We Don't Know

Photo source plaguefest.com

Last week, I found myself sitting around the breakfast table, reading the story of Joseph to my children.

We had come to the part where Potiphar's wife falsely accused Joseph of taking advantage of her (I did my best to explain the context to my two older children), and he was unjustly thrown into prison. Later, when he correctly interpreted the dream of Pharaoh's chief cupbearer, and the cupbearer was released from prison, he forgot Joseph's request to put in a word with Pharaoh on his behalf.  The Scriptures tell us that Joseph sat in prison for several years as a completely innocent man (see Genesis 39-40).

It was right around this part of the story when my six-year-old daughter stopped eating her strawberry jam and toast and her brown eyes widened, fixating on my own.

I took a long sip of hot tea as I sensed a question forming in her mind, soon to be expressed by her sweet little voice.

"But wwwwhyyyyy Mommy?" she asked as her mouth hung open.  "Why would that happen to Joseph?"

And I sat there, in silence, looking down at the open Bible on the table in front of me, and we both just paused in wonder and amazement.

Why.  Why?

Why did all these bad things happen to Joseph?  I mean, isn't it bad enough to be ridiculed by your brothers, striped and left for dead in a cistern, only to be sold to a band of travelers and wind up in a foreign country as a slave?  Why did Joseph have to be falsely accused, imprisoned, and forgotten, too?

My mind quickly darted to Job, David, Christ, Paul, and then to people and families I know in my day-to-day-life, who struggle with the death of their children, health problems, cancer.  I think of the Christians in Egypt who were bombed a few days ago on Palm Sunday, worshiping in their own church.

Why, do bad things happen, God?

I confessed to my daughter that morning that we truly don't know why.  My thirty-nine trips around the sun offer no more wisdom and insight than her six trips do.

I am reminded of a pie chart that my Sunday School teacher showed us the other week in my conversational apologetics class, complements of Randy Newman at the C.S. Lewis Institute.  I love flowcharts and diagrams and schematics, and I am a visual learner to boot, so this graph really hit home for me.  I am grateful that my teacher gave me permission to share it with you, as well.  Check it out below:

Conversational Apologetics, Randy Newman: "How Could a Good God Allow Suffering?" March 19, 2017

You see, when we talk to unbelievers about God, or even when we wrestle with this question for ourselves or with other believers, we must be real and admit that, while the Scriptures offer up some of the reasons why God allows evil in this world, the bulk of the answer to this question is simply:

WE DON'T KNOW

And so, as my daughter and I sat together, her with sticky jelly fingers and me with my hands encircling my hot mug, we took time to take that hard truth in:  We don't know.

One thing we do know, however, is that we serve a loving and good and all-powerful God.  And I look forward to continuing my reading of Genesis with my children, where we will soon see that God has a wonderful plan for Joseph, for his family, for the soon-to-be nation of Israel, and ultimately for the world.

Unfortunately, you and I cannot flip through the pages of our own life stories and read ahead to see how God will work out all things for our good and His glory.  But we don't need to--God has placed that promise very clearly in His Word:

"And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose."  --Romans 8:28

Come what may, we can put our faith and trust in a loving and perfect God, whose promises are sure, and we can choose to be okay with those three little words, we don't know.


(If you have more questions about God using (and intending!) both the "good" and the "bad" in our lives,  I'd encourage you to check out this post, this post, and this post from the archives.)