The Evangelical Universalist Forum

God Is Not The Author Of Evil

Theology Biblical Theology
#41

If God must do something for evil to exist, whether remove His Hand of Grace, or rub them together to conjure it up, it makes no difference. God is the CAUSE of evil if He must do something in order for it to exist.

Even if evil is a lack of God, when He withdraws, from Him, evil comes.

1 Samuel 16:14-16
Now the Spirit of the LORD had departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the LORD tormented him. Saul’s attendants said to him, “See, an evil spirit from God is tormenting you."

Your logic does not come from the Scriptures, your logic comes from an inability to understand.

1 Samuel 24:13
As the old saying goes, ‘From evildoers come evil deeds,’

God is the AUTHOR of evil, but He does not do evil. By God’s actions (inaction is an action), evil is created but God does not do Evil. So since God does not do evil, neither are His deeds evil. You will see a repeated phrase in Scripture, “They did evil in the sight of the Lord” or “He did evil in the eyes of God,” etc. These phrases tell you that evil is subject to God’s judgment and all men are under His judgment, but for God to do evil in the eyes of man, God can never judged righteously for this.

Job 34:10
“So listen to me, you men of understanding. Far be it from God to do evil, from the Almighty to do wrong.

Isaiah 45:7
I form the light, and create darkness; I make peace, and create evil. I am Jehovah, that doeth all these things.

As long as one has the theology that many souls will be lost permanently, or tortured infinitely, then it is no wonder you find an injustice in the understanding that God created evil. You believe that evil persists in the end, and that many will be lost maybe even you, Michael.

You fear evil.

There is only one Truth and that is From God all things exist and through Him all things are held together, and by Him all things will be reconciled.

#42

I thought about posting the Isaiah passage, too. But it looks to me like it probably really means more along the lines of “I bring calamity” or “I create disaster.” That sort of thing. Nevertheless, if evil is a thing or a force or an absence or a choice . . . it seems to me that it has to come, in some fashion, from the one Creator. Otherwise we have two gods; a good one and a bad one.

I wonder if that which we call evil is something to do with creation wanting to regress to the chaos/void/nothingness from which God created it (and which, in itself, had to be created by God to begin with, even if it is a nothingness). It’s evil because it’s a regression to a less developed, matured state. And maybe we need to experience some of this from time to time, for various (and always beneficial in the long run) reasons. What do you all think? You’re not going to hurt my feelings if you think I’m way off – I’m not holding this as a dogma or anything, and I genuinely would love to hear your take on it.

Thanks in advance!
Cindy

#43

Hi. My understanding is that this is the same word for “evil” as it is the Tree of Good and Evil…If that makes a difference. :wink:

#44

No, He creates RA. If Isaiah meant to write calamity or disaster, he would have used EYD or HOVAH. Isaiah wrote RA, the same word in Genesis for the Tree of knowledge of Good and Evil (RA). It has no ‘lines’ of calamity or disaster. It means moral evil.

#45

That’s a good point AUniversalist. I’ve changed my views on this. I don’t follow the Bible anymore. It’s my belief now that there is One True God who has two Spirits that emanate from Him/Her. One is the Spirit of love and light. The other is the Sprit of evil and abuse. I try not to follow the Spirit of evil and abuse. Rather, I try to follow the Spirit of love and light. This is my Higher Power. The Spirit of love and peace. I do this by taking care of myself and helping others when I can. I try to refrain from self-destructive and abusive behaviors. Not that I don’t ever mess up. But when I do I just forgive myself and make my amends to others if needed. My goal is to love myself and others as I trust in and rely on the Power of love that comes from the Spirit of light and peace.

#46

There you go. It is far more reasonable to have your now current belief, than the one you were talking about earlier. The religion of man has gone a long way in distorting the truth. I have a post here earlier speaking of what Satan is and it isn’t a Angelic Being.

Though, I believe your current belief also is logically unsound despite regardless of it’s scriptural support or not (whether you want it or not). I find your current belief has you live in constant fear from a ‘Being’ and you will never know which side will win since now it appears you believe that evil is inherit and not created.

What matters though, is that you pursue good and do good expecting nothing in return, and have joy in your heart and be happy in everything you do.

#47

That is correct. I believe that they are eternal. And they will continue for all eternity. I don’t follow the Spirit of abuse anymore though. I follow the Spirit of love and peace. I don’t live in fear of the Spirit of love that I follow. I don’t see anything illogical here.

#48

Also, one of the problems I have with the God of the Bible is that God the Father was sacrificing His only Son on the cross for His blood so that He could cover our sins and forgive them. It is said that the O.T. sacrifices were types and shadows of this bloody sacrifice, in particular when God told Abraham to sacrifice His only son. The only difference is that there was no one there to stop Father God from sacrificing Christ. I just don’t understand why God requires blood to cover our sins in order to forgive. If it was only death God was after then He could have killed the innocent Christ without all that torture and blood. Nope, it was both death and blood that God the Father wanted. What does innocent blood have to do with forgiving someone for their sins? My Higher Power doesn’t require blood sacrifices in order to forgive. When I mess up I just forgive myself, ask for forgiveness, and make amends if needed. There’s no need for all that blood and abuse from my Higher Power.

#49

Michael_Cole, you have asked a great question and one that has perplexed me more than perhaps any other theological concept.

The traditional view of penile substitution I just don’t buy at all. I don’t believe God is the bloodthirsty hothead that I think is the predominant view within the evangelical camp.

Instead I’ve come to view the story like this. We, the people God created, and due to the effects of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, went astray and began to horribly mistreat each other. We kill, rape, use, steal from, and manipulate each other – we sin. The cure for the disease caused by the famous tree is not judgment and punishment but instead forgiveness and God’s plan from the beginning was always to be the one to get the forgiveness ball rolling.

