Why does God allow bad things to happen to good people? It’s a question that has haunted people for ages. Christians have many answers to the problem of pain in the world, some well-reasoned, and others that seem only a means of avoiding the question.

I’ll tell you something though: that question is one thing debated in the classroom, its another when it lands on your very doorstep.

Suddenly even the most satisfactory answers to the suffering of this world become incredibly shallow. Why does God allow people to suffer and die? And why does He allow Christians to go through those tribulations? We are, of course, promised trials and tribulations for His sake in this world. But much of what we suffer often does not seem to fit those criteria.

In my own life, the death of my mother hardly seems to be an event I can simply chalk up as a promised “tribulation” as a Christian. Being persecuted as Christian is to be expected (though to most Western Christians, this means hardly more than a few nasty jeers, or being the brunt of some cruel jokes, certainly not anything to be compared with what many go through for the name of Christ in the rest of the world). Losing your mother isn’t a part of the deal.

So why does God allow it? I wish I had a good answer. I’m sure there are many zealous Christians and Bible scholars out there who would gladly throw some answers out in reply to my question; I would caution them to not. This isn’t really about that. My questions aren’t really for a lack of knowledge of the answers, but instead a need to reconcile head knowledge to reality.

It’s one thing to say God is good, it’s another to face personal tragedy and say He is good. By His grace, I am not in a place that calls His goodness into question. But I see how easy it would be to do so, and I certainly would not fault anyone going through similar circumstances to truly question whether or not God was good. Even the great Christian apologist C.S. Lewis struggled with significant questions on God’s goodness in the wake of his wife’s death. I would suggest that those who have not read his “A Grief Observed” do so sometime. It will bring new perspective on what it means to struggle with grief and loss as a Christian.

Sometimes Christians make the loss of a loved one to be an easy thing. We do, after all, know they are “in a better place.” True though it may be, it is hardly a satisfactory comfort sometimes and to have even well meaning Christians say that sometimes feels more like an insult than a comfort.

Losing anyone is hard. Losing someone who has been a part of your life from day one is nearly impossible. It can hurt when people try to cheapen that loss. Yet the other side of the coin is that it really is a comfort. The loss isn’t easy, but the knowledge that they are “in a better place” is sometimes the only thing that can keep you going. What a paradox.

In the months to come, some may perhaps hear me raise these difficult questions. I hope when I do it does not sound as though I really do doubt the goodness of God, or that I am struggling with faith. Rather it is a simple need to reconcile the course of events with my prayers and with my ideas on God. Perhaps somewhat unique to my case was a universal petition for my mother to be healed, not just through death and resurrection, but physically and tangibly in this life. How could literally hundreds of people unite in praying for my mom–not just for “peace” or “comfort” but for her years to be prolonged and for a restoration of health–how could such strong prayer seem to yield no answers? The simple, common answer of “God heals through death” isn’t at all satisfactory. It would be easy for an outsider to assume we simply asked for healing because we didn’t want to come to terms with the prognosis of cancer. But even people who had no vested interest, or people who feel into the “God always heals” camp, believed it wasn’t her time.

If there was one thing that seemed clear, it was that God wanted to heal her. Not just in death, but in this life.

I did not start this journey as one who claimed God always healed people. I looked at stories like my mom’s, and saw how many people prayed for healing, yet did not see it. Surely that must mean God does not always heal. Yet that view began to erode as many different things intersected my path, and as I began to truly study the Scriptures more. To the skeptic, I’m sure it sounds like a crutch, especially now seeing how events turned out. But it was more than that. That isn’t who I am naturally; I am a skeptic at heart. And even now, I still believe God would like to heal. I don’t think the traditional view that he “sometimes” heals and “sometimes” doesn’t is accurate; I think it is simply a way to avoid the question.

But nevertheless it is a question among many I ask. It is easy to praise God in the midst of comfort and ease. It’s easy to praise Him when the bank account is plush, when your family is healthy, when the people in your life “get along”, and when life is good. But it is harder when everything seems to have crashed in around you. Times of difficulty are much harder to say He is good. When you do, however, it brings a fresh meaning to that idea. It isn’t hard to say you trust God when everything seems fine, but when everything seems to be torn apart, to say you trust Him takes true faith.

And when you turn to God and say you trust Him, he won’t let you down.

For it may seem as though I have been let down. I lost my mother, and that is not easy. But it isn’t because I lost her that I haven’t been let down. In the midst of her rapid decline, God was good. Weeks before things really became serious for her, God repeatedly was telling me “It’s going to get worse before it gets better.” The night before she went to the hospital–when everything still seemed relatively ‘normal’ under the circumstances–I became very agitated with everything. Months of longstanding frustration and confusion were broken, and I went to bed that night saying in a way I hadn’t before “God I trust you.” Yes, though I didn’t expect to lose her so quickly, God prepared my heart marvelously in those last weeks. Was it easy? No. But He was There.

A song that meant a lot to me when I first learned of my mom’s cancer, was the song “Our Great God.” I’d like to quote part of it, but I honestly don’t know what to quote. Each word is profound. If you must go through the storms of life, it is a great comfort to know that you rest in the arms of the Savior–that you do serve a great, eternal God.

God has been closer these past weeks of my life than I think He has ever been. Or probably more accurately, closer than I have ever let Him come. Nothing will rock your world like the loss of someone you hold dear, and nothing will turn you faster to the only Comfort there truly is. I have had in these days a peace and a comfort that is truly inexplicable. It doesn’t replace the loss of my mother, and it doesn’t make things easy. But I knew this would be hard. At least I’m not alone, for I know my God is with me.

Glory be to Our Great God.