All mixed up in evil

Romans 8:18-25

18 I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. 19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God, 20 for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be set free from its enslavement to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning together as it suffers together the pains of labor, 23 and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. 24 For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope, for who hopes for what one already sees? 25 But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43

24 He put before them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to someone who sowed good seed in his field, 25 but while everybody was asleep an enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat and then went away. 26 So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared as well. 27 And the slaves of the householder came and said to him, ‘Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? Where, then, did these weeds come from?’ 28 He answered, ‘An enemy has done this.’ The slaves said to him, ‘Then do you want us to go and gather them?’ 29 But he replied, ‘No, for in gathering the weeds you would uproot the wheat along with them. 30 Let both of them grow together until the harvest, and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Collect the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.’ ”

36 Then he left the crowds and went into the house. And his disciples approached him, saying, “Explain to us the parable of the weeds of the field.” 37 He answered, “The one who sows the good seed is the Son of Man; 38 the field is the world, and the good seed are the children of the kingdom; the weeds are the children of the evil one, 39 and the enemy who sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are angels. 40 Just as the weeds are collected and burned up with fire, so will it be at the end of the age. 41 The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will collect out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all evildoers, 42 and they will throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. 43 Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Let anyone with ears listen!

It is impossible to believe in a God who is both good and all powerful, because of the persistent, undeniable reality of evil in the world.  Either God is not the creator, does not have absolute authority, or if God does, then God’s apparent tolerance for suffering violates any reasonable definition of “good”.  The world is an immoral place, and if God exists then God must also be immoral, worthy perhaps of our fear but certainly not our love.  Better to believe that we’re here by accident than to believe our existence owes to deliberate callousness.  

This represents the most common philosophical objection to belief in God, and it’s one that should be taken seriously.  The evil and suffering in our world do demand a response.  In fact, I imagine that some of us here wrestle with this very fundamental question, and that the answers we’ve arrived at are not always entirely satisfying.  We still ask, why this suffering?   If God can, why doesn’t God do something?  

The two passages we read from Romans and Matthew teach us how to think theologically about these unavoidable questions.  Jesus told the parable of a field that was sown with good seed, but in the darkness of night an enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, so that both grow up together.  The slaves/servants come to the master and express confusion, or maybe question his competence, perhaps even accuse him of malpractice: “Master, did you not sow good seed in your field?  Where, then, did these weeds come from?”  After Jesus explains their nefarious origin, the servants ask the entirely reasonable question: Do you want us to go gather these weeds and restore the field to its rightful condition?  No, says Jesus, for if the weeds are removed then the wheat will be uprooted as well.  Instead, we await the harvest when all will be collected and sorted.  

But, Jesus tells us, there will come a day, in the fullness of time, when God will literally sort it all out, and that evil and all of its sources, will be gathered up and thrown into the fire.  Only that which is good, which God intended in the first place, will remain.  This is a picture of judgment - and surely Jesus wants his hearers, including us, to make sure that we are children of the kingdom (though the nature of the plant follows ineluctably from the seed was sown…) - but it’s also an image that, finally, God will root out all evil, will purify all things as by fire, that creation will be restored.  

Though Paul used different metaphors, he paints a similar picture.  He recognized that this present age is indeed full of suffering, but he’s confident that this suffering doesn’t compare with the glory that will be revealed.  The whole creation longs for the revealing of the children of God, he says, for the time when the good, the true, will triumph and when all that is false and evil will be destroyed, when the weeds will be burned up and the wheat can flourish.  

He says that “creation was subjected to futility” which seems to be a reference to the curses imposed on creation in Genesis, curses which resulted from Adam and Eve’s eating of the forbidden fruit at the urging of the serpent, the one who sowed evil seeds in the garden.  In response God imposes curses - though it might just be that living with evil seeds growing among us is the curse itself.   In any case, God consents to life proceeding under this new, unwelcome, condition, but God does so in the hope that this curse will be broken, that creation will be set free from its bondage, that it will no longer be subject to death, that we will return to the garden from which we were banished.   

And this new creation is, in some sense, already present, Paul says, amongst those have received the Spirit, the same Spirit which raised Jesus from the dead, the first fruit of what is to come.   The favored metaphor for the coming of the new creation is that of giving birth, that just as a mother must endure labor pains in order to bring a child into the world, so all creation suffers as it awaits its redemption.  But it waits in hope, exactly because it has not seen what will be revealed, and it waits with patience. 

The answer (or at least the response) to the question, Why does God allow such suffering, why does time go on with seemingly no improvement to the situation?, is that, like a seed which grows, like a child coming into the world, the good things God intends take time, that even a corrupted and broken creation is still God’s creation, it is still good, and despite it all, life is very much still worth living.  

Our response to evil and suffering is very much like that of the servants; we think it should be excised and removed, that there should only be wheat in the field.  And indeed that’s true - it should be that way, but in fact the weeds have been sown, sin and death have entered the equation (and with deliberate intent) and the seeds of good and evil are now so intertwined, so entangled, that it’s impossible to extricate one from the other without uprooting everything.  It can only be sorted out once and for all at the very end.  

Imagine if God actually did try to take the evil out of the world, what would remain?  Would you?  Would I?  While evil might seem like too strong a word for our own failings, we can safely say that none of us are perfectly good, that all of us are, at times, a source of suffering for others.  Indeed, we are sources of suffering for ourselves.  This is simply now the nature of things, and we do not grasp the depth of the problem if we think this can easily be undone.   While we might want to externalize the evil, blame it on outside agent, like Adam blaming the serpent, the problem is very much us; we desire to eat the forbidden fruit, and we all suffer the curse. 

But even so, you might ask, Why create such a world in the first place?  Surely if God is indeed omnipotent and omniscient, then God necessarily foresaw how this would go.  Do we then conclude that God calculated that some suffering - a lot of suffering, actually - was worth it, a price worth paying, collateral damage for the greater good?  And even if you’re prepared to answer “yes” to that question, you still might wonder about the child born into this world with an excruciating, untreatable illness, whose life is only suffering and ask why is this permitted?  Why, if God is good, would God create a world in which this is a possibility?  

And I think the only theologically sound and morally coherent answer to that question is God’s insistence that evil will be judged and destroyed, and though this is a fearful thing, it’s also a wonderful thing.  God is not callous to our suffering; God does not regard it as the price of doing business.  Those people and those forces who cause suffering will get what they deserve, and all will be restored, made new.  The death of a child is not the end of the story; God will make it right.    This is good news.  

Yet we still ought to heed Jesus’ warning and consider just what kind of seed we are, what kind of soil we’re planted in, what is growing in us, what kind of fruit we are bearing.  Is it the kind of stuff that will last for eternity?  Or is the kind of stuff that will be discarded and burned up?  We will all face judgment, we will all pass through the purifying fire.  It’s never too early to start getting ready.