Lesson 27: Be an Overcomer (2)
Read Romans 1:18-2:11 - https://www.bible.com/bible/59/rom.1

We find God's personality and God's attributes described many places in Scripture, and our answer from last lesson’s question of “Why?” is found in these attributes: Omnipotent, glorious, omnipresent, holy, eternal, love, gracious, merciful, faithful, and we could go on. Can omnipotence or omnipresence exist without the presence of evil? The obvious answer is yes. Can holiness or eternal existence exist without the presence of evil? Again the answer is yes. Can love exist without evil? Yes. Can grace exist without evil? Can mercy exist without evil? Can faithfulness exist without evil? Yes, though they cannot be fully and ultimately displayed without evil.

What does this mean? God could have created both angels and humanity without ever allowing evil to exist, but a part of His personality could never have been fully displayed. A part of God would never have been able to receive total glory without this conflict. Did God create evil? Absolutely not (1 John 1:5)! He did, however, allow it to come into existence and He did so by giving His creature, His created being, free will. Both angels and humans were created with the ability to choose. We will look at the extent of this free will in another lesson; however, at this point we will only accept the fact of free will.


When God allowed His creature to have free will it became a certainty that one or more would choose to not love Him. With this certainty acknowledged, God also planned for the salvation of the creature which would then display His grace and His mercy to their fullest extent. In the case of the angels, God exercised His righteousness and judgment by not allowing them to have a second chance. This decision set the backdrop for the grace and mercy that would be extended to mankind when they had made the same decision the angels had made. The darkness of righteousness and judgment now display the radiance of grace and mercy.

Knowing this we can now address the original question, "Why does God allow bad things to happen?"

First of all, God has given us the right/responsibility to choose. A right to choose cannot exist without a consequence to the choice. If there were no consequences, there could be no choice. Therefore, many of the bad things happening in our lives are the consequences of either our choices or someone else's choices. A father who sexually abuses his child places consequences onto this child's spouse and offspring. A mother who abandons her children places consequences onto her parents or siblings to raise those children, and entire families and communities are affected. There are, in fact, very few choices we make which do not in some way have consequences for other people. But one thing to remember with God is that God never holds us responsible for things happening to us for which we had no choice. He only holds us responsible for what we DO with the effect it has on us. He holds us responsible for OUR choices (Job 4:8 reap what you sow).

*When bad things happen, and you find yourself turning to someone other than Jesus, whom are you usually trusting?
*What would it take in your life to make Jesus the first one you would turn to?