Good And Evil

Good and Evil

There are perhaps no two words that are more highly abused than these two. With multitudes of people calling evil good and good evil. We had better know the difference:

Isa 5:20 Destruction is certain for those who call evil good and good evil...

1. What truly is Good? Here is a bedrock and unchanging truth: Only God is truly Good:

Luke 18:19 (Jesus) Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God.

God alone is good; there is no goodness apart from Him. Being good and unchangeable, He only ever does good; where His will is done it cannot help but be good. And whenever someone allows Him to impart His nature of goodness to them then they, but only to the extent of that nature and to the degree that they live in that nature, they too become good.

Mark 7:37 (Speaking about Jesus) "He has done all things well (or Good)...”

2. What then is Evil? Evil is the opposite of good, meaning everything and everyone that opposes Good. Since God alone is Good (unless you reject the words of Jesus Christ) then evil is everything and everyone that opposes God, and His will, and opposes God’s people when they’re living in His divine nature of good imparted to them. All God’s angels when originally created were good and perfect, including Lucifer. But they were given by God a free will to obey God and remain good or to disobey God and become evil. Lucifer, being lifted up with pride over his beauty, sought to be equal with God and so iniquity or evil was found in him. He was ejected from heaven and a third of the angels followed him.

Ezek 28:15-17 (Concerning Lucifer who became Satan) You were perfect (good) in your ways from the day you were created, until iniquity (evil) was found in you. Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty...

Isa 14:13-14 For you have said in your heart...“I will be like the Most High”

3. Did God create Evil? Those who don’t believe in God, who think they are quite smart, will sometimes attack Christians with this argument: Did God create everything? (the implied answer is: Yes) Is there evil in the world (the implied answer is: Yes). Then the questioner gleefully concludes: Then God created evil, didn’t He? To which the truthful answer is: No He did not create Evil. There was no such thing as evil in His original creation. After each step of creation, Genesis 1:4, 10, 12, 18, 21, 25 all say “And God saw that it was Good”. Then God created man after His own image, which is, Good.

But He gave man a free will to choose either Good or Evil and instructed him not to choose

Evil. He said: “Do not eat, meaning believe and act on, the fruit, meaning the words, that come from the tree, or being, that has the knowledge of Good and Evil”. Satan, of course is that being, since he was created a good angel but chose evil, and hence has the knowledge of both good and evil. And what did the good man and good woman do? They choose to believe, to eat, the fruit of Satan’s words instead of God’s words and by them came to know evil. And that is how evil entered the world. God did not create it. It is also how the Devil became the “god” of this world and the dominant influence over its affairs:

2 Cor 4:4 Satan, who is the god of this evil world... TLB

1 Jo 5:19 ...The whole world is under the rule of the Evil One (Satan). TEV

Now, there is a scripture in the King James Version that has troubled some Christians:

Isa 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil... KJV

It says that God created evil. By extension all evil must somehow be indirectly under His control including wars, murder, rape, robbery and premature death. This is God who in love, goodness and mercy, sent Jesus to bleed and die for me on a cross at Calvary so that He could take away my sins and make me His son. This seems a total contradiction:

According to Strong's concordance the Hebrew word translated “create” in both instances is the word “bara”. This word “bara” is also translated “dispatch” and “cut down” in other parts of the Old Testament. If we substitute these meanings the verse would then read:

Isa 45:7 I form the light, and dispatch darkness: I make peace, and cut down evil…

Which of these two renderings is consistent with what other scriptures tell us about God?

I John 1:5 ...God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all (He dispatches it).