So God the father sent his only son, his most precious one to earth where sin was rampant. God knew we would mistreat him, torment, torture, and kill him. We would spill his innocent blood and it had to be this way. For the initial and pivotal act of forgiveness would necessarily demand the most heinous of crimes.

It pleased God to take the vilest viciousness we could dish out, to watch as we gave our best shot to destroy him, and then in complete reversal to offer forgiveness. He was not pleased in the blood just for the sake of bloody goriness, but he was pleased with the blood because it was the result of the most egregious offense we could direct towards him. He took the most we could dish out and in the midst of blood, agony, and death offered unmerited and total forgiveness and grace.

The God I worship chose to send his beloved son to a bloody death in order to show his equal love to the ones desperately in need of healing.

The God I worship chose to be sent in innocence and suffer and die at the hands of those he himself created.

The sender and the sent are one, with one purpose, and one desire – that through the spilled blood and resulting forgiveness, all sin and its resulting pain and death would be swallowed up in victory.

#50

Hi David,

I still don’t see the point in all that blood being needed to forgive someone for their sins. I’ve been through alot of different paths of healing and I find that the one that is most effective for me is the 12 Steps. There’s nothing there that says blood is required for the forgiveness of sins. And that is something I like. If you find healing in the death of Christ then thats great. For me, it has taken alot of work of going through the 12 Steps. As for the afterlife. I’m not sure there is one. I hope there is one. I do however believe in an eternal God.

#51

From my view its not really that “the blood was needed IN ORDER to forgive someone of their sins”, but rather the blood was necessary TO PROVE that God really is a good and forgiving God. So, we might think, well he forgives little things but then if we do something really bad then he might not.

The blood was necessary to show the completeness and fullness of God’s grace and forgiveness towards us.

The fact that Jesus was spotless and innocent proves it all the more.

The “types and shadows” of the OT being, sin, blood, death, and then forgiveness was perfectly played out on the cross.

In order for us to know that ALL sin is forgiven then the most grave of all sins must be played out and then forgiven.

Does that make sense?

#52

I don’t see why blood is ncessary to prove that you are forgiving. The Bible says without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins. I don’t see any need for all that. For my Higher Power is forgiving without having to die an abusive death.

#53

For me the cross can prove one of two things. Either God is a bloodthirsty killer or the complete opposite.

One view is that God killed Jesus in order not to have to kill us.

An alternative view is that God allowed us (people) to kill God himself in the person of Jesus so that God himself could reciprocate with forgiveness and grace thereby proving he is the exact opposite of a bloodthirsty killer.

God demonstrated his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us.

#54

Yes, but why blood and abuse? Why not just forgive someone who truely asks for it?

#55

Me, you, and every other person on the planet are the bloody abusers (pun intended).

What do we naturally want to see when someone abuses us? We want to see them humiliated, bloodied, and crushed.

Jesus was the abused, not the abuser. It was his blood that was shed because of our abuse. God the father suffered abuse as well - watching his son die at the hands of his other lost wayward children.

God came to us bloody abusers to teach us a new way. The way of forgiveness and grace.

God forgives and has forgiven everyone, even those who truly ask for it.

How can we be sure of this? Because of the cross.

#56

Why is blood necessary to prove that you are forgiving? Why is there no forgiveness of sins without the shedding of blood? I don’t see the connection between blood and forgiveness.

#57

David,

If it brings you healing to read about or watch someone get tortured and beat to death then more power to you. As for me, I don’t get healing out of reading about or watching someone get beat and tortured to death. It’s just not my cup of tea.

#58

I don’t and I’m not sure how you concluded this from what I wrote previously. There seems to be a total disconnect here between you and me. Apparently my writing skills are just not up to the task of clearly explaining what I was thinking - sorry for that.

#59

There is no problem with this, because it had nothing to do with God. It had to do with the LAW that the Hebrews submitted themselves to. There is no sin that Jesus died for concerning the Gentiles, He died for the SIN of the HEBREWS who submitted themselves to the LAW, a LAW. This was not GODS LAW, but THE LAW OF MOSES, which had specific conditions which allowed the HEBREWS to be free. God did not ‘sacrifice’ His Son based on any of His Laws, He gave His Son who sacrificed Himself to destroy the Work (the LAW) of the Evil One.

The issue is that Christianity has not been teaching the Gospel correctly and applied principles to themselves that was not talking about them. So if you are basing your logic on what they teach about God as being true (such as Jesus died for the sins of the world and not the SIN of the world [that is submitting themselves to the Law which was not God]), then of course it wouldn’t make sense.

#60

There is no blood needed to forgive the sins any man has made against God. That was not a requirement of God, that was a requirement of the Law (not God’s Law remember). Read the Gospels and you will see Jesus said, “In YOUR law.” or “You follow your father, the devil.” or “In the Law of Moses,” or “In the Law and Prophets.” etc.

When people begin to realize the LAW was what they were forgiven for, and that the LAW had built within it, a escape clause which Jesus fulfilled. We recognize that there was no penal substitution established by God, but established by men who felt guilty and created a law and attributed it to God out of fear. Such Law has spiritual power to oppress the person who submits to it and because those who submit to this LAW were weak in the first place, they were unable to be set free without the LAW being made obsolete. Jesus died and shed his Blood and being the vessel that fulfilled the Law’s requirements making it obsolete and being the High Priest, and taking from men what was God’s, Jesus established a new covenant.

Now, if God was going to do something so wonderful to a people who were his people, how much more has he blessed the Gentiles who were not under the Law. So because of what He did for the Hebrews, He called a people who were not His People, Sons of God. Hence why we are called Evangelical Universalists at this forum.