Posted on 10/29/2026 11:25:36 AM PDT by Red Badger
Billy Crystal has had a terrible past few years.
A wildfire destroyed his home and possessions, and the murder of his friend and longtime collaborator Rob Reiner left him grieving another devastating loss.
When asked recently whether he had been talking to God through it all, Crystal offered a blunt answer:
"No, because I don't trust Him. Too many bad things have happened."
It's a painfully honest response, and plenty of people understand the sentiment. When life delivers one blow after another, it's natural to wonder where God is and whether He can really be trusted.
But does abandoning trust in God actually make more sense of our suffering, or does it leave us with an even bleaker picture of the world?
Terrible things happen to people every day, including people whose suffering far exceeds even Crystal's. Faithful Christians lose their homes, bury their children, endure cancer, and experience violence that seems impossible to reconcile with a good God. Some emerge with their faith strengthened; others struggle to hold on. What accounts for the difference, and what does Christianity offer that might help us understand it?
The Christian answer is not that God promises to shield His followers from tragedy. Jesus told His disciples they would face trouble in this world, and Scripture is filled with people wrestling with God's apparent silence. Read Job, the Psalms, or Jesus' own words from the cross, and you'll find that grief and bewilderment are not foreign to biblical faith.
But Christianity offers something more than an explanation for why bad things happen. It offers a God who entered into our suffering.
In Jesus Christ, God experienced betrayal, injustice, grief, and death. The cross doesn't answer every question about why suffering occurs, but it tells us something essential about God's character: He is not indifferent to our pain. And the resurrection declares that pain and death will not have the final word.
We don't trust God because everything that happens is good or because we can always discern His purposes. We trust Him because we believe He has revealed His goodness in Christ and demonstrated through the resurrection that evil will not ultimately prevail.
Crystal's response also invites us to consider the alternative. Suppose there is no God. Would that make the loss of a home or the murder of a friend any less painful? Perhaps believing that suffering has no larger significance offers some comfort, but it comes at a cost. If the universe is ultimately indifferent, there is no assurance that justice will prevail, evil will be defeated, or death is anything other than the end. The suffering remains, but the hope of ultimate redemption disappears.
In his sorrow, Crystal appealed to laughter, calling it a healer, and he's right. Finding moments of joy amid sorrow is profoundly human. But laughter can help us endure suffering without answering the deeper questions it raises: Is our life ultimately meaningless? Will evil be triumphant? Does death get the last word?
Christ says the answer to those questions is no.
I wouldn't fault anyone for wrestling with God after devastating loss, and I don't presume to know everything happening in Crystal's heart. But far from being evidence that God cannot be trusted, the worst things that happen to us may be the very moments when we most need to understand who He has revealed Himself to be.
The Christian promise is not that we will never walk through the valley of the shadow of death.
It is that we need not walk through it alone - and that, through Christ, even death itself will one day be undone.
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When people turn from God because bad things happen to them, it means they weren’t there in the first place.
He put his faith in leftism, that’s his issue.
It seems he’s unfamiliar with Job.
His house burned down because of California's stupid liberal policies about "the environment", and Rob Reiner was killed because of his stupid liberal policies regarding raising his son.
God isn't Billy Crystal's problem. It's the way people around him think.
You are correct. Sadly, because he’s famous, he will lead many astray. He has reaped his reward.
Yeah well it is not about Billy or any one of us. Self-centered people speak like Billy. This is God’s universe and He can do whatever he wants. We are just along for the ride and perhaps being tested to see if we are even suitable for heaven.
The Earth is not our final home. Just a pass-through. Those who are not suitable based on God’s selection criteria - whatever that is - are probably not invited into God’s home. But no mortal knows the details of how all of this works. We must have trust and faith in Jesus.
That’s what came to mind for me.
He’s got the socialist’s mindset, even towards religion: Dear Supreme Leader in the Sky, please give me everything I want!
Yes, that’s the root cause.
It is not a matter of trusting God, it is a matter of accepting the challenge of what are sometimes severe tests of faith, and rising to that challenge in a manner which builds character, and teaches a lesson in humility along the way.
Is the glass half full, or half empty? Neither one, the glass merely contains a liquid of sometimes unknown composition, and your task, if you choose to accept the challenge, is to deal with whatever effects it may have on your particular situation, whether to your advantage, or your failure.
Even failure is instructive.
He believed that made him exempt from the consequences of California Democrats' wildfire management.
At some point in life I stopped caring what other people believe in.
My advice is to be concerned about ypur own personal beliefs and actions. Having an opinion about someone else’s is literally a waste of your time. And we don’t have an abundance of time.
At some point in life I stopped caring what other people believe in.
My advice is to be concerned about ypur own personal beliefs and actions. Having an opinion about someone else’s is literally a waste of your time. And we don’t have an abundance of time.
I've driven though Pacific Palisades before the fire. Amid the $3 million "middle class" homes are huge estates in the eight figure range, behind high walls and security guards. It does make one feel shielded from threats.
Apart from Job, Crystal should also familiarize himself with Poe's "Masque of the Red Death."
A mental illness brought on by years of profound drug abuse. Drugs are glossed over by leftists. Their son was allowed to live with them while he indulged himself.
How is that God’s fault?
I believe raising a child with liberal valuses creates "mental illness."
Children need structure and they need discipline. Failing to give it will create feral little monsters like Reiner's son.
I think that same son would have turned out just fine had he been raised by a rational man.
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