God is not to blame for suffering of any sort.

In fact if you study the history of deaths and injuries to both mankind and animals you will find that in fact exercise of free will most definitely di come into most of them. Why? How? Simple, the vast majority have happened to mankind because of choosing to live in areas that are prone to that sort of event. Had they been in a position to use their free will wisely and consult with God about it they would doubtless have been steered away from those areas, however, Adam"s misuse of his free will prevented that being possible.. What about the Natural disasters themselves? An interesting point tends to emerge if you follow the bible story closely. Genesis 1:9 tells us that the waters on the earth were all gathered into one place, which by default means that effectively the land was also. Had the earth"s crust remained that stable there would have been no natural disasters. So when did the land become unstable as it is currently? The first, and only, hint that Genesis gives us about that is in Genesis 10:25 tells us that after the flood, Peleg was born and it was in his lifetime that the Earth was divided., because people were already dispersing, that can only mean the literal earth, and the continent splitting and starting to form the Continents we know now. What could be the link between that and the flood? Genesis 1:6-8 tells us that there were two lots of waters. One of which remained on the earth, and one which was taken to high in the Atmosphere, presumably in the form of vapour. This would be the source of the water that was brought down to form the flood. Since that water was never taken back up, how did dry land appear? Geology tells us that at some point the earth"s crust cracked and was violently tilted in places, which is why we have tectonic plates that move under each other and are the cause of earthquakes and Tsunami. It would be logical to suggest this was the point at which the crust cracked and tilted allowing water to sink not the lower parts and the higher parts to rise above the surface, because of the weight of water being brought down onto the earth to form the flood. This could also explain the "instantly frozen" mammoths that have appears from the thawing Permafrost for over 100 years now. This means that the natural disasters themselves are all caused by the historic misuse of free will that brought the flood down on humanity. The important thing is that you can chose how you use free-will, and also whether or not to give it up. The original intention was for mankind to use it wisely by consulting with God on difficult issues and accepting his advice, sought or not. Would God have been wiser not to give man free-will? Really considering he wanted a semi-autonomous humanity, he had no choice but to give us free will and his trust to use it wisely. Would he have been more loving to withhold free-will? Does anyone really feel that would like to eb nothing more than a robot with no control whatever over their lives? Of course we didn"t shoes to be "Agents of free-will". We didn"t choose to be born either. We didn"t choose to have the need to breathe either. There is no such thing as eternal suffering in the next life. For those who fail the final test , eternity will be very brief indeed. I supplied an alternate analogy because it works, simple as. Except that God did not give us this disease, Adam did. It was simply an inevitable result of Adam"s sin. Which, again, is why I gave you an alternative analogy which actually works. "Why did Adam get to accept a cancer on my behalf? How are Adam's actions my fault?" It"s called Heredity, Just as you can inherit a weakness to cancer from your parents, towards heart problems, so you inherit all the sinful nature of Adam and all the weaknesses that his imperfection brought with it. " God created this system where it was possible for Adam to fail even though he did not need to, and with the knowledge that billions of souls would be tormented because of the creation of such a system." In fact if, as I explain above, God wanted something other than ether a static display, or a completely predictable creation with no control over its own actions, then he had no choice but to give us free will and trust us to use it wisely. " That's easy for you to say. You seem quite well-fed, and since you can afford to use the internet I am guessing you're not in a bad financial situation either." Guess again. I am a partially disabled 64 year old living on pension credit and low level DLA, which the government seems intent on doing away with because3 of the need to make financial cuts. I have no other income and am in fact, due to a period of ill health, heavily in debt and under an "Independent Voluntary Agreement" to pay those debts off. The internet is not a luxury for me. It pays for itself in lack of stress because I can shop from home, manage what finances I have from home, it saves me money by allowing me to shop at home, and most of the time is my sole contact with the outside world as I have no family and few friends in this area, as well as being unable to get out and make more. I have been homeless a number of times, and the one thing I have never done is starve, because food, and my only touch of independence, my Kawasaki ZX10, come before all else. For the last few months I have been living, deliberately, well below the "bread line" because I have been saving radically. I have had the good fortune to meet on the internet, a young lady, currently working as a house servant in the Lebanon, who has agreed to become my wife and carer, to which end she has refused to renew her contract, after 5 years, and is going home to the Philippine so that we can get married there, because that is her home country. She knows of my health problems and lack of money, partly because she knows I have been having a very restricted diet simply in order to save to get there, and bring her home with me. Things are rarely as they seem on the surface. "Can you please explain to me how I can possibly turn my free will switch off?" Easy, you simply choose to let others make all your decisions for you. You wouldn"t be the first to do so, and you won"t be the last if you go that way. "Why should God not have wants?" He is a super intelligent being, why should he not have wants? "Because that turns him into a being that is not self-sufficient." How? If he were not self-reliant he would have needed help to do everything he ash chosen o do. " It should not require the existence of any other beings." Creating this whole caboodle was a want, not a need; he could manage perfectly well without it, and did before he decided he wanted something to love and care for. " An All-Powerful God should not be affected in any way by our actions." Other than our ability to make him happy or otherwise, he is not affected by us in any way. " Our actions cannot possibly benefit or harm a self-sufficient and all-powerful being." True, we cannot affect him in any way other than making him happy or otherwise. "Satan challenged God. He said he would prove to God that human beings would not serve him. God said that they would and allowed Satan to influence human beings just to prove him wrong. In what sense of the word is this not a bet? And if God did not allow suffering because of this particular event, why even mention it?" That was not a bet it was a challenge to God"s authority, and right, as well as ability, to have others serve him voluntarily. He accused God of being a liar in his temptation of Eve when he told her "You positively will not die" What was God to do, ignore such an insult, and all the problems that stem form it? No. He took the only truly wise course open to him to remove once and for all the challenger and ensure that none were able to follow in Satan"s footsteps in the future, the only option that would achieve that end other than completely wiping out all of his creation and forgetting the whole thing. Why would he, as the epitome of Justice, thus punish all the faithful angels that have stood by him through all of the events of the last 6,000 years or so despite Satan openly mocking God in front of them all? That really would be completely unjust. "No we're not. God is not just the one giving the operation, he is also the cause and propagator of the disease of the disease. This is not true of the parents, who would prevent the child from getting sick in the first place if they could" No, he did not cause or propagate it. Satan caused itr and is continuing to propagate it. "My solution was to separate Job and Satan (i.e. Not let them interact with each other). So in fact, Satan would NOT be able to do whatever he wanted (i.e. influence humans Didn't humans have enough temptations already? I mean give us a break Yahweh)." Job is merely an example; Satan has been influencing people since the Garden of Eden. Simply preventing one from doing anything does not prevent others from trying it. Proving beyond doubt that the challenge is not true solves all problems which is why God chose that course. "Furthermore, the option God chose is in fact the option whereby Satan got to do whatever he wanted except directly cause the death of human beings. Would you suggest to the parents in my illustration above that they should simply do nothing and allow the child to suffer for the rest of its life? That is "option 3" in that case. There is no eternal suffering. And separating those two children only affects those two, Satan and his followers affect all of mankind , past and present except those few who have chosen to accept God"s protection, as has always been the case. The logic of it is really very simple. He was not to blame for it all going wrong, and once it had he took the only course that would prevent it ever recurring. Simple as. There really is no other alternative.