Inception: where to begin?

Let me start out with another question I get often: If God wants the best for us, why does God let bad things happen to good people, or anyone for that matter? Let me first say, for natural disasters, I have no idea, chaos is somehow part of the equation in our world. But also part of the equation is consequence, and a lot of the pain in this world is caused by us. What if what is really best for us is a world with consequences, where our greed and malice breeds pain and our graciousness and love breeds joy. It's a world where peace and justice has to earned. That's a high price to pay.

Which brings me to the second question, one I have been trying to figure out for a while: If the rules of our world are under the arbitrary control of God, why did God set it up such that Jesus had to die to provide salvation to the world. There must have been some other way! Perhaps Jesus died to show us that love is capable of fighting to the bitter end for the sake of the poor, the outcast, the forgotten, and to do so uncompromisingly, even when threatened with death. I have never had to fight to the death for anything, but I know there are many people that have, often in the defense of those whose societies want to ignore or endlessly exploit. Jesus is God's endorsement to those that would fight for good even when the stakes are stacked against them, when death is the likely outcome, and when everyone else says to abandon the fool-hearty cause because the opposition is too powerful or too established or too brutal. Perhaps it is this that will save us from our sins.