Evil In The World

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Text: Romans 1:18-32

Reflection: Sometimes its important to slow down and look closely at something so as not to misunderstand what is being done or said. That seems to be the case here in Romans 1 as Paul explains God's revealed and righteous wrath. Some time back, I read some comments about these verses suggesting that God's wrath against mankind is justified and that His direct actions against them was appropriate. While I would not disagree with the fact that God's judgments are always right, I do disagree with two wrong assumptions made by this author. First, God's wrath is not being poured out against people per se, but their wickedness. Notice that Paul is careful to say that God's wrath is not directed toward people, but toward "...the godlessness and wickedness of men..." As such, God is dealing with sinful actions rather than sinful people. Second, God does not directly do anything to these people. Notice that Paul says that God "...gave them over to the sinful desires of their hearts..." In other words, God allowed men to harm themselves as they acted on their own evil desires. As such, God did not harm humanity. Human beings harmed themselves as they acted upon their own evil desires. So rather than blaming God for the evil in the world, perhaps I should look in the mirror and realize that the evil so prevalent is a result not of God's anger but my acting out my own evil desires.