Dale Partridge - Real Christianity #166： If God is So Good, Why is There So Much Evil？

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Real Christianity. My name is Dale Partridge. This is a 100% listener-supported 0.65

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00:00:32.320 our ministry in any way, you can do that at relearn.org forward slash donate. Today's

00:00:38.780 conversation is an important conversation about the origin and the existence of evil in the world.

00:00:46.280 Many people have asked this question, why is there so much evil? Why does God permit so much

00:00:54.400 pain and suffering. And we're going to be answering the specific question from someone

00:01:00.100 who asks, Pastor, I never know what to say when I hear someone state that they don't know if God

00:01:08.140 exists because of all the suffering and evil in the world. Does the problem of evil defeat

00:01:14.680 Christianity? What should I say to those who think it does? Now, this is obviously a complex question,

00:01:22.060 and I'm going to offer the most simplified answer I can. But even then, it is still a

00:01:29.040 difficult conversation to have. But before we begin, I just wanted to announce a few things.

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00:02:21.120 you can't afford even the price that we have it at, we've made a way for offers of discounted

00:02:26.840 rates for those people who would just like to take the program. So that's available to you

00:02:32.240 right now, again, at standinvictory.org. Also, I wanted to make one quick announcement for

00:02:38.400 our program at reformationseminary.com. We are enrolling for the January 2022 program. We have

00:02:47.680 so many more individuals, men that are interested in the program than ever before, but still we

00:02:55.020 would like to fill this group and the next group after it. These are men who are looking to plant

00:03:00.700 biblical house churches in their local area. These are men that are looking for theological

00:03:06.200 training on how to be missionaries in their own hometown. And so if you would like more

00:03:12.820 information on how to plant and pastor and preach at a biblical house church, if this finds

00:03:17.740 an interest in your heart, if you feel the Lord leading you towards this direction, especially

00:03:22.180 in these times where the church is continuing to increase or experience increased hostility

00:03:27.700 toward the culture, please check out reformationseminary.com, especially for you brothers

00:03:34.800 and sisters that are in Canada and Australia and places where we're starting to see more extreme

00:03:41.260 forms of political persecution. Again, that's reformationseminary.com. Okay, so let's get back

00:03:48.320 to this question, and I'll read it again. He says, Pastor, I never know what to say when I hear

00:03:54.640 someone state that they don't know if God exists because of all the suffering and pain and evil in

00:04:00.860 the world? Does the problem of evil defeat Christianity? So this is most often phrased

00:04:09.600 in my experience, how can a loving God allow such evil to exist? That is, how can the God

00:04:18.380 of the Bible, this all-powerful, sovereign, righteous, loving, and good God exist if his

00:04:28.000 creation is overwhelmed with war and divorce and murder and tragedy and death. In other words,

00:04:36.200 how can these two realities coexist with one another? Because if God is so good, then why

00:04:41.820 is there so much evil? And if God is in control, then why is there so much chaos? But more

00:04:47.580 importantly, if God is omniscient and omnipotent and omnipresent, then why does he not intervene

00:04:54.980 and eliminate evil altogether? Now, these questions plague the minds of not only atheists,

00:05:02.940 but agnostics, religious skeptics, but also Christians. The complexity of these questions

00:05:10.840 revolving, I should say, really revolves around the origin and the presence of evil. It's actually

00:05:19.800 been called the Achilles heel of Christianity, namely that these issues are somehow the central

00:05:27.240 location of vulnerability for the Judeo-Christian theological system. Now, I agree that these 0.99

00:05:35.860 questions are not easy to answer. St. Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Luther, Calvin, Edward, Sproul,

00:05:43.520 MacArthur. They've all put enormous intellectual and spiritual effort toward these questions.

00:05:50.500 And you know what? They still have not come to a conclusive and final answer. Now, that said,

00:05:59.380 this does not mean that we don't have sophisticated and biblically supported explanations. We do.

00:06:06.700 It simply means that there are still mystery behind elements of this discussion.

00:06:15.320 For example, in speaking to the origin of evil, theologians often call it the mystery of iniquity.

00:06:24.240 And the attempts that we've made throughout church history to understand the origin and the existence of evil without compromising the righteousness of God is called theodicy.

