Why Did God Create Evil?

Some time ago I posted something on the subject of why did God create Satan. At the time, I pointed out that God created Lucifer as an angel, but that Lucifer became evil later. Someone else pointed out to me that the Bible actually says that God created evil. So, it gets more complicated. Why did God create evil? It occurs to me that perhaps the best illustration comes from an old children’s movie.

Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory (the 1971 film, not Charlie & the Chocolate Factory from 2005 based on the same book) was an interesting film, to say the least. A lot of the special effects don’t look nearly so good today as they did almost forty years ago, but the film still holds up pretty well. TBH, I thought Deep Roy in CatCF made a better Oompa Loompa than the guys they had in the original. Jonny Depp made a passable Willy Wonka, but Gene Wilder was better. Also, it seemed to me that Tim Burton (who directed CatCF) missed the point of the movie (although I could be mistaken—I understand that Roald Dahl, who wrote the book, hated WWatCF).

In any case, in both films, Willy Wonka has been reclusive for many years, but for whatever reason, he decides to include golden tickets in five candy bars manufactured at his chocolate factory. Each child who collects a golden ticket is invited for a special tour of the factory. Also included is a sample of a new candy called an everlasting gobstopper. Each of the five winners is approached by a creepy, mysterious man named Arthur Slugworth, who tells them that he is the head of a rival candy factory, and that the everlasting gobstopper threatens to put him out of business, unless they sell him their sample, and his people can reverse engineer it before Wonka puts it out on the market. During the tour, each of the five children, in turn, breaks one of Willy Wonka’s rules, and is eliminated from the tour (WARNING: Spoiler Alert! Don’t read the rest of this until you have seen the movie unless you have already made up your mind that you aren’t going to watch it). Charlie’s grandfather gets angry at Willy Wonka, and tells Charlie that he should sell his gobstopper to Slugworth. Their family is not well off, and the money that Slugworth has offered would make a tremendous difference. Even watching the movie (the first time) I couldn’t help but wonder, does Willy Wonka expect these children to be perfect? Charlie considers, but, decides that Willy Wonka is right, he did break the rules, and he can’t expect any special treatment. In order to eliminate temptation to change his mind later, he makes his way to Willy Wonka’s office, where Willy Wonka looks absolutely crushed, as though he can’t believe that none of the five children could follow a few simple rules. Charlie apologizes, and returns the everlasting gobstopper. Willy Wonka’s whole demeanor changes instantly, and gets very excited that one of the children actually did the right thing. It turns out the Wonka had a pretty good idea that none of the five children would be able to follow all of the rules for the entire length of the tour, but he wanted to see if any of them would take responsibility for their own actions. He names Charlie as his heir, Charlie will inherit the Chocolate factory, and introduces Charlie to his assistant, Arthur Slugworth, who shows Charlie the other four gobstoppers. At this point, we realize that Slugworth was part of the test (and, of course, prevented the gobstoppers from falling into competitors hands to be reverse engineered). I hope that the Biblical parallels are obvious…

The point is, if there were no evil, how would we know to choose the good? If we only do good because we have no other options, what have we really accomplished? If there were no Satan tempting us, then we would have no battles, and we would have no victory. Of course, Satan is not God’s assistant, but he does God a service by providing us with choices. If we want to be the heir, though, we will fight Satan’s choices, and stick to God’s.

Being Judgmental

Last week I mentioned that we Christians sometimes come off as judgmental, and that we put too much emphasis on what a person outside the faith is doing or not doing other than coming to Christ. I neglected to mention that when a person (whether they are of the Body or not of the Body) commits sin, and we just stand by, as condoning that sin, then we become partakers of that sin. We have been commissioned to warn people about the wrath to come.

When the adulterous woman was taken before Jesus, He did not (directly) prevent her stoning, although he was certainly more compassionate towards her than her accusers; He did tell her to go and sin no more, which made it clear that her earlier behavior was not acceptable (although one would hope that her narrow escape from a death by stoning would have made that point abundantly obvious). At the same time, He didn’t browbeat her about her past sins, in fact, He said, “Neither do I condemn thee.”

