which are produced by and within, and are thus a part of, their parent’s bodies. A new born baby bears the image of its parents both in its physical appearance and in its DNA. This is so because the child is the actual flesh and blood of the parents. Even prior to a child’s conception, it lives, in a sense, in its parent’s bodies. Consider this passage from the Bible:
Hebrews 7:8-10 “in this case mortal men receive tithes, but in that case one receives them, of whom it is witnessed that he lives on. And, so to speak, through Abraham even Levi, who received tithes, paid tithes, for he was still in the loins of his father (Abraham) when Melchizedek (who collected the tithe from him) met him.
We are not responsible for Adam’s sin in the sense that we committed his sin or are held to account for what he did. This is made clear in the following passage from the Bible:
Ezekiel 18:20 “the person who sins will die. The son will not bear the punishment for the father’s iniquity, nor will the father bear the punishment for the son’s iniquity; the righteousness of the righteous will be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked will be upon himself.
Rather, because we have been corrupted in our nature through our forbear, Adam, we are in need of regeneration and redemption. Death is our future because of our corruption, which we inherited from Adam. All humans descended from Adam who is the progenitor of the human race. His sin preceded the conception of his children. Thus, all his descendants carry his corrupt nature and are destined for death. Consider this passage from the Bible:
Romans 5:12 “therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned. For until the law sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over those who had not sinned in the likeness of the offense of Adam, who is a type of him who was to come.
Adam’s sin brought death into the world and it extends to every person on the basis of their corrupt nature, in spite of the fact that they did not actually commit Adam’s sin, and prior to their having committed any sins on their own.
3. People suffer the affects of Adam’s sin because all human beings are represented by him. This is known as federal headship. As the federal head of our government, the President of the United States has the power to make war against foreign nations. If he does so, then the entire country will go to war, and Americans will suffer and die. As Americans, we cannot escape the consequences of a war in which our federal head may choose to engage. During World War II, the United States dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Even though the inhabitants of those cities may never have even served in Japan’s military, they died nonetheless because of our response to the actions of their emperor and military leaders. As human beings descended from Adam, we cannot escape the predicament into which our federal head has thrust us. Adam chose to go to war with God when he made the decision to sin. His descendants suffer the consequences.
Answer the skeptic: Why do children die of cancer?
1. The question has two parts: Why do children die? And, why do they die of cancer? Naturally speaking, everyone dies. Some people live only a few days or perhaps even a few years, while others live for decades. But, the outcome is always the same: death. Everyone will die of natural causes (aging or disease) unless their lives are preempted by an unnatural cause such as an automobile accident or a murder. Cancer is simply one form of disease that takes human life.
2. The real question is, “Why is there disease and death?” These are a result of the corruption that entered the created order when man sinned against God in the Garden of Eden. This point was more fully explored in the above answer to the question, “Why do people suffer for a sin Adam committed long ago?”
Answer the skeptic: Why is it fair that God ordered the killing of Canaanite children?
1. First, all human beings are destined for death, as argued above. We are all under a death sentence for our corrupt nature. That God hastens the death of some over others does not change the fact that death is coming. War does not increase death. It merely hastens it.
2. God’s ordering of the killing of Canaanite children is not unfair in the sense that God has ordered the deaths of all human beings.
3. Fairness is not an attribute of God. God is not fair, or else everyone would be given the same station in life, the same appearance, the same intellect, etc. Variety in humanity necessitates “unfairness.” If God were fair, that is if He created and treated every human being exactly the same, then there would only be one human being necessary to satisfy God’s desire for fellowship, and there would be billions of useless redundant ones.
4. God is just. Because of the corrupt nature of the Canaanite children, God is just in killing them. Moreover, the Canaanites were destroyed because of their corruption of the land God had set aside for Israel. The Canaanite people were involved in child sacrifice, bestiality, and idolatry. Their children would have continued in the same sins. God was just in killing them.
Answer the skeptic: Why do bad things happen to good people?
1. There are no “good” people. As argued above, all human beings are corrupt through Adam. Humans are bad because they have a sin nature. This is evident from at least two observations. First, children do not have to be taught to misbehave. They have to be taught to behave because their nature drives them to misbehave. Ask any parent. Second, laws exist to control human nature. If humans lived by the golden rule, there would be no need for laws. The existence of laws demonstrates the corruption of human nature.
2. Bad things happen because the creation is corrupted. When Adam sinned in the Garden of Eden, not only was his nature changed (corrupted), and that of his posterity, but the natural created universe was also changed. God cursed the creation with the decay that resulted from its corruption, because man had defiled it. Consider this passage from the Bible:
Genesis 3:17 “then to Adam he said, ‘because you have listened to the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree about which I commanded you, saying, ‘you shall not eat from it’; cursed is the ground because of you; in toil you will eat of it all the days of your life.’”
