If God is benevolent (good/loving), omniscient (all-knowing), and omnipotent (all-powerful) why is there evil in the world? This question has been around for a very long time, and it is the cause for many people leaving the Christian faith, or not even considering it. The question is extremely difficult to face, not just because it is an intellectual question that keeps getting asked, answered, and challenged from a variety of different angles and perspectives, but it is also tied to our emotions. We see and feel evil and its consequences every day. We hear, see, and even experience hatred, racism, genocide, war, and question why that those innocent animals have to die in that raging forest fire.
Welcome, friends, to the Problem of Evil.
The logical problem of evil looks something like this…
(1) If God exists then he is omniscient, omnipotent and perfectly good.
(2) If God were omniscient, omnipotent and perfectly good then the world would not contain evil.
(3) The world contains evil.
Therefore:
(4) It is not the case that God exists.
There are a lot of responses to this argument (including that the existence of certain evils is necessary for other forms of good can be evident, and that God could be stopping a greater evil from existing by allowing smaller evils, etc.) My initial response to all of this was that we brought evil upon ourselves because of sin. Basically we choose sin, we deserve the consequences. One act of disobedience towards God is justly punished by death and eternal separation from God in hell, then it follows that any evil we experience on earth is a display of God’s mercy. Also, God always provided a way out of evil, a path out of sin and into God’s forgiveness and into a relationship with Him. After the first act of sin we see God sacrifice an animal to clothe Adam and Eve. We see Cain and Able sacrificing to God as well as Noah before the Levitical Law was established. Then we see the sacrificial code established in Leviticus 1-7, and ultimately we now turn to Jesus, the one and only perfect sacrifice that atones for all our sin. So the existence of evil is the result of our free will, our choices to rebel against God. God in His mercy has delayed punishment in His perfect timing, because even though waiting means allowing more evil to exist, it also means that more people can come to Him. In a sense, we deserve every bit of evil that comes our way. Even Job who questioned God about why he was facing evil even though he was righteous was shut up simply because of who God is.
I figured my response made sense, perhaps it was a little heartless and unfeeling, but I favor logic over emotions. Then I went to the Killing Fields in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. There I was confronted with the deep rooted feelings of devastation that go along with genocide. I saw where part of an entire generation was wiped out. I looked at a tree upon which small children and infants were beaten until they died. Bone fragments and pieces of clothing are still coming up out of the ground as rain and wind erode the layers of dirt. It was sickening…and I claimed that we all deserved this. It is the closest thing I’ve seen to hell on earth…and we deserve it. Don’t get me wrong, I do NOT think this should have happened. It was unjust, cruel, and completely out of line with God’s grace and mercy, but it is still a picture of what sin deserves, how devastating sin is, and how merciful God really is. The emotions I was confronted with were heart wrenching. I realized how insensitive my stance was on the problem of evil. Though I have now been confronted with the emotional baggage that goes along with facing such devastating evils, I can see the good and the love that God can pour out from it. I see His mercy in everyday things; I have a new picture of how disgusting my sin really is to God. I also have a better understanding of how to approach and discuss struggles with evil things that happen with more sensitivity and emotional awareness, and I know that emotional awareness does not negate the logical understanding either.