When he was at the Pharisee Simon’s house for dinner, and the woman (was it the same woman? I suspect that it was, but the Scriptures don’t say) anointed His feet, Simon found fault with Jesus, supposing that Christ didn’t know what sort of woman was touching Him. Of course, Jesus did know what she had been, but, unlike Simon, He was aware that her repentance was genuine; she was no longer what the Pharisee thought she was. Unfortunately, even those of us that call ourselves Christians often have more in common with Simon than with Christ. We are very limited in what we can see and sense. Many of us have been fooled more than once by people who have offered repentance as a pretense in order to gain, and then betray, our trust. I can forgive such a betrayal, but it is very hard for me to ever again extend trust to such an individual. We look at people with our human eyes, and we see their human faults, and, well, let’s be honest about it, we pass judgment, even though we know we aren’t supposed to. What we are supposed to do is meet people where they are, and help them to see what they could be.

I have talked before about Rahab the Harlot; out of all the people living in Jericho, she was the one who showed some measure of righteousness, if only because she feared God. When the two spies went into Jericho, they didn’t pass judgment on her for her profession, they understood that she was in the same predicament as the rest of the people of Jericho; if they didn’t repent, they would all die in their sins. Of course, Rahab showed by her actions that she feared God, and she was ready to change her entire life.

I’m trying to show that there are ways to convey that certain behaviors are not acceptable (most people have a pretty good understanding of what those behaviors are anyway) without being judgmental. People outside of Christ don’t need judgment from us, they will face righteous judgment in the next life anyway; what they need is mercy (hasn’t God showed each of us more mercy than we deserve?). They do need to be warned, but that should be done as compassionately as possible. Having said that, let me also point out that some people are going to need their cages rattled before they will be ready to accept a warning. Sometimes the most compassionate thing to do is to let compassion go by the wayside and let the sinner have it with both barrels, but, that’s the exception rather than the rule. We seriously need to pray that God would allow us, and help us, to see people the way that He sees them.

Nobody's Perfect

I think we’ve all heard the expression, “Nobody’s perfect.” That’s true; God doesn’t create perfect people. Even the best of us have our faults and foibles. A lot of us are painfully aware of our own, although there are many that seem to be blissfully aware of theirs. To be honest, that kind of makes me wonder if I don’t have traits that I am unaware of, that other people are all-too aware of…

Part of the problem with that is that people outside the church will often judge the church by the people in it. If that person is a Christian, shouldn’t they act better? To be honest, all of us should be acting better than we are. Unfortunately, our human selves get the best of us, sometimes. All of us know, on some level, what we should be doing (or not doing), but find ourselves doing the wrong thing instead. I mentioned Paul’s writing recently, where he talks about doing things that he doesn’t want to do. Paul is talking about wanting to do the right thing, but then not doing it, or doing something he doesn’t want to do. He goes on to say that “it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.”

Does that mean that we shouldn’t worry about how we treat people outside the church? Should we assume that if God really wants them to be saved, that He will blind their eyes to ours faults? Let me first point out that there is no “if”—God wants them to be saved (“For God so loved the world…). Let me also point out that Apostle Paul started out as one of those nitpickers; he found fault with everything the early church did, until God opened his eyes. Let me also remind you that Jesus taught us about taking care not to offend. Okay, if you look at the accounts in Matthew and Mark, it’s clear that Jesus was talking about new Christians, but someone who has yet to be won to Christ isn’t going to become a new Christian if they become offended before they get the chance. So, we need to do the best we can with unbelievers (although not to neglect the believers) and then pray that God would cover our shortcomings.

Now, to those outside the church who are considering taking the plunge, but are having a hard time dealing with the apparent hypocrisy inside the church, I say: I understand that much of what we do seems hypocritical. We say, “Judge not,” and then we tell people how to live their lives. We say, “Love one another,” but we have lists of the type of people that we won’t associate with (as though sin were contagious). We say, “Look not on the outward appearance,” and yet look down our noses at a woman whose skirt is perhaps a little too short, or a man whose pants sag too much. Many times we worry way too much about the actions of those that don’t even claim to be Christian. If a person has no interest in Christ, and is a drunkard, does it matter that he drinks? He isn’t going to Hell because he drinks, he’s going to Hell because isn’t saved. Now, it might be much easier to get him to church if he were sober, and we certainly shouldn’t let him think that it’s okay with God if he spends his life in a drunken stupor, but the important thing is that he know what he needs to do to get right with God. Even then, if he honestly isn’t interested, then telling him about Jesus is essentially casting pearls before swine. I think that sometimes we get too involved in making sure people understand what it means to live right, when they aren’t interested in living right to start with. Often we avoid those who don’t live the life that we lead; we strengthen each other by sticking together. The point here is, we’re doing the best that we can, but we aren’t perfect, just forgiven. If you had a job to do, and you didn’t do it, and then when the boss asked you why you didn’t get your work done, all you could do is point at other people, you probably wouldn’t be collecting a paycheck for very long, at least, not if your boss was wise and fair. God is very wise and fair, and if, on judgment day, all you can say in your defense is that I wasn’t persuasive enough; that, in your mind, my mistakes outweighed the righteousness that I have tried to show you, He will remind you that your life is your responsibility. I will regret, and I will feel bad that I was unable to convince you (at least until God removes you from my memory), but, ultimately, your choice is your own, and I can only do what I can do. If my problems are really that much of a barrier to you finding your way to Christ, then I would ask that you pray for me. What good are the prayers of an unbeliever? I don’t know for sure, but I know that God listens to sincere prayer, and I know that He wants you to be saved, so if you pray for me to be a better Christian so that you can become one also, perhaps He will grant that request. Please don’t let me get in your way.

