Have you ever asked the question, why do bad things happen to good people?
If not, then you must have a heart of ice! I ask this a lot, and the closer I get in my relationship with God I ask it even more.
Solomon had some pretty wise answers to this question. He basically said that’s life! Sometimes life is good, sometimes it’s bad!
However, there are times when the bad is for our own good. I’m not saying this is in every situation in our lives, but there are times when God allows the bad the make room for the good.
In Acts 8 we see the early church has boomed to mega proportions. Over 10,000 people in the area around Jerusalem are now part of the church. People are being healed, lives are being changed and a community is being transformed. Yet in the midst of all this the people in the church start to get persecuted. This isn’t your name calling, laugh behind your back persecution; this is chop your head off, beat you until every bone is broken persecution.
Most people would not understand this treatment, and I bet the people in Jerusalem didn’t understand.
However, we are told that because of the persecution the church in Jerusalem started to move into other areas around Judah, Samaria and other regions near Jerusalem. As the church moved out, more lives were changed and transformed. In fact due to the persecution in Jerusalem church became a greater force and this set up the pathway to reach in Europe and subsequently the whole world.
Imagine what would have happened if the church had not had received persecution? They probably would have stayed in Jerusalem, transformed a community but left behind a world that was unreached and untouched.
Maybe you’re going through some stuff at the moment and all you can do is ask God, WHY? I don’t have the why answer, but I do know he is in control, and maybe just maybe, he is using this ‘why’ situation to push through something so incredible you would have never believed it if he told you!
