Open Theism Discussion Board

8. Evil comes from creatures. Evil originates in creatures. It does not come from God. It is not the will of God. Creatures bring evil into God's good creation by misusing and abusing the good things given by God, beginning with their own being and life. Sicknesses and diseases, and even natural disasters and the ravages of beasts, are, according to Christian scriptures and saints, somehow the fault of creatures who have broken their relationship with God. If human beings were perfectly good, Christian tradition contends, and if they remained in perfect communion with God, acting freely by God's Good Spirit and not enslaved by evil spirits, the elements and the animals would be in their control and would thereby be deprived of their destructive and death-dealing powers. This cosmic peace is exactly what is expected in God's coming kingdom under the lordship of Christ at the end of the ages. It is already witnessed in Jesus' earthly life, according to the scriptures, as well as in the lives of saints.

9. Evil's origin is creaturely choice. It is often said that the origin of evil lies in choice, and that sin is the making of bad choices. This is true when properly explained, but it seems more consistent with Christian scripture and tradition to hold that the origin of evil is found in the presumption that creatures have choices at all. The point here is simple. If God exists, what choices can creatures possibly have? Their only real choice is to love and trust God, and to do God's will. This seems to be what the Genesis stories are written to tell us. It is also what Jesus, the second and final Adam, witnesses when he says that he has no words, no works and no will of his own, but that all that he says, does and wills is in obedience to God his Father. It is impossible to imagine that Christ would presume to choose anything, or even think that he had a choice. Even more impossible is it to imagine that Jesus would hold that his freedom and dignity derive from the many choices available to him in his alleged autonomy!4 ^{((4•St. Maximos the Confessor was mutilated for insisting that Christ, having divine and human natures, wills, energies and operations, had no "gnomic will," which is to say that he never made choices based on deliberations since he possessed perfect freedom in his perfect union with God the Father (a condition which is also theoretically possible to "mere human beings" by faith and grace.) The Sixth Ecumenical Council confirmed this doctrine.)) Jesus obeys God his Father with absolute, love and devotion. He says "yes" to the Father's will in every circumstance, even when he asks his "Abba," to whom all things are possible, to remove the cup of suffering which he must drink at the hands of evildoers. In this understanding, the cause of every evil lies in the lie that creatures have choices. In this way of looking at things, the making of choices demonstrates an egregious failure on the part of creatures to abide in communion with God. It demonstrates a disobedience and rebellion that inexorably lead to destruction and death.}

10. God wills that there be evil. Although God did not create evil, God clearly wills, according to Christian scripture and tradition, that evil and wickedness exist. The fathers, interpreting scripture, make this subtle point by saying that though God does not will evil metaphysically. God certainly does will evil providentially.5 ((5See John of Damascus The Orthodox Faith z.22-30. )) This is proven by God's creating those whom he knew would be evil. God does this, the scriptures testify and the saints explain, because God in his love creates all that can be created, both good and evil. He does this so that creatures who come to see themselves in the light of God's good-ness,and recognize themselves as being both creatures and sinners, can repent of their evils by being tried, purified and glorified for unending life in communion with God through what they suffer. It is therefore inevitable that there be evil. God wills the existence of evil as a creaturely perversion of good in his decision to create. And he uses evil, in all its horror and ugliness, for the ultimate glory of his creatures. In a word, God either has a world with evil, or God has no world at all.

11. God hates and loves evildoers. Reflecting on God's relationship to evildoers provides a perfect example of the need for "saying and unsaying to a positive effect." Christian scriptures and saints insist on God's hatred for evildoers. Yet the Christian good news, fulfilling the law and the prophets, proclaims God's love for sinners. In creating a world with evil, and ultimately destroying evil by Christ's crucifixion at the hands of evildoers. God demonstrates his ultimate love for the wicked. If God loved only those who love him, he would, according to Jesus, be no better than a sinner himself. But it is perfectly proven in Christ that God loves his enemies. He blesses those who curse him. He speaks to those who do not speak to him. He gives to those from whom he has no hope to receive back again. He is kind to the ungrateful and the selfish (see Lk 6:3 z-3 6). God's very wrath for the wicked is an expression of his love, for God cares enough to be angry over evildoers whom he ultimately forgives and redeems in his son Jesus. Thus we must say, paradoxically, that God hates those whom he loves when he sees them sinning, and loves the sinners whom he hates when he does all that he can to save them.