Dealing With Urges (Part II)

The last time a posted a blog, I discussed the difference between urges and sin. It occurs to me that I may not have made one point in that discussion as clearly as I could have, so I will try to rectify that now.

Jesus said that if a man looks after a woman to lust after her, he has committed adultery with her already in his heart. John said that a man who hates his brother is guilty of murder. I think that it’s a pretty safe assumption that that same train of thought applies to other things, as well. If you plan out a bank robbery, and the only thing that keeps you from carrying out that plan is the fear of getting caught, well, in God’s eyes, you’ve already been caught. Now, if you walk past a bank, and it occurs to you that it would be nice to have the money in that bank, and keep walking, and don’t think about it any more, that’s completely different. Of course, if you keep walking by that bank, thinking about how much you could use that money, then, eventually, you’re going to start thinking about robbing the bank. By the same token, if you notice a person that you find attractive walking down the sidewalk as you are driving down the street, that really just shows that your eyes and brain still work. On the other hand, if you circle the block to get another look, then you’re in trouble with God.

There’s also a difference between being angry with someone, and hating them (thank goodness). Even the best of friends have arguments occasionally. If you stop and think about it, if you and your best friend always agree on everything, then what is either of you getting out of the relationship? Oh, sure, you can have some good times, and you would probably enjoy each others company tremendously, but neither one of you is growng. The Bible says that iron sharpeneth iron. I don’t imagine that would feel too good to the iron (if iron could feel), but it’s important that your knife or sword be sharp; a dull blade doesn’t cut well. An occasional disagreement can help you to see a different perspective, to expand your horizons, as it were. Sometimes we take those unpleasant discussions too personally; a friend who points out what he or she thinks is a mistake on your part is really only trying to help you. If the mistake is actually theirs, in thinking that you have erred, well, be patient with them and explain yourself the best you can. On the other hand, if they are right that you are not acting in your own best interest, then it’s better that you listen to them. Either way, you gain valuable experience.

By the way, one other thing, when we think of lust, we generally associate that with physical attraction. I suppose that’s the most common form of sexual lust, although that doesn’t necessarily follow. For one thing, lust isn’t necessarily sexual; one can lust for money or power as well. If you desire someone because they have money, that is just as much lust as if your interest in them was purely physical. On the other hand (by now you’re probably thinking that I have too many hands), if you desire someone even though they don’t have money and you don’t find that person particularly attractive, that may or may not be lust. The real test is what do you hope to accomplish by being with them. Do you want to get married, and raise children, or maybe just grow old with them; or, do you just want what you want, with no regard for the long term? One of the problems here is that we often confuse our own motives. Amnon, the son of David, had a half-sister named Tamar that he wanted badly. If he had asked his father the king for her hand in marriage, David probably would have let them wed. I’m not sure why he didn’t ask; maybe he was afraid that David would refuse, and take steps to keep those two apart, or maybe he was afraid that he would actually wind up married to her. In any case, he got what he wanted by subtlety, and his guilt turned into hatred towards her. I feel pretty confident that he wouldn’t have done what he did if he had realized that it would cause him to hate her; I also feel confident that if he had really loved her, he would have simply married her. In any case, he wanted what he wanted, and he spent way too much time trying to figure out how to get what he wanted by trickery without thinking through the consequences of his actions. If he had just walked away from the urge…

Dealing with Urges

I recently heard from someone who has written a great many Christian songs, with powerful lyrics, and, if I understand him correctly, has chosen to give up the fight. His logic comes down to, God made me what I am, but what I am doesn’t conform to Scripture, therefore, the Scripture must be wrong. Surely God created me as He wanted me to be.

