The Purpose of Evil

                                                              

“Remember the former things of old; for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things not yet done, saying my counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose”.

                                                                                                                                    -Isaiah 46:9-10

God, from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of his own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass; as yet so, as thereby neither is God the author of sin, nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures; nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established.

                                                                                                    -Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 3

Our God is in Heaven. He does whatsoever He pleases. (Psalm 115:3).

For the Lord of hosts has purposed, and who will annul it? His hand is stretched out, and who will turn it back (Isa 14:27)?

Speaking about the Lord King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon said, “For His dominion is an everlasting dominion, and His kingdom is from generation to generation. All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing. He does according to His will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth. No one can restrain His hand or say to Him, what have you done (Dan 4:35)?

These words answer the question as to if God is in control of absolutely everything that happens in the earth. The above passages make it clear that God is the direct or indirect cause of all things.

So, what about evil? Does evil come from God?

The answer is no. God in eternity past did not create evil nor is He morally responsible for it. The scripture says in James 1:13-14, “Let no one say when he is tempted, I am being tempted by God, for God cannot be tempted with evil, He Himself tempts no one. But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire.”

Another clear-as-a-bell passage describing clearly God’s and man’s relationship with evil.            

We need to ask another question. Since God is sovereign and is in absolute control of everything that happens, how did evil get here? The only answer that makes sense is God allowed it to exist, He ordained it. I did not say He created it, He ordained it for a reason.  God in His infinite wisdom before the foundation of the world decided He would redeem the world through the sacrifice of His Son, and also before the world began decided he would allow evil to serve a purpose in His providential plan.

What is evil? It is a sinful disposition toward what is good and right. It is not a thing, or a spirit. Rather, it is a negation, a deprivation of what is good and holy.

Evil will always call God’s goodness into question. If God is who He says or who you Christians say He is, then why did He allow evil in His world is always the question of the critics. He must not be that powerful if evil snuck in! Look at all the terrible things that happen every day! Or, since evil exists, God must be evil himself. If God is so good there should be no evil at all!

Certainly God could have created a universe with no evil, but we have to wonder what that would look like.  Well without it (i.e. the ability to choose evil) there would be no choices for mankind. We would have no freewill. This would make us robots with pre-programmed choices. That is not what God wanted when He created us. He gave us the ability to choose, to love Him or hate Him; to obey or disobey. Since when do we want our choices taken away from us?

As for the evil we deal with it every day; Planes crashing into buildings, poverty, disease, murder, drug abuse and trafficking, prostitution, adultery, pornography and death. Whose decisions were these? Certainly not God’s! They were ours. We are our own worst enemy. The reason the world is a mess is because of the choices mankind has freely made. We want to get rid of evil, we have to stop committing sin!

We are living with the consequences of our actions.

Our fault. We continually overdose on the sinful choices we make, and we cannot and will not get clean. That is an every-millisecond-of-the-day reality.  Why can’t we stop being evil? 1) We are evil by nature (Eph 2:3b). 2) We love our sin and our darkness (John 3:19).

So where can we get help? Is there any hope for mankind?

Only in the Lord Jesus Christ can we be made free from sin and its damning consequences. God sending Jesus was not a backup plan because the fall of man through Adam’s sin, it was always the Father’s plan to send His Son to redeem sinners since He knew we would fall. Without evil being in the picture, there would have been no need for Jesus to come and save sinners because everyone would be sinless.[1] God has always desired to put His love, righteousness, grace and mercy on display, and by sending Jesus to become a satisfying sacrifice for sin, He was able to do that in the most perfect way. God wanted to glorify Himself.

Ephesians 1:4-6, “Even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ according to the purpose of His will, the praise of His glorious grace, with which He has blessed us in the Beloved.

One of the reasons why God allowed evil is so that He could put His kindness, grace and mercy on full display. This way God could demonstrate His grace and mercy against the backdrop of evil otherwise His grace and mercy is not seen in full for the holy virtues they are.

Another reason for God allowing evil is so that He could put His justice and wrath on display on those who hate Him. Romans 9:22-24 says this, “What if God wanting to show His wrath and to make His power known endured with much patience the vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, and that He might make known the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy which He had prepared beforehand for glory, even us whom He called, not of the Jews only, but also the Gentiles?”[2]

The last reason God allowed sin or evil to exist is so that He could put His love on display. Romans 5:8 says, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

We see then that evil was indeed ordained by God for the reason I just mentioned; So the Lord could put His righteousness on display in the face of unrighteousness. To put His love on display in the face of hate. And to put his wrath and holy anger on display.

Could we know God’s perfect love to the degree we know it without hate? Could we know God’s righteousness without unrighteousness? Could we know God’s hatred of sin without His judgment of it? The answer to these questions is no.

Without the negative contrasts of evil human choices we could never praise God for the sweetness of His power and grace to the degree we know now. As heinous and pervasive as evil is, God’s love and power are infinitely greater than evil.

Less someone is still confused or bewildered regarding evil, it is not a force that is fighting against God for supremacy over Him. Evil is a servant of God. It does His bidding. He controls it.  Even when mankind sins, it does not alter the plan of God He pre-ordained from eternity. Every decision man makes whether good or evil is already interwoven into the fabric of God’s providential plan.

Yet despite all the writer just covered, someone will say, “If every decision fits into God’s plan perfectly, and His will is being accomplished no matter what man does how can I be judged as a sinner for my actions” (Rom 9:19)?

The person that is asking this question wants an excuse for their sin; they are not interested in repenting.

The reason why we are judged by God for evil is because we chose the path of sin. We also have the option to choose what is good.

There is a glorious end to our current morbid reality. In the new heavens and earth God will abolish evil forever (Rev 21:4-5). God’s superlative love is demonstrated in this final act of judgment. What if evil never existed? God could not be extolled for abolishing it from the earth. The eventual removal of sin demonstrates God’s supreme power. At this point all the redeemed from all time will dwell with the Lord. We will no longer have the ability to sin.

Concluding, God ordained evil so that He could put His righteousness on display. God ordained evil so that He could put His love on display. And finally, God allowed evil, to put His wrath on display against it and ultimately destroy it.

All of the aforementioned should leave no doubt to who is in charge of everything that occurs, both good and evil.

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[1] How could God’s love be put on display if Jesus came and died

For a world with no evil? So we see the necessity of evil in God’s

Overall plan so that the atonement of Christ actually saves sinners.

No evil, no salvation. And since God predetermined in eternity past

To send Christ to die and save sinners, the Father decided to allow evil

To demonstrate its wickedness through the sinful decisions of man they

freely made, which allowed to Him demonstrate the wonders of His grace.

[2] This is clearly dealing with sovereign election