The Problem of Evil

What is up guys, my name is KJ and this is Why Theology. So glad to be back. And I also have Jeremiah with me, man.

Hey everybody, my name is Jeremiah Nortier. I'm frequent guest slash host on Why Theology. KJ, thanks for having me on again, man.

No problem, man. Well, we're having a lot of technical difficulties trying to get it all together. So I'm glad his patience for enduring with me.

Patience of Job.

Our patience right there, some good patience. Yeah, man. Well, I know once again, maybe somebody just tuning in this week and they didn't watch our last, when they heard our last podcast. So we have a debate coming up.

When is that and where are the details about that?

Yes, thank you for bringing that up. So February 11th at 6 p .m. I'll be debating at Arkansas State University. I'm debating a church of Christ gentleman on baptism. So we will get to kind of present our cases and talk about the importance of this.

The church of Christ view essentially sees baptism as necessary for a right standing with God. And I would contend to say baptism is important, but it simply demonstrates a justified heart, somebody that's put their faith in Christ and then they ought in works of obedience, demonstrate that.

So yeah, that's February 11th, 6 p .m. at ASU in Centennial Hall.

All right. I already know it's gonna be a pretty good debate, man. What else has been going on that the Lord's been teaching you lately?

Well, it's funny we're talking about patience, but just patience and serving at 12 Five Church where I served at, just patience with God's timing and discipleship with sermon preparation, with teaching, loving on the people that God has brought us.

My virginity, KJ, I wanna do everything so fast the way that I see it, but I want God's perfect timing. So that is, hopefully we can talk about sanctification at some point in the future, but patience is so sanctified, you know?

Definitely, definitely.

I'm mad to have patience with my football team, man. I thought we were gonna go all the way this year and I got let down once again, but it's okay though.

It's okay.

But definitely maybe in the foreseeable future, talk about sanctification because it's something every Christian goes through. God said he would do it. Maybe talk about the ins and out of that. Now, I mean, all the topics that we've discussed, this one might be the most difficult and like, I guess, diving deep into the waters of the theology.

And so the topic today is the problem of evil. And so me and Jeremiah are gonna try to tackle this together. Now, it's always good when we're having any kind of discussion, especially about Christianity and theology, to talk about what God we're referring to.

So when you had a question, Jeremiah, who is God? What comes to mind for you?

Yeah, the only true God of the scripture is the triune God, God, the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, eternal communion with one another and has revealed himself to us in his word. And we also know by looking at creation, the world is structured in such a complex, diverse, particular way that's also unified that only the triune God could account for.

So that's the God. The God of Christianity is the only true God who's revealed himself to us in his word.

And I always add the fact about his ascetic, how he sustains himself by his own power. Like humans, for example, we need water, air, and food, but God existed before air, water, and food came into being.

That shows that he can keep his own. He sustains himself. And then, like you said, the Trinity, three in one, and one in three, God is one, but also three persons. That separates Christianity, the God, from all other religions, and they're false gods.

And so we're talking about the God of the Bible. Now, when we're dealing with the problem of evil, what does the Bible say about that particular God we're referring to in the Bible? I know a couple of verses, some people say it's James 1 .13 and Psalms 5 and 4.

How would you kind of reconcile those verses? And I can read those verses all we want.

Let me go to the James one. If you want, KJ, I'll read the James one. If you want to go to the Psalm one, because I think James 1 .13 has a really informative context that's worth noting in this conversation about evil, how it relates to God.

So James 1 .13, along with 14, says, let no one say when he is tempted, I am being tempted by God, for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one. But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desires.

So God does not tempt us in any way like our flesh tempts us. That's really the context is on the human level that when we see something that's luring, kind of like a fish hook, you got this bait dangling out there, our flesh immediately gravitates to this.

God does not tempt us in any way, shape, or form by dangling something in front of us. The tempter is Satan, right? He's constantly warring against the saints, and God does not tempt us. When we talk about God, he is in a category unique of himself.

And so what's interesting, KJ, is the word tempted here is the same Greek word for test. When God moves and works, he tests us. I mean, that's what he says earlier, kind of all joy, my brothers, when you go through various trials, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.

