My brother, my sister, these matters I lay before you are difficult for me to write about. When I began to write, I did not expect to find myself at the foundations of the world. Were I a better writer, I might more easily lay before you the foundation of the world so that you might easily see why all her edifices are vanity, already lost in the wind. So if you find my words and ideas difficult, do not be discouraged. Go and read the Bible and believe God. At best, and I have not reached it, all I can do is expound on His Word. Therefore, the previous article laid before you two foundations. One Is The Cornerstone Laid by God, Marvelous in our eyes Psalms 118:22-23 and The Song of all the angels Job 38:4-7. The other is the illusion created by rebellious man. One Is Jesus Christ Who Is The Father’s Goodness and the other is man’s antichrist, the empty expression of our evil already condemned. But we get ahead of ourselves. Let us first talk about the origin of all evil.

As we have seen in previous articles, false ideologies are composed of moralities. Each ideology makes promises and gives instruction based on its knowledge of good and evil. Feminism says, “It is evil that men and women are not equal.” Chauvinism says, “Men better, greater and more important than women.” Racism says, “Black people are inferior to white people. Yoruba people are inferior to Ibo people.” Most bothersome to me is this present extolling of Judeo-Christian values without praising God Who Gave Them. As believers, we cannot oppose these evil ideologies unless we know that good and evil are expressions of God’s Relationship with us. Now you may say, “These thoughts are too high” and then claim that believing God is enough. To which I say, “God Commands you to love Him with all your mind.” This lack of loving God with our minds that make us prey to false prophets incessantly proclaiming that God Wants us to be prosperous while offering to cancel “generational” curses. Conveniently they forget to proclaim holiness and godliness. And we who believe fall and injure ourselves because we don’t know where good and evil come from.

The Origin of Evil

Jesus calls the devil the father of lies John 8:44. he is the father of liars because men and women lie in imitation of him. But where did the devil come from? Well, the Bible reveals that the devil was an angel created by God Genesis 1:1, Revelations 12:9. He became the devil by refusing to be God’s creature Isaiah 14:13-14, Ezekiel 28:17. The devil lies by declaring that he has no beginning and no end. he lies by saying of himself, “i am”. Now remember how we said in the previous article that God Calls all His creation good and that His creation is good through Him. Ezekiel 28:15 What happens then to the creature that refuses to be God’s creature? Well, that creature also refuses God’s goodness. By refusing to be God’s creature, the devil also refuses the goodness that flows through an obedient relationship with God.

However, and this cannot be stressed enough, the devil did not become evil through this choice. It cannot be stressed enough because the primary sin of man is the belief that his choices matter as much His Creator’s. A fish in the water may desire all it wants to not be wet but it remains wet because it is the will of the ocean to make all things wet. My little girl, who squirms and kicks while being bathed, clearly doesn’t want to be wet or clean. But her choice doesn’t matter in comparison to the choice of her mom to clean her. Infinitely more than the fish or the baby, regardless of his choices or self deception, the devil has no power to stop being good or stop being God’s creature. Instead, God, In His Holy and Just Love, Pours upon the devil All His Holy Wrath and Cuts the devil off from His goodness. Therefore, the devil is not the source of evil or of anything. The devil’s evil is the expression of God’s Loving Judgment on his sin. Evil is God’s Judgment upon the devil, upon every creature, that refuses to be who God Made him or her. The disobedient creature, looking away from God and proclaiming, “i am”, is evil only because God Lovingly Withdraws His goodness. Ezekiel 28:18

In Revelations 12:4 we see that the devil was not alone in becoming evil. The devil is a liar because he says he is his own father. he is the father of lies because he tempts angels and human beings to do the same. 1/3 of the angels in heaven immediately became evil demons when God Judged them for imitating the devil. The devil also came into Eden and, through the serpent, enticed Adam and Eve to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Essentially, he tempts Adam and Eve to make themselves good and forsake goodness that only comes from God through obedience to God. He tempts them to become their own makers, to “create” themselves and refuse to be creatures of God. By eating from the tree, Adam and Eve join the cacophony of demons; children of the devil imitating the devil by proclaiming, “i am”.

The Mercy of God

Yet, God Does Not Immediately do with Adam as He Did With the devil. Instead of Immediately Casting Adam and Eve from His Presence, God Goes to Eden and Calls out in sweet words of amazing grace, “Adam, where are you?” Genesis 3:9 God Draws Near to Adam and Eve and Withdraws His goodness by cursing Adam, the woman and the earth. Therefore, we are assailed by evil on every side. Hurricanes, earthquakes and famines roam the earth killing many and keeping many in abject poverty. In pain we bear children and in even worse pain, we are unable to have children and worst of all our children die before our eyes. Our bodies are attacked by disease, rebel through cancer and are destroyed in time. Our nature, our very being, once very good, is now abhorrent and evil. Genesis 6:5 God Withdraws from us His goodness and we have become evil liars, murderers and adulterers. We do unspeakable things to each other while boasting of our deeds to any who can hear. The most beautiful, most intelligent and most gifted among us rot and fester from within because of their ungodliness. 1 Peter 3:2-5

Yet in spite of our rebellion against Him, we have no power to stop being God’s creatures. He Does With us as He Pleases. Lovingly, God Chooses Against our choice and bathes us in the water anyway. Matthew 5:45 Because of Jesus Christ Who Died, God Has Mercy upon us and in His Grace, He Gives us His goodness. Lamentations 3:21-24 Therefore, even from the most evil among us, comes the beauty of art, the majesties of science and the peals of a baby’s laughter. There is gari and peanut soup and fried chicken and pecan pie. We still gather in kindness to form communities and raise families. While He Gives us breath, we do not yet become demons eternally worse than Hitler. Because we are evil, we presume His Blessings to be evidence of our goodness and beholding our “creations”, we proclaim ourselves to be gods. Despite this insolence, God Still Restrains our madness and evil by Drawing Near to us, not with a sword Numbers 22:23,31 but in The Humble Interceding Worship of The God-Man Jesus Christ. 2 Peter 2:16, Numbers 22:23-27, Deuteronomy 18:14 Do you hear His Voice? Numbers 22:28-31 Turn aside in the field, take off your sandals and worship Him!

His Mercy, though Scandalous, Remains Just because God Poured out All His Wrath on His Son Jesus Christ instead of us. For our sake, because of His Love for us, God Does to His Holy Sinless Only Begotten Son what He Did to the devil. He Made Him Who Knew no sin To Become sin for us. Even more, God Enables some to believe in Christ and Gives them His Holy Spirit. By His Holy Spirit, these believers in Jesus Christ become righteous and good. He Made Him Who Knew no sin to Become sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ. 2 Corinthians 5:21 Through faith in Jesus Christ, instead of becoming demons and fiends, believers become good, friends of God James 2:21-23 and holy judges of angels 1 Corinthians 6:3. To God Be All Glory and Honor and Power forever and ever. May He Be Praised for He Is Holy In Love, Wrathful In Love and Merciful in Love.the goodness of god.script.md