00:06:35.480 And this is an English word that's made up of two Greek words, theos, which means God

00:06:39.960 in Greek, and dikaios, which means righteousness in Greek, or righteous.

00:06:45.360 And basically what I'm saying is that a theodicy is a defense of God's righteousness.

00:06:52.920 This podcast is really a micro-theodicy and a brief Christian explanation for the righteous

00:07:01.780 presence of evil, pain, suffering within the biblical worldview. And I want you to catch that.

00:07:08.340 I said it's a righteous presence of evil, pain, and suffering within our biblical worldview.

00:07:16.740 So when God first created the world, there was no present evil. There was no pain or suffering

00:07:24.740 because there was no sin. And sin, which is the cause of evil, okay, so hear that. Sin,

00:07:32.060 which is the cause of evil, is also the cause of death. Now, death, by definition, is separation.

00:07:40.880 Okay, in the Garden of Eden, in Genesis chapter 3, moral sin caused humanity to be separated from

00:07:49.700 God. That is, we died spiritually. So I want you to grasp that concept of separation. Death is

00:07:56.340 separation. So in the garden, we sinned, or Adam sinned, and caused humanity to be separated from

00:08:04.800 God. And we died spiritually. And this is why Ephesians 2.1 tells Christians that we were dead

00:08:11.600 in our trespasses and sins. It's also why the Bible repeatedly states that Christians have to 0.74

00:08:18.580 be born again or been made alive in Christ. I mean, we have to be born again in the Spirit,

00:08:26.920 right? And we have to be made alive in the Spirit because we have been separated from God. We have

00:08:34.480 died and been separated from God. Now we need to be born again or made alive in Christ. That is

00:08:41.500 that God spiritually resurrects his children. And he does that through regeneration and repentance

00:08:48.900 and faith in Jesus Christ. Now, moral sin is also the cause of physical death, which separates our

00:08:58.220 soul from our body. And without repentance of faith in Christ, the Bible actually tells us

00:09:03.040 that we will experience a second death. You can see that in Revelation 2.18, where our souls will

00:09:10.100 be eternally separated from God. But the effects of sin and evil actually go much further than

00:09:19.860 death and separation. They also include metaphysical evil, which is like natural disasters,

00:09:29.340 storms, tornadoes, hurricanes, physical evil, such as disease and decay and sickness.

00:09:40.100 demonic evil, such as possession and temptation. The reality is, and we all know this,

00:09:47.620 is that we live in a sin-ridden, evil world. Now, the next question is, what is evil?

00:09:56.080 And this is an important question. What is evil? We need to realize that evil is not

00:10:00.600 an independent being or force. Evil is more like a parasite. It only finds expression 0.98

00:10:11.080 when it's connected to a host. R.C. Sproul once said, evil does not exist as an autonomous

00:10:19.360 entity, but it is an action of something that does exist. You know, basically what he's saying

00:10:28.240 is that evil on its own doesn't exist. It needs to attach itself to an entity in which sin can

00:10:36.200 occur, which evil will find its expression. Now, even though evil does not exist in and of itself,

00:10:43.840 the effects of evil do exist in and of themselves. And there's even an additional factor that needs

00:10:52.220 to be stated. Not only does evil require a host, but it also requires its acts to be taken upon

00:11:00.340 the backdrop of good. And what I mean by that is without good, you cannot categorize an action as

00:11:08.640 evil. So again, evil, which is the result of sin, is first dependent upon an entity like a parasite,

00:11:19.060 And second, it's dependent upon the existence of good.

00:11:24.180 For example, murder cannot exist without an entity willing to impart death upon an innocent party

00:11:32.120 and a moral law claiming that innocent life should not be taken.

00:11:38.360 Okay, now we have somewhat clarity on the question, what is evil and kind of the forms of evil

00:11:47.160 and the presence of evil, and these things are helpful for us as we're having this discussion

00:11:53.920 and getting to the point of, you know, why is evil here and what's its purpose. The next question

00:12:00.060 that needs to be answered is regarding the origin of evil. And, you know, since evil is the result

00:12:06.540 of sin, where did sin come from? Romans 5.12 states that sin entered in by one man, Adam.

