Christians, can you account for the problem of evil given this pre-rebuttal?

Evil, by definition is opposition to DIVINE law and DIVINE authority; that is God.

God defines murder as something that is against His law, His commandments.

If God commands (in this case Israel) to kill, it is not murder, because God commanded it.

There is an example In Judges 20, where the tribes of Israel went to war against their own tribe of Benjamin and lost 2 battles although Israel outnumbered Benjamin 10 to 1. When Israel consulted God about the evil that the tribe of Benjamin had done, THEN Israel won the war. The lesson should be, don't go to war without consulting God first.

Take your cancer example. How does one get cancer? Eating food that they shouldn't or Drinking something they shouldn't or Breathing something they shouldn't. In some cases like breathing, it is not necessarily the persons fault, but is instead the fault of mankind and industrialization. Right?

God is not a dummy. I have tried it this before, and it didn't work. Why should God answer my prayers when I have not or am not being obedient to his commandments? If I have not confessed all of my sins and am not working to repent (turn away) from those sins, why should God answer my prayers when I am essentially being unfaithful? That is good reason for God to not answer prayers, don't you think?

On the other hand, if God wants me with Him, cancer can be a good means to get myself right with God and eventually go home to heaven.

Does this help?

First of all I do not consider cancer or sickness that may or may not lead to death evil, but are merely consequences of the fallen state of man which acts indiscriminately among the saved and the lost. Just because a person of faith prays for healing does not necessarily mean healing will come. We do not know the mind of God and what good He brings from different situations. I frankly do not believe healing does not come because God has a bigger plan for them in the afterlife but that God has a bigger plan for those who remain. God uses hardship and tough life situations to draw people to Himself since the Bible does state that God is our refuge, an ever present help in time of trouble. It is not that God is mean and has to be harsh to bring people to Himself but that God allows distress that people will seek refuge. We see it time and again in the old testament with God's chosen people, things were going good they forgot God but difficulty turned them back to God. That is why being a Christian a person does not have to fear death because whether they have been overtaken by evil or just the effects of a fallen state, we already have victory over the grave. Martyrs would not have died for their faith if they did not have this hope.

Dying from cancer is evil?

And please do explain how this so-called "argument" that, so far, atheists seem to be the only ones using, that Christians saying God had a "bigger plan" for them later on somehow makes human life valueless from a Christian perspective.

The logic of that nonsense escapes me completely.

Details, details.

And as Paul said "Should we do evil so that good may come about? Absolutely no", so there goes your vacuous and tenuous attempt at logic concerning the angle about murder as well.

"If this were the case, however, murder wouldn't be a bad thing"

Scripture teaches the end does not justify the means. It is not ok to do evil so that good can come, so it is not the case that murder wouldn't be a bad thing.

Also, where in all of scripture does it teach this life is meant to be easy and without suffering? To the contrary, Christ said we would have persecution and tribulation in this life. If you do some OT reading, you'll find that people draw closer to God in times of trouble, not in good times. It may be that our temporary troubles here will prove to be eternal blessings, as was the case with Lazarus, but not the rich man.

Actually, the Bible doesn't talk about an "after life". It talks about life, this life, real life, only in a repaired universe that runs right without an evil influence.

We are in a probationary period where the forces at work in the spirit realm and the physical realm are allowed to exert their influence and free will as they see fit. God will only influence and Satan is only allowed to influence. What happens when God is unable to answer a prayer in a way that we would like is that his influence could not override all the other random factors such as time and chance, cause and effect, and the consequences of what happens to us by choice or accident or one of the aforementioned causes.

Life happens.

Sickness is a part of the consequences of sin.

The problem of evil is everyone's problem, not just Christians. I believe that God has a greater plan for this life, not just for the afterlife. Others believe that there is no greater plan. That doesn't make pain go away...it just makes it pointless.

As far as death is concerned, everyone dies of something. Some just die earlier than others. On this side of eternity, death is a hard-and-fast rule.

Scw319, thank you for asking your question in such polite way. And yes, it is an interesting question... What happens is that we don't understand God's will, when we pray, many times we are asking for our will to be done. Our will is not always God’s will. We are not always open to God’s will. We or the people we are praying for are not always willing or ready to accept what God wants to give. Murder is wrong because Jesus taught us to love one another, and certainly when you murder another person you are not loving that person.

God bless you.

A billion die every year from cancer, heart disease and strokes alone!

3 million die every year from starvation, drought and the diseases caused by it.

200,000 from natural disasters!

This god who christians credit with creating and causing everything seems to love killing more people every second than the number of people that have ever been claimed to have been saved by his miracles!

"what is God doing when a cancer patient prays for his cancer to be healed and dies anyway?"

Answering their prayer.

no we are growing in our knowledge of God the father, God the son Jesus and God holy spirit daily. and we have been made alive together Christ alive spiritualy, and we have been set free from the bondage of sin and death to live in the newness of life guided by God's Spirit daily, God has no greater joy than to know his chrildren walk in truth, our only source of truth in this fallen world is found in God word (bible). all things you speak of the answer is things happen some time we donot understand but it is God will and he know the full story of what is happeninge,we only see a speck of what is happing. God is just all loving all caring and he makes our paths stright daily.