3. Who is responsible for the evil on the earth?
Dividing the seven different responsibilities for evil: God has four, and people have three.
God is responsible for what He created, and humans are responsible for their choices and the effects of their choices.
God has four responsibilities. Three of God’s responsibilities are the three parts of the evil that He created, as defined
above; evil could not exist in our universe if God did not create it. God’s fourth responsibility is the earthly reality of
cause and effect. This fourth responsibility is part of God’s creation of the earth; it means that every choice made on the
earth, impacts the earth according to the God-determined effects of a person choosing that option - good or bad.
God determines both the options and the effects of each choice of a good or bad option; those effects must happen on
the earth when a person makes a choice. The God-created effects of each option chosen must happen because it is the
way God created our reality to work. God chooses no bad option; only humans choose bad options on the earth. As a
result, all of the ‘bad’ or evil that happens on the earth, happens because a human chooses a bad option. God is active
on the earth, but all of God’s activity on the earth happens when people choose well, knowingly or unknowingly. God’s
personally-chosen activity always advances His purposes.
Humans have three responsibilities: 1) each choice made, 2) each action taken, and 3) each effect of each choice and
action, both good and bad, help and harm, blessing and cursing … happening on the earth. Each person is entirely
responsible for each choice made, and for each effect of that choice. While God creates all of the evil or 'bad stuff', a
human must choose a bad option in order for any ‘bad’ evil to happen on the earth. This means that God is not responsible
for any ‘bad’ evil on the earth, even though He creates every bad consequence. In addition, since God is the Sovereign
Boss, He sets the rules; He never cooperates with any person choosing badly … His purposes always and only advance.
Knowing about evil and these responsibilities does not solve the problem, because so much evil hits the earth. If God,
on His Own, could stop the evil effects before they hit the earth, then it seems that He should do so … but He does not
stop many evil effects … and we wonder why. Therefore, God's existence with evil is still an unanswered question.
Believer’s have explained that God has purposes to bring even more good out of evil, and that is often true for those who
trust Him, but God does not explain many of the details of those specific purposes, so they are not generally accessible.
Since these purposes are mostly hidden in God - we know neither what God’s purposes are nor what effects might
happen when a person makes a choice. The problem with that explanation is that it is valid only for trusting believers,
and even then, the answer is limited in not having all the details - of course no human will ever have all the details, only
God knows them, so humans having all the details is not part of the solution here. Additionally, that answer is not
available to believers who do not trust God in a time of difficulty, nor is it available to unbelievers, who likely do not
seek out God’s purposes.
One important reason that this solution does not include many details is because if I act on this solution properly evil
will not hit my life. That may seem unrealistic, but God is God and He is Almighty. Let us relate to God, as Chapter
21 describes.
Thankfully, God revealed an authority structure (described next) that completes the answer. He established that structure
for our reality on the earth.