CD - The Seventh Petition - Psalm 23

What is evil? Why is there evil? Why does God allow evil? When we think of evil, many questions come to mind. If God is good, why does He allow evil? We often associate pain with evil and rightly so because, when evil abounds, pain follows as a result, not necessarily physical pain, but mental and emotional pain as well (Romans 6:23).

What, then, is evil? Evil might be described as the absence of good. When Adam and Eve were created, they knew only good. God, who is perfect, created Adam and Eve perfect and placed them in the perfect garden He had created, Eden. There was no evil in the garden, only good abounded.

In the garden, God placed all kinds of flowers, trees, plants, and animals. God also created and placed two special trees in the garden, the Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. God proceeded to tell Adam, who later told his wife Eve that they could eat from any tree or plant except the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. For, in the day they ate of it, they would die. Why did God do this? Well, actually, the Bible does not say why God did this. The Bible does, as Jesus said, tell us what we need to know for our salvation. We need to stop and realize that God has infinite wisdom. There is more about Him that we do not know, than we do know. Anyway, back to the why and this why is strictly opinion, or as I hope, an educated guess. If you had a little robot, you could program it to do your every bidding and to always come to you and say “I love.” If you also had a little brother or sister you could ask to do favors for you and they had the option to say yes or no, and they also told you they loved you, which would you cherish more? Obviously, the latter. God created us, not as robots or puppets, but as thinking people who could, with His help choose to obey and tell Him we love Him.

Back to the garden of Eden, God placed thinking Adam and Eve in the garden to serve, obey and worship Him. The only thing Adam and Eve could give back to God was their obedience. A fallen angel, Lucifer or Satan, tested Adam and Eve’s obedience. As we know, they failed. Their sin, or evil, has infected us all since.

Very quickly, Satan’s problem is that, when he was created as an angel, he thought he could be a god, too. He rebelled and was summarily kicked out of heaven. Now, he goes around spreading vicious lies, trying to get others into hell with him. As the saying goes, “misery loves company.” Satan wants you on his “side,” not because he loves you, but because he hates you. Satan hates all people. His goal is to destroy as many people as he can before our Lord returns to take us to be with Him where Satan will be no more.

Now to tie this temptation and evil together, we have only ourselves to blame when we fall into temptation. We cannot say, “The devil made me do it.” That excuse does not hold up before God, for we can and do pray, “Deliver us from evil.” On the other hand, when we are delivered and resist temptation, it is not we, but God who gets the glory for delivering us. Thus we pray in this petition that the Lord would “deliver us from evil,” and help us to give Him our obedience.

Dear Father in heaven, forgive me when I rebel against You and follow my own sinful desires. Deliver me from evil, dear, Father and help me to live my life according to Your good and gracious will in order that Your name might be praised. For Jesus’ sake. Amen.