APOLOGETICS
THE PROBLEM OF EVIL
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The Problem of Evil, or
“Why Do Bad Things
Happen to Good People?”
The Problem: How can these three
statements all be true?
1. God is all good
2. God is all powerful
3. Evil exists, but why?
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•
Either God isn’t all good, or
God isn’t all powerful
Why should I believe in a being who either
isn’t strong enough or good enough to
put an end to evil?
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How Humans Have Tackled
the Problem of Evil
Atheism (there is no such being as God):
Agnosticism (if there is a God, he can’t be known,
and is irrelevant):
• Evil undeniably exists
• Humans must find answers to reduce the effects of
bad moral choices
• “Quit blaming a devil!”
• “Quit waiting for help from a non-existent (or nonchalant)
god!”
• Ultimately, either “Life’s a b_ _ _ _, and then you
die,” or “Life is what you make of it”
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How Humans Have Tackled
the Problem of Evil
Manicheanism (and Zoroastrianism, Greek
paganism, and Eastern paganism):
• Deity isn’t all good
• multiplicity of gods, or dual nature within one god
• constant struggle between good and evil
Process Theology (influences present in
Social Gospel Movement, Liberation
Theology, Amillennialism):
•God isn’t all powerful
•“Believers pool their moral resources
•with God’s finite goodness”
•“Together, evil eventually will be defeated”
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How Humans Have Tackled
the Problem of Evil
Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism,
New Age Religions:
• Evil doesn’t exist
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•
•
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“Moral dualism is an illusion”
“Merge with the One,” or
“’Awake’ in Nirvana,” or
“Find peace in the Yin and the Yang”
“All will be well when you
• Cease to believe in ‘good vs. evil and
• Find the god within”
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How Humans Have Solved
the Problem of Evil
Christianity, Judaism, Islam:
• God is all good and all powerful, and
evil does exist
• Moral evil (sin and its direct consequences)
is a necessary condition of humans having
free will (“the free-will defense”)
• Non-moral evil (natural disasters, etc.)
exists to perfect us (“the vale of soulmaking defense”)
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A Closer Look at Evil
Augustine let the problem of evil keep him from
God, so after his conversion he studies the
undeniable reality called evil (Confessions
includes some of humanity’s deepest
thoughts on the subject)
• All God’s creations were good
• Some goods were higher than other goods
• Angels and humans have the ability to
choose
• This ability was corrupted when they chose lower
goods instead of higher goods
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More about Evil
Augustine taught that evil’s “existence” is
not independent
• Evil is the privation of Good
• Evil/Good = Darkness/Light
• Evil/Good = Death/Life
•Evil parasitizes the Good
•The parasite’s existence is never of a
higher order than its host’s existence
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Still More about Evil
Augustine taught that evil’s “existence” is not
necessary
• God existed first, and God is good
• Evil entered creation when will (a good
faculty) was misused
• Humanity’s main problem is the perverted will
• Good can be appreciated without there being
evil
• The City of God is inhabited by humans with
converted wills
• The City of God will never go away, even though
Rome goes away (this is why Augustine wrote The
City of God)
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Suffering
• Does the presence of
suffering indicate the
absence of God?
• If so, does the absence of
suffering indicate the
presence of God?
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Suffering
• If neither, then . . .
• Suffering and
• God being here (or not
here)
. . . are not necessarily
related causally
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Suffering and Eternity
Should all who die
painfully go to
heaven?
Should all who die
painlessly go to
hell?
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Pain
• The Gift Nobody Wants
• “Nightmares of Painlessness”
• How much pain is too much?
• How much pain is enough?
• Would a morally fallen world
without suffering be
• Heaven?
• Hell?
“Pain is God’s megaphone.”
– C.S. Lewis
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The Vale of Soul-Making
Defense
Is God a …
• Zookeeper?
• Loving Parent?
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Does God Feel Pain?
If He does not, then there is an element of
experience that we have that God does not
have.
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This is absurd.
If He does, then His ability to feel pain is not
limited like ours is.
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This boggles the mind, and vexes the heart.
If God feels pain, and sin pains God, then
why did He create us?
Study of the character and attributes of God
can be the most rewarding and enriching
experience in learning that you will ever
encounter.
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Love Creates Possibility of
Evil
A Creator’s Options
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1 create nothing
2 create an amoral world: no evil, no good
3 create only automatons, no free choice
4 create free will to choose right or wrong, to love or not to
love
Love must not be coerced to be true love
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no love possible in options 1-3, only possible in #4
love requires loving enough to give the freedom to reject the
love
love without pain is superficial love
Evil is man’s choice, not God’s
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take responsibility for own actions
don’t blame God for man’s evil
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Philosophical Doom
How do we know which creation option is
best?
Requires ultimate knowledge ourselves
 Any choice but #4 annihilates ourselves
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Assume we exist (self-evident, Descarte)
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1 create nothing: poof -- we’re gone
2 create amoral: poof -- we’re gone
3 create automatons: poof -- we’re gone
Self-annihilation to limit pain is only logical
recourse
 Atheists may not be willing to pursue this logic
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“Religious Evils Nullify
Religion”
Copernicus, Galileo, Crusades, Inquisition,
Slavery, Bosnia, Rwanda, Ireland
None of these injustices supported by Christ’s
teachings
 Christ’s teachings clearly stand against such
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After all -- that is the critics’ point: the hypocrisy
What about the greater injustices of Atheism?
Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Mao, Pol-Pot, Idi Amin
 All such actions consistent with tenets of atheism
 Self-destruction is not “hypocritical” to an atheist
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“Where is God when it
hurts?”
Atheism has no moral basis to even ask this
question
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“Hurting” is merely physics and chemistry in an atheistic
worldview
Certainly not an “evil” that anyone must be compelled to
“fix”
God does address hurting and evil
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in His way
in His time
effectively
Response: Where is Atheism when it hurts?
“This pain isn’t really bad because it’s only amoral
chemistry and physics.”
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Solution to Problem of
Pain/Evil
Jesus Christ
Pain and Evil
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Exposed God’s Love to Man: Cross
Love requires self-sacrifice to another: trust
Love and Justice “married” through Mercy and Grace
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a world without love is no world we would have
a world without justice against evil is likewise intolerable
Demonstrates His Power over Evil: Resurrection
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Requires ability to create Life from Death: Demonstrated
Cross shows man’s inhumanity IS
Evil
Cross shows God’s humanity IS
Good
Without Jesus Christ, nothing makes sense
Requires a great deal of trust on our part as well as
God’s
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Show me an atheistic ...
Joan of Arc
Florence Nightingale
Mother Teresa
Mahatma Gandhi
Martin Luther King
Jesus of Nazareth
Why were they what they were?
They knew truth of God’s reality
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Apologetics to the Glory of God
Ch6&7 Defense: Problem of Evil
10. Scriptural
Romans teaches what we see elsewhere in Scripture:
1. We have no right to complain against God, and
when we do, we expose ourselves as
disobedient.
2. God is under no obligation to give us an
intellectually satisfying answer to the problem
of evil. He expects us to trust him in spite of
that.
3. God’s sovereignty is not to be questioned in
connection with the problem of evil
4. God’s word, his truth, is entirely reliable.
5. God is not unjust. He is holy, just, and good.
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Apologetics to the Glory of God
10. Scriptural
Ch6&7 Defense: Problem of Evil
(continued)
God vindicates his justice by helping us see
history through his eyes:
- mystery of time
- God enters in judgment, but each time he
preserves the people in grace.
- CHRIST IS THE THEODICY (Romans 3:26
“he did it to demonstrate his justice at the
present time, so as to be just and the one
who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.”;
Rom 5:8 “He demonstrate his love..”)
- 1 John 1:9 faithful and JUST to forgive
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Apologetics to the Glory of God
10. Scriptural – GreaterGood Defense
Ch6&7 Defense: Problem of Evil
Clarifications/Foundation:
1. Theocentric (not anthropocentric) –
God’s ultimate purpose is to glorify
himself (man’s chief end “is to glorify
God, and enjoy him forever.”)
2. Obedience to God is a way of life and
happiness (John 10:10; Dt 5:33; 8:3;
11:13-15…Ps 1; Ps 119:7) Suffering
is for a while; glory is for eternity.
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Apologetics to the Glory of God
10. Scriptural – GreaterGood
Ch6&7 Defense: Problem of Evil
Ways God uses evil to bring about greater
good:
1. Displaying his grace and justice (Rom
3:26; 5:8,20-21;9:17)
2. Judgment of evil (Mt 23:35; John
5:14), now and in the future.
3. Redemption: Christ’s sufferings are
redemptive (1 Pt 3:18) and in a way so
may ours (Col 1:24)
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Apologetics to the Glory of God
10. Scriptural – GreaterGood
Ch6&7 Defense: Problem of Evil
4. Shock value to unbelievers, intended
to gain their attention and promote a
change of heart (Zech 13:7-9; Luke
13:1-5; John 9 healing the man born blind.
Why blind?)
5. Fatherly disciple of believers (Heb 12)
6. Vindication of God (Rom 3:26)
We know that God has a reason for
everything he does. Everything he
does reflects wisdom.
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Apologetics to the Glory of God
Ch6&7 Defense: Problem of Evil
Conclusion
Why can it be called a so-called problem of pain?
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It isn’t so much that evil & pain is an illusion
It isn’t a philosophical problem that argues against
God’s existence.
Pain testifies to the veracity, the truthfulness, of God
and of Scripture.
The answer to the problem of pain is that in reality
it is a problem of sin.
A good, just, omnipotent, sovereign God has to
make the sinner (the rebel against God) suffer.
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For further study
Lewis, C.S. The Problem of Pain
Yancey, Philip. Where is God When it Hurts?
Brand, Paul and Philip Yancey. PAIN: The
Gift Nobody Wants. (on library reserve)
Allen, Diogenes. The Traces of God. (on
library reserve)
Taylor, Larry. The Relationship of Free Will
to the Concept of Soul Making in the
Theodicy of John Hick.
Leibniz, Gottfried. Theodicy.
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