3. Bad things happen because there is evil in the world. When man (Adam) rejected God’s authority in his life, he became evil. Adam experienced spiritual death (estrangement from God, and in effect, estrangement from good) as a result of his sin. Evil is the absence of good. It has no properties. Evil does not exist within itself. It exists in hosts. Because they are evil by nature, humans do bad things, and usually to each other. Bad things happen to bad people because only bad people exist and they do bad things to each other.
Answer the skeptic: Why is eternal punishment fair?
1. As discussed above, God is just rather than fair. That said, it is quite just for the punishment of sinners to last throughout all eternity. There are at least 4 reasons that this question only seems reasonable to ask. The question assumes: a). too low a view of God’s holiness, b). too low a view of the horror of sin and its offense to God; 3). too high a view of human nature; and 4). too high a view of man’s sense of justice. God is utterly holy. This means that God is separate and distinct from His creation, and that He is set apart from it. He is wholly other and uncorrupted by sin. Because of His holiness, He cannot ignore sin or allow it to go unpunished. Sin is such an affront to holy God that it must receive the maximum punishment. Anything short of eternal punishment would be an inadequate response to the enormity and grotesqueness of sin. When humans ask this question they are elevating their sense of justice above God’s. Fallen humans who are corrupt in their thinking cannot reach a perfect ethic. Only God knows ethical perfection.
2. God is eternal. For the unrepentant, neither is His knowledge of sin erased nor is His holy wrath appeased. Sin must be punished eternally to satisfy God’s eternal wrath.
3. God’s punishment of the damned is proportionate to their sin. Consider these passages from the Bible:
Matthew 11:22-24 “Nevertheless I say to you, it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the Day of Judgment than for you. And you, Capernaum, will not be exalted to heaven, will you? You will descend to Hades; for if the miracles had occurred in Sodom which occurred in you, it would have remained to this day. Nevertheless I say to you that it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the Day of Judgment, than for you.”
Luke 12:47-48 “And that slave who knew his master’s will and did not get ready or act in accord with his will, will receive many lashes, but the one who did not know it, and committed deeds worthy of a flogging, will receive but few. From everyone who has been given much, much will be required; and to whom they entrusted much, of him they will ask all the more.”
God is just in His judgments and in His sentencing of offenders. Everyone will get his just desserts unless, by God’s grace, he is saved.
4. The damned do not repent. There is no amount of punishment in hell which will bring about repentance, that is, a change of heart toward God and one’s own sinful ways. The damned will regret their circumstances, even the sin that brought judgment upon them, including the sin of refusing the provision God made in His Son for the remission of their sin, but they will not repent of their sin and turn toward God. Consider this rather lengthy passage from the Bible:
Luke 16:22-31 “Now the poor man died and was carried away by the angels to Abraham’s bosom; and the rich man also died and was buried. in Hades he lifted up his eyes, being in torment, and saw Abraham far away and Lazarus in his bosom and he cried out and said, ‘father Abraham, have mercy on me…for I am in agony in this flame.’ But Abraham said…between us and you there is a great chasm fixed, so that those who wish to come over from here to you will not be able, and that none may cross over from there to us.’ And he said, ‘then I beg you, father, that you send him to my father’s house—for I have five brothers—in order that he may warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’ But Abraham said, ‘they have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.’ But he said, ‘no, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent!’ But he said to him, ‘if they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead.’”
This passage is telling. Neither does the rich man repent, even though he is in extreme agony, nor will anyone else repent who has not listened to the gospel message (Moses and the Prophets). Repentance does not come through circumstances, but through the preaching of God’s Word and the inner working of His Holy Spirit. Circumstances produce regret. Repentance is a gift from God. The following two Bible passages illustrate these truths. The first shows that regret (the “sorrow of the world”) leads to death, but repentance leads to salvation. The second shows that the preaching of the gospel message brings about that repentance.
2 Corinthians 7:9-10 “I now rejoice…that you were made sorrowful to the point of repentance; for you were made sorrowful according to the will of God, so that you might not suffer loss in anything through us. For the sorrow that is according to the will of God produces a repentance without regret, leading to salvation, but the sorrow of the world produces death.”
Acts 2:36-38 “Therefore let all the house of Israel know for certain that god has made him both lord and Christ—this Jesus whom you crucified. Now when they heard this, they were pierced to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “brethren, what shall we do?” Peter said to them, “repent, and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.”
5. Just as punishments are eternal, so are rewards eternal. If one argues that, since a man only sinned during a short, finite life, he should not be punished eternally in hell, then one must also agree that since a righteous man lived a short, finite life, that his reward in heaven should be cut short. If that were the case, then one would wonder why any creation at all. God created man for eternal fellowship with Him. If He so arranged things that eventually He would to be left alone again, His initial act of creation seems incomprehensible. On the contrary, man was created to exist eternally, whether in or out of fellowship with God. And, ultimately, man chooses his own way.
Answer the skeptic: If conscious belief in Jesus is required for salvation, how is that fair to those who have never heard the gospel?
