Abused, Raped, Tortured, Killed - what good can be taken?

[lanthean]

I have seen how cruel and evil a human being can be. Although I never witnessed the real event, but I believe that what some movies shows the cruelty of human can really happen or have happened somewhere in this world.

For example :
A baby was born in abusive home, call her Ann. Ann was abused by her parents physically and mentally, beaten, insulted, and so many more. When she was teenager she was abducted by rapist who later chained and caged her in basement with no window and in constant darkness. The rapist only visit her to give her food or to rape and torture her. She was kept for several years before the rapist finally kill her.

Although this is fictive I made, but I believe this can happen somewhere in this world. In fact, I believe something far more worse than this story happens all the time throughout the world.
My questions are :

1. God loves all human, where is God love for her?
2. Is anything good can be taken from her experience?
3. Is it her fault if something like this happen to her and how will she able to say God has plan for her?
4. If she is christian, will God allow things like this to happen to her? since God says in the Bible that He will not give us more than we can handle. I can't imagine if anybody can handle this kind of situation.

[Byblos]

I have seen how cruel and evil a human being can be. Although I never witnessed the real event, but I believe that what some movies shows the cruelty of human can really happen or have happened somewhere in this world.

For example :
A baby was born in abusive home, call her Ann. Ann was abused by her parents physically and mentally, beaten, insulted, and so many more. When she was teenager she was abducted by rapist who later chained and caged her in basement with no window and in constant darkness. The rapist only visit her to give her food or to rape and torture her. She was kept for several years before the rapist finally kill her.

Although this is fictive I made, but I believe this can happen somewhere in this world. In fact, I believe something far more worse than this story happens all the time throughout the world.
My questions are :

1. God loves all human, where is God love for her?
2. Is anything good can be taken from her experience?
3. Is it her fault if something like this happen to her and how will she able to say God has plan for her?
4. If she is christian, will God allow things like this to happen to her? since God says in the Bible that He will not give us more than we can handle. I can't imagine if anybody can handle this kind of situation.

This all boils down to the question of why God would allow evil to exist and this topic has been addressed many, many times on this board. Please look on the main page for some good articles or do a search.

[Silvertusk]

A very quick reply - and probably not satisfying from our human perspective - is not matter how much suffering we have down on earth - we have an eternity of Joy where God can make up for it. Remember it is not God's fault that this happens.

[jlay]

1. God loves all human, where is God love for her?
2. Is anything good can be taken from her experience?
3. Is it her fault if something like this happen to her and how will she able to say God has plan for her?
4. If she is christian, will God allow things like this to happen to her? since God says in the Bible that He will not give us more than we can handle. I can't imagine if anybody can handle this kind of situation.

1. God does love all humans. In fact he loves the person committing the atrocities just as much as the little girl.
2. Not on the surface. But God will work all things, even evil, together for those that love Him. God will judge all these evil deeds in due time.
3. I can give you thousands of testimonies of people who endured terrible circumstances and yet are confident of God's plans. How will she be able to say it? Well,if she is a believer, she can say it, because it is true. She can trust God. Just as I could trust God even when I was enduring the abuses in my life.
4. Yes. In fact Christians are promised that they will endure trials because of their faith. In fact when I was 12 I endured heavy persecution from my peers because of my faith. The bible doesn't say he won't give us more than we can handle. It says that when we are tempted we will not be tempted with more than we can handle.

Now some questions for you.
Have you ever been responsible for any suffering in the world?
Have you ever failed to respond with love in a situation where it was needed?

[PaulSacramento]

The issue of human caused suffering has been dealt with in quite a few books.
The core issue is one of free will, if we have free will we must also have free will to do bad things to each other, as is our curse in our "fallen state".
God not permitting free action coming from free will would make God a dictator and a coercer.
God is neither.
We may not like it or even agree with it, but with free will comes suffering and hardship because of those that try to impose their free will on others, their free will to do what they want, regardless of how it effects others.
As humans we do have the capacity to right wrongs and to fix mistakes and to fix and handle suffering but only through Christ can we come back to God and our natural state in which we do NOT impose ourselves on others and only then will there be no human imposed suffering.

[lanthean]

For all who answered my questions, thanks alot.

While I can't imagine myself can handle those kind of situations, but I am grateful I am never been in those situations (hopefully will never be).
Even sometimes it is very hard to say that God does have plan, I give my salute to anybody that can do that in the worst situation.
but I do believe God does have plan (although I never been in any horrible situation).

[PaulSacramento]

For all who answered my questions, thanks alot.

