Why does God allow bad things to happen?

In His providential dealings with us He either orders or allows all that comes into our lives. He has the almighty power to prevent anything from happening, so if it happens, He has allowed it. Therefore, complaining is the same as saying that we know what is best for us better than God does, or else that God does not care enough to give us what is best. One is pure pride, the other is distrust of His motives.

There is only one answer to be given. God is not the author of evil, but He has allowed sin for His own glory. He did not create creatures who were incapable of choosing between good and evil, else He would have created mere machines—infinitely more wonderful than motor cars and aeroplanes, but yet on the same level.

If there be sin, how can all have been according to God's will? And, on the other hand, if all has been according to God's will, where is there room for sin? It is plain that the two thoughts are mutually destructive. The idea that He has willed that man should frustrate His will is too flagrant an absurdity to need comment, and thus it is that man knows only too well when he listens to its voice that the Bible speaks the truth, when it says plainly to him that he is a sinner. He rarely in these days charges fate with the cause of all things as they are, because this palpably means, as it is not God, some power or principle to which even God must bow. With the revelation of God in the world, the darkness of such a thought (which, however, the wisdom of man had reached before the Lord came into the world) is dispelled, and so man, the poor dupe of one far more subtle than he, now tries to believe that God is responsible for everything as it now exists, heedless of the utter folly of the idea. It is true that He could sweep the whole creation into destruction by one word; and it is also true, most surely and solemnly true, for every unsaved soul, that ere long He will sweep all that is evil in the world into woe that is unutterable but yet is the only fitting resting-place for foul corruption. But the responsibility of the presence of the evil here, for God so ordered it at the beginning (as we have seen in the account of the establishment of responsibility), rests with him who introduced it into the scene of God's power in goodness; and meanwhile He who has power in judgment to remove all by destruction upon all yet waits, in grace bearing with the presence of the evil which He hates, in order that He may provide the means and the opportunity for man, the sinner, to be freed from the consequences of his sins.

But again we ask, Why did God leave moral evil a possibility? Or, in other words, why permit the entrance of sin? Could He not have created a being, which could not fall? One who could only do what was good and right?

The answer is plain. Because, if He would create a glorious creature — man, after His own image, and in His likeness, free to choose either good or evil, and not a creature governed by a mere chain of instinct, as the birds and beasts around him — He must leave the entrance to him of evil, a possibility, though not a necessity.

Either God must refrain, — we write the words with reverence — from creating such a being, of this high and glorious order of existence, with a free choice and will; or He must leave the question of evil a possibility to him. Alas, for the result! of which a fallen race speaks with such terrible reality. He chose the evil and refused the good; and the moment he exercised his choice he became a sinner. Man, created in the image of God, fell from that pinnacle of eminence, never to be restored to it again. Fallen Adam begets a son in his own likeness after his image (Gen. 5:3), while unfallen Adam had been created “in the likeness of God” (Gen. 5:1).

Here we see the same human reasoning that departs from what God has said, simply in devotion to a predetermined scheme. Why is it "unmistakably evident" that God decreed that sin should enter the world? It is not evident at all. God placed Adam and Eve here in perfect innocence only- and, in order that His creatures should be intelligent, He gave them specific instructions and warned them of the consequences of disobedience. To leave man as an intelligent and responsible being, God had to leave the entrance of sin a distinct possibility. We admit that God foreknew how it would be resolved, but we affirm with decision that this does not involve God's eternal decree that man had to sin. Away with such a thought! for hedge about his teaching as Mr. Pink will, it cannot but reduce if not remove man's responsibility.

Behind all this there lay the question of man's spirit-being, which constituted him a responsible moral agent. As such, he comes immediately under obligation and fails. In that act he touched the question of good and evil already raging in the creation, and, becoming a sinner, brought himself immediately amenable to the holy government of God. The rights of God are attacked, and His supreme majesty trampled in the dust by the presence of sin. For its presence one of two reasons may be given. It is either permitted for some wise purpose on the part of God, or it is there at His expense, and in defiance of His authority. The latter is unthinkable, as it would dethrone God and bring in eternal chaos. It is inconceivable that God could be frustrated in His creation; hence we may see that sin is permitted for His own wise ends. It serves God; all things must indeed serve Him, as all scripture entitles us to say. Satan, sin, death and hell must obey Him. The Almighty One is supreme and there cannot be two supremes. All nature, history, experience, our life, existence upon the earth, the interventions of God in the race, — and above all the incarnation, death, resurrection and ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ, — all prove the supremacy, the glorious and eternal supremacy, of our God.

But although God is not the author of sin, but its Judge, He, for His own wise purposes, allowed it to enter His dominions. He will make it serve Him, and He will get glory to His great and holy name through it, and in the end banish it from His sight forever; and we may be sure enough of this, that were it not destined to serve the purposes of His heart, it could have gained no entrance. But it does serve Him, not willingly, but in spite of the fact that it is an enemy it is made to serve Him, as is every other creature, be that creature good or evil, be it the horrible invention of the wicked mind of angel or of man, or be it the offspring of the goodness of God Himself, everything must serve in the carrying out of the purposes of His love; and in nothing shall the creature be triumphant, for dust must be the serpent’s meat, and every proud spirit must be humbled, and in the end come to learn, in the bitterness of eternal defeat, destruction and death, that all its profound plotting and restless wickedness have only been helping on the end the blessed God had in view from the beginning.

God does not cause the suffering to His own, but He allows it to happen, so that His servants can benefit from the experience (e.g. increase their faith), and also for His own glory. Two examples are: Job, whom Satan tested to the uttermost, see Job 1 & 2, and Peter, whom Satan desired to sift as wheat, Luke 22:31.

The question has been often asked, Why does God allow the people on whom He has set His love to suffer in this way? and the answer is simple. It is because He loves them. There may be, there are, other reasons, but this is the chief. Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth, and if the heart wander chastening is necessary. The wise man tells us, "By sorrow the heart is made better," and experience teaches us the truth of this. How readily will evil attach itself to the best of us! but in the furnace of affliction the dross is separated from the purer metal, and consumed. Moreover, when we endure chastening, God deals with us as with sons; and every trial which visits us, were we but patient under it, would be fruitful in blessing to our souls. True, the experience of passing through the trial is not pleasant; it would be no trial if it were; but a morning of joy succeeds the night of sorrow, and in the quiet after-time we say with David, "It is good for me that I have been afflicted."