1. All people are entitled to eternal punishment in hell for two reasons. First, they have a corrupt sin nature which cannot enter heaven into the presence of Holy God, as I argued above. They are sinners by nature. Second, they have committed sins which must be punished. They are sinners by act. Everyone who goes to hell receives what he deserves, which is quite “fair.” To say it another way, everyone is born standing in line for hell. If God, in His mercy and grace, elects to pluck some out of the line and place them in the line for heaven, it is no injustice for the others to receive what they deserve by remaining in the line for hell. Fairness and justice are different concepts, and only justice applies to the character of God.
2. No one is undeserving of hell simply because he has not heard the gospel. Man has been given the necessary natural revelation sufficient to escape hell, but he rejects it. Consider this Bible passage:
Romans 1:20-21, 25, 28, 32 “20 for since the creation of the world his invisible attributes, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge god any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper, and although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them.”
Man’s guilt is on his own head. Moreover, there are many who hear the preaching of the gospel and still do not repent. The question assumes that hearing the gospel automatically results in repentance and faith. This is not the case. Preaching of the gospel is the means, but it is not the cause. Salvation is a result of God’s election of a person for salvation. That election is unmerited, and the reasons why God chooses one for salvation and not another reside solely within Him. As long as he is just, he is free to do anything He chooses, including displaying His mercy and grace in the lives of those whom he chooses. This Bible passage sums it up well:
Ephesians 2:8 “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of for by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God.”
Answer the skeptic: Free will isn’t so valuable for God to permit so much suffering.
1. God created the best of all possible worlds, a world which includes free will and the necessary by-product of suffering. Suffering begins as a result of sin, as it is the tangible affect of human punishment.
2. Without free will, there is no point to creation. God did not create a toy when He created the universe. Nor did He create a robotic artificial intelligence. He created beings in His image, which included a free will, to enjoy fellowship with them and them with Him. God’s refusing to create the universe on the basis that it would be better to avoid suffering altogether than to enjoy the benefits of created human beings, even if it meant enduring the existence of their suffering, is no different than parents refusing to have children on the basis that things will not always go right for them, that they will pay for their mistakes, and that they will eventually die a death of disease, accident, or murder. Parents for millennia have produced children for the sheer joy of their companionship and for love. Love creates, nurtures, defends, provides, corrects, encourages, and instructs. These are at least some of the intangibles that move parents to have children, and these are at least some of the motives of God in creating human beings. It is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved. For the vast majority of people through the ages, it is better to have been created and to have endured some suffering while enjoying life than never to have been created at all.
Answer the Christian: What good is the suffering I endure?
1. Suffering can be a good thing. Pain and suffering are often the evidence of good. The pain of loss of a loved one is evidence of the love one had for the one lost. No pain, no gain. In exercising, muscle tissue is torn and produces pain. But, as the body heals, the muscles are built up and can do much more. When people avoid the pain of exercise, the cost is atrophy and weakness. People who have suffered little are ill-equipped to handle life’s stresses and challenges. Suffering brings people together. Consider comrades in arms who have survived war, or families who have struggled together through difficult tragedies.
2. Where there is no suffering there is no opportunity for God or man to display virtue. Without suffering there can be no justice, no mercy, no grace, no forgiveness, and no reconciliation. When God displays these attributes of His nature through our sufferings, He is glorified. Moreover, it is God who endures the greatest suffering as a result of His own creation. This is true in two ways. First, when something is done to His children it is done to Him. A single human may suffer in this life, but God suffers with all human beings through the ages. When he suffers for our sakes, He is glorified. Second, His greatest glory came at the expense of His greatest suffering; the offering of His Son’s life for ours. Nowhere is God so clearly worthy of our thanksgiving and praise than when He suffered the loss of His innocent Son on behalf of a sinful world.
3. Suffering can produce good. Pain teaches us right and wrong, and how to treat others, and obedience to God. When we have suffered, we understand the importance of refraining from harming others. Pain protects us. We avoid behaviors that produce pain because pain indicates we are doing something harmful to ourselves. When we endure God’s chastisement for our sins, we grow into more godly people. Suffering under the weight of undeserved circumstances produces patience, endurance, humility, the love of mercy, grace, justice, and other virtues of noble character. Songwriters have little, if anything, to say that touches the soul or offers hope until they have earned their street creds by living through tough times.
4. Suffering lets us identify with Christ. When we suffer, when have fellowship with Him. When we suffer for His sake, especially without complaining, but rather bearing up under it, we are pleasing to Him, and He rewards us.
Answer the Christian: How will Heaven mitigate our suffering on earth?
1. This life is temporal; heaven is eternal. Our sufferings in this life produce in us a future glory that will far outweigh the sufferings of this life.
2 Corinthians 4:16-5:8 “Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison, while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal. For we know that if the earthly tent which is our house is torn down, we have a building from god, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens…Now he who prepared us for this very purpose is God, who gave to us the spirit as a pledge. Therefore, being always of good courage, and knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the lord—for we walk by faith, not by sight—we are of good courage, I say, and prefer rather to be absent from the body and to be at home with the lord.