While I can't imagine myself can handle those kind of situations, but I am grateful I am never been in those situations (hopefully will never be).
Even sometimes it is very hard to say that God does have plan, I give my salute to anybody that can do that in the worst situation.
but I do believe God does have plan (although I never been in any horrible situation).

I know two sisters that were abused by a family member, this went on for some time and it was finally brought to light.
They both got the same support structure but the eldest was a tad stronger, though less vocal than the youngest.
The guy was found guilty and is now a registered sex offender and predator and is not allowed to be alone with children, ever, because f his advanced age there was no jail time, but the reaming given to him by the judge was quite something.
The eldest sister was there to hear it and see this germ for the low life, sad and pathetic person he was.
The youngest was not strong enough, though in her opinion she didn't have to be there because it was over.
The eldest forgave him, she went on with her life, she healed, has a family with two beautiful girls and a husband that loves her.
The youngest was a mess of relationships, got herself pregnant, is in an "ok" marriage at best, with no career prospects at all and isn't able to talk about it, never had closure or put it behind her and will "never forgive" what happened.

Forgiveness heals, hate destroys.
God's grace heals.

[neo-x]

1. God loves all human, where is God love for her?
2. Is anything good can be taken from her experience?
3. Is it her fault if something like this happen to her and how will she able to say God has plan for her?
4. If she is christian, will God allow things like this to happen to her? since God says in the Bible that He will not give us more than we can handle. I can't imagine if anybody can handle this kind of situation.

You are correct in assuming this happens a lot around the world, i have a few of such incidents close enough to know the messy details. But I think all of the above points are based on the premise that God is round the clock protective of us, he is omni present so he knows and sees all.

What I have come to believe is that, everything that happens to us is not controlled by God, God never tempts anyone with evil. so a rape is not based on the context that it was supposed to be trail of faith nor a lack of commitment of God's part. the thing is, life in itself is not based wholly of action and reaction while this sounds straight enough to be understood, it isn't. life is an array of events that may be most of the time not interconnected with each other and one may vary to the next.

And if God is not in control of us all the time (even being a strong believer), he not in control of others (sinners) either. human beings were made in the image of God and so we carry the concept that if one person is torturing the other, it is wrong. but in the wild world, if we see a lion preying in a deer or a shark eating a seal, we call it nature and do not interrupt it as it is the natural balance itself. the strong prey on the weak. so I gather that human beings feel the way to justify the all loving God out of reason rather than purpose (no offense, only a victim might have a real purpose).

1. God loves all human, where is God love for her?...God's love is eternal.
2. Is anything good can be taken from her experience?...no, only that she can discover herself to be stronger than she thought, if she choose to believe it.
3. Is it her fault if something like this happen to her and how will she able to say God has plan for her?...No, i don't think one's sin brings such a fate, though consequences may vary, if a girl is walking wearing a thong, in a place she knows to be filled with hungry eyes,and then something happens. well...my point is you never know. But such an accident is not brought on by God as a punishment.
4. If she is christian, will God allow things like this to happen to her? since God says in the Bible that He will not give us more than we can handle. I can't imagine if anybody can handle this kind of situation....I conclude that it is not in God's hand on what he allows and what he doesn't. most people like to believe that God is in control of us all the time or our lives and our families lives. but experience tells me, it cant be true. if it were true we'd be living in a utopia. And saying that, my faith still stands.

I'm more than sure that victims of such horrible crimes find it increasingly difficult to believe and there is no answer to their "why?". but it is because we are always told that God will protect us, we are taught to pray like that and our whole ideology of love revolves around that.

God has partial control over mankind, and where he sees all and knows all, I am sure that he deeply saddened by it. When God saw the generation of Noah, he was saddened and furious. But he couldn't make them stop. he could wipe them away but can not force them to obey. His control is limited to man's choices and decisions, to free will as you may say. and thus we can assume that there is no pre-destination. what happened could have happened bcuz of a lot of reasons( this does not include prophecies and a few rare instances in the bible)
our fate is not written, because then Paul argues that if i was supposed to do something, why should I be called a sinner for that (from romans, i guess, refers to pharaoh).

I live in Muslim country, and i have seen entire Christian villages burnt down to the ground, what was their sin, what wrong did they do. I have no answer. and if I believe in a justifying God, then the above satisfies me. because a time will come when he shall avenge his people, those who labor and pain for his name. (amen)

[SnowDrops]

Hi,

Here's a real life example: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/2 ... 84731.html
Just so we agree these things can and do happen.