00:12:20.220 That is that sin was not invented by Adam. It didn't start with Adam, but it entered into the

00:12:29.560 world by his disobedience. This means that prior to Adam's fall, sin was already present

00:12:37.960 in some capacity. And we know this because Adam and the fallen angels before him had the

00:12:45.680 inclination to sin, and you cannot be inclined towards something that does not exist. C.S. Lewis

00:12:54.660 understood this concept when he wrote his book, Mere Christianity. And I quote,

00:13:00.300 creatures are not born with desires unless satisfaction for those desires exists. A baby

00:13:08.400 feels hunger. Well, there is such a thing as food. A duckling wants to swim. Well, there is such a

00:13:14.380 thing as water. Men feel sexual desire. Well, there is such a thing as sex. If I find myself 0.53

00:13:21.280 a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy. The most probable explanation

00:13:26.860 is that I was made for another world. Now, obviously, Mr. Lewis is using this example

00:13:35.440 of saying, if we have a desire for heaven, then it must exist. It's a beautiful argument.

00:13:40.400 But in our case, talking about Adam, Adam felt the desire to sin because the possibility of sin

00:13:49.420 already existed. And this destroys the weak Arminian arguments of man that man initiated,

00:14:02.520 that Adam initiated sin by his free will to disobey. This doesn't answer the question about

00:14:09.420 the origin of evil. It only answers the question of who was the first person to sin.

00:14:13.980 now i do believe however that adam did choose to or to disobey but i believe that his choice to

00:14:25.560 disobey though it was made without compulsion by god was foreordained by god to occur and we know

00:14:34.840 this because the scriptures of acts 223 428 first peter 120 explicitly teach that the cross of

00:14:43.020 Christ, the crucifixion of Christ was foreordained before the foundation of the world. Therefore,

00:14:51.020 the fall of Adam that took place after the foundation of the world was a necessity for

00:14:57.020 not only God's plan of redemption, but also if we're to find our theology in alignment with

00:15:03.520 the rest of the scriptures. In addition to this, the Bible is saturated with scriptures like

00:15:10.980 Lamentations 3.37, Psalm 33, 9-11, Isaiah 46.10, Proverbs 16.9, that demonstrate God's orchestration

00:15:20.600 and design of all things that come to pass, including sin and evil. What Christians must 0.85

00:15:31.820 really stop doing when we get asked this question about the existence of evil and why so much evil 0.75

00:15:38.740 if we have such a good God, we must stop attempting to free God of a usage and ordaining of evil.

00:15:46.580 The Lord in the scriptures is fully content to state his use of sin and evil to accomplish his

00:15:53.180 purpose. John MacArthur once said, and I quote, we cannot divest God of the existence of evil.

00:16:02.800 He has taken responsibility for permitting its existence, end quote.

00:16:08.220 And this isn't simply his opinion or my opinion either.

00:16:11.760 The Bible is filled with scriptures in support of this claim.

00:16:14.840 Here are just a few.

00:16:16.000 Isaiah 45, 7, God says, I form light and create darkness.

00:16:20.880 I make well-being and create calamity.

00:16:23.740 I am the Lord who does all these things.

00:16:27.440 That word calamity in the Hebrew can actually be translated to disaster as well.

00:16:32.080 Amos 3.6. God says, is a trumpet blown in a city and the people are not afraid?

00:16:40.560 Does disaster come to a city unless the Lord has done it? Acts 22 or Acts 2.22-23 says,

00:16:49.340 men of Israel, hear these words. Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with

00:16:55.340 mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know.

00:17:02.080 Verse 23, this Jesus delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God.

00:17:10.800 You crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men.

00:17:16.100 Acts 4, 24 and 28, sovereign Lord, this is a prayer, sovereign Lord who made the heaven

00:17:21.880 and the earth and the sea and everything in them for truly in the city, there were gathered

00:17:27.440 together against your holy servant, Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate,

00:17:32.900 along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel to do whatever your hand and your plan 0.73

00:17:38.820 had predestined to take place, which we know is the crucifixion and murder of his son.

