All in Does God Cause us to Suffer

When we first witness to someone who has never heard the good news of Christ, or when we are having a gospel conversation with a person who is struggling on the verge of believing, one of their most pressing questions they ask is “if there is a God, and He is good, then why do bad things happen to good people? Why was His Son made to suffer and die for us?” It seems we are alright with the notion of bad people suffering, or being punished, but yet we stumble when those we see as good are allowed to face hardship, pain, or tribulation. So how do we speak to them about the nature of life in the world, sin vs righteousness, and the fact that without sickness there can be no healing, unless there is suffering, we can’t know joy, or… without having come face to face with bad, or worse yet, evil, then we can never truly know what is good.