12.. God cannot create only those who are good. Some people ask why God does not create only good people in a good world. At least three answers seem possible to this question. The first is that there are no completely good people (including those who put the question), or, at best, very few who are righteous by faith and grace but who nevertheless are still subject to innocent human failings and weaknesses.6 ((6 'See St. Silouan's comments on the sinlessness of Christ's mother Mary in Archimandrite Sophrony's St. Silouan the Athonite (Crestwood, NY: St Vladimir's Seminary Press), 392. )) The second is that all who are saved for everlasting life with God are saved through sin and repentance. The third is that all human beings, to become truly like God and totally deified, must, without exception, confront and endure evil without being overcome by it. Good people must prove their goodness by their love for God through love for their neighbors, including the most egregious doers of evil. They must come by God's grace to imitate God's love and to overcome evil by good . which inevitably requires the enduring of evils, suffering and death.

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15. Human beings are a complex of good and evil. The Bible knows no real atheists. It knows fools, who say that there is no God; apostates who turn their back on God and rebel against him; idolaters who make gods in their own images and worship them in place of the only true God; hypocrites who pretend outwardly to be godly and good, but inwardly are evil and wicked; and blasphemers, like the demons, who in their rebellious madness hate God and refuse to submit to his righteousness. Some evildoers know what they do and knowingly draw others into their madness. Some have been deceived and deluded and act wickedly without really knowing what they do. All, especially at this late point in human history, including those who call on the name of the Lord, are a complex mixture of good and evil, of knowledge and delusion. All are in desperate need of God's word and God's grace in order to be healed and saved.

18. God is the Lord of good and evil. It is sometimes said that God is Lord of good, but not evil, of light but not darkness. In this view, evil is independent of God and outside his control. A version of this view is that the Lord permits evil to exist outside his control, although he could in fact control it, because he respects the freedom of his creatures. Such an understanding, it seems to me, is contrary to Christian scripture and tradition. The teaching is rather that God creates a world in which evil exists through creaturely rebellion, and that when evil emerges through the wickedness of creatures, God can literally do nothing about it except use it for good according to his providential purposes, and take it upon himself to destroy it from within through the crucifixion of his Son. The Orthodox doctrine, therefore, seems to be that the God of gods and the Lord of lords rules over good and evil by ordering a world and accomplishing a providential plan which includes the existence and employment of evil for divinely designed purposes and ends. As the biblical songs declare, it is God who kills and makes alive, who brings to sheol and raises up, who wounds and heals, who makes poor and rich, who brings low and exalts.10 ^{((10 '"E.g. Deut 32.:39-4Z, i Samz;6-7. )) The greatly stricken Job, whom God himself offered to Satan, responds to his wife's counsel that he "curse God and die" with the stark question: "Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?" (Job 2,:ci-io) The biblical answer is obvious." ((11 "Job argues with God for forty chapters only to "repent in dust and ashes" when he sees the Lord with his eye (Job 41:1—6). What did Job see? Perhaps it was the messianic mystery. . ))}

19. God uses evil for good. The biblical story, which Christians see recapitulated in the gospel of Christ, is the story of God using evil for his ultimate victory over evil by good. In Hebrew the word for salvation and the word for victory is the same word. Savior and victor are synonyms in the Bible. God uses evil to chasten, cleanse and. instruct his People. He brings evils upon the proud and glorious of the earth in order to bring them to their senses that they might repent of their evils and return to God.12 ((12 "At Lenten Matins in the Orthodox Church the faithful sing a solemn "Alleluia" interspersed with lines from Isaiah's canticle which include the verse: "Bring more evils upon them, 0 Lord, bring more evils upon the glorious ones of the earth" (Isa 26:15 LXX). It is a common teaching in Orthodox spiritual literature that evils are God's sole means for converting and saving sinners. )) He sends diseases, afflictions, terror, invasions, plagues and disasters in order to instruct and chasten his people that they may ultimately be saved.13 ((13 The Lord sends the tribes of the north and Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon whom he calls "my servant," against Judah and Jerusalem in order to "utterly destroy them and make them a horror, a hissing and an everlasting reproach" (Jer 25:8-9). The apostle Paul says that God sends "a strong delusion" upon those who "refused to love the truth" in order to "make them believe what is false, so that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness" (2 Thess 2:10-11). . )) In the person of Christ, God destroys human wickedness by reconciling all people to himself by the folly and scandal of the cross. Christ takes upon himself all the evils of the world and overcomes them. He does this by becoming their innocent victim through his broken body and spilled blood in the curse of crucifixion. Jesus' execution is the most magnificent and compelling example of God's use of evil for good.

