| Evil is a positive presence in the world. Sin,sickness, death, fear, pain, loss, hatred, you name it, evil is more than the absence of good. Evil is a real presence. Now since God created everything, is He the author of evil? The answer is yes and no. When God first created the angels, Lucifer, the angel of light, was the most beautiful of all the angels, but when he fell, when he rebelled against God, wishing to be worshiped as God, he became the prince of darkness and evil came to be. If God made a mistake, and I say that reverently, his mistake was making Lucifer so beautiful that a third of the angels found him more attractive than God and fell with him. Lucifer's pride became his downfall. (See Eze 28, Isa 14, Rev 12) Interestingly, when Jesus took on human form he had no form nor comeliness. His beauty was an inward beauty. He had to deal with popularity and success but not from a physical viewpoint. The second fall, the fall of man, occurred after God made man from the dust of the earth and the woman from the rib of man. In Genesis we learn that everything God made was good. But the test for Adam and Eve was to obey God rather than Satan, the prince of darkness. They could eat of all the trees in the garden except for the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. To eat of that tree would bring death. Satan succeeded in enticing Eve and when she ate of that fruit, sin, sickness, and death became the lot of man. Thus evil spread from the angels to man. The story of the cross is God's answer to the failure of his creation. If predestination is anything, then predestination is God's plan to bring salvation to man by the shed blood of His Son. That God permits evil is the consequence of giving all of mankind the opportunity to experience redemption through Christ. In the end, all evil will end up in the lake of fire and those who received the gift of eternal life will live with God forever. God's patience with evil is His judgment that eternal life with him is worth the price of all human suffering. Did God create evil? In reality, no, but he took full responsibility for it by offering his Son for the salvation of the world. Evil is the result of free choice, not God and God will be exonerated in the end. For now he speaks only through His Son. Amen |