I’ve read that, while there are many questions hard for an atheist to answer, there is really only tough one for a Christian apologist — but’s it’s a doozy: Why do bad things happen to good people on this earth?
Here’s a possible elevator answer:
It depends. (1) Sometimes it’s because God has given us free will and, alas, that is often abused: Bad people do bad things to good people, and sometimes even basically good people make very bad choices. (2). Sometimes the harm we suffer brings us closer to God, causes us to turn to Him. As C.S. Lewis wrote in The Problem of Pain, “We can ignore even pleasure. But pain insists on being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts on our pains: it is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.” (3) Sometimes it makes us better people. We often hear people say, That was a really tough time, but it made me appreciate such-and-such, or it taught me that whatever, or it made me stronger. Who is made better by easy times? (4) Sometimes what seems to be a bad thing isn’t really, as it turns out. Thank God, as the country song says, for unanswered prayers. We see the bad in something that happens, but forget the good or ignore it or maybe just don’t see it at the time — or even ever in this life. (5) And sometimes — sometimes and in some situations, I just don’t know why the bad thing has happened, not really. Yeah, that’s not very satisfying. But you know, physicists can’t answer every question either.