Bad things happen.
It is a part of life.
When they do, we often wonder where God was.
I posted something once about God when someone commented to my post "Where Was God At Auschwitz?"
Certainly we can't ignore the reality of suffering in life and wonder why God allows bad things to happen.
Auschwitz was the largest of the German Nazi concentration camps and extermination centers. Over 1.1 million men, women and children lost their lives there. It is horrible stain on our history that these events ever took place. So it is difficult to understand why God would have allowed this to happen.
What we have to understand about God is permission for horrible things to happen to people doesn't mean He approves of them. God’s allowing the Holocaust in no way suggests His approval of it. God is grieved by the sinfulness of man and the hardness of his heart. While nothing can justify the evil of the Holocaust, it did indirectly bring about an advancement in biblical prophecy. The Holocaust was a primary reason the White Paper of 1939 was rescinded, freeing European Jews to immigrate to Israel. Regardless of one’s political stance, the fact is that the 1948 restoration of an independent Jewish state helps to fulfill such biblical prophecies.
The blame for the Holocaust lies squarely on the shoulders of sinful humanity. The Holocaust was the product of sinful choices made by sinful men in rebellion against a holy God. If the Holocaust proves anything, it is the utter depravity of man. The real question of "Why did God allow Auschwitz?" should be "Why Did We?"
Auschwitz was the largest of the German Nazi concentration camps and extermination centers. Over 1.1 million men, women and children lost their lives there. It is horrible stain on our history that these events ever took place. So it is difficult to understand why God would have allowed this to happen.
Could God have stopped the Holocaust from happening? Yes, He could have. Why didn't He? Where was He?
We cannot allow horrible things that we don't understand to keep us from trusting in God. No one can adequately explain why God allows these things to happen. We have to believe that there must be a reason for it. We might not like that answer but we don't know the mind of God and not understanding shouldn't determine if we believe in Him or not.
Even though I post positive things about trusting God, I still have trust issues at times when I suffer loss or experience difficult times in my life. We all do. Trusting in God isn't always easy. I often wonder where God is at times and why He doesn't intervene to help. I was scrolling recently and read a story about a couple who were leaving for a date in the parking lot of their apartment complex when they were random targets of a kidnapping. They were taken away, mercilessly tortured and murdered in a community where you would never think something so horrible would happen. The entire time I was reading this story I also wondered why God didn't send someone by to help them or stop it in some way. They both died a horrible death for no reason.
We can also look at the story of Job in the Old Testament. Many like to point at the patience of Job but if you read the story, he also questioned God after God allowed Satan to take away everything and everyone around him. Job demanded an explanation from God and in Job 38 God responded. While there may be evil and suffering that God allows in the world which seems needless, tragic and unjust, God has the wider view and there may be a vast network of factors that make the same tragedy fit into a larger cause and effect pattern that ultimately works together. It's just impossible for us as humans to know the mind of God and what He's doing.
Obviously, none of us like that answer. It really doesn't answer our question when bad things happen to us. We are finite beings and our brains are not designed to take in the information necessary to make evaluations of God choices. We are not God. We are human. We will never understand these things in this life.
So where was God in Auschwitz or when our loved one dies? God is right there with us. Although He could have prevented it, for some reason He chose not to but that doesn't mean that He is absent. These are the times our trust is tested. No, there aren't any easy answers or memes we can post to overcome those questions but we have to find a way to trust God's wisdom when we encounter suffering rather than trying to figure out the reasons for it.
