Why would a “good” god allow the coronavirus?

This is a good question to ask, as now more than ever, people are wrestling with suffering and tragedy. Our family members, friends and loved ones are affected, some get seriously sick, some lose their business or their livelihood, and some even die. It is heart breaking!

In order to figure out the answer to that question, we must put our feelings aside and focus on the question itself. Is it true that a “good God” would never let people get sick or die?

That is why it is really helpful and beneficial to step into the Christian worldview. But in order to do that, you have to set aside the materialistic atheist mindset, because according to the materialist, all there is is matter, there is no spiritual aspect to reality or to ourselves, and when we die, we cease to exist. For these folks, all we have is around 80 to 90 years. And then it is over.

Therefore people with that belief have to fill those years with great experiences, like falling in love, having children, having great careers, traveling, “living life to the full”, etc.  So, of course, it makes sense that tragedy, suffering and disease that attack the only things that matter for them, are supremely wicked.

Someone asking why would a “good” God allow the coronavirus has his feet in two different world views. He has got one foot, and probably most of his body, stuck in the materialistic worldview, and the other foot placed just enough in the Christian worldview to acknowledge God. But keeping yourself half in and half out like that leads to confusion and appears contradictory. .

A materialist who tries to assess Christianity from the outside looking in, is like someone sitting at the end of a boat, looking down in the water and making pronouncements about what is under the surface of the water. This person may even stick their feet under the water, but they cannot with any confidence say that they understand the purpose of the underwater ecosystem, unless they fully submerge and enter into the ecosystem itself, and get a proper look around. So if people really want to understand and evaluate a robust system of belief in God, they must adopt the entire framework for these beliefs, by stepping inside it and looking around to see if it really does make sense.

You see, according to Christianity, the thing that really matters is not your work or your love life, or you healthy body, even though those are really good things that God actually wants for His creation, for mankind, but that is not the primary thing. What supersedes all these other things is to know the one true God. Jesus told us: “Now this is eternal life: that they know You, the only true God.” (John 17:3)                          

In fact, there is a lot more than 80 or 90 years of life at stake here, there is all these years plus eternity.  Once you realize that eternity awaits you after this life, suffering and death take an entirely different light, doesn’t it? Even if the coronavirus can attack our physical body and even kill it, it can’t harm our immortal souls, and eternity dramatically overshadows this lifetime until it is almost nothing.

How long is 100 years compared to eternity? It is zero percent! So when thinking about suffering and death, especially with regards to the coronavirus, we need to have the proper eternal perspective, and recognize that the Creator should be our primary concern. Our purpose should be to know Him and to make Him known. All other things are of lesser importance. Even though they are good things, they are not the primary thing, and in this world, we have to be ready to see them challenged or even taken away.

If you seek God with all your heart, you can have strength, comfort and peace in these uncertain times. But you’ve got to have the right perspective of life and eternity in order to understand reality clearly.

The primary thing, knowing God, will never fade away or be lost. And the coronavirus, and the suffering of this world, will be like Paul said “a light momentary affliction that is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.” 2 Corinthians 4: 17-18. This is a good verse to turn to in these times of turmoil. Someday, all of our trials will seem like nothing, and that can be a great comfort to us now.

God does not send or allow viruses to judge the world, to hurt and kill thousands of people. He is neither the perpetrator nor an accessory to mass killing.

We live in a fallen world and bad things happen as a result of sin, of man’s greed, selfishness and disobedience to God. It is because of what man did to the earth, the animal kingdom, the human race, that we have viruses and plagues and suffering. Viruses come to steal, kill and destroy, they are not from God.  God is a good God, He cares and He loves.