When God moves and interacts, it's in the form of a test, that positive implication. But when we are tempted in the negative sense, it's because of our flesh, it's because of the work of the devil. So yeah, just because God is sovereign and upholds the universe by the word of his power and is ordained whatsoever comes to pass, nobody in creation gets to accuse God of any more moral failures.

He's in a unique category, all of his own, and it all fits perfectly together.

Definitely, definitely.

And that verse talks about how, like you said, God tempts no one. So it would contradict the essence of who God is, which we'll talk about later, that he's truly good. And so for God to tempt somebody, how would you kind of correlate that?

If God were the one who tempted people to sin, how would that relate to his character?

Yeah, well, it would fall apart because this is in the negative sense. Tempting here is something that which the devil does to us. The tempting more specifically here is how our flesh engages with those things that are luring us in.

And so yeah, God cannot tempt us in this category because he is perfectly good, he is holy. And we'll get more into this, but he's the ground of all being. He's the one sustaining everything that has been created.

So yeah, it really doesn't make sense, KJ, to say that God, it's not even possible that God could tempt man in this particular category. Where this gets interesting and a little off topic is when we start talking about the God being Jesus, how is it that he was truly tempted in all ways, like we are, and yet was without sin?

Definitely, it's actually a good way to think about it. I'm gonna let you answer that a little bit later, so I'm gonna see what you think.

Just saying.

Psalms chapter five, verse four and five, it says this, for you are not a God who takes pleasure in wickedness, nor shall evil dwell within you. Though boastful shall not stand in your sight, you hate all workers of iniquity.

Some translations say you hate all who commit evil, but I just wanna focus on verse four. The end of verse four says this, nor shall evil dwell within you. So it kind of is very similar to the James passage talks about how God has tempted no one because there's no evil within God.

And then right here, like God does not take pleasure within evil, he hates it. And so if God, we'll talk about this, but we're talking about the problem of evil. So the problem of evil in certain sense, like God's not the author of it in this sense, that he's not the one that's committing the evil in the world.

That's the way you can look at it. What would you say about, I guess these two verses, and I have another verse I wanna talk about too. What would you say so far?

Yeah, it's interesting, because you have to reconcile these verses that says, God cannot tempt any man, he would not. You do have to acknowledge God is still sovereign in some capacity. When you read passages that say, God in fact is working all things together after the counsel of his will.

And for the believer, the application is all things are working together for our good, for our sanctification, those who are called according to his purpose. So God is sovereign. He has a purpose in evil existing.

It's not just randomly happening in his universe. No, God is omniscient. In light of that omniscience, he created this world. Everything has purpose. And that's just something that we have to understand.

We gotta let God have creator categories. And when we look at human flesh and the devil, we gotta have creature categories. And so we always have to maintain those distinctions as we talk about these things.

Definitely, definitely.

Now, I know a pretty big one that a lot of people talk about when we're dealing with this subject is Isaiah chapter 45, verse seven. And it's the King James Version, where it says, I form light and create darkness.

I make peace and create evil. I, the Lord, do all these things. How would you kind of go into that verse?

Yeah, so I actually have that pulled up too.

So this is the ESV.

For I form light and create darkness, I make well-being and create calamity. Calamity, I'm the Lord who does these things. So to me, what we have to understand is that there is what we call natural evil that occurs in this world, like buildings falling over and people dying.

We have to understand that there are natural disasters that take lives. God is the author of life and he is also, he can take someone out. It's his prerogative. He's the author of life, right? Job understood that and said, blessed be the name of the Lord.

The Lord gives, the Lord takes away. But God is the ultimate one that determines that. And the reason why we don't, we shouldn't get mad at the creator because that's futile. We see that in Psalm chapter two, that the nation's rage, the king's plot against God, and yet he laughs because it's a foolish thing to try to rival the creator in that way.

I think that probably is talking more about natural evil, but God still is the one that has ordained whatsoever comes to pass, even moral evil. He has a purpose.

There's an end.

There's an end goal that God is working out for his own glory. And he's going to display mercy, right? On whomever he wills, Romans chapter nine. And he's going to exercise justice on whomever he will, right?

And so we understand that God is going to ultimately be glorified at the end of the day, all to the praise of the glorious grace.

Definitely.

