Why?
This is a short question that we all have asked countless times.
Why?
It is a question that is very easy to ask, but not always easy to answer. We begin asking this question as a small child. Why shouldn’t I touch fire? Why do I have to go to bed now? Why are things the way they are?
This is a short question that we all have asked countless times.
Why?
It is a question that is very easy to ask, but not always easy to answer. We begin asking this question as a small child. Why shouldn’t I touch fire? Why do I have to go to bed now? Why are things the way they are?
We might grow older and ask this question a
bit less often, but we still wonder – why? There is a why question that is
perhaps the most powerful and hardest to answer and it is “why do bad
things happen to good people?” In philosophy and theology we call this “the
problem of evil” – how do you reconcile evil in the world with a loving
all-powerful God?
In many times and many places – people have
answered this question of “why bad things happen” by saying that bad things only
happen to those who deserve them. It might seem obviously false to us, but it
has been commonly thought to be so, even in Jesus’ time. The disciples once
asked Jesus – who had to sin that a man was born blind – was it his parent’s
sin or his own sin? (John 9) Jesus said it was neither who sinned. Hindus have
a complicated system of reincarnation and karma that insists that good things
happen to good people and bad things happen to bad people – that you deserve
your fate. Classical Hinduism explains that it is your own fault when you are
born into an unfortunate situation – you must have done something wrong in a
previous life in order to be born to abject poverty and suffering.
When we try to automatically place the blame
for bad things onto the victims we ignore numerous things, but there are three I'd like to mention:
1. When we blame the victims we ignore when other people or society at large is responsible, and thus things are more difficult to change for better
2. People really are a mix of good and bad, and
3. Bad things really do happen to people who do not deserve it
1. When we blame the victims we ignore when other people or society at large is responsible, and thus things are more difficult to change for better
2. People really are a mix of good and bad, and
3. Bad things really do happen to people who do not deserve it
We have a good example of this last point in
the book of Job. Job lost everything – his wife and children, his property, his
health – and some of his friends tried to offer him advice. They believed that Job
did something wrong, and so must admit his guilt. In the story, Job is innocent
of any wrongdoing. The book of Job teaches us that there isn’t always a good
reason for suffering, and that it is not always our fault.
Towards the end of the book of Job, God
responds to the accusations against Job and to Job’s cry to God. God’s response
is interesting because God offers no explanation why things have happened to Job. God
exclaims: “Where
were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?” (Job 38:4) This is an echo to the
question that people often asked God – “Where were you when I needed you? Where
were you when such and such happened?” God doesn't often answer that
question in the way we would wish. God’s
echo of our “where were you?” shows the distance between what we experience and
know and what God knows and experiences.
In our gospel lesson today, the disciples are
frightened by a storm. Jesus is asleep in the boat, and they woke him up and
asked, “Teacher, do you not care
that we are perishing?" (Mark 4:38) Jesus wakes
and calms the storm. The disciples thought that just because they didn’t see an
immediate reaction from Jesus meant that he didn’t care. But Jesus was in the
boat with them and in control.
Along with “Where were you”, “Do you care” is another way of
asking God why something happened. When things go wrong in our lives and in
the lives of those whom we hold dear –
we wonder, where is God in all this? Does God even care? We wish that Jesus
would wake up from his nap and do something.
I have no clear, easy answer to why bad things
happen. If I did, I wouldn’t put it in this sermon anyways. I’d write a book
and then become the richest person on earth.
There is not one answer or one statement that will satisfy every
situation that we find ourselves in. It would be dishonest of me to pretend
that I have the answer for why things happen.
There are certain things that we can know, for
we all observe them. We know that there is suffering, there is pain, sorrow,
loss, destruction, and death in this world. Sometimes it is our own fault,
sometimes it is the fault of another person or group of persons, sometimes it
seems to be no one’s fault.
Sometimes we can see the likely reasons why
things happened – people do make bad decisions, people do make legitimate
mistakes, and the physical world has chaotic phenomenon that can be studied by
scientists – like hurricanes and earthquakes. But oftentimes, we don’t see a reason
or are not satisfied with the reasons that we obverse. Yes, we know what causes hurricanes but why didn't God stop it? Yes, that person’s
decision to drive drunk caused a person’s death but why didn’t God intervene? I
wish I had an answer as to why God sometimes intervenes and sometimes does not
– I’d write another book about that one.