Why does God do bad things to us?

p249 DEAR BROTHER, - I write a line, not having been able to see you in my very hasty visit, to sympathise with you in your present trial, quite feeling how real a one it is to you. I enter not only into the way this would exercise and naturally prey upon the mind in all its thoughts - "the multitude of thoughts within me," as the Spirit of God deigns to speak. It is a serious trial to the father of a family, occupied as you are, to be deprived of sight. When the outward trial of being thus rendered comparatively helpless, brings all the heart into exercise, the subjection to God's will, the humbling ourselves under His mighty hand and contentment with whatever lot He may assign us and besides the question of an humbled will, there often arise doubts practically of His love, an impugning of His wisdom and almost a preference to be out of His hands, what Elihu calls a choosing iniquity rather than affliction. I do not say that this has been produced in you at all. I speak of the trial and temptation when such a case arises, and I speak of it, dear brother, that you may be helped by the remembrance of our Father's love, and turn at once to Him, and the assurance of His love. Remember that God, even our God, has better thoughts for us than rest or a portion here. He is educating us for a blessed and eternal rest, free from evil and all that would cause it, and He is bent on the blessing of His children; and moreover He is bound by His holiness to purge us suitably (though most graciously) for the place He has called us to. How often He lets Satan do this painful work, and try and sift us as Job! But His hand and will are behind it all. He gives His saints up to Satan's hand to a certain point, but only so far as to bring the heart fully to a bearing before Himself, and enter into deep questions with it, breaking down its pride. But not only was the tempter absolutely limited in what he was to do to Job, but it was the Lord who first proposed his case to Satan. He had His own end in it, as we see: Job gets into blessing with a knowledge of himself and of God, incomparably beyond what he had before. In all these cases, therefore, though Satan may sift and try us by a thousand trials without and thoughts within, our business is to think on His hand and love who originates it all as to the ultimate purpose. By its being the enemy the soul is sifted in it, tempted to murmur. God could not do that: and what flesh is, is fully brought out to us, and there is a giving up of self, which enables us infinitely better to appreciate God.

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.

Do you think it is only of Job that God thinks? Do you think that God is not thinking of every one of you now, and that in the presence of the evil angel? Do you suppose that this was something entirely exceptional? The account of it was, the allowance of it was, the special circumstances of it were peculiar; but the principle is the same for every believer. God in His sovereign love and grace takes a pleasure in His children, far more than we take in any of ours. And you know what that is for a parent. Well now, God takes more pleasure in you — not merely in Job — in you. I grant we do not deserve it; that is another thing altogether. Love does not count up deserts at all. Love goes out because God is love, and for His own glory in Christ the Lord. Now He is able to do it righteously; able to do it effectively. But here there was tremendous suffering before Christ came in, and before the full light of God came. God allowed all that; nevertheless it was He that began it; and, if God begins, how will He end? Worthily of Himself. It is not merely patching up; it is not merely repairing, but a radical work of self-judgment in the soul.

In 1983 a famous Rabbi in the US, Harold Kushner, published a book about the problem of suffering. In it he suggested that we should not blame God for sufferings (which is right); then he goes on to say that God is good, but that He cannot help it when evil befalls His people (which, of course, is a wrong thesis). Perhaps we may remind ourselves at this point of Romans 8:28, where we see the very opposite of Kushner's claim. God not only allows adverse circumstances, He is even in full control and uses them to form believers in His school' (Rom. 5:3-5; Jam. 1:3). His ways ultimately, and surely lead to the fulfilment of His purpose, that we should be conformed to Christ, the Firstborn among many brethren (Rom. 8:29). Why do we have sufferings? Is it not also, to make us realize that we are living in a world which is in direct opposition to God's will? (cf. 1 Peter 2:15).

“The Lord is good.” It is one of the greatest triumphs of God that He has given the knowledge of His perfect goodness to many a frail man, so that the most untoward circumstances, the deepest bereavement or sorrow or suffering, cannot shake their confidence. Even Job said, “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.” But we are permitted to go a step further. We know that whatever is brought upon the believer by God is not merely the product of divine goodness, but the positive plannings of divine love. However severe the trial and deep the pain and trying the exercise, it does but the more convince us of that clear warm love that makes no mistakes—a love which is so deeply concerned that the divine purpose should be worked out in us that it will not shrink from adopting means that may at the moment bring the tear to the eye and make the whole frame wince and quiver. Nevertheless afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to them which are exercised thereby” (Heb. 12:11).

All this is deeply touching. To speak after the manner of men, it was enough to make reason totter to be thus, in a moment, bereft of his ten children, and reduced from princely wealth to absolute penury. What a striking contrast between the opening and the closing lines of our first Job! In the former we see Job surrounded by a numerous family, and in the enjoyment of vast possessions; in the latter, we see him left alone, in poverty and nakedness. And to think of Satan's being allowed — yea, commissioned of God — to bring about all this! And for what? For the deep and permanent profit of Job's precious soul. God saw that His servant needed to be taught a lesson; and, moreover, that, in no other way, by no other means, could this lesson be taught, than by passing him through an ordeal the bare record of which fills the mind with solemn awe. God will teach His children, even though it be by stripping them of all that the heart clings to in this world.

But another aspect of suffering is considered from verse 5 to verse 11: "And ye have forgotten the exhor­tation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of Him: For whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom He receiveth." If they suffered persecution from sinners, yet it was God who was allowing this means by which to train His own to conform to His own thoughts: this was "the chastening of the Lord." Blessed is that faith that looks far deeper than the surface of things, to see that every bit of trial and affliction, though it may be occasioned by the grossest wickedness of men, is under the perfect control of our God and Father, being the very thing our own souls need to form them in the pattern God has planned. A child may little understand the reasons for his father's dealings, but if the father has proven himself perfectly kind and trustworthy toward his child, then the child may have fullest confidence that those dealings are to be trusted.

The object of judgment is to obliterate evil; and when it is a question of sin, according to God’s estimate of it, death is the just and the only penalty in so far as life in this world is concerned. “The soul that sinneth it shall die.” But as that rigorous sentence would carry every soul into eternal punishment, God, who desires not the death of the sinner, introduces the principle of substitution, executes judgment to the uttermost upon His own Son, making Him, who never knew sin, to be sin for us, and then preaches peace and life by Jesus Christ. This at once divides the world into two classes, — those who accept God’s proclamation of peace and life, upon His condition of obedience to His Son, and those who do not. It also leaves God free to act in minor judgment (so to speak) in His moral government of this world. That is, to deal with evil in a way that a divinely instructed man must acknowledge to be holy, just, and good. And this minor judgment (such as loss of friends and property or bodily suffering), suiting itself to the needs of the two classes above mentioned—needs observed and estimated by a God of perfect wisdom and perfect love and grace—takes the form respectively of chastisement (properly child-training), or else, as in the case of the prodigal son, of special appeal or solemn warning. So that what might appear, at first sight, to be judgment, is really nothing but the divine movement of the heart that yearns over His ignorant, self-willed, and erring people, of the God that speaks in righteousness, mighty to save. “Whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth.”

Yes, God in infinite and tender goodness can, and does, bring His children through sorrow and suffering. He did it with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, David and others, and He is doing it to-day. He may chasten for sin, as corrective, or He may discipline the soul as seeing danger ahead, which surely is preventive, and, as in the case of Job, He may put us through a good deal of trial, that we may learn ourselves, and enter better into the knowledge of Him — which is surely promotive.

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."