If God is good, why is there so much suffering?

Few questions cut as deeply as this one. For many people, it is the single greatest obstacle to belief in God. When tragedy strikes, every human being wants to know:

1. Does God know?
2. Does He care?
3. Can He do anything about it?
4. If He knows, cares, and can act, why doesn’t He?

Much about suffering—#63 on my list of 70 things every man needs to know—remains mysterious. Yet Christianity answers these questions not merely with arguments but with a Person. At the cross, God demonstrates that He knows, He cares, He has power, and He has purposes that are not always revealed to us.

The Pain of Suffering

Consider a tragedy that made national headlines: A father took his eighteen-year-old son on his first hunting trip. Mistaking his son for a deer, the father accidentally shot and killed him. Overcome with despair, he then turned the gun on himself.

How could such devastating sorrow happen? Where is God in tragedies like this, or in the countless other tragedies that people experience? I think about the mass shootings that scar our world, or my daughter’s sudden death in 2024.

The problems of evil and suffering have been debated for millennia. The ancient philosopher Epicurus asked, “If God is willing but not able to prevent evil, is He impotent? If He is able but not willing, is He malevolent? If He is both able and willing, why does evil exist?” David Hume popularized this challenge, and many have since echoed it.

In response, Christian philosopher Alvin Plantinga appealed to rational thinkers by simply asking, “Where is the contradiction?” He then provided a logically possible premise: that “God created a world containing evil and He had a good reason for doing so.” If you’d like to explore this more deeply, possible reasons offered have included Plantinga’s free-will defense, Aquinas’ greater good, or Augustine’s idea that evil is not a “thing” but a privation of good.

Yet while philosophy may satisfy the mind, it rarely heals the heart.

Plantinga’s argument may have addressed the rational problem of evil, but the psychological problem of evil is very different. It is the pain of losing a child to a drunk driver, burying a spouse too soon, facing a frightening diagnosis, or wondering why God allowed your prayers to go unanswered. No rational argument can fully remove that pain.

Here, Christianity offers something no other worldview can: a God who suffers with us.

Jesus Christ entered our broken world, where He was brutally beaten and tortured to death by crucifixion. He did not remain a distant observer. Rather, the Father Himself suffered the loss of His Son. In this way, God demonstrates that He not only understands our suffering but also shares in it.

The Inevitability of Suffering

The Bible predicts our suffering: “Do not be surprised at the painful trial you are suffering,” Peter wrote, “as though something strange were happening to you” (1 Peter 4:12). Hardship is woven into the very fabric of our fallen world. It’s not strange; it’s expected.

Many believers, however, expect faith to exempt them from suffering. Jesus promised the opposite: “In this world you will have trouble” (John 16:33b). Scripture treats suffering not as evidence that God has abandoned us, but often as evidence that we are living in the same broken world where Christ Himself suffered.

The question, then, is not whether we will suffer, but what suffering will produce in us. To this point, Scripture insists that suffering is never meaningless.

The Purpose in Suffering

Paul writes, “We know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him” (Romans 8:28a). That doesn’t mean hardship is good in itself, but rather that God promises to mold our sufferings for good purposes, such as shaping our character (Romans 5:3–5), teaching us to rely on Him (2 Corinthians 1:9), making us more compassionate (2 Corinthians 1:4), or displaying His glory to others (John 9:3).

Looking back, much of the deepest growth in my life followed seasons I never would have chosen. God has used my suffering to expose pride, deepen dependence, reorder priorities, and produce qualities prosperity never seemed able to produce.

No sane person enjoys suffering while living through it. Yet many mature believers eventually say something surprising: “I would never volunteer to repeat those seasons, but I would not trade what God produced in me through them.”

Many believers eventually discover a difficult truth: Suffering compels us to seek the God that success makes us think we don’t need. How many of us have looked back and said, “My hardest season became the turning point of my faith.” Suffering has a way of stripping away illusions and bringing us back to what matters most.

Even suffering itself can be protective. Many believers can look back and say, “If God had given me what I wanted, it would have destroyed me.” That’s my story. What felt like loss in the moment was actually mercy.

The cross of Jesus is the ultimate proof. Out of the greatest evil ever committed—the murder of the sinless Son of God—came the greatest good: salvation for the world. And if God can redeem that suffering, He can redeem yours too.

Living With Hope

So, does suffering disprove God’s goodness? No. It may actually be one of the strongest reasons to believe. Other worldviews either deny suffering, minimize it, rage against it, or treat it as random. Christianity alone says suffering is real, it matters, and it has purpose.

Don’t let your questions about suffering distance you from God. After all, if you’re not wrestling with Christianity, you don’t understand it! We will never fully understand our suffering on this side of eternity. But even when the reasons remain hidden, we can trust a God who entered suffering Himself and promises that, one day, He will wipe every tear from our eyes. Until then, we live with mystery.

We also live with hope, because Christians believe something radical: Our pain is not wasted, our trials are not meaningless, our God is not distant, and death does not get the final word. Jesus wants us to know: “I see you. I love you. I know what you’re going through. And I am always with you.”

And if you live long enough, you will eventually come to believe a surprising truth: The seasons we would never choose often become the seasons God uses most powerfully.

Hot fire makes good steel.

Much love,

Pat

For Reflection and Discussion

1. What has been your worst experience with suffering and evil, and what toll has it taken on you?
2. According to Scripture, what are some of the promises of God when we face suffering? (See Romans 8:28, Romans 5:3–5, 2 Corinthians 1:3–5, and 1 Peter 4:12–13.)
3. Looking back, have you experienced a painful season that produced growth, wisdom, dependence on God, or unexpected good? What happened?