One of my favorite stories is about a young seminary student who went to sleep in class. The professor stopped and stared at the young man until he awoke startled and embarrassed. The professor said, "Tell me young man, why is there evil and suffering in the world?" The young man stammered out that he had forgotten the answer to that question. The professor turned to the class and said, "Mark this day well, for in the history of man there has only been two people who ever knew the answer to that question. One was Jesus Christ and He did not tell us, the other was this young man and he forgot it."

No one knows why bad things happen to good or bad people. I often say that the first time they have question and answer period in the hereafter I will be on the front row with my hand up. I have had to stand in too many cemeteries holding the hands of too many broken hearted people not to have more questions than could be answered in a lifetime. To me faith is not knowing the answers. Faith is being willing to wait and really believing that one day I will know and understand what I have no way of knowing or understanding now.

There is one thing I really do believe; I do not believe God takes away a loved one to punish us for some wrong or to teach us some lesson. I cannot believe God would parlay one life against another, nor cut someone's life short to correct or teach someone else a lesson.

I hope those who read this will understand I speak from the Christian faith standpoint. I wish I knew enough about the teachings of the other faiths to understand and speak about how this issue is seen from the teachings found there. These blogs are called The Penultimate Word which means the next to the last word. No one has the last word in these areas and since my knowledge base is limited to just the Christian perspective, I don't know that I even have the next to the last word. Suffer me then to share it as I see it from my perspective and then make up your own mind.

I was raised thinking that bad things happened as a punishment for some sin. I heard enough sermons on "Be sure your sins will find you out" to leave me in constant fear of when and how God was going to get even with me. When I became a father, the fears really became real. Would God take one of my children to punish me, or to break me to His will? I remember being afraid of loving my children too much for fear that would make God jealous in some way. My fears led me to explore the concept of punishment in the Bible. 

I was amazed to find that the concepts in the Bible develop and change. That was a little hard to swallow at first. I wanted absolutes—set in stone statements that never varied or changed. It seems to me that God started where man was and gave him only what he was ready to understand, and then developed the concepts further as man progressed. That seems to be especially true in the case of punishment.

The concept begins with such things as "our fathers have sinned and their children's teeth are set on edge." Or statements about God visiting the sins of the elders on several generations that followed. As I read those text my fears intensified. But as I moved through the Bible the concept seemed to mellow and change. Then I found the book of Ezekiel. The eighteenth chapter of that book starts off by saying that there was a proverb used among His people that the fathers have eaten sour grapes and the children's teeth are set on edge. Then it says. "Don't say that anymore ever." The rest of that chapter indicates that no one suffers for someone else's sin. Needless to say, I found great relief there.

I have no idea why your loved one has died. I do not know why God allowed it to happen, why God did not stop it from happening, or have any answer to the other "whys" we must live with. I know there is no theory that will really satisfy or answer your questions. There is one thing I am sure of however, I know you did not cause it nor was it done to punish or teach you. Unfortunately, we must wait for any answer beyond that. I really hate to wait, don't you?

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