Hi Friend,

The world, and especially the Western Culture, is entering a time of music to celebrate peace on earth.  Who doesn’t want peace on earth? As it turns out there are many who want anarchy and revolution.  Normal people are appalled that twenty-five cars could surround the entrance of Nordstrom’s Department Store and eighty thugs armed with crowbars and weapons could ransack the store in broad daylight.

When a mom takes her children into the mall she is listening to the beautiful music of “peace” while keeping an eye for terrorists who are willing to maim or kill her family.  Does that seem strange?

The same sense of irony surrounds the story of the birth of Jesus.  Herod was a madman with one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel, as we say.  He had several terminal conditions at the time Jesus was born yet he is concerned that Jesus would become king thirty years in the future.  It doesn’t make sense, but it was reality—just as real as the terror we face today. Like barbarians today, Herod was intent on senseless murder, so an angel was sent to warn Joseph and Mary to escape to Egypt.

In light of this it’s interesting that God chose not to surround Jesus with an army of angels, but rather gave instructions to the parents and expected them to use their wits.

As a child, I often wondered why the birth of Jesus was surrounded by such evil.  Why did God allow Herod to have such power?  Why was the birth of Jesus announced rather than have it occur in secret? Why did those wise men have to even meet Herod?

Man must wrestle with the question of why evil is allowed in the world.  The Christian may ask “Where was God when Adam and Eve sinned?”  For that matter, why did God allow Satan to walk freely over the earth and influence the first two humans or any human since?

For any thinking person, the dilemma of “evil” in a world created by a good God is a perplexing and sobering question.

As strange as it is that people deny the existence of God, it may be even more strange to deny the existence of Satan.  It is a proclivity of man to accept good as a “given condition” of life even when we forget to honor the source.  Do children appreciate the effort it took to raise them until they have children of their own?  But let a man experience pain, or evil, and he will remember it for a lifetime.

So it seems incongruent to me that forty percent of professing Christians strongly agreed with the statement in a George Barna survey that said Satan “is NOT a living being but is a symbol of evil.”   Of the remaining sixty percent of Christians, nineteen percent “somewhat agree” that Satan doesn’t exist, and eight percent aren’t sure.  Only a minority of Christians—twenty-six percent—believe Satan is real and nine percent think he may exist.

So how do people, especially Christians, explain Hitler, Stalin, Osama bin Laden, Columbine or 9/11?

After 50 plus years in the ministry, one of the most perplexing things I’ve witnessed is the struggle man faces to understand the presence of evil.  Evil is a ubiquitous enemy and therefore important to recognize.

After all, we teach our children to not talk to strangers because some adults are just plain evil.

Almost daily the news quotes people saying that the world we live in is so corrupt that they can’t “make sense of it”.  That’s because there is no “sense” to evil.  The only rational explanation is that there exists a spirit that is NOT rational.  Attempting to reason with it is as hopeless as reasoning with a terrorist, or a child in the middle of a temper tantrum.  Rational people must be stronger than the irrational or be destroyed.

Jesus once sent many of those closest to him with instructions to preach and teach.  “Then the seventy returned with joy, saying, “Lord, even the demons are subject to us in your name.”  (Luke 10:17)

There must have been a sense of exhilaration the first time one of these men healed someone who was blind or faced down a demon and the powerful spirit being retreated before the power of a mere mortal.

But Jesus explained more about the power he was giving them.  “I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and overall the power of the enemy…” (verse 19).

The good news is that man is not created to be subject to evil.  He is created to have dominion over it.  The first step in conquering evil, like diagnosing disease, is identifying it for what it is.  The Apostle Paul gave us a good way to see it objectively.  It starts with identifying what is good.

It may be surprising to some, but Paul said that he would not have known what evil was if it had not been for the law. (Romans 7:7) Paul went on to say, “So then, the law is holy, and the commandment is holy, righteous and good.” (Romans 7:12)  That’s the beginning of self-defense.

Until next time,

Jim O’Brien