Rediscovering The Truth About Creation

Before proceeding to that examination of ALL the Facts, an additional matter needs to be discussed. In Chapter Twelve, reference was made to a remark by Mr. Steven Weinberg in which the author pinpointed some of life's disasters and indirectly suggested that God could not exist and still allow such terrible events to occur. The question being raised by his comment is not illogical. How can God who hates evil allow that which He hates? How can He, at times, almost make Himself appear as a partner-in-crime concerning some of the bad that happens? These questions are valid and important, and each can be related to some of the confrontations which were just presented.

Why did the Lord, for example, allow Eve and then Adam to do something which would lead to so much trouble? He could have intervened and stopped that whole situation, but He chose to let it be. Why did He allow evil to progress so far during Noah's time and also in the incident at the Tower of Babel? He, again, could have intervened in either or both, but He did not! Why does God, at times, appear to be so passive toward behaviors or predicaments which seem so bad, but then, at other times, charges right in and takes over? In my opinion, there is a somewhat simple explanation for what is often referred to as the problem of pain and evil.

Concerning His apparent passiveness and why He allows so much, the Lord does many of those things because He loves us! This answer, I know, sounds absurd, but it really is not. He could treat each of us as robots and control our every action, but He does not! Instead, He allows us many individual freedoms so that we can do as we please. Unfortunately, those freedoms often cause trouble, both for ourselves and for others. If, for example, I exercise my freedom to obtain a gun and shoot my neighbor, then that act, if permitted by God, will cause anxiety for my neighbor and his family, plus I, of course, will probably go to jail! Yet, in this instance, God did not cause the evil, but because He loves me enough to let me make many or most of my own choices, He did allow it. A simple spiritual truth is that God rarely forces Himself on others or into their situations. Obviously, there are exceptions! He can and sometimes does intervene, but many times, He simply stays back and allows us the freedom to do things which might ultimately hurt ourselves or others.

In the second, third, and fourth confrontations, the Lord did eventually intervene, and while this might seem almost contradictory given the nature of the statement just made, the key to understanding the difference is to look again at Facts 28G-3 and 29D-1. It is correct to say that God loves each person enough to allow many individual freedoms, but at the same time, He does not allow the devil to get too much of an upper hand! If one reviews the episode in the Garden of Eden, not only was the devil able to trick Eve into taking the forbidden fruit, but he was also correct in what he had promised her. In Genesis 3:5, he said, "Your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." In Genesis 3:7 and again in Genesis 3:22, Moses confirmed that Adam and Eve's eyes had been opened and that they did know good and evil.

In like manner, the opening verses of Genesis, Chapter Six, give information about Noah's times and suggest that those people, as far back as probably five thousand years ago, had been experimenting with the idea of a "super race." In Genesis 6:4, the indication is given that they were at least a little bit successful at the job. Thus, they had to be stopped! Later, Genesis 11:6 shows that the people at Babel were successfully building the Tower. So, they too had to be stopped! While God did not initially intervene into any of these situations, He did ultimately have to become involved when it looked like the whole thing might get out of hand. By that time, though, one could almost say that He had been pushed beyond a reasonable limit.

Because God loves us, He gives us the freedom to hurt ourselves, to hurt others, and to even practice evil. It is as simple as that! Unfortunately, the consequences to humanity for His tolerance is often pain and sorrow for the innocent victim. The alternatives, though, of being controlled like robots and of not being allowed to choose between different options in life, are much worse. Most people criticize the Lord and are impatient with Him for allowing so many disastrous things. However, if our individual freedoms were taken away and we were suddenly treated like mindless creatures, then most of us, if we could even know what was going on, would be far more upset. Much human suffering comes from the three sources that have been mentioned in this and the previous chapter. Either the devil, in trying to get back at God, attacks and hurts a person, one aggressive individual locks horns with another, or God is simply pushed to the point of having to act. These three causes of pain and evil are summarized below in Table 15.

To conclude this discussion about pain and evil, it is correct to say that God allows certain behaviors and actions simply because He loves us. It is also true that He sometimes puts down certain movements because the devil has carried them too far! These two truths bring us to our final Fact.