We all have those stories of pain and loss of friends and family. Some are more intense than others. Many of those stories happen over the holidays, and we’re reminded of them when the seasons change from the warm summer to the cold winter. Then there are the larger societal stories, like one of the most devastating earthquakes ever recorded. On July 28, 1976, in a city east of Beijing, China, a 7.5 magnitude earthquake stuck the city of Tangshan. The whole city laid in rubble, with the official death toll just under 250,000, but estimates put it up to around 600,000. But it didn’t stop there. An aftershock hit another city, causing another roughly 250,000 deaths. These tragic stories are the reality of our world, and the question is why? Why all this pain and suffering?
At the the end of our November Apologetics series on Answering the agnostic scholar Bart Ehrman, we talked about how Ehrman’s issue with the orthodox faith of Christianity is the problem of Evil. Ehrman writes, “There came a time when I left the faith. This was not because of what I learned through the historical criticism, but because I could no longer reconcile my faith in God with the state of the world that I saw all around me …. There is so much senseless pain and misery in the world that I came to find it impossible to believe that there is a good and loving God who is in control, despite my knowing all of the standard rejoinders that people give …. In my case, historical criticism led me to question my faith. Not just its superficial aspects but its very heart. Yet it was the problem of suffering, not a historical approach to the Bible, that led me to agnosticism.”
The problem for Ehrman is the problem a lot of people have with God. If there is a God, why is there evil? If God is all-powerful and all-good, then why do people suffer? Sometimes it’s phrased as, “Why do good people suffer?”
The problem of evil is universal and is one of the core questions that every religion and worldview struggles to answer. To the Hindu or the Buddhist, evil and suffering occur because of past things we have done and now must learn to move beyond them. To the muslim, evil is created by Allah to test his chosen and damn the rejected. To the atheist, it’s part of an uncaring, non-purposeful world.
However, for us as Christians, evil is laid at our feet as a way to diminish the teaching of the Scriptures that God is wholly good, and all-powerful. But how is that possible? The Hindu does not have a wholly good and all-powerful god, neither does the atheist. The muslim’s god is the creator of evil and is un-personal, and creates evil as a tool by which he carries out his plan. But the God of the Bible cares deeply for his creatures. To Ezekiel, God states, “For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone, declares the Lord GOD; so turn, and live. (Ezk. 18:32)” Even the death of the wicked God takes no pleasure in.
So while evil is a necessary part of other worldviews and religions, it isn’t with the biblical God, because, as the Scriptures say, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change (Jam. 1:17).” So if God is good, loving, wants good things for his creatures, and there is not evil in him, then why do we have evil?
Now, there are a lot of ways to approach this question, some of which I shared back in our series on Answering Ehrman. However, I’m going to give you my answer to the question of evil, and develop it over the next four weeks. There are four aspects that we’re going to cover: The origin of the problem, why is there evil? This will be today. Why is there natural evil, tsunamis, earthquakes and the such. Why is there seemingly a lot of evil? And finally, what is God’s answer to all of it?
Let’s answer the first question, what is the origin of evil? I see the question as being rooted in the very nature of God’s design for us.
Genesis 1:26-27 reads, “Then God said, 'Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.’ So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”
This one sentence is a profound theological statement that reverberates throughout human societies and the nature of who we are. We, both men and women, are carriers of the imago Dei, the image of God. But what does it mean to be made in the image of God?
The theological definition is: A term describing the uniqueness of humans as God’s creatures. In the Genesis creation account, Adam and Eve are said to be created in God’s image and likeness (Gen. 1:26-27). Theologians differ on what the image of God actually refers to, but most agree that the image is not primarily physical. Instead, the imago Dei may include presence of will, emotions and reason; the ability to think and act creatively; or the ability to interact socially with others. Scripture attributes the imago Dei solely to humans, and it indicates that the image is in some sense still present even after the Fall (see Jas. 3:9). Above all, however, Christ, and by extension those who are in Christ - is the image of God. (Grenz, Guretzki, Nordling, Pocket Dictionary of Theological Terms, 63)
Theologians and Scholars have not come to a consensus on what the image of God is, but it is unique to humans. But why does God create a uniqueness for humans to carry his image?
You might have heard this from the Westminster Catechism as it begins with these words, “What is the chief end of man? Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.” This is God’s goal for humanity: that his creatures would experience him. However, how can the finite experience the infinite, and what does it mean to experience him? Second Peter 1:4 reveals that those who are in Christ Jesus “… become partakers of the divine nature … (ESV).” But how can the finite participate in the divine nature of the wholly-other God? Humans will not be omniscient, or omnipresent, or omnipotent. They will not be little divines, for there is only one divine, none before, nor none after (Is. 43:10). So, in what way will humans participate in the divine?
