How can I believe in the goodness of God when there is so much evil in the world?

The cross of Christ brings before us good and evil in a very blessed way. There the evil of man rose to its height in the rejection and crucifying of God's own Son, but it was there that the goodness of God met and triumphed over all the evil, so that the cross becomes for the believer a tree of life.

God was not taken aback by the entry of sin, or by all the dishonour brought upon His Name by sin, for He had resources to meet it all, and to bring greater glory to Himself, and greater blessing to men than all that was lost in fair Eden.

How wonderful is the triumph of God over all that Satan brought into Eden, and this divine triumph, with all its blessing and joy for those who believe, rests upon the work of the Seed of the woman who crushed the serpent's head through going into death. It was at infinite cost to God, and to His Son, that the victory was secured, but its results will be seen for all eternity in the rest of God that never can be broken.

As to why believers, whose sins have all been gone into, judged, and judicially made an end of in the death of Christ, are not exempted from suffering is a cause of great concern in the minds of many who have not the scriptural answer to such a very important question.

Now the greatest favour that God has conferred upon His saints is the privilege of sharing in His sufferings (Phil. 1:29). To be granted faith is surely a wonderful favour from God, but to be allowed to suffer a little for His sake is a still greater manifestation of His favour to us.

"I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us." This shall much more than compensate us for all the sorrows we have to pass through on our way to heaven.

We try various things with the object of displaying either their badness or their goodness, and thus God works oftentimes with men.

Oftentimes God's desire in thus dealing with them is to manifest to themselves the evil of their own natural hearts (but this is not always necessary); and what is always necessary and of far greater importance in God's sight is to make their faith shine more brightly. This was the desired end in His dealings with His servant Job.

I believe that it means that God never tries a man merely to expose the evil that is in him to the man himself, as if this were the end, the prime motive of the trial, though this may come out (as with Job), in order that we may see what we are. God has a higher object than this, even our blessing.

Now we learn that not only is God the Holy Spirit in us, but that God is for us in "all things" that are taking place around us. In regard to all the circumstances of life, the trials, the sorrows, the conflicts and the difficulties, we may not know how to pray as we ought; but this we do know, "That all things work together for good to them that love God."

To assure our hearts that all is working for good, we are reminded that we are "the called" of God; and, if called, God has a purpose for us. God saves us because we need saving; God calls us because He wants us. All God's ways with us in the present have in view the fulfilment of His purpose for us in the future.

"But we do know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to purpose." Is this the wholehearted expression of our souls? Every Christian certainly agrees with the truth here, but how many Christians enjoy it as a real, practical power over the soul, and therefore rest fully in the unceasingly operative love of God toward us?

His complaint was, "All these things are against me." And so indeed it appeared. He had yet to learn that all these things were a part of God's plan for his ultimate good, so that at the end of his life he might be able to refer to "The Angel which redeemed me from all evil" (Genesis 48:16). The fact was that "all these things" were going to "work together for good," and therefore provide us with an effective illustration of the truth of Romans 8:28.

The lesson for Job was that it was altogether too great for him to try to get to the bottom of things and seek for explanations. God in His counsels and actions is altogether too big for us.

Job's patience was manifested when he said "Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither: the Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord." That was Job's patience, but the end of the Lord was reached when Job said "Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes."

Paul was indeed driven by it to an ever fuller experience of the Lord Jesus when he says "Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me." "My strength," said the Lord, "is made perfect in weakness."