That’s a strong argument, and, to be honest, one that I have fallen for myself, in the past. I will admit that I get urges that don’t conform to the dictates of scripture. It would be nice if, once one has dedicated one’s life to Christ, all the negative influences just went away. Some of the thoughts that pop into my head are just incomprehensible, yet they keep coming. As I spend more time studying Scripture, and praying, they come less frequently, and less powerfully, but they still come. Scripture tells us that the creation has no right to ask the creator, “Why hast thou made me thus?” Yet, we, as human beings, can’t seem to help but wonder why it is that God created us as we are. I think that it is significant that we are not just slaves to our DNA, but we are affected by environment, as well.

Still, Apostle Paul once wrote that he was aware that in his flesh was no good thing. David wrote that he was conceived in sin, even though his parents were married at the time. None of us are strangers to temptation. Even Jesus was tempted, but He withstood the temptation, and set an example for the rest of us. It is important that we be prepared to fight ourselves. It is not by accident that scripture says that the Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent taketh it by force. It isn’t Heaven that we are fighting, though, it is ourselves, our sins, our transgressions, and our temptations.

We have been commanded to walk in the Spirit, so that we will not fulfill the lust of the flesh. It is important that we strive. The Bible also says that the righteous are scarcely saved. It is important to remember the difference between being “good” and being “righteous.” There are a lot of good people; there are not so many righteous. We have to remember that we are not worthy of the gift of salvation, but we shouldn’t use that as an excuse to sit back and do nothing. We have a duty and a responsibility to do what is right, even when we don’t feel like it, and when it isn’t convenient. God didn’t call us to watch. It’s easy to say that if it’s truly God’s will, it will come to pass, but it’s much more convicting to say that if it is to be, it’s truly up to me.

Jonah ran from God, and God had to persuade him to do God’s will. I’m not sure of Jonah’s motivation; it’s been suggested that Jonah didn’t like the Ninevites, and was afraid that if he preached to them, they would repent, and God wouldn’t destroy them. He seemed to understand that God wanted to save them. We can’t count on God holding off on judgment until we get ready to preach, though. The Bible talks about people being in the valley of decision; what if there is someone ready to receive while I am busy with my own concerns, but it is their last chance? That person may not make it, because I wasn’t focused on following the leading of the Holy Ghost. What can I say to that person?

The bottom line is, there will always be distractions, urges, temptations; anything to keep us from doing what God has called us to do. We need to remain focused, allow ourselves to be led of God, and do whatever it is that needs to be done. How do we grow closer to God so that we can hear His voice more clearly? I would recommend prayer and fasting.

Tithing

It occurs to me that there seems to be some confusion concerning tithing in the New Testament.

Really, not a lot is said about tithing in the New Testament. Jesus once got onto the Pharisees about paying tithes of mint, cumin, and anise. He didn’t say that they were wrong for tithing, but he did tell them that they had neglected the weightier (or more important) parts of the law. I had someone tell me once that the Pharisees were so legalistic that they were counting the leaves on the plants in their gardens and cutting off one-tenth of the new leaves to give to the temple. I have two problems with that: One, Jesus didn’t even suggest that they were wrong for doing what they did, in fact, he said, “These ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone.” Two, these plants are not known for their blossoms. All three are known for their aroma; they are sometimes used in perfumes, and in cooking. Even today, in many countries where rainfall is scarce, spices such as these are used to mask the unpleasant smells that result from infrequent bathing. It may occur to you that Ancient Israel didn’t get a lot of rain. My point is that the Pharisees were probably not growing these plants as a hobby, they were probably making a living by selling these spices. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if the Pharisees didn’t start out growing these plants specifically to be used in the Temple, but then were allowed to sell the excess to pay their living expenses. If that were the case, though, wouldn’t they be expected to tithe of the money they received by selling the excess, rather than to simply tithe of what they were ostensibly growing for the Temple? I don’t know for sure, that’s really just supposition on my part.

In any case, a lot of people seem to think that tithing was part of the law, and, since we are not under the law, but under Grace, then tithing is no longer required. I would have to argue that. Very little is actually said about tithing in the New Testament. There is the passage mentioned above, and a similar passage in Luke (although this one mentions rue—also known for being very aromatic—and “other herbs” rather than cumin and anise); there is also a passage in Luke where Jesus compared a proud Pharisee to a humble sinner who were praying in the Temple at the same time; and then there is a passage in Hebrews where Apostle Paul reminds us of the Priest Melchisedec, to whom Abraham paid tithes after the slaughter of the kings. Now Abraham lived long before Moses the Lawgiver, so clearly he did not do what he did because of any requirement of the Law. We, of course, claim to be led of the Spirit. Are we not led by the same Spirit that led Abraham to pay tithes to Melchisedec? If the spirit that’s leading you isn’t directing you to pay tithes, then I would strongly suggest that you carefully examine yourself, and see what spirit it is that you are following.

