The question haunts human minds: “If God is good, why does He allow evil?” Many view this difficulty as the most substantial challenge to Christianity, and some take it as evidence that God does not exist. If God is all good, then certainly He desires to eliminate evil; and if God is all powerful, then certainly He is able to eliminate evil. For some, the fact that evil persists at least demonstrates that the Christian concept of God cannot be true, and at most casts doubt on the possibility of any God existing at all. Philosopher J.L. Mackie insists, “The existence of apparently unjustifiable evil means that some other god or no god may exist, but the traditional God could not exist.”
Normally, the objection follows three logical stages: (1) If there is evil, then there is no all-powerful and all-good God. (2) There is evil. (3) Therefore, there is no all-powerful and all-good God.
Fortunately, by challenging the assumptions lying behind the first two premises, the problem of evil proves itself to be a mere problem of perception, and not a sustainable objection to the Christian faith.
The first premise — “If there is evil, then there is no all-powerful and all-good God” — contains two faults. First, it assumes too much. On what grounds does one know with certainty that an all-powerful, all-good God cannot coexist with evil? In the Bible, when Job experiences great tragedy, God answers him, essentially, by saying, “I’m God and you’re not” (Job 38-42). The explanation for some events is simply beyond our comprehension, and we must trust the maker of the universe to act justly. Second, the premise ignores another possibility. What if an all-good and all-powerful God has perfectly good reasons for allowing evil to exist? While there is no “one size fits all” biblical answer for the existence of evil, consider the following list of possibilities offered by theologians such as Russ Bush and John Newport:
- Punitive: Suffering consequences helps maintain the moral order.
- Educational: We mature through times of suffering.
- Probational: Suffering proves the genuineness of faith.
- Revelational: Through suffering, we come to know God more fully.
- Redemptive: Suffering on behalf of another is an act of great love (what Christ has done for us!).
- Satanic: Evil occurs because of the fiendish work of a supernatural being.
- Eschatological: God will be more greatly glorified for having allowed evil and defeating it in the end.
Granted, none of these possibilities, individually or taken together, fully relieve the tension. The biblical authors, when lamenting over evil, do not hesitate to ask “Why?” and “How long?” Neither should we. Nonetheless, the first premise of the logical problem of evil fails because it disallows other legitimate scenarios.
The second premise — “there is evil” — can be challenged head-on as an example of worldview borrowing, which occurs when one steals a concept from another worldview to support his or her own. In this case, from where does the objector obtain the notion that evil exists at all? The naturalistic atheist has no means for maintaining evil as a static moral category, because there is no transcendent moral order. Everything is natural, and what we perceive as moral is merely the social outworking of natural selection. Likewise, the postmodern, employing extreme relativism and distrusting everything but the self, can only resort to saying, “What is evil for you may not be evil for me.” It seems, then, that one can only maintain evil as a stable moral category from within a theistic worldview. The problem of evil, therefore, is no problem at all for Christianity. The reality of evil actually supports belief in God, because theism is the only worldview that can admit that evil truly exists.
Perhaps one of the following syllogisms would better explain the issue:
(1) If evil exists, then an all-good and all-powerful God must have reasons for allowing it. (2) Evil exists. (3) Therefore, God has reasons for allowing evil to exist.
Or:
(1) If evil exists, then God must exist. (2) Evil exists. (3) Therefore, God exists and has reasons for allowing evil.
These reframed syllogisms help relieve the tension between God and evil, but believers cannot consider the problem merely in view of God, but also in view of the gospel. A distinctly Christian approach demands a focus on the character of God and the accomplishment of Jesus. First, the fact that God allows evil is evidence of his mercy. We all want God to eradicate the evil from the world. Few of us, though, realize that for God to eradicate evil from the world, He would have to eradicate us, because we are sinners. Every person is a perpetrator, and God mercifully and patiently bears with us.
Second, Christianity not only uniquely explains the existence of evil (the Fall in Genesis 3, in addition to the list mentioned above), but the gospel uniquely claims that God will finally defeat evil. In the incarnation of Jesus, God experienced and confronted evil. At the cross, Jesus bore God’s wrath on evil. In the resurrection, God in Christ conquered evil and its deathful consequence. Finally, at Christ’s return, He will vanquish evil altogether. The saints will be perfected and cosmos renewed (Revelation 19-22).
Christians must respond to the problem of evil with the hope of the gospel. The great hope of eternal life in Christ is that “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes” (Revelation 21:4). C.S. Lewis concludes, “They say of some temporal suffering, ‘No future bliss can make up for it,’ not knowing that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory.”
— Chuck Fuller is assistant professor of Christian studies at Anderson University.