How can a Loving God Allow Evil to Exist

Table of contents

Introduction2

What is evil?2

Origin of evil3

Effects of evil4

Presence of God5

Justification of presence of evil in the presence of God6

Moral and Spiritual Development require the Confrontation with Suffering6

Freedom of Will Leads to the Evolution of Evil7

Confrontation with Evil Guides the Way to God7

Conclusion8

End Notes9

How Can a Loving God Allow Evil to Exist?

Introduction

To have faith in a conviction about loving an omnipotent and invincible God is not always that simple. There is a lot of evil and suffering around us that there seems to be nothing like righteousness and integrity on this planet. This leads us to question ourselves if actually; there exists a loving God who has a power to control everything? Well, in this case, refusal to accept the presence of God is not a sensible option to deal with the issue; if no God was present, there would simply be no reason to rummage around for answers. Evil would continually confront us being in this world, however, we need to realize that death is inevitable, and ends the stage for all of us players, and hence there is no crux to all this argument.

Occasionally, life appears to be meaningless, because of all the evil prevalent in the world, which is indeed very desolating and depressing. On the contrary, there come times when certain happenings serve as evidences to the existence of an invincible God and the fact that He is full of love and He has the power to control everything. This adds to the strength of our belief in Him and His astute and considerate style to govern the world. But the question, whether He is the one to send down evil on earth and if He has the power to conquer that evil, remains unanswered.

What is evil?

Evil can be classified as moral evil or non-moral evil. Moral evil can be referred to as the “evil produced by the activity of moral agents”, whereas non-moral evil can be defined as “the evil that occurs in a natural order”. Both the moral and the non-moral evils are observed on a day to day basis in the world around us.

The examples of moral evil include assassination, selfishness and materialism, while non-moral evil appears in calamitous and ruinous events that are beyond the influence of moral mediators. Hence, moral mediators select the means that are contradictory to God and sin. There is evil present inside each one of us hence we all have this tendency to do sin, and nature itself contributes to the evolution of evil from amongst us. A philosopher expressed evil to be an essential element since we lack in completeness and perfection. For the reason that we are not inestimable, the catastrophe operates on the moral evilness.

Origin of evil

As implicated by the prophet Isaiah, as illustrated in the Christian doctrine, God is in due course responsible for everything, even evil; “I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do ...