We're Asking the Wrong Question

One of the biggest questions humanity has wrestled with in regards to the existence of God is: "How can a just God, who loves everyone, simply sit back and let innocent people die (ie. the Holocaust, starvation, cancer, etc.)?"

I think if we truly stopped to ask the right question, we just might get an answer, although it will probably be an answer we don't really like. You see, the question makes the assumption that there are innocent people in this world. However, the Bible says: "There is no one righteous, not even one" (Romans 3:10). I'm not righteous, my pastor isn't righteous, Mother Theresa wasn't righteous, Apostle Paul wasn't righteous. From the moment we enter this world, we are born into sin. If you lived your whole life with a blameless record, didn't ever once steal or kill or gossip, do you think you would avoid ever having a selfish thought, or think poorly of someone, or get jealous or angry?

There is no one righteous. There is no one innocent. Does it make me upset when people whose lives are marked by evil go on living and causing destruction, and people who try to live good lives experience harm and death? Absolutely, but the bottom line is that one day we will all meet the same fate, we will all stand before God and give an account of our lives, what we did with the time we had here on earth. "Did you live for me? Did you love me? Did you love others?" Those will be the questions we hear. And it will only be by His grace that we will be saved.