And if you look at that, obviously, like you said, there are three different types of evil. The calamity would fix more with the context as God is talking to Cyrus. And if it's more with the context, verse six, that I may know from the rising of the sun to the setting, there is none beside me.

I'm the Lord and there is no other. So back and forth, you see this contrast. And it's kind of what verse seven is getting into that contrast once again. Now, I guess when we continue this conversation, I'd like us to define a couple of terms that will help us kind of dive more into this conversation.

And I'm going to add another term I didn't talk to you about beforehand. I want to see what you think about this. So I guess number one, when we say like the author or something, so me and you probably both agree that God is not the author of sin, but we probably would say that God, he's the primary cause of everything that exists in the world.

Now, how do the two go against, how can we correlate those two? Because me and you, once again, we agree with that, that he's a primary cause of everything, but he's not the author of sin. How did that go to end to end?

Yeah, we always have to define our terms because God is not the effectual author of sin. He is not the one moving evil to come about. He uses means. I do say that God authorizes evil, similar to a writer of a story, right?

If you read J .R. Tolkien and Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter, there's a lot of evil that goes about. But J .R. Tolkien and Lord of the Rings or J .K. Rowling is not the effectual author of the characters actually carrying out these evil, but the whole story was kind of determined by the writer and they are free to do that.

God is free to create a world that he sees fit. And so that's how I wanna help people understand. So he uses means to bring about that end cause. This doesn't totally capture everything. I do think there's some mystery attached to it, but God permits Satan to do what he wants.

Now that whole dialogue was ordained to happen. But when Satan wanted to afflict Job, he had to have permission by God. And so God determined this world for that to take place and he uses the means of Satan to afflict Job.

And yet Job does not say, I blame Satan, I'm mad at him. He humbly acknowledged the sovereign creator and say, the Lord gives, the Lord takes away, blessed be the name of the Lord. I think that's a really good way of looking at it, KJ.

I think it's James 5 .11 that says, you've seen the end purpose of the Lord to display mercy and compassion. God had a plan in it all, he had a purpose in it all, but look at the means that he used. Martin Luther said, the devil is God's devil, right?

It's like a dog on a leash and he can only go where God allows him to.

Now, some of our fellow brothers would say the devil was bound, so we have to be careful by saying he's on a leash, you know.

Uh-oh.

Oh, man. But yeah, I like what you said that like, you know, God isn't the author of evil, but he does authorize it. That's a cool way to think of it. That again, like even the story of Job is a perfect example that like, you know, Job wasn't getting, like the devil was the person that was doing all those things to Job, but God knew about it the whole time he allowed it.

In any moment, he could have easily prevented it, but he allowed it to happen. The same today, you know, we're going to talk about this later, but the problem of evil, like, you know, the same things today that we see around like murder, rape, stealing, I always have to be careful about some of these topics because people, you know, how we view God and maybe God's evil because a lot of things that happen.

And we'll talk about that a little bit later, but so that's how we define the author and then a primary cause. Another one, how does the, how can we define free will? Cause it's going to be kind of helpful as we get into some other deep questions about the problem of evil.

Yeah, I think there's just really two major categories that people interact with. I mean, there's a lot of philosophy that goes into this, but essentially you have what's called libertarian free will.

And then you also have another understanding of what's called compatibilistic free will. And so those are the two terms and just to define them quickly, libertarian free will says that in any given moment, talking about people, we have the ability to choose to do otherwise.

It's not foreordained, it's not predestined. We live in this undeterministic world and the power to choose rests solely in the believer or unbeliever or the person. It's left with them. And to me, I think that actually doesn't, I don't think that that's possible given the attributes that God actually has, but that we can get more into that.

And then compatibilistic free will, I actually like quoting Proverbs 16 verse nine that says, man chooses, makes his plans according to his heart and yet God has determined or purposed his steps. Basically what it says is the free that we experience is what we truly desire to do according to our heart.

I'm sitting here talking with you and I'm choosing to do that. That's compatible with God foreordaining it before the foundation of the world. So just to kind of help people too, man can't mirror this in the sense that we can't create robots, right?

That truly feel and have volition to make those kinds of choices. They're mechanical. They have a program. Even artificial intelligence cannot feel like truly, that's the best man can do, but that doesn't truly reflect what God has done.