Another argument that has been made is that, “God doesn’t need my money.” You’re right, He doesn’t. He didn’t need Esther to approach King Ahasuerus, either, but it was His will that she do that. By giving you an opportunity to pay tithes, God is offering you the chance to reap a blessing. I would advice caution, though; there are a lot of people out there that claim to be ministers of the Gospel that are no different than the money-changers in the Temple… Before you pay a tithe to a man, an organization, or even a church, spend some time in prayer asking God’s direction that you can pay your tithes in such a way that your offering will be used for the glory of God. I’m sure that there are more than a few theologians out there that will rush to tell me that an offering is not the same thing as a tithe; technically that’s true: a tithe is one-tenth of one’s income, and an offering is anything above that. Still, if one’s tithe is not offered freely, then there is no reward from God for that. In other words, if you pay a tithe only because you feel you have to, then you may as well keep your money. How’s that for a conundrum? But, if the tithe is offered freely, then, to my mind, it is an offering. Besides, grammarians will no doubt understand why I chose not to use the word tithe twice in one sentence (although they will object to my starting a sentence with a conjunction. Sigh. You can’t please everybody, but if you can please God…).

Forgiveness

This past weekend I watched the movie In My Country (also known as The Country of My Skull) starring Samuel L. Jackson (A Time to Kill as well as many other movies) and Juliette Binoche (The English Patient and Chocolat). In this movie, she plays an Afrikaner writer, and he, a writer for the Washington Post. Both have been asked to cover the Reconciliation talks after the collapse of Apartheid. Obviously, they go into it with very different attitudes. She feels that it is important to find out exactly what abuses occurred under Apartheid, but he feels that it is important to bring the Afrikaners to justice, and feels that every Afrikaner has a share of the blame for what happened. She, and some other locals, try to explain to him the concept of Ubuntu. I thought Ubuntu was a Linux operating system, but I digress (okay, I knew the word Ubuntu meant something before anybody ever named an OS after it, but I wasn’t clear on the meaning). Eventually he came to understand that we are all connected, and, if you do something that hurts me, it also hurts those around me, and, eventually will hurt you, too, even if you do what you do because of something I did to you. That, in a nutshell, is Ubuntu.

It occurred to me that the people who practiced Ubuntu are better at forgiveness than I am. By the way, I could be mistaken, but I got the feeling that the two main characters in the movie were either fictional or composite characters; at the beginning of the movie, though, they showed a disclaimer that basically said that the Reconciliation talks were faithfully recreated, that the script-writers did not write any of that dialog. In many cases, those who testified wanted only to have the bodies (or body parts) of loved ones returned to them for proper burial. It’s hard for me to imagine what those people must have been feeling, but clearly they had accepted the fact that killing or imprisoning those who had abused their power would not bring back their loved ones; it would only make the healing of their country more difficult.

We are, of course, commanded to forgive. In fact, we have been told to pray for those that despitefully use us. I have to admit, I haven’t had to deal with too much “despiteful use” myself. Perhaps if I lived in another part of the world I would get a chance to really test my faith (not planning on doing that any time soon, though). I have certainly been lied about, but then, I guess all of us have had to deal with that at one time or another.

I just got an E-mail from a good friend who just found out that her family has been embezzled from. They don’t know how much was taken, but it could be a considerable amount. The embezzler is someone who has been very close to the family for quite some time, and was never even suspected. She understands that she has to forgive this person; she wants to feel love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and temperance, but right now, it’s hard. She is in prayer, and she has asked me for prayer, and I am asking for prayer on her behalf, as well.

Perhaps the best known Scriptural reference is the Lord’s Prayer, in Matthew 6:9-15. You notice that, in the prayer, Jesus teaches us to pray for forgiveness, but also for God to help us to forgive others. At the end of the prayer, He points out that our forgiveness from God is dependent upon our ability to forgive others. Has anyone ever wronged us as much as we have wronged Him? Remember also that Peter once asked Christ how many times was he required to forgive, and Jesus surprised him with how much forgiveness Peter was responsible for. That applies to us, too.