Question:
Answer:
As Creator of life itself, God has sovereignty over it. We did nothing to earn the gift of our lives, and therefore we can’t blame God for willing its end.
It is true that he gives life, but it also belongs to his divine prerogative to take life. He does this every time someone dies a natural death. As St. Thomas Aquinas puts it,
All men alike, both guilty and innocent, die the death of nature: which death of nature is inflicted by the power of God on account of original sin, according to 1 Samuel 2:6: “The Lord killeth and maketh alive” (Summa Theologiae, I– II, q. 94, a. 5 ad 2).
God’s will for a person to die in no way contradicts his divine goodness. God’s choice to cease imparting his causal power in keeping a person alive is nothing more than God’s choice to not will all the good that he could have caused, since for the person to remain alive would be a good. And since to not will some good is not the same as willing evil (e.g., it’s not evil that God could have willed more sparrows than he did), God’s choice to no longer will a person to live is not to will evil. Therefore, God’s choice to no longer will a person to live is not contrary to his goodness.
So, God’s choice to cease willing the life of the firstborn males in Egypt in no way contradicts his divine nature.