You can add to it too. And R .C. Sproul talks about how like, humans, we're human beings, but obviously God is a divine being. And even in the garden, man wasn't totally free because there were restrictions.

Man could do only so much that God allowed them to do, but yet with God, there is no restrictions. So you see how that free will is limited only to the choices that God allows his creation to do. As your favorite term, the creature created distinction right there.

So we see that all throughout the scriptures, they're like mankind only is able to do what God allows them to do because he's the creator. And it makes sense. He's authority to tell us what to do. Now, how does that, I guess, it kind of falls into another category, which is determinism.

Many people say like mankind can determine, as you said earlier, like their future, for example, and many prosperous preachers preach that. But how would that kind of relate to this topic of the problem?

Yeah, there's kind of a few different terms that I want people to be familiar with. Under determinism, you have what's known as soft determinism or hard determinism. And then you have a different category of indeterminism.

That's where libertarian free will fits under that. And then there's a secular philosophical term within determinism and it's fatalism. And so it's worth distinguishing all these things because fatalism, we'll go and start with saying how that can't work.

Fatalism says that since the universe is set, everything is being moved by fate. Some impersonal force makes everything fixed. It's arbitrary. And I would say that's a form of hard determinism. And really, since everything is arbitrary based on this impersonal force, nothing has meaning.

I think Ecclesiastes would say that everything under that model would be meaningless like grasping for air. So fatalism does not begin to touch what theological determinism we're trying to get at. So hard determinism says, it doesn't matter what you choose to do because God's already predetermined it to happen.

And we would say that that doesn't seem to represent the biblical model and it doesn't really comport with our experience either. We would just challenge that definition of hard determinism concluding that it doesn't matter.

I would say the contrary. Because God has foreordained and purposed whatsoever comes past, especially in my life, what I do actually has meaning because it's grounded in that Trinitarian counsel. So a lot of this is semantics, KJ.

It's how you define terms and ultimately what does the Bible teach? That's what we wanna get back to. So soft determinism says, absolutely what we choose to do is compatible with what God has ordained.

And I love what Dr. James White has pointed out is the incarnation truly brings meaning to our world and shows us that God, it matters to God and it matters on our side of things too because God the son took on flesh and dwelt among us.

You can't just say what hard determinism says is it's all like binary code and it's all gonna happen and it's basically like fatalism and it doesn't matter. We're saying, no, it's compatible because God stepped into that creation and he's the one upholding it all.

And he is the one that redeems man, right? God is letting his plan of redemption unfold. So I just say that soft determinism reflects the biblical outlook and you got to understand free will in terms of compatibilistic free will.

Definitely, I like to think of it too. Let me read this, the confession here first and I'll explain it. But chapter three of the confession says, from all eternity God has decreed everything that occurs without reference to anything outside himself.

He did this by his perfectly wise and holy counsel of his own will freely and intangible. Yet God did this in such a way that he is into the author of sin nor has any fellowship with sin. This part is kind of key right here.

It says, this decree does not violate the will of the creature or take away the free working or contingency of second causes. On the contrary, these are established by God's decrees. In this decree, God's wisdom is displayed in directing all things in his power of faithfulness.

So you can, I like to go like this way too because in the Bible, like you said, you have the scripture teaching both. You have the scripture teaching of his God's sovereignty but also man's responsibility, free will.

They go hand in hand. You can't, they're inseparable as Charles Spurgeon would say. Now, I think of the story in Acts.

I forget which chapter it is.

It may be Acts two when Peter said, preaching to like the crowds. And he says, you know, all these things happen as your hand destined or determined as some translations may say. Now that doesn't mean that the people in the audience like God forced them to do all those things that he determined to happen.

The Old Testament predicted how the Messiah would die but no, God was using the free will of the creatures, us humans and our sin to accomplish his means to bring about the Messiah's death on the cross.

And so you hear God's sovereignty. God knew in eternity past that what his plan was was to have the Messiah die on the cross. But at the same time, you had free creatures acting now, you know, making decisions that God used those decisions to bring about the death.

What do you think about that, Jeremiah?

That's good. What I think is interesting is I've listened to Christian philosophers online. They try to say that God has decreed man's libertarian decisions and work that out. And I'm saying that's a contradiction in terms.

