Problems with Pain and Prayer

Why is there pain in the world?  Why does a good God let suffering happen?  Why is there no answer to my prayers?  Does God hear me?

These questions are not new.  Every culture throughout time has asked them.  I asked them.  I saw atrocities and injustices and heard of worse.  I questioned God, about His existence, for why all the pain, and for why prayer does not work like I was told it should work.

Two of the questions were answered through prayer, immediately.  I simply asked God if He existed.  He answered, “Yes.”  It was as clear as if someone next to me spoke, and I sang for a week.  I knew that some prayers were answered.  But that did not end my quest.  I needed rational answers.  I kept asking.

I do not believe in the goody-goody God described by some.  I do not believe He is so perfect that He hides from sin in some far away heaven.  If God is everywhere, then He is everywhere.  He is with everyone, not just the good guys.  That means He is with the worst murderers, rapists, and hypocritical church leaders while they plan and enact evil.  And… He let each one continue in their evil without stopping them.  This theology is biblical.  He let nations get horrible before He sent in other humans to annihilate them.

But, that does not answer the question of, “Why pain?”

The Bible describes God with feelings.  Some say the writers anthropomorphized God.  Some say this was Jesus.  I believe God feels.  Being everywhere means God feels every person’s pain.  He has been with every victim of every crime.  Not one of them suffered or died alone.  He shared their pain, and ours.

God took responsibility for all that pain.  He made covenant with Abraham (Gen 15) but instead of letting Abraham pay the price for his children’s eventual sins, God accepted responsibility for those transgressions.  In doing so, He accepted the sins of the entire lineage of Adam, including those yet unborn.  God, as Jesus, consented to physical life and physical death to show us how close He is to our suffering.  He knows it all.  Not one evil deed goes unnoticed.

But, that does not answer the question of, “Why pain?”

Most prayers are petty.  Humans are generally petty.  But even a contrite prayer about “impending doom” can be petty in contrast to someone else’s troubles.  I think God sees our petitions as if we are small children.  We want what we want when we want it.  NOW!  Yet, throwing a tantrum or “praying hard” does not get us what we want.  After a while, if we don’t get what we want, we think bad things about God.  He does not answer prayers.  He can’t answer prayers.  He is mad at me.  He hates me.  He’s not good.  However, saying, “No,” to a child is often the best answer.  They don’t understand why, may never understand why, but it is the best answer.

God does not give signs and wonders to those who simply want to be impressed.  Prayer is not about getting stuff.  It is not a magic wand to flick for miracles.  Prayer can make us feel better if we pray often.  That is because we are communicating our troubles and worries instead of bottling them up inside.  God helps us work through problems and often see our own selfishness as a barrier to a solution.  If we became upset with God, we stop communicating.  Not surprising, the benefit of communication leaves and all those troubles and worries stay within.  That does not mean God did not hear and feel your frustration and distress.  It simply means we need a way to release them, to grow past them.

A lot of pain originates with humans.  We as a society inflict it upon ourselves, and then expect God to fix our troubles.  Good people do not stand up to evil people who continue to spread their evil.  Instead of stopping the evil early, we let it endure until we must go to war to stop such things from continuing.  There, people die or are wounded physically.  All are wounded psychologically.  Wars happen globally.  Wars happen in families.  Consequences are real.  Churches are not immune.  Atheists are not immune.

My belief for why God does not stop these from happening is that the good people were supposed to act but did not.  Leaders were supposed to teach goodness, but the power hungry became the leaders and they preferred ritual and dogma that hid evil.  Leaders were to teach inner healing, but did not befriend those who bled.  A community’s morality and ethics can become so distorted they call good evil and evil good.  God went through all that pain with all those people, because we were not willing to step up early to fix our mess or help our neighbor.

But that does not answers the question of, “Why would a good God create a world with so much pain in the first place?”

The book of Job addresses that issue.  His friends preferred to hunt for something to blame.  At the end, God rejects their reasons.  However, God’s response to the question of, “Why?” is strange.  The short answer is, “Because, that is how I made the world.”

That answer frustrated me for a long time.  But the answer is there.  We don’t understand because our teaching is distorted.  Biblically, God did not create a perfect world.  Nor did Adam’s sin corrupt a perfect world.  Those dogmatic concepts are not in the Bible.  Our forefathers preferred to blame Satan or sin.  These beliefs were added because we do not comprehend why God’s creation included earthquakes, high wind, and so many creatures that harm and kill.  We can’t accept that God’s creation allowed for mutations that turn into cancers and kill young children.  But, God called all His creation “Very Good.”

