This is one of the most puzzling questions from non-believers. Most of time, we, as Christian, answers with a simple theology: we don’t know the reason, but God is all good, so we just trust in God. For believers, this answer might be the right answer and we all buy into it, but for non-believers, it sounds like Christianity is not rational. Trusting God without understanding may sound like irrational, but life is full of things that we cannot understand. The problem of evil is one of them. However, Christianity and theology has been pursuing the understanding of faith in God, so there could be better answer than just trusting in God. So I recently wrote a research paper for the class I was taking, Systematic Theology 1. It is not even close to the complete survey of the issue, nor exposition of the answer you might be looking for, but helped me to understand various issues and themes about the problem of evil.
here is the introduction and Check the attachment for detail.
INTRODUCTION
Why does God allow evil? If God is good, why is there suffering and pain in the world? How can the presence of evil and suffering be reconciled with the goodness of God? The problem of evil has been one of the most serious philosophical challenges to the Christian faith. It has been used frequently by atheists to deny the existence of God. If God allows evil and suffering to continue and cannot stop them, then God may be good, but he is not all powerful. If God allows evil and suffering to continue even though he could stop it, yet he won’t stop it, then God might be all powerful, but he may not be good. In either case, the conclusion is that God is not good and all powerful at the same time. The implication is that the existence of evil calls into question the existence of God. One of the most cited quotes on the problem of evil is the one created by the Scottish philosopher David Hume when he asked, “Is [God] willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then is he impotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then is he malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Whence then is evil?”
James Wood explained his loss of faith in God because theology could not provide any answer to this agonizing problem of evil and suffering in this world: “Either God omnipotently presides over these happenings in some way, or there is no God. But if God omnipotently presides over them, then he presides over our suffering. He watches us drown in our own incomprehension. I am afraid that I must choose the latter explanation.” It seems that there has been no grater argument against the Christian faith than the problem of evil. Probably there have been many arguments from theodicy but it seems that Christian theologians and philosophers have not provided clear theological answers, at least not to most people. Otherwise people would not struggle with the problem of evil and suffering.
This paper will survey several historical Christian traditions over the issue of evil and suffering, and try to provide different perspectives in an effort to solve this problem, such as logical, theistic and Christological approaches. This paper is not intended to find an answer to the problem of evil, but to provide a helpful theological foundation that can be used at a time when we face pain and suffering in our lives.