"Well, if God was good, then he would stop this. But he doesn't. So either he isn't all powerful, or he isn't good. And if either of those things is true, then why call him God?"
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| WINNING! |
Okay. That argument against belief in God is old. It's super duper old. It goes back to a time shortly after the birth, death, and resurrection of Jesus himself. And that's just this quote!
But the problem of evil is a thorny one. If God was all-powerful, and truly wanted there to be good in the world, then how is there still evil. How do we live in a world today in which the Syrian government is lobbing shells at its civilians, or the Israelis and Palestinians are firing rockets at each other. How do we live in a world in which we have people doing a whole bunch of horrible things to each other, and yet we still say God is good? How can we?
Yes, we live in a terrible world, in which people are terrible to each other. And we ask the question, as we are wont to do, why doesn't God just get rid of all the evil in the world. What's he waiting for? He's all powerful, and ostensibly a cool guy, so why all the pain and suffering?
This is a scene that I keep on going back to again and again. Why do I keep on going back to this trailer? Because I sincerely believe that it hits a pretty major point in the problem of evil. Bill Maher, in this most excellent trailer for his most excellent movie 'religulous,' asks a man dressed as Jesus why God doesn't just get rid of all the evil in the world, to which the guy dressed as Jesus (apparently an authority on this) says that He will. And Bill Maher's response is "What's he waiting for."
That's apparently the knockout punch. That's the devastating knockout punch to religion in general, and ones that have an omnipotent God in particular. Ones like Christianity. We have an all-powerful God who is good. So what's with all the suffering? Why doesn't he just obliterate all the evil in the world?
Well, I believe that a golden opportunity was missed in this scene by the guy in the Jesus suit not answering with the very real, very heartfelt answer that is lurking at the core of each individual Christian. It's not one we think about very often, but it's really central to what we believe, and the problem of evil in general. Why won't God wipe out all the evil in the world? Because I don't want him to.
As a famous singer once said, 'if everyone wanted peace like they said they want peace, we'd have peace.' And if everyone who said they wanted God to obliterate all the evil from the world actually wanted God to obliterate all the evil from the world, then there would be no more evil. But I don't. Sure, I might say that I want God to eliminate the people who are committing genocide, or crushing their own people into submission, or raping or murdering or what not. But you know what? Short of murder, I have no way of stopping those people from doing what they're going to choose to do. So the one person over whom I do have control, i.e. me, I'm not really keen on changing what he does. I don't think that any of my sins are that big a deal, that God should be worried about bigger issues. It's like how you are when a cop pulls you over for speeding, and the first question you may ask is 'don't you have any real criminals to catch?'
But imagine a cosmic cop who could watch everywhere and be everywhere at the same time. Imagine if said supercop was able to see everything that went on, and could perfectly punish every infraction, no matter how minor, it would be worth his time. You see, we tend to think of our actions as being very similar to those watched by the cop. And we tend to think that the stuff we do is no big deal. God should be concentrating on the big stuff. The Hutus and the Tutsis, the Palestinians and the Israelis. He shouldn't worry about the fights and neglects going on in your own home.
But, of course, he should. And he does. If we expect him, as Epicurus does above, to be all good, and all powerful, then he should probably care about everything. If we expect him to strike the genocidal dictators dead for their work, then why do we feel as though He shouldn't strike us dead before we raise a hand against our wives or children, or as we click a link on the internet that takes us somewhere we shouldn't go, or before we speak spitefully to a spouse, or take money that isn't ours, any of these times, why should God not strike us dead.
In many ways, the question is not so much 'why does God allow evil to exist,' but more 'why, in his infinite wisdom, does God see any good in any of this?' Why did he allow free will in the first place if it was going to turn out so poorly? Well, think of who you are, and what you do. Think of yourself when you are at your best. Think about what you do that is phenomenal and good, when you exceed even your own expectations, when you do what you know is the right thing, when you are good and generous to someone who really doesn't deserve it, and what do they say?
"You didn't have to do that"
It's true. You didn't. And that's what made it good. If you had to, it wouldn't be a good work now, would it? Nobody compliments their pizza delivery driver by saying 'yes you had to get here because it's your job to do so.' Nobody says to their waitstaff 'hey, my food arrived at my table. Good work.' We tip these people when they go above and beyond what they absolutely had to do. It's your free will that makes you a chunk of junk sometimes. Yes. But it's also your free will that makes anything you do worth doing. It's only your free will that gets you beyond your obligation, and lets you do the works that are closest to the divine.
If there was just something that you absolutely were compelled to do, by biology, by physics, by chemistry, it wouldn't be good or bad. It would be neutral. But God made us with free will, with the ability to be both good and bad, and with the ability to be loving or hateful. And in the midst of all this, he made a promise through Jesus. He promised the impossible. He promised life everlasting, in which all the burden of sin would be taken away. What does that mean? That through Christ, and the forgiveness of sins, we can be both sinners and saints. We have the free will to botch a thousand things a day up, and yet we can still take that sin to Christ and have it forgiven.
Can God prevent evil? Only through getting rid of us.
Is he able but not willing? Yes.
Then he is merciful.
To you and to me, to Epicurus and to Ariel Sharon.
To those who can do great evil, and to those who can be simply rude to each other.
Through the cross on which Jesus Christ died, and through his death, he broke the problem of evil.
We are bad, but God forgives. There is justice and there is mercy.
Jesus. Winning since 33 AD.
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