Unrestrained Evil!

This afternoon, shortly after returning home from church, I heard the devastating news about the horrific church shooting in Sutherland Springs, Texas.  This small town is about 35 miles southeast of where I live in San Antonio.  For such a massacre to take place so close to home forces one to come to grips with the reality of this evil in a whole new way.

I am a man of great faith, but I have to confess that my first reaction to this report was the same as my first reaction to the reports of the massacre in Las Vegas a few weeks ago.  "God, why would you let this happen?"  In a sense, we can never understand the answer to that question because we will never have  a command of anywhere near the knowledge, understanding and information that God has at his command.  God does restrain evil.  His Word makes that clear.  But God does not restrain all evil.  And we probably would not be able to understand why evil is seemingly allowed a free hand on some occasions even if God tried to explain it to us.

As I reflected on this shooting through the course of the day, a number of thoughts came to mind.  This world is very evil.  Why is that?  It's because ever since Adam and Eve misused their free will to rebel against God's command, sin has been a reality in the heart and mind of every human being that ever lived.  Evil is real, but it is not just an impersonal force floating around in the universe. It is a part of the very nature of our being.

If you doubt that evil is a very real part of your being, just imagine a machine that would portray your every thought on a theater screen for everyone to see.  How long do you think you could perfectly control your thoughts while sitting there looking out at the audience of your friends, neighbors, family, co-workers?  How long before thoughts of jealousy, envy, hatred, lust, revenge, greed, or a thousand other sinful ideas would be played out for everyone to see?

Yes, evil resides in everyone of us. Left to our own devices, we are all capable of the worst evil that we can imagine.  But thank God that for those of us who know and believe in Jesus Christ, there is a check on the evil within us.  That check is our faith and the power of the Holy Spirit.  It begins with the realization that there is a God to whom we must answer.  The Bible says that "the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom."  The fear of God can restrain evil within us and help us make wise choices about our actions.

But even more so, it is our new birth though faith in Jesus Christ that helps us overcome the evil within us and helps us live our lives to the glory of God.  "If anyone is in Christ he is a new creation."  It is Christ living in us that empowers us to say no to sin and say yes to God.  Furthermore, the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit is going on in us to transform us into the image of God's Son.  "It is God's will that you should be sanctified," Scripture says.

The more we immerse ourselves in God's Word, the more we seek God's face in prayer, the more we honor Him in worship, the more we taste of His grace in the Lord's Supper, and the more we serve Him with our hands and feet as we serve others in love, the more the evil within us will be overcome.

What America needs to overcome the kind of evil that we've seen in Las Vegas and in Sutherland Springs is repentance and faith.  Jesus warned us, "In this world you will have trouble, but take heart, I have overcome the world." Because of the Gospel of Jesus Christ at work in the hearts and lives of God's people all manner of evil is restrained every moment of every day.  But because unrepentance and unbelief is rampant all around us, there will always be evil to contend with.  Some of it God will choose to restrain outwardly. Some of it will be limited by His divine power.  And some will seemingly go unchecked. In the last instance we must trust God's promise that He works all things for the good of those who love Him, even if we cannot comprehend how that will be.

But to give up on faith because of evil men like the one who senselessly massacred 26 people at First Baptist Church this morning will only make the world more evil.  When we who have faith lose it because of evil, we become more evil ourselves.  Cling to faith, it is the only thing that can restrain the evil within us.