Even reading the Bible, it seems like a total free for all on this Earth. Many stories of people getting killed, look at all the apostles, and all the danger.
And recently a Church shooting has happened this week.
Yup. The moment we forget that the heart of every human God has not transformed is "deceitful above all things and desperately wicked" (
Jeremiah 17:9) we become very vulnerable to their wickedness. The world is hopelessly fouled with sin, ruled by the devil 'til Christ returns and the entire planet and heavens are destroyed in fire and replaced. (
2 Peter 3:7-10) The world is a very dangerous place.
Not only do I want salvation for my soul, I want salvation on this Earth and be protected from anything at least that I did not cause to happen (stuff out of my control), whether they are intentional or accidents (getting in a car wreck).
I do not fear death, but enduring pain and hardship. I thought to myself if something terrible would of happened to me it would deeply shake me up and start to question God.
If God kept you from all harm, would He not be obliged to keep everybody from harm, too? What would be fair and just in God keeping only you fully protected from pain, hardship and death caused by sin? If He did so for you, He'd be obliged to do the same for everybody else. But, then, we wouldn't be truly free moral agents, would we? Suffering, pain and death are the natural consequences of Man's wicked choices. If God simply negates the corruptive, lethal consequences of Man's sin, keeping everybody safe from the effects of their sin, the choice to sin is not genuinely free.
Imagine if this happened to the good choices we made, God erasing the positive consequences of our actions, blotting out, say, the rewards of hard work, or the benefits of an act of integrity, or the life-saving efforts of a firefighter, or EMT, or surgeon. We'd think God very evil, our good choices being made in no small part for the positive effects they produce but divinely negated all the time. And what would be the point of making good choices, then? In the same way, if God were to negate all the destructive effects of our sinful choices, they cease to be meaningful and so cease to be genuinely free.
The price of freedom, of our moral free agency, is personal responsibility and the consequences for good or ill that tumble out of our choices. God must let the results of our choices bear their full fruit if our choices are to be free and meaningful. But, that means we all suffer the ripple effects of the evil choices of others and of our own wickedness. When many billions of people are doing sinful things many times a day, the corruption and death of their sin is going to be enormous and our world a very dark and dangerous place. Thank God, He has not totally withdrawn His sin-mitigating influence upon the world! Yet.
Anyway, all this to say that God doesn't do us a bad turn when He allows us to choose freely and to bear the consequences of our choices - consequences that, for good or ill, touch the lives of others, too. Without such freedom we could not truly love God and walk with Him in joy as we were made to do.
But as I read more of the Bible, I see people did not have an easy life, and there was no promise for being free of persecution in this world.
Sometimes I lose focus on the long term, and these worldly things get in the way. It is hard to let go and fully trust in God in these difficult times.
All of us will have to "let go" at some point, whether we want to or not, passing through the valley of the shadow of death into eternity. But our Lord, the Good Shepherd, is with us in that valley, leading us into the joyful forever for which we were made, our lives here merely a brief moment in the everlasting life we will live with our Holy Maker.
Philippians 3:20-21
20 For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ;
21 who will transform the body of our humble state into conformity with the body of His glory, by the exertion of the power that He has even to subject all things to Himself.
Colossians 3:1-4
1 Therefore if you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.
2 Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth.
3 For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
4 When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory.
2 Peter 3:11-13
11 Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness,
12 looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be destroyed by burning, and the elements will melt with intense heat!
13 But according to His promise we are looking for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells. 