00:17:48.080 Genesis 5.20 and speaking to the story of Joseph says, quote, as for you, you meant

00:17:54.680 evil against me, but God meant it for good to bring it about that many should be kept alive

00:18:02.580 as they are today. Psalm 119.71, it is good for me that I was afflicted, that I might learn your

00:18:10.360 statutes. Romans 8.28, talking to the sovereignty of God in the usage of sin, as we know that for

00:18:17.640 those who love God, all things work together for good for those who are called according to his

00:18:23.060 purpose. All things work together for good. All things. Everything. That means that God cannot

00:18:30.680 make a claim on all things if God does not have sovereignty over the use of evil and suffering in

00:18:37.240 this world. He is orchestrating and designing these things. Ephesians 1.1 says, In him we have

00:18:45.420 obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all

00:18:51.620 things according to the counsel of his will. All things. If he didn't have sovereignty over evil,

00:18:58.540 he wouldn't be sovereign. And we must remember that the God that we're talking about is the God

00:19:03.140 of Noah's flood, the God of the plagues of Egypt, the God of the initiator of wars throughout

00:19:09.240 scripture, the inauguration of evil kings, the striking down of sinners, the sender of serpents,

00:19:15.540 the power behind all natural disasters, the architect of Jesus's crucifixion.

00:19:22.820 Again, if you attempt to strip God of his use of sin and evil in his design for redemption for those who love him,

00:19:31.480 you strip God of his sovereignty.

00:19:35.060 And so then we arrive back at our original question.

00:19:40.520 Does the presence of evil defeat Christianity?

00:19:45.540 Is this truly the Achilles heel of our Christian faith?

00:19:53.740 No.

00:19:55.040 In fact, I would argue that the presence of sin and evil does not defeat Christianity. 0.98

00:19:59.700 It conceives it. 0.97

00:20:01.720 That is, the issue of sin is a fundamental basis for God's plan of redemption.

00:20:08.380 Without sin, we would have no need for the cross.

00:20:10.760 Without the cross, we would never understand the righteousness and mercy and love of God.

00:20:16.640 I mean, put differently, God, for the sake of demonstrating his righteousness and holiness

00:20:21.460 to us, has permitted sin in this world.

00:20:25.920 Romans 3.5, Paul sees this and he asks the question, but if our unrighteousness serves

00:20:32.540 to show the righteousness of God, what shall we say?

00:20:36.620 He continues later in Romans 9, 22 to 23, where he says,

00:20:40.420 What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make his power known,

00:20:46.920 has endured with much patience the vessels of wrath prepared for destruction,

00:20:52.080 in order that—this is a purpose clause—in order that he might make known the riches of his glory

00:20:59.140 for the vessels of mercy, those who are saved, which he has prepared beforehand for glory,

00:21:06.700 end quote. In other words, what if God permitted sin so that we might know the fullness of his

00:21:13.280 glory? Because without sin and suffering, we would never know God's forgiveness and grace

00:21:19.260 and mercy and holiness and compassion and righteousness and love. It is by the presence

00:21:26.220 of sin and evil that we can see the glory of God shine most brightly. Now, does this mean

00:21:36.320 that God has no desire or will to reduce sin and evil in the world? Does the presence of sin and

00:21:46.260 evil mean that he approves of sin and evil? Certainly not. It simply means that God has a

00:21:54.620 redemptive purpose for the entrance of sin into the world. And according to his perfect wisdom,

00:22:01.140 he has determined that a world with sin would not only bring about his greatest glory,

00:22:07.800 but also bring about our highest worship. In other words, like everything else in the universe,

00:22:14.080 even sin and evil will bring glory to God. When I explain this to my children, I often say to them,

00:22:22.800 How can we bring the most glory to the art of a white crayon?

00:22:29.340 And my kids will respond, by coloring with a black crayon around it.

00:22:34.820 We see ultimately, guys, his wrath and his judgment and even our sin will serve to magnify his glory.

00:22:46.180 That black crayon will magnify the whiteness of the glory of God.

00:22:52.800 In 2010, at the National Ligonier Conference, R.C. Sproul said,

00:22:59.740 Evil is not good, but it's good that there's evil.

00:23:04.960 A few years earlier, John MacArthur made a similar statement at the same national conference just a few years earlier.

00:23:12.540 He said, Is God made more glorious because evil exists, or is he made less glorious because evil exists?

00:23:20.300 The answer is unequivocally more glorious.

00:23:25.080 That is, our highest praises of him are because of what he has done to overcome evil.

00:23:33.540 I mean, this purpose of sin and God's triumph over it is most clearly seen in the predestined death of his son on the cross.

