INTRODUCTION

These questions probably go back almost 6000 years to the fall of Adam and Eve. There must be thousands of answers that have been proposed. Humans like to play the blame game so I will pick somebody to blame for all of the terrible things that have happened over the millennia and still happen today. I will blame Adam and Eve. Why Adam and Eve?

WHY ADAM AND EVE?

When Adam and Eve were created they must have had a truly wonderful life. They lived in a garden that was a true paradise. It contained all kinds of fruit trees from which they could eat. This garden must have been in both heaven and on earth. It is described in some detail in Gen 2:8-14 and the description is clearly on earth in the area called Mesopotamia. It was in Iraq, basically between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers and extended northward into what is today Turkey. It also must have been in heaven. I have several reasons for believing that. Three reasons are that Jesus and Satan both walked with man in the garden, God has a garden in heaven called the garden of Eden in Ezek 28:13, and when man was kicked out of the garden he discovered that he was naked. I will explain what it means to be naked below. Apparently when Gen 1:27 says that God created man in his image that meant that man had a nature similar to God. God could go freely through both heaven and earth, so man likely could do the same.

God set some standards for man that are still in place today. Man was created without sin and he had to remain that way in order to continue his access to heaven and be in the presence of God. God placed two trees in the center of the garden, the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The tree of the knowledge of good and evil represented Satan and sin. Man was warned to not partake of the fruit of this tree or he would be banned from the garden. Man was given “free will” to choose to follow God’s plan for him or to ignore it and fall into a life of sin. Man ultimately listened to the father of lies, Satan (John 8:44), and partook of the forbidden fruit, sin. When he did he was kicked out of the heavenly dimension of the garden of Eden. He obviously still had access to the earthly garden. God was seriously offended by man’s actions. What did he do as a result of man’s free will choice to disobey him?

GOD’S RESPONSE TO INITIAL SIN

As a result of this initial sin man was confined to earth and a barrier was set up to keep him from ever again being able to get back into the garden of God in heaven by anything he could do by himself. This barrier was referred to as a flaming sword in Gen 3:24. It symbolically represented purification (fire purifies, Zech 13:9, Mal 3:2, Matt 3:11, Mk 9:49, 1 Cor 3:13, Rev 3:18) by accepting the word (sword of the Spirit in Eph 6:17) of God, the gospel of Jesus. Accepting Jesus means that his shed blood covers up our sins and purifies us, meaning that God then looks at us and sees us as perfect in his eyes. Thus we must go through Jesus to get back into heaven. Jesus is the only way. He is the barrier that stands in the way of the world. I Peter 2:7-8 says, “Now to you who believe, this stone is precious. But to those who do not believe  “The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone,” and “A stone that causes men to stumble and a rock that makes men fall.” They stumble because they disobey the message.” They cannot get into heaven because they do not know Jesus.

Another very interesting thing happened to Adam and Eve relating to getting back into heaven one day. As soon as Adam and Eve were kicked out of the garden they noticed something quite shocking to them. They were “naked,” Gen 3:7. This was not being naked in the normal sense that we usually think of. 2 Cor 5:3 explains what it means to be naked from the perspective of Paul. To Paul a person is naked if he does not have a glorified body. This shows me that Adam and Eve had glorified bodies when they were in the garden of Eden. It is clear from a detailed study of the symbology in Rev 21-22 and John 12-17 that a glorified body is necessary in order to be able to live and participate in a united heaven and earth, the new order mentioned in Rev 21:1-4. Adam and Eve were able to do so before their fall into sin and all believers will be able to do this after they receive glorified bodies at the rapture. It seems clear from a study of John 17:6 and Phil 3:20-21 that our glorified body will be like the glorified body that Jesus had after his resurrection. We also see from John 17:6 that this is the same nature he had before coming to earth and before the creation of the earth. Jesus appeared on earth and looked like a man several times in the Old Testament. As “The Angel of the Lord.”

Two other very critical things happened when man was kicked out of heaven. First, God placed a curse upon the earth, Gen 3:14-19. This curse resulted in serious consequences for Adam and Eve as well as their offspring; The consequences included:

Women would be the physically weaker sex and would experience pain in childbirth.

Man would now have to work painfully hard to provide food for himself and his family.

Plant life was cursed and weeds, thorns and thistles emerged to make life very difficult for man.

Man was apparently created to live with God forever in heaven; however because of his sin his body would now age and die. Along with this physical death came all of the things that cause death including diseases, poisons, accidents, wild animals, murder, destructive forces of nature, etc.

Second, when man was banned to earth it began a spiritual war in the heavenly realm over the spirits of men that is still taking place today. Satan and his angels became man’s worst enemy, Gen 3:14-15. This war was basically for the heart of man and was between the angelic forces for good and evil, with each trying to influence man to use his free will to follow either God or Satan, Eph 6:10-12. God won the critical victory with the death and resurrection of Jesus, which accomplished God’s ultimate purpose in allowing man to once again be seen as perfect and fit to enter heaven for eternity, Col 2:13-15.

THE CONTINUING SAGA

Man made his choice by exercising his free will given to him by God. He chose the way of Satan over the way of God; he chose Satan’s fruit, sin, over obedience to God. Unfortunately, believers in Christ will continue to have to bear the consequences until their death. After that their spirits return to God. Again, this was made possible because Jesus bought their pardon for sin with his death and resurrection. However those who do not belong to Jesus will have to pay the consequences for eternity. They will never be able to return to God’s garden in heaven. They will be sent to a place of darkness, a place where the light of Jesus does not shine. There are eternal consequences for not belonging to Jesus.

SO, WHY DOES GOD ALLOW BAD THINGS TO HAPPEN TO GOOD PEOPLE?

The simple answer as we said above is that man is still paying the consequences for freely choosing sin over obedience to God. When God kicked man out of his presence and confined him to earth he allowed Satan and his legions of angels to have access to man’s heart, his subconscious mind. He also allowed sickness, poisons, potentially injurious plant and animal life, evil will, the destructive forces of nature, etc. to enter the earthly realm. Nobody on earth is immune to these things. God placed things in motion and now things happen because of all of the interactions between people and the environment. There are a combination of forces involved including careful and careless people, toxic people, environmental toxins, dangerous forces of nature, etc. Angelic forces also bear heavily on things that happen on earth. God seldom openly interferes with things in the physical world, except for the occasional miracle, but he does interfere heavily with things in the spiritual realm. Believers have a huge advantage over nonbelievers because they have access to the full armor of God. This is explained in Eph 6:11-17. Satan is the ruler of this world at the present time, John 12:31, 2 Cor 4:4. Eph 2:2. However, he who is in believers is greater than he who is in the world, 1 John 4:4. God provides all sorts of help to believers in dealing with the unfortunate, bad, evil or destructive things that happen to them. This help is usually deep within us, in the seat of our emotions, in the heart or mind of our spirit. We have the strength to get through our trials, knowing what our future holds, and knowing he who holds the future.