2nd Opinion: ‘Why did God make stickers?’

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Four-year-olds have a way of getting to the heart of things. And they can be surprisingly theological, too.

Not long ago, my 4-year-old grandson, Anthony, got into some grass burrs that hurt his feet and made him miserable. While I was helping him extricate those stickers from his socks and feet, he looked up at me and said, through tears, "Why did God make stickers, Grand-dad?"

What is the reason for suffering?

He knows, of course, I'm supposed to be some kind of expert on God and assumes I have ready answers to questions like that. I looked at my son—Anthony's dad—for help, but he smiled at me and shrugged his shoulders as if to say, "You're on your own on this one, Old Man."

"I'm not sure why God made stickers, Anthony," I replied weakly.

"But God wants to take care of us, not hurt us, right?" Anthony said.

"That's true, Bud," I said, "but sometimes we get into things like stickers, and we're not sure why."

If Anthony did think I was the Answer Man for all things pertaining to God, he now knows otherwise. I was as confused as he was as to why God would create stickers so we could step on them and experience pain. If God wants to take care of us, why did he ever create stickers that are guaranteed to make us miserable? At age 4 or 64, we're clueless when it comes to that question.

2nd OpinionAlthough he doesn't know it, this will not be the last time Anthony wrestles with this dilemma. As he grows older, he will ask a variation of that question a thousand times. "Why stickers, God?" will morph into "Why tornadoes, God?" "Why tumors?" "Why loneliness?" "Why death?" and many other "Whys."

Like the rest of us, he will have to grapple with a world that is brimming with evil and suffering. And like the rest of us, he often will wonder why God would create such a world. This won't be the last time my grandson asks, "God wants to take care of us, not hurt us, right?"


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I wish I had a ready answer for him. I really would like to be Anthony's Answer Man, dispensing easy answers to all his hard questions. Then, he could look proudly at Granddad as some kind of spiritual giant, someone who can make sense of evil and suffering, and maybe the world would seem a little less sinister to him.

I suppose we're all looking for that person, really. We all would like to find that person, parent, preacher or professor who knows more than we do and can explain the mysterious ways of God to us. We would all like to believe someone out there is smarter than we are, understands what's going on in the world and can make some kind of sense of it.

But it's not going to happen. I've read the Bible from cover to cover, and I've read quite a few books on the question of evil and suffering, and I still don't have a clue why God made stickers. Isaiah got it right when he looked out at his baffling world one day and heard God whisper, "My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways. … For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts" (Isaiah 55:8-9). Maybe someday, we'll understand. But not now. Not in this world.

So, I'm sorry, Anthony. I don't know why God made stickers or any of the other things that will inflict pain upon you as you grow older. You might as well know right now, at the ripe old age of 4, that I'm as lost as you are when it comes to comprehending those things. We live in a mysterious world full of unanswerable "Whys."

But here's what I promise you. As long as I'm alive, I'll be there to help you pull the stickers out. As long as I'm alive, I'll be right beside you—if you want me to be—when you have to deal with tornadoes, tumors, loneliness, death or any of the other mysterious enemies you will have to face. We may not have all the answers, Bud. But we do have each other.

And here's what I hope and pray for you: When you have to face those painful stickers, you will discover that God is with you even—or especially—in your pain.

Judson Edwards is a retired pastor in San Antonio. His newest book is Blissful Affliction: The Ministry and Misery of Writing.


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