Why does God let evil continue? Part I

After talking about God letting evil in (previous post) so we could fall and then be redeemed to an even higher status through union with Christ, I would like to touch on a follow up question. Now that Christ has joined us with himself and is sanctifying us, why not just go on and fix us completely? That sounds nice. Why let evil linger? I believe we can find some answers in Scripture.

1 Peter 1:3-12. Just as gold is passed through fire to purify it, we are passed through trials to purify us.

God let evil continue to allow trials to sanctify us.

       Can it be true that the prophets of old longed to know Christ but were told that their longing was meant to serve us and not them? Why didn’t they get to see Him? I don’t know. Peter says it was revealed to them that they were serving us who would hear the preaching of Christ from the apostles. I feel a bit selfish as I think about my longings and frustrations. At times I get disappointed because it takes too long for lunch time to arrive or a coming holiday. How much more difficult was it for the prophets who never got to see the fulfillment of what they prophesied. They longed to see the Messiah. It was a true prophecy. They didn’t fail. But they didn’t get to see it before they went to the grave.  

We also have to wait. The prophets waited for Jesus to come. Long after many of them died, He came. The apostles got to see him and touch him. But then he ascended and now those of us who believe after he ascended don’t get to see him physically. Yet we can still love him and believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory. How? Through faith. 

Faith is mysterious. Peter says that the outcome of our faith is the salvation of our souls. This sounds a lot like what Paul says in Romans 8:24 and 25 about hope. Then it also connects with what he says in 1 Corinthians 13:13 of faith, hope and love, but the greatest of these is love. There will come a day when faith will be obsolete. We will no longer need it because we will see him face to face. There will come a day when hope will be obsolete. We will no longer need hope to wait for him because we will have him present. But love will continue. He will continue to love us and we will continue to love him. Until then, we need faith and hope to be able to love. Faith enables us to see him whom we do not see. Hope helps us wait for it with patience. Until that day when Christ comes back and finishes making all things new, we have faith and hope. 

What strengthens our faith and hope? Peter says our faith is more precious than gold. gold is tested by fire. Our faith is tested by trials. Trials are presented to us through having to deal with evil. I think this is one of the reasons God allows evil to linger. He allows it to be a trial to strengthen our faith and hope. I wonder if it is similar to the saying that you should not help a chick hatch itself from an egg because you will deprive it of the strength that it needs to gain by the work of pecking itself out. Perhaps it is connected to that teacher who will not give the students the answers but makes them go look them up and figure them out. God is allowing us the opportunity to grow and strengthen through the trials he puts us through with leaving evil to plague us and buffet us just as gold is passed through fire to purify it. We are passed through trials to purify us. This is done both through evil outside of us and within us. We see evil around us in the acts of the devil working through the world and people with mass shootings or rape or robbery or even with our neighbor defaming us with lies. But we also see this evil through the indwelling sin in each of us that we long to be free of that led Paul to say in Romans 8 that hope that is seen is no longer hope. We hope for that redemption and freedom from sin. He even says that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. But if we already had it completely we would no longer need to hope for it. We would have it. On that wonderful glorious day when Christ comes back, we will have it. He will be revealed to us and then we will understand and know fully. But then there will also be no more evil.

“In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”

(1 Peter 1:6–7 ESV)