In the Summa Theologia by Thomas Aquinas, the medical scholar points to God’s will as being the core to who God is. God is the only being who can actually will something to come about. That means that God is the only being who makes free choices. In that will, Aquinas notices that God wills goodness. This is why all that he wills to create is good. As the Scriptures state, “And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day (Gen. 1:31).”
His will is something unique to him and his will produces goodness. Keeping this in mind, what is the first thing he says to humanity? Genesis 2:15-17 gives us the first words to Adam from God, “The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, ‘You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.’”
This is a command to choose to follow God, or not. To participate in the good things that God creates, or choose a different path. In other words, a core component of an image bearer is the ability to choose. And that core component does not go away with the fall. Joshua would call the people of Israel, “Now therefore fear the Lord and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness. Put away the gods that your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord. And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord (Jos. 24:14-15).”
God would speak of this choice when he spoke through Isaiah, “Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool (Is. 1:18).”
John’s Gospel opens up with this choice when he writes, “But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God (Jn. 1:12).”
And in that same Gospel, Jesus said on several occasions states, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments (Jn. 14:15).”
To be an image bearer is to use the will the Lord gave us for goodness, which means choosing him instead of anything else.
The way we experience the divine is through yielding our will to the will of God. This can be seen in John’s vision of heaven, in Revelation 4:9-11, "And whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to him who is seated on the throne, who lives forever and ever, the twenty-four elders fall down before him who is seated on the throne and worship him who lives forever and ever. They cast their crowns before the throne, saying, ‘Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.’”
So then, where does the evil come from? It comes from the will of the image bearer to not willingly participate in the goodness of God. The choice is the greatest gift God has given to his image bearers because it allows us to participate in the divine ability to choose. However, God’s choices are eternal because he knowns and understands good and evil from an eternal perspective. For us, there is only one eternal choice, to accept God’s work on our behalf, or reject it.
All evil comes from a will who is rejecting the goodness of God. This is why Jesus states, “For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander (Matt. 15:19).”
James would write that what is contained in the heart is our desire and that is the cause of strife, “What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you (Jm. 4:1)?”
But though a person might be ignorant of who God is, they are not ignorant of God’s call to them. As Paul writes, “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse (Rom. 1:18-20).”
Each of us are responsible for the use of our will. What we choose reverberates into eternity. As Paul writes in Romans 2:6-8, "He will render to each one according to his works: to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life; but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury.”
So God gives the gift of the divine ability to choose to his image bearers, and with such a tremendous gift, a great responsibility weighs on us to utilize that gift to bring glory to him.
Due to this, the choice to do good mirrors God’s own. However, God’s choice to will good is from an eternal perspective that understands good and evil. Our choice comes through a finite experience of good and evil. It is because of this that God forgives through the work of Jesus even the most horrific of evils. Teaching us another aspect of his goodness, that of sacrifice, mercy, and grace.
By choosing God, we make an eternal choice of God’s goodness, and we understand, as God does, the impact of evil. Therefore we can then live eternally with him, as those who choose only good and never sin in his presence.
This is why our acceptance of what Jesus did on our behalf is so important. All of us have chosen evil, and because we have chosen evil, evil runs rampant in our world. Every time we choose evil, it grows. When it grows it devours. When it devours, death reigns. Until Christ is accepted, evil has dominion. Yet through Christ’s work, evil has been broken. Where before the evil seemed like the only choice, and even our good choices seemed to lead to evil, Christ’s way brings a new kingdom, and new reign where good and righteous work can work even in the most evil of places.
The question, why is there evil, is rooted in God’s love for us. A love that designed us to participate in a divine aspect of his nature, choice. Yet with that design of choice, we can use it it bring about evil. The answer to the question why is there evil, is that we use what we have been given wrongly, and why does God continue to allow it, that’s a question for another week. But for now the answer to the origin of evil is us. When we chose anything but the goodness of God, we participate in the creation of evil. We distort the good things of God, to seek our own desire, and by doing so, evil runs rampant. So it is us, not God, who is at fault for evil.
But what about natural evils, what about the amount of evil, and why doesn’t God do anything to stop it? We’ll cover each of these in the next several weeks. For now, we must take responsibility for the creation of evil, and realize what God calls us to do, lay down our will for his. Because his will is always for good.
My challenge then, is to go before the Lord, and pray this prayer.
“Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven (Matthew 6:9-10).” Amen.
Let us be a people who lay down our will to the Father, choosing his good over our evil, just as we were created to do.
