Why doesn't God eliminate all pain, suffering and evil?
The reality of pain, suffering and evil in our world is often challenging for believers and even a point that atheists use to claim God doesn’t exist. The topic itself is not an easy one to cover and especially not an easy one to be brief on. Rather than pour out a doctoral dissertation, let me offer something more brief that may help you think about suffering differently.
God as the master potter, we are his clay
I don’t know if there’s much of an answer for suffering of any kind, other than to understand that it has purpose. I don’t think there’s a ton we can do to eliminate the pain of suffering or struggle, but knowing that there’s a God-endorsed reason for the pain somehow makes it more tolerable - at least this is my perspective.
In moments of suffering I often find myself revisiting the potter/clay metaphor and heavily projecting my experience onto clay. Knives, wire, tearing, reshaping, soaking, firing in a furnace - what a violent life clay endures. But the master potter expertly uses those tools and techniques to form it into a glorious masterpiece. It doesn’t diminish the pain of our suffering, but it reveals the purpose.
The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord : “Arise, and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will let you hear my words.” So I went down to the potter’s house, and there he was working at his wheel. And the vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter’s hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter to do. Then the word of the Lord came to me: “O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this potter has done? declares the Lord . Behold, like the clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel. If at any time I declare concerning a nation or a kingdom, that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it, and if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turns from its evil, I will relent of the disaster that I intended to do to it. And if at any time I declare concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will build and plant it, and if it does evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will relent of the good that I had intended to do to it. Now, therefore, say to the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem: ‘Thus says the Lord , Behold, I am shaping disaster against you and devising a plan against you. Return, every one from his evil way, and amend your ways and your deeds.’
But now, O Lord , you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand.
Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use?
You turn things upside down! Shall the potter be regarded as the clay, that the thing made should say of its maker, “He did not make me”; or the thing formed say of him who formed it, “He has no understanding”?
We are God’s workmanship
God both adds and subtracts from our lives to shape us into his masterpiece in ways that only he is capable of and sometimes only he understands. We aren’t called to perfectly understand God and his ways, but rather endure the trials and testing of this world and life so that we may be united eternally with him in the afterlife.
For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
Matt Whitman is one of my favorite YouTube personalities. In March 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic was just beginning and he made a video on the problem of evil. I highly recommend watching it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vUC5Pmcb0EA.