Why do bad things happen to good people?
It is a perennial question that every generation asks.
It starts out as an intellectual question
that is intriguing and maybe a little bit troubling
but when those bad things happen to us,
the questions become emotionally troubling, disturbing
and even spiritually challenging to comprehend.
We want to believe in a God
who would make things a lot easier by
having only good things happen to good people
and bad things happen to bad people.
It would make it much simpler that way.
In fact if it was true, I suspect our church would be full
because they would want to be the “good ones” right?
The challenge is our experience tells us that is just not the way it is.
The bad things happen to the good and the bad;
and good things happen to the good and the bad.
That may be the hardest one to actually figure out
because when good things happen to people who we know are evil,
we go like “Whaat? What’s with that?”
Also we wonder why when illness happens to good people
because illness is troubling
and it eats away at our heart.
We wonder why it is this is happening to somebody we love.
Why is this happening to us?
The Old Testament scriptures struggled with this
as well as our ancestors in faith.
Time and time again, this has come up.
The leaders in the Old Testament times believed
that good things happened to good people
and bad things happened to bad people.
That was just the way they understood it.
Even then however, they challenged that.
We can see thatbeven in today’s society; even in today’s world.
We see the evangelists on television;
They say, “If you do these things,
God will be good to you and you will be blessed
and a bounty of money will come your way.
And give some of it to me.”
Fundamentally, the message of the TV evangelists
is that you will be blessed and
that blessing will come from God because you are good.
And you have to give them a portion of it.
Often times, the challenge with this logic is
that we have to decide who is good and who is bad.
That’s number one.
The second thing is God must follow our logic. Right?
This is a struggle for every generation.
Look, religious leaders get caught in this all the time themselves.
Just this week, our bishops are now trying to decide
who gets to go to Communion and who does not.
I understand the intent but we are on really dangerous ground
when we attempt to be God in this time.
I understand where it comes from.
But it is just not rooted in scripture.
It is just not there.
And that is what disturbs us.
So what are we to do?
Lets look at what the scripture passages today
say about this because that is what the whole subject is about:
Why do bad things happen to good people?
Let’s look at the Book of Job.
To give you the context of today’s little small reading.
Job was a good man and everybody acknowledged he was good.
The parable was told to help break open
why bad things happen to good people.
So God and Satan have a little game to play.
They take Job and they take away everything that is good for him.
They take away all his family.
They take away all his property.
And he is left alone.
And what do all his friends say?
“Oh, you must be bad because all these bad things are happening.
We thought you were good.
So you need to repent.”
Job says, “How can I repent?
I haven’t done anything wrong.”
And then the religious leaders come along
and they say even harsher things:
“You cannot come anywhere near us.
In fact, we do not want you inside our community
because you must be really evil.
So you need to stay out of our churches
and stay out of everything we have.”
Job goes to the Lord and says
“I don’t understand Lord. What is going on?
I haven’t done anything wrong ever.
You know that so how do you do this to me?”
This is where we pick up the reading today
when God says to Job, “Did you make the oceans?
Did you make the mountains?
Did you do all that?”
And Job says “Well, no, no.”
God says, “No, I didn’t think so. And you wouldn’t understand it.
And if I did give you the answer as
to why all these things are happening
you still would not understand it.
Your only role is to remain faithful.”
And Job demurs.
And says, “You are right, I have overstepped.
I’ll just be faithful.”
And that is what Job’s message is.
In today’s gospel, the disciples,
the ones who have lived with Jesus for three years
are struggling with the exact same thing.
Again, let’s understand the context.
We have to know they are on the Sea of Galilee
and they are on the Jewish side of the Sea of Galilee.
And Jesus says, “Let’s go to the other side,”
which meant “Let’s go to enemy territory.
Let’s go to the gentiles.”
So they get in the boat and they say
“Okay, he’s the Son of God, so we’ll go.”
And he gets in the boat and falls asleep.
And there is a big storm.
The disciples are going like “What is going on?
I thought he was the Son of God,
what’s he doing? He’s sleeping. And we are going to die.”
They say to him: “Don’t you care that we are dying?”
And he wakes up and quiets the storm and
then says “Don’t you yet understand
that is not what it is about.
I am always with you.
It doesn’t matter whether there are storms or not.
I am here. And I will always be here.”
It is hard for us to get the logic because it is divine
and we are just human.
Therefore, we have to accept, out of faith, to remain faithful.
And that is where today’s second reading
might be the key to unlock the logic in all of this.
Paul is also being challenged by his logic.
He turns around says “Look,
forget who is saying what,
the main message is all about Christ.
And that Christ is within us and we are within Christ.
And as long as we remain in Christ,
we will always be fine because Christ will remain in us.”
And that is what we celebrate every single Sunday
when we come to the table.
And it is so wonderful to see people come.
It is great to have you still on livestream
but it is so much nicer to have us all gathered in person. Why?
Because real presence needs real people.
And what we do when we gather around this table
is to say we become what we receive.
We become the Body of Christ broken for others.
We become the blood of Christ poured out for others.
But what does that mean when bad things are happening?
It means that we are Christ to one another;
and when you are suffering,
I am not going to try and answer why this has happened
or why it should happen or why it isn’t happening.
I am just present to you.
I stand with you and I suffer with you.
And that is sometimes all that we can do
because then we are the hands and feet of Christ to them.
It becomes real because we are with them;
because we stand with them
as the living Body of Christ here and now.
And when those bad things happen to us,
when those things, like illness, comes our way
and we cannot understand why God would allow
this to happen to us
then we allow those who are around us
to be the hands and feet of Christ to us.
Often in silence but just present;
the silent presence that can make all the difference in the world
when we are suffering.
Today, we celebrate Father’s Day
and often fathers do not verbalize their affection.
They are often just present.
They sit and they are there and
we know they are always there.
And often, the strength that they give us is
because of their conviction and of their presence
that remains with us always.
We thank them for that presence.
And also for those who are father figures to us;
that are like a father to us;
who have fathered us in so many different ways.
That silent presence is powerful.
It is the presence of Christ with one another.
Often times in the turmoil of life
we sometimes get lost and we fight for that
but it is in the silent presence that is most beautiful.
I want to close with a poem by Edwina Gately
that speaks about that silent presence of God;
and sometimes we forget where God is
but that in all the travels of life
that he is always there in the silent presence.
Silent presence
(Edwina Gately
Psalms of a Lay Woman)
I thought that God
Had come to me.
That after the wild delights—
The suffering and the joys,
The pain and the hopelessness
Of the years—
That God
Had come to me.
Then after adventure and achievement,
Pain, despair, and death,
God
Had come to me.
Yes—with relief and mild surprise
I met my God again.
And then I saw,
Oh, fool, I saw!
That God had suffered
The pain and hopelessness,
Had shared the achievements and the joys,
That God,
All enveloping,
All compassion,
Had been there in silence
All the time.
My friends, we are present to one another in the silence.
That is our answer and our role is to be faithful to that answer
by being the Body of Christ to one another
especially in the difficult times.
