Time Puts Things in Perspective

I was recently discussing my book that I am writing by the same title as this Web Site with a young man.  When I told him the title he stated, “but God doesn’t make sense.”  When I asked him why, he responded with a question I get often – “why do bad things happen to good people?”  That’s a question that probably all of us have wondered about and been troubled with at one time or another.

I’m not going to attempt to answer this question in full in this article.   The scope of that question is too large to address in one blog.  What I ‘d like to do here is put forth something to consider when you are thinking about that question.

Have you ever had a bad day?  Of course you have.  That time you did poorly on the test or you had that fender bender that was your fault, or when you got that speeding ticket.  Maybe it was when you lost the championship game.  At the time these things were frustrating, even sad.  We would classify them as bad things.  But as time went on they bothered us less and they certainly impacted us less.  Maybe enough time has passed by now that they seem almost trivial.  If not it one day will.  They seem almost unimportant in the overall story of our lives.  The two or three hours or even few days that were “ruined” by these things seem minor in the full picture of our lives, especially if you are someone who has lived say 40 or 50 or even 70 or 80 years or more.

While I certainly do not wish to diminish the pain and suffering that come with more serious things in life like cancer or the death of a loved one, lets consider how they fit into the overall picture of things as well.  Things like these are serious and they cause pain and sadness.  The test, the speeding ticket, the car accident mentioned above became less of a defining item in our lives as more time passed.  Is it possible that these more serious matters may also?

As Christians our view of life is that it is eternal.  We do not view life as lasting merely 60, 70 , 80 or 90 years, but for all of eternity.  Consider what the cancer, or the loss of a loved one will be like in comparison to 100 million years. 

I know this doesn’t ‘explain’ why bad things happen to good people.  We will try and address some of that in future posts.  But maybe it helps put it in some perspective and makes it a little easier to accept and understand. 

Consider this question.  Why do good things happen to bad people?