And this is what I try to dial it back to, KJ, is if God is omniscient, truly and omnipotent, then he determined to create this world and everything in it, declaring the end from the beginning so that his counsel and purposes would stand.

And so from God's perspective, it's all set. And we just need to let the creator be the creator and trust him and pray for his mercy in our lives and so forth. So, and this is another thing. If someone affirms God's omniscience before the foundation of the world, then what they have to understand is they are in a hard position to account for because man cannot truly choose to do otherwise in any given moment if God is omniscient and then created this world.

You would simply be falling back in this compatibilistic position saying, well, yeah, God foreknows what I'm going to do. And we're over here saying, absolutely, because he's omniscient. He's not forcing you, right?

He's upholding the universe and has ordained for any moment what you feel, what you're going to do. I've heard some people say, well, he doesn't care about my socks that I put on. He created this world that was going to come about in a particular way.

And one of the best verses to illustrate that is the last verse of Proverbs 16 that says, we cast the lot, but it's every decision is of the Lord. And that's a good illustration to say that even random things to us, maverick molecules bouncing around, whether we put on socks,.

All these meaningless, mundane things,.

God has a purpose in it. We just don't get to see the big picture. And last thing I want to say, KJ, is every position has to give a theodicy. They have to give an account of evil. And for the person that wants to uphold libertarian free will and yet say, but God was omniscient before he created the world.

Well, they have to give an account just like us. And this is going to sound just like what the reform position says. Well, yeah, God knew, right? But I'm trying to think, God is still the primary first cause.

And so we're saying, how is it even possible? Because if I truly had the ability to choose to do otherwise it would actually limit God's omniscience in some way. And then I think it would contradict, he wouldn't be omniscient anymore.

That's why some people adopt what's called open theism, that God doesn't know the future, because if he did, then we wouldn't be free creatures. And I'm over here saying, how about just let God be God and let us be the creatures.

And we truly choose according to our heart's desire.

Yeah, Paul tells us in Ephesians one verse 11, in him also we have attained inheritance it's being predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counts of his will.

And so when you think about that word, all I mean, all means all without exception, right? And so everything in human history is happening from God, go ahead.

Yeah.

The reason all means all there is because it's talking about God's all encompassing attributes. We always look at the word all in its context. A lot of times when we talk about God desires that all men be saved.

Well, that's in a particular context of all men without distinction, not without exception. And so, but when we're talking about God, who is all for of him, through him and to him are all things to whom be the glory.

Well, absolutely, that's all encompassing, right? All things are working together after God's counsel to the praise of his glorious grace.

Definitely.

And then again, the confession in chapter three, paragraph two says, did you mention it? It says God knows everything that could happen under any given condition. However, his decrees of anything is not based on foreseeing in the future or vicinity recurring in such conditions.

So it's like, it's not like God's looking down at the history, okay, he's saying, okay, KJ and Jermiah are going to have this podcast. Okay, now let me at, but no, God's determined. Like it's basically we're arguing in self-determinism.

You have God's sovereignty and freedom going together using the second causes of man, but also he's so sovereign. He planned it out exactly that would happen.

The way it did.

So I go hand in hand. Now, you mentioned the word earlier, but theodicy, this is what we're dealing with right now. The study of evil, many people call it. Now, when we're defining evil again, we're talking about theodicy.

How does the Bible define evil? I kind of put a little header on this. Is it a person? Is it an action? What else would define evil as, Jermiah, to you?

It's interesting because I've always been intrigued with this question, because we're asking what is the ontos of evil? What is it, right? Because we don't wanna say evil is merely the absence of good, right?

It is in a way, like we would say that darkness is the absence of light, but it's not just a mere absence. There's something there. I forget which philosopher tried to say, look, you have a donut, right?

And in the hole, there's nothing there. So it's not satisfying to say that it's merely the absence of good. There's something there. So there's an ontology there. Evil exists in the world. And so I think what we get at is evil is kind of twofold.

It begins in the heart of man. There's obviously other angelic beings that are evil, and it carries out into actions. So I didn't know if you wanna chime in on that.

Yeah, I like what you said. I like to think of it too, because a lot of times when we think about evil, we're thinking about like the, I know most people in my immediate go to like the evil that's in the world.