We want to scream “God did it wrong!  A good God would never have done it that way!”

But what if all those frightening and deadly things are good for something.  Volcanoes, earthquakes, and tsunamis are good.  Plate tectonics makes earth a living world capable of making continents and shallow oceans.  Mutation kills some individuals, but it also helps sculpt life forms into an array of variation.  Bacteria infect too often, but they are used to make medicine, bread, and wine.  Maybe, to get to the really good stuff, one must go through hell.

God asked us from the beginning to be good.  That one thing would alleviate so much suffering.  He asked us to understand the good in the earth and the good in the plants and animals.  Understanding these would let us anticipate the dangers and utilize the resources.  Humans keep resisting these.  We do things the hard way because that is how we always did it.  Maybe, just maybe, God does not answer every prayer, because He wants us to grow up and learn to understand why He said, “No.”

Legacy

My mother’s birthday is coming up.  Finding a “not Christmas” gift this close after Christmas has always been difficult.  Finding something for an 86 year old with Alzheimer’s living in a memory ward is even more so.

I came up with a brilliant idea.  I would frame a set of pictures of her four adult kids to go with the pictures of her four babies.  It would help her remember what we look like longer.  The problem was finding four headshots that matched well enough.  That included one of my little brother.

Emotions surfaced as I shuffled old photographs.  He was murdered in 2003.  Memories of the good times and the not so good coupled with a truncated life of someone I loved, still love deeply.  The stress was compiled by computer problems solved over the phone by my husband who was out of town.  Finally, frustration made me quit for the day, and I sat down to read a large stack of mail.

One piece waited to the end, a letter from my Dad’s stepsister.  I resisted opening it as it meant more emotions to process.  Five pages, both sides, hand written in a shaky but once beautiful cursive.  She described her health problems and mourned for my mother’s loss of memory.  Then, she started unfolding her childhood memories with my Grandfather and dad.  Her words were so beautiful.  They glowed with love and admiration.  Instead of crying, I smiled.

She described her “dad” as the best man she ever met.  He was kind and generous to everyone, especially those who could not return a favor or those he would never see again.  He honored people who never received honor.  His love was for everyone.

Mixed in was the pain that his family never accepted her mom.  A divorced woman with three kids marrying a man 30 years her senior had to be for security, a gold-digger.  They never saw the love that made them a family.  They never understood how much these women needed acceptance.

My dad was in high school at that time.  He saw.  He called them family.  The only one who did.

She suddenly had a big brother.  This is something she desperately wanted as her two brothers had died.  In her young eyes, he was the most handsome man in town.  She may have been right.  I’ve seen pictures.  He was a real cutie.

But that was not why she loved him.  She described my dad as the best man she ever met, a mirror of his dad.  He too cared for people in a way that most people cannot fathom.

I knew that man as my father.  Mom was always appalled at the “riff-raff” he brought home and asked her to feed.  She did, but she never understood.  He would sit and “chat,” listening to their stories and making them feel wanted.  Some of those people were never seen again.  Others kept in touch; they needed to tell him how knowing him changed their lives.

As I read, I saw my brother in her words.  After he died, the testimonies of his friends told the same story.  He took care of those around him.  He encouraged drug addicts to stay clean.  He hunted for lost people until they were found.  He fed the hungry and gave his clothes for others to wear.  His home and heart were always open when they needed him.

These three wonderful men are gone from this world, but their legacy lives on in all the lives they touched.  They loved because it was the right thing to do.  None of these men were perfect, yet something in them changed people.  Sadly, their families only saw the imperfections and condemned their acceptance as unsafe, their compassion as foolishness.

My personality is not a mirror of theirs.  I am too much of a hermit.  I must work to accomplish one act of kindness where they breathed mercy.  I worry that my love for humanity falls short too often.  Some friendships do not make sense, as a “safety first” video replays in my head.  Some acts befuddle my mind, and I hear echo’s of my mother’s contempt.

I pray that when I die people will say such words about me, the good and the bad.  I want to live a life that helps people to live, to hope in a better future.  I want to give a hand instead of a pat on the back from a distance.  I want to build up and not tear down.  These are difficult, but I will continue to strive toward that goal.  Because… love is the right thing to do.