Evil is a problem. For most of us it's one kind of problem when it's evil over there but a very different kind of problem when it's evil that confronts us right here. The evil that's 'over there' can be ignored - and often is - but not the kind that is 'right here', the kind that invades our lives. What too many miss is that being able to deal with evil up close and personal is tied to being able to understand it when it is a distant issue.
How should we understand some tsunami or earthquake or the like? People are killed. The lives of the survivors are changed forever. What happened? Or more important, how did it happen? The basic answer is clear. God did it.
I am the LORD, and there is no other,
besides me there is no God;
I equip you, though you do not know me,
that people may know, from the rising of the sun
and from the west, that there is none besides me;
I am the LORD, and there is no other.
I form light and create darkness,
I make well-being and create calamity (literally: 'evil'),
I am the LORD, who does all these things.
Isaiah 45
Where do these calamities that dramatically affect so many come from? God does it. He doesn't just 'allow' it. He does it. He creates 'evil'. And that makes sense. 'There is no other, besides me there is no God.' So, there is no mystery about where some evil came from. God did it, and he has his reasons, good reasons, holy, just and loving reasons.
Now that is more than an orthodox doctrine that we're supposed to believe. It helps to make sense of life. It leads to this.
I know, O LORD, that your rules are righteous,
and that in faithfulness you have afflicted me.
Psalms 119:75
Here, the psalmist was afflicted. Something bad happened. He experienced evil. But he knows where that evil came from. God did it. And he did it for good reasons. He did it in faithfulness. That is, he was keeping his promises to the psalmist. And he used evil to do that.
So, the next time you are confronted with some evil - you lose your job, serious sickness hits your family, someone you love dies - how will you respond? Panic? Fretting? Doubt? The best response is faith, believing God's explanation of life. The evil confronting you - the 'affliction' - is from your heavenly Father. He didn't just allow it. He did it. And remember that he has sent you that evil 'in faithfulness' to all his promises to you. Life will still hurt, there will be tears, but there will also be a cord of hope that you can cling to. '... in faithfulness you have afflicted me.' God sends evil, and he has his reasons. He wants you to flourish - just as he promised.