Why do bad things happen to good people? God does not owe us an explanation; God's thoughts are infinitely higher than ours. The secret things belong to the Lord, but our pride does not like to factor this insight into our thinking. As a shepherd does not take the sheep into his counsel as he moves the flock to another pasture, God (seeing the big picture) does not take us into His counsel on every move, trial, or test He puts us through. The story of Joseph (with Jacob's apparent bitter loss of Joseph) illustrates the necessity to exercise patient faith in the wake of incomplete data. God is not obligated to give us an explanation for His decisions.