St. James, Kidbrooke 4th. March 2007

Does God make a Difference to Evil?

Genesis 3.13-19; 1 Peter 5.6-11; Matthew 13.24-30.

Introduction

Does God make a difference to evil?
Having thought about the wonders of the world last week,
this week we have to square up to the fact that things are not all that they might be:
things are not that we might be able to imagine them to be, or want them to be.

I find that to be a compelling argument in support of the belief of the goodness of creation.
The fact that each of us has an innate understanding and appreciation of goodness
(so much so that we take it for granted) is significant.

The existence of goodness as a concept, even if not always in existence,
leads us to an acceptance of badness and of evil: it has to.
Evil is not the way things should be.
Evil is the world out of kilter, even though it seems so effective.

As an aside, we should note that, yet again, this contradicts the notion of evolution.
The popular notion of evolution is that things are not as they should be,
but that we are evolving towards goodness.
Actually, if you starting prodding this with a few sharp questions,
it very quickly unravels and, even in purely scientific terms, it is tosh!
A scientific understanding of evolution has nothing to do with goodness at all.

Evolution is arbitrary; it’s to do with the survival of some creatures over others according to their circumstances, and that these creatures will change over time along the lines of the most useful attributes for survival, and that, eventually, these changes will produce entirely new species. That’s evolution, and it’s nothing to do with goodness at all.
Even Richard Dawkins appreciates that. His line is that we have risen enough to finally appreciate the values of goodness so that we are no longer completely subject to the forces of natural selection. But exactly how and why, he’s at a loss to tell us.

1. What is Evil?

The biblical view is different.
The biblical view is that the world is good,
because it was made, and is preserved, by the good God.

However, the world has ‘fallen’ from its pristine state. Sin has come into the world.
We read some of that account in our OT reading today.

We all know the story: of how the serpent deceived Eve into eating the fruit
of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil,
and how Eve persuaded Adam to do so as evil.

When we join the story, the disobedience has been discovered,
and there is a reckoning, a calling to account.

We see in this story three of the elements of the fall: sin, suffering, and evil.

The serpent persuaded Adam and Eve to rebell against God’s rule:
to disobey a clear command. They sinned. As a result the world cracked.

Interestingly, God’s own position was not affected at all by this rebellion.
However, the world was: the order of things was changed.
We are so used to the way the world is (after all it’s the only world we’ve known!)
we don’t appreciate that it’s meant to be different and yet, returning to my earlier point, we do!

According to what we are told here, the fall brought suffering and struggle into the world.
There was a change in the order of things:
competition replaced cooperation: strife replaced harmony:
creatures devoured one another... the emergence of the ‘food chain’.

Eve is told she will have pain in childbirth:
this is not as it was meant to be.
She is told she is subject to Adam; there is a change to the social order:
this is not as it was meant to be.
Adam is told he will have to struggle to produce the crops he needs:
this is not as it was meant to be.

The Fall drastically changed the world.
The world works, but in a rather warped way.
Hence the cynical view that says, “Life’s a bitch, and then you die.”
The fall stripped the world of much of its joy in being.

Adam and Eve sinned, but were they evil? Well, in one sense yes.
All human beings have it in us to be evil, and sin is of the realm of evil.

Yet in another sense no.
The serpent is the key creature in this story.
The serpent is the one who engineered the whole thing.
Unlike Adam and Eve, the serpent didn’t stumble into sin.
No, the serpent embraced sin, welcomed it.
It reminds me of that phrase “with malice aforethought”.

The understanding that there is an evil realm has remained.
The devil and all his works embrace evil.

Evil, in this sense, is active opposition to God.
It attempts to create its own realm, for itself, devouring all others.
It craves raw power and blatant indulgence, all at the expense of others.
It includes an enjoyment of pain and suffering,
because it implies power over others, and even over God.
Evil is not nice.

2. The “P.R.” of Evil

It may seem silly to say, ‘evil is not nice’,
but it needs to be said because evil has a fantastic P.R. department.

So often evil is seen to be attractive and exciting.
(This is, in part, because of our propensity to sin, but not entirely.)
So often evil seems to be utterly dominant.

And if you think this is because of modern technology: think again.
The psalmists were complaining the same way hundreds of years ago.

Evil wants us to think that it is irresistable, to make us give up hope,
to persuade us, even, to switch sides.

What can we do about it? Answer: a lot!

3. Resist the Devil

Look at the words of Peter in our NT reading today. Listen to what he says.
Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.
Okay, Peter, tell me something I didn’t know.
That’s exactly how it does seem at times: being pursued, hunted, by a roaring monster.

What are we to do? Run? Hide?
No. Resist!

Resist him, standing firm in your faith.
James, in his letter, says this: Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

Stand up to him.
Don’t believe the devil’s publicity: it’s all lies anyway.
Instead, believe in the word of God.

And... looking again at the word of God,
both James and Peter preface their words about resisting the devil
with a call to submit ourselves to God.
Submit yourselves, then, to God, says James.
Humble yourselves... under God’s mighty hand, says Peter,
that he may lift you up in due time.
Even more, he says, Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.

This isn’t the devil’s world. Evil is not irresistable. (Resistance is not futile!)

Which leads us to what difference God can make to evil.

4. God’s Affect on Evil

Note again how James and Peter urge us to submit ourselves to God.
The first thing to note is what we saw in Genesis 3,
that evil made, and makes, no difference to God.
God’s position is not altered one jot by evil.

Therefore God’s power and authority are undiminished.
Therefore, also, his love, care and security for us are sure.

Of course, it does not always seem like that, and we don’t understand why,
and the devil uses that to try to deceive us.

But, remember the parable Jesus told us, about the wheat and the weeds.
It’s a very simple story, yet rather important.
A man’s enemy secretly sows weeds in his field of wheat.
When discovered, the man’s servants offer to pull up the weeds,
but the man stops them for fear of spoiling the wheat.
Instead they will wait for the end, and harvest both:
the wheat for the barn, the weeds for the fire.

Total control: no flap.
But it doesn’t look like this when the weeds are growing.
But listen to how Jesus introduces the parable.
“The kingdom of heaven is like this...” not, “The world is like this...”
This is about what it’s like where God rules.

5. The Cross

But how is it possible that there is ‘wheat’ at all?
God may not be touched by evil’s rebellion, but the world is, and we are.

The simple answer is judgement. That is the story of Noah’s flood.
But that way produces no harvest.

Instead God chose another way: the way of the cross.
In coming as Jesus, and dying on the cross,
God took on all the powers of the devil and his realm and defeated them utterly.
Thus, our faith is true, and our hope is sure, because God’s love wins.

Conclusion

The greatest difference that God made to evil is to overcome it.
Right now, it doesn’t always seem like that, and it never has,
but that doesn’t change the truth of it.

So we can do no better than to heed the words of Peter and James.
Humble ourselves under God’s hand,
resist the devil, and he will flee.