Here is an inquiry that I received from a college-aged young lady:
There’s this question I have been struggling with for a while now. I understand why people grow old and die naturally but why do young people have to die? I know a 21 year old girl who was driving home for a friends house at 3 am and was disoriented and flipped her car and died. She was a wonderful girl. My cousin’s best friend was on meds, it did something to his heart and he died randomly at 21.
I just don’t understand why young people have to die. My dad was telling me that he believes that the sin that brought our world to imperfection makes these things happen, that God will help sometimes but not always. What makes Him choose who dies and who lives?
First, I don’t propose to have any clue on why or how God chooses to do what He does (who lives, who dies in this case) unless the Bible clearly declares His reasons for all of us to know. In the case of a young person or baby dying, or a “good person” having bad things happen to them, that belongs to the secret knowledge of God and there it shall stay with my comments. Now, on to what we can know based on the Bible…
Your Dad is correct. God chooses for His own reasons when to intervene in human events but regardless, God will make all things right for eternity. That’s what we base our hope on as Christians. That’s why the “unfairness” of this existence does not cause us to despair like those who have no hope (1 Thessalonians 4:13). That’s why injustice, suffering and bad things do not steal our joy as Believers.
A fact of human existence is people of all ages die and bad things happen to “good” people because of one reason: SIN. Not necessarily specific sin they’ve committed individually (though that can often be a factor), but the overall sin of humanity.
Sin is what caused God’s creation to be cursed. The curse brings accidents, disease, suffering, unfairness, injustice and evil.
Every time something like this happens, it reminds us of how horrible sin is, and how we should long for Jesus to return so that all the bad things will end. It reminds us of how perfect God is, and how imperfect we (as a whole of humanity) are not.
Our collective sinfulness, and the curse it brought on God’s creation is the origin of all the bad things that happen (Romans 5:12). Some day sin and the curse will be removed forever (2Pet 3:10; Rev 21:1)… until then, we trust that God will ultimately make all things right, punish all evil, reward all good, and rest in His perfect love and care.
We should have an eternal perspective… see things eternally, not just from the temporary nature of this life. This sin-cursed creation will be a blink, a wisp, a vapor compared to eternity. As we call this to mind, it helps us remain joyful and hopeful it the face of hardship or uncertainty. Our hope is in God’s faithfulness and unfailing promises:
- Psalm 39:7 – “And now, Lord, what do I wait for? My hope is in You. (NKJV)
- Titus 1:2 – in hope of eternal life which God, who cannot lie, promised before time began, (NKJV)
- Romans 5:5 – Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us. (NKJV)
- Romans 15:13 – Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. (NKJV)
- Psalm 146:5 – Happy is he who has the God of Jacob for his help, Whose hope is in the Lord his God, (NKJV)
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I always go with Jeremiah and Romans on questions like this. God’s plans are to prosper us and not to harm us. My niece died at 12 days old. Another nephew at 11 years old. I sincerely believe that God’s plans for their lives were to prosper them and not to harm them. Thus, those plans were accomplished despite the shortness of their lives. I wish they could have been longer but those were the days planned for them to accomplish His purposes for their lives. My faith is in Him, that He knows what He’s doing.
I came to Christ late in life (31) and struggled a long time with why bad things happen to good people and found my answer in Romans 8:18 “I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.” I meditated on that verse a long time and came to the conclusion that a glory not worth comparing (not makes up for for or minimalizes) to the horrible suffering in the world must be something indeed. I look at the vastness of the suffering and can’t even begin imagine the vastness of a glory that makes the suffering not comparable. It still astounds me today when I try to wrap my mind around the idea of a glory that leaves all of our present sufferings in the dust when compared to it.
Yes, young people die but for those of us who believe, we know it’s not the end. And while my sisters-in-law and the whole family suffer real grief missing the children in our family, I know God’s plans for our glory are being accomplished.
Isaiah 57
1 The righteous perish,
and no one ponders it in his heart;
devout men are taken away,
and no one understands
that the righteous are taken away
to be spared from evil.
2 Those who walk uprightly
enter into peace;
they find rest as they lie in death.
These are the verses that comfort me, when I am wondering, “Why, Lord?” It comforts me to know that they will be spared from evil, and find rest.
When young people die, (or anyone, really), I think of an analogy that I read once that was very soothing.
Imagine that your child falls asleep watching TV on the couch downstairs. You wake up in the middle of the night, see your child sleeping in the living room, you go downstairs, pick up the child and put her into her own bed. Now you know that the child will be much more comfortable in her own bed.
That is the perfect picture of our Heavenly Father picking us up out of this sinful world and taking us home to Heaven where we will be much more comfortable!
More, even than death, I pondered why God would allow a person to suffer on and on. After years of questioning this, I came to realize that He’s working something wonderful in the lives of others who encounter the suffering person. An sweet elderly person who spends time in the hospital and/or nursing home touches many lives. Their caregivers can’t help but be impressed by one sufferer. I think of the Apostle Paul singing praises to God when chained and beaten in prison. Look how this impressed his jailers. My second cousin, died at age 10 after battling cancer for 3 years. The lives he touched were numerous, telling how thankful he was, how he kidded the doctors and nurses, fooled his teachers and was such a good friend of many.
My late daughter wrote and posted spiritual poetry on a poetry site that was read and requested at a nursing home in Canada. She later wrote a poem about not knowing how many lives we touch, totally unaware of it.
I can’t think of an instance when God didn’t know what He was doing, can you?
Rae
Bad things happen in life as the whole cosmic system is governed by inscrutable laws of Karma… as we sow so shall we reap… nothing less or more! If they were only happiness in life… all would become monotonous… meaningless! Only when we suffer… we understood true value of happiness… never otherwise!
Yep,
I try and answer these questions on my youtube site. In eternity we will not care whether we lived life long or short on this Earth. What will matter is if we knew Jesus Christ. There is no point living life to 100 in good health if you die in your sins. I have read many stories in my 8+ years of being a Christian where many young people, many of whom were totally living for God, died under the most tragic/bizarre circumstances. The fact is that if they knew Christ, they are with Him now and forever. Eternally safe forever more. This world will one day pass away. Only what we have with Jesus Christ will remain.