00:23:47.060 Okay, see, God, by the permission of sin and evil in our world, allowed pain and suffering.

00:23:54.760 But he didn't allow it just for us alone.

00:23:58.260 See, God came down to earth in the flesh of a man named Jesus, the Christ.

00:24:03.860 And while Jesus never sinned, he did experience the effects of sin.

00:24:10.180 He, like us, he felt the pain and suffering of evil.

00:24:14.440 He experienced temptations and betrayal and lying and demons and disease and chaotic weather,

00:24:21.180 and ultimately, he experienced murder.

00:24:24.280 And while we who have sinned deserve suffering, the one man in history without sin experienced

00:24:33.040 more suffering than we ever will.

00:24:36.440 And while we deserve the wrath and judgment of God for our disobedience against him, the

00:24:41.960 one man with perfect obedience, that's Jesus Christ, took on God's wrath on our behalf.

00:24:48.660 And on the darkest day in human history, the crucifixion and murder of Jesus Christ,

00:24:52.540 the innocent and blameless son of God, the king of this world, sacrificed for us what was most

00:25:00.520 costly to him. And he did this for one reason, that we who believe might overcome sin and evil

00:25:09.180 through the blood of his son to the praise of his glory.

00:25:14.080 And that day, that day where Jesus was crucified,

00:25:18.480 the most evil day in human history is now called Good Friday.

00:25:27.660 And so while we may not have all the answers for why and how sin are present in our world,

00:25:34.880 we do know that we have a God who was determined to permit sin so that he may demonstrate his

00:25:41.880 righteousness and love toward us who believe in his son. And we also know that, you know,

00:25:49.880 he has come in the flesh of Jesus Christ to triumph over sin and evil and has promised to

00:25:56.080 return to restore the earth and remove all forms of sin and all of its effects for all time so that

00:26:03.760 we who believe will be restored to glory with Christ. So we must believe really the words of

00:26:13.300 Paul in Romans 8.18. He says, for I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy

00:26:22.940 to compare with the glory that is to be revealed in us. People, this world, it's broken. Sin and

00:26:32.520 evil are painful. But the Lord is using all of it for good, for those who love him and are called

00:26:41.400 according to his purpose. He is using it to demonstrate the fullness of himself to us. He

00:26:48.420 is using it to show us how glorious and righteous and magnificent and loving he truly is. So allow

00:26:57.160 me to close with a quote from the great Puritan writer Richard Baxter. Is it a small thing in

00:27:03.820 your eyes to be loved by God? To be the son, the daughter, the spouse, the love, the delight of

00:27:11.200 the King of glory? Christian, believe this and think about it. Because of Christ, you will be

00:27:18.580 eternally embraced in the arms of the love which was from everlasting and will extend to everlasting.

00:27:25.000 of the love which brought the Son of God's love from heaven to earth, from earth to the cross,

00:27:33.980 from the cross to the grave, from the grave to glory. That love that conquered sin,

00:27:40.800 that love which was weary, hungry, tempted, scorned, scourged, buffeted, spat upon, crucified,

00:27:47.820 pierced, which was fasted, prayed, taught, healed, wept, sweated, bled, and died,

00:27:56.580 that love will eternally embrace you. My hope is that this episode was helpful and edifying for

00:28:06.680 your walk in the comprehension and the understanding of the origin and the presence of evil in our

00:28:11.080 world. It's a complex issue. There are so many fantastic resources on this topic. You can check

00:28:17.660 out things by Dr. John MacArthur and Dr. R.C. Sproul. Both of their conference lectures on this

00:28:26.140 topic are available on Ligonier's website. You can just search on The Presence and Origin of Evil,

00:28:32.560 and you'll find both of those episodes. Again, that's at Ligonier.org. Other individuals like

00:28:39.240 St. Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Luther, The Bondage of the Will, which was written by Luther,

00:28:47.660 and the works of Jonathan Edwards on the same topic

00:28:53.060 are all fantastic resources

00:28:54.960 for those that are looking to dig in more on this issue.

00:28:59.980 On that note, thank you guys

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00:29:36.020 Thank you for listening to this episode of Real Christianity.

00:29:38.840 My name is Dale Partridge, and I'll see you next week.

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Dale Partridge - October 22, 2021

Real Christianity #166： If God is So Good, Why is There So Much Evil？

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