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24. Evil will be separated from good at the end. Christian scriptures teach that in God's coming kingdom evil will be separated from good. The very word judgment (krisis) means separation. Evildoers who persist in evil will no longer be able to harm those who repent of their evils and accept God's mercy. They will be tormented by God's presence, by their own madness, by other evildoers and by evil spirits who cling to darkness in their blasphemy of God's Holy Spirit. The persistence of evil will not spoil the joy of the repentant because nothing more can be done for those who are established in evil. All that can be done for them has been done by Christ on the cross. If the sinners' refusal to repent would cause suffering to the saved, the victory would be theirs. It would be exactly what they, in their perversion, desire: to make the righteous miserable forever. Their containment, however, even without conversion, will be a joy to those made righteous by faith whose delight will be due not to any supposed punishment of the evildoers, since, as a matter of fact, no punishment is inflicted. Their rejoicing will rather be because the evil actions of the wicked can no longer harm the innocent. If the wicked should at some point repent and surrender to God's love, the joy of the just would be all the greater. But there seems to be no clear evidence in the scriptures that this is likely to happen, though faith and love still constrains us to hope and pray that it may.

26. God's judgment of evil is his mercy on all. God shows mercy on whomever he wills, and he wills to show mercy on all. This is the biblical teaching. It is God's gospel in Jesus. It is God's judgment on the world. Writings attributed to the apostle Paul tell us that we are to "have hope on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially those who believe" (I Tim 4:10). Christ's beloved disciple John tells us that he is writing to us that we may not sin, but that "if anyone does sin, we have an advocate {parakletos} with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and he is the expiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world" (i Jn 2:2). Universal salvation is given in Christ. The return of all things to God (apokatastsis ton panton) is realized in Jesus seated in glory at the Father's right hand, made the head over all things through what he suffered at the hands of evildoers (Eph 1:20-23). This is the judgment of creation: God's universal and unconditional act of mercy in Christ for which every creature under heaven will one day have to answer and account.

27. God will be all and in all through Christ. At the coming of Christ, when the Lord submits everything with himself to God the Father who subjects all things to him, God will be "all and in all," or (as some English translations of scripture would have it) "everything to everyone" (i Cor 15:28, cf. also Col 3:11). Paul puts this teaching another way when he writes that "at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father" (Phil 2:10-11). Such sayings lead some people to think that everyone and everything will be saved when all creatures will be compelled to worship God and his Son through whom God will be "all and in all." There is, however, no logical or theological necessity in drawing such a conclusion. As my dogmatics professor, Serge Verhovskoy, would put it: God will be all and in all, but not all will like it; every knee will bow before God and his Christ, but not all will epjoy it. The scriptural teaching seems to be that the same presence of God that brings refreshment to the faithful brings torment to the wicked.16 ^{(( 16 Compare Acts 3:19 where God's "times for refreshing" for the righteous come "from the presence (or face) of the Lord [apo prosopou tou kyriou}" with i Thess i :9 where God's "punishment of eternal destruction" for the unrighteous comes also "from the presence (or face) of the Lord [apo prosopou tou kyriou}." The word "exclusion" found in the RSV rendering of the Thessalonian text is not in the original Greek. The apostolic texts are clearly inspired by OT prophetic writings which ascribe both the Lord's mercy and judgment, with his comfort for the just and his judgment on the wicked, to the Lord's same terrible appearing. )) This seems to be Paul's teaching when he says that unrepentant evildoers will pay the penalty of "eternal destruction from the presence (or face) of the Lord and from the glory of his might" (2 Thess 1:9), and that Lord Jesus will "destroy [the lawless] by the appearance (epiphania) of his coming (parousia)" (2. Thess 2:8).}

We sum up our "saying and unsaying" about God and evil by once more insisting that God is not evil and does not create evil. Evil comes from creatures and inevitably exists as the perversion of good in a human world. God uses evils for positive providential purposes. God orders and orchestrates evil for his ultimate glory and that of his servants. The ways of the Lord, who sends evils upon whom he wills so that they might repent before his terrible justice and majestic mercy, are beyond creaturely comprehension and questioning (Isa 55:8-9). When believers in the Christian God witness earthquake, flood, fire, war, invasion by enemies and evils of every kind, they believe that they are being visited by God for their chastening, repentance and everlasting salvation. They surrender in love and obedience to God who sends these evils upon them for their instruction and purification, and overcomes them in Christ for their salvation and glorification. They do this by affirming the Lord's victory on the cross and his coming in glory by co-suffering with him in love through the crosses which he provides for their glory. The refusal of God's victory in Christ, with the refusal to suffer in love with the Lord for good, results in a misery and torment which may well last forever.

The biblical psalms proclaim in the most perfect way what Christians believe to be the truth about God and evil in this present age. They declare God's sovereign dominion over good and evil, and his steadfast love for those who come to adore his majesty and accept his mercy. For Christians, the psalms are the words of Christ.17 (( "See Patrick Henry Reardon, Christ in the Psalms (Ben Lomond, CA: 2000); Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Psalms: The Prayer Book of the Bible (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress Press, 1970). )) They "say and unsay" to every possible positive effect everything that human beings can possibly "say and unsay" in the face of evil, before the face of God, until the Lord's coming.