Is God the author of the evil that's going on in the world? Many Calvinists preach that God is sovereign, so that must mean that God has to offer. If he's predetermined everything to happen, he must have predetermined evil to happen in the world.

And so many people think of God being the author of evil in that sense. And so if that's true, just granting that thinking, 1 John 3 says this, whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness and sin is lawlessness.

And you know that when he was manifested, he can't take away sins. Whoever buys in is not sin. And you guys know that verse. But John defines sin as breaking the law. How can God break his own law? God is perfect and holy and just, so he can't go against his law.

For God to break his law, for God to sin, that would make, we would all be in trouble because how could the Messiah die on the cross if he was not perfect? And so for God to be the author of sin, it would contradict who he is in essence.

What's your take on that?

Well, I thought you did a good job explaining it. Evil has that moral component like we're talking about. And then earlier we mentioned how there are natural evils as well. So yeah, God can be sovereign.

Another phrase that we've used, KJ, that I really like is God uses sin sinlessly. That's only possible because of the creator creation distinction. The creator is qualitatively different than what he created.

So he's able to uphold and sustain his creation, to plan it out in such a particular way without him being that effectual, that's key, without being the effectual cause or author of evil.

Definitely.

And we've already quoted many scriptures about that, but just for somebody that's kind of interested, story of Job, I think the Genesis 26 with Abimelech, the people that killed Jesus, Peter tells us in Acts, all those things happened by the hand of the Lord, but yet God did not sin at all.

He just used it to bring about his means. Again, using the free will of mankind to orchestrate his plan throughout history.

Perhaps Genesis 50 verse 20 brings this full circle. You got Joseph's brothers, all of their evil actions, they intended to bring harm, evil. And yet you have God, the same verb, yet God intended it for good.

That's compatibilism. God is not using libertarian free creatures that he doesn't know their actions. And you can't just say he foreknows it. Well, he foreknows it because he sustains his creation and has planned it out.

I really do think, KJ, to say that man has the ability to choose otherwise in the libertarian sense would necessarily negate God's omniscience.

That's good.

Well said, man. Now, when we think about this, now that we define author, primary cause, free will, and determinism, how does all that tie into the theodicy.

Of the study of evil?

Is God responsible?

Yeah, well, all those terms are important because everybody has to give a theodicy. Everyone, even the atheists, they have to try to give an account for the evils that happen in this place. You got false religions that try to say that it's illusory, that it's actually not real.

And that's not satisfying to the human soul. We know evil exists. And as Christians, God has revealed that. We actually can know where evil came about. It stems back to Adam and Eve with Satan in the garden.

And we're gonna get into how there was a process. There's an even more fundamental original sin before original sin with man. So I think what it's gonna come down to is if someone's gonna hold to God's omniscience, they're gonna say behind every evil act is a God that knew it was gonna happen and could stop it.

Or he's just like, I'm over here. I'm just, I'm allowing it to happen for my own purposes. And I'm just on standby watching and hoping that you make the right decision. To me, that's very unsatisfying because God is allowing so much evil that he didn't really want to happen.

And I think the correct biblical narrative is that God has purpose in all things. Everything relates together because he is the creator of all things and he has purpose, right? He's working it out. And so, yeah, when you look at an evil action, you can say, God, you mean this for good.

I can't necessarily see this in this moment, but you've told me to be thankful in all things and to rejoice in all things because this is for my good and for my sanctification. And so I think for the reform perspective, people can say God is the creator as defined by the scripture and he is good.

He is working all things together for his glory and in purposes. Nothing is going to catch him off guard. And he's not this lower, in my mind, I know people would be mad at me, but he's not just on the sideline rooting.

No, God's the sovereign creator. He has purpose in all things.

Well said, man, well said. Now we think about that, Jeremiah, now that we kind of sit at some of these things, can we as Christians say that even as you're a Calvinist or you believe in God's sovereignty, we don't like term Calvinist, but you say you believe in God's sovereignty.

And we all have to as the Christians, right? Can we as Christians articulate and say that God's the author of evil? Or even an atheist, if they say God's the author of evil, how can we go about talking about that based on the scripture we've kind of.

Already dealt with today?