Week 3: Chapter 2 — How Could a Good God Allow Suffering?

1.Keller describes sitting with people in his congregation who have experienced devastating loss and who ask, "How could a good God allow this?" Before you engage the arguments, sit with that question personally: Have you ever asked it yourself, or has someone close to you asked it? What did it feel like?

2.He argues that the existence of suffering does not logically disprove the existence of God — because the argument from suffering requires a standard of "what should be," and that standard itself implies a moral order that points back toward God. Walk through that argument in your own words. Does it hold up?

3.Keller cites C.S. Lewis's famous statement that his argument against God was that the universe seemed "so cruel and so unjust" — but that this sense of injustice itself presupposed a real standard of justice. How does this "moral argument" function as a response to the problem of evil?