Daily Devotional for Monday May 28, 2007
Is Evil Real
(Micah 7:2; 2 Timothy 3:1-2)
Is evil real? Most people want to dismiss evil as a fairy tale, but what happened in the United States on 9/11 was an example of evil. The sniper incident a few years ago that held the entire Washington, DC area in terror for 3 weeks was an example of evil. The tens of thousands of babies aborted each day worldwide is an example of evil. Men and women around the world who plot to kill other people for whatever reason are examples of evil. EVIL IS NOT A FANTASY...IT IS REAL...IT IS A SAD PART OF THE HUMAN EXISTENCE!!!
First, understand that God is NOT the author of evil. Evil stems from the rebellious hearts of man. Man has to make choices throughout each day, to either obey God, or rebel against Him. Evil is a manifestation of that rebellion. Those who choose to follow God, make choices that build people up, advance the cause of God on this earth, are positive. Those who choose to reject God, make choices that destroy people, oppose the plan of God for this world, and are negative. To be blunt, those who follow God are good, those who choose to reject God are evil. This may sound harsh, but evil can ONLY come from those who are in rebellion to, and reject God!
Satan is the embodiment of evil. He rejected God and was cast out of Heaven, and his entire purpose is to oppose the work of God. Satan is the poster boy for rebellion against God...for evil! The simple fact is that any time that you rebel against God in your life, any time that you reject His way, you contribute to the evil that is in this world. Evil ONLY EXISTS because of the rebellious hearts of man. As hard as this may be to accept, the fact is, every time that you reject God, every time that you choose to ignore God, YOU ARE SIDING WITH SATAN AND ARE CONTRIBUTING TO THE EVIL THAT IS IN THIS WORLD!
I love you and care about you so much. The motivation for this Devotional today was the way our society has tried to down play the existence of evil in our world. The way our society tries to make every excuse in the book to call evil anything but what it truly is....EVIL! The point I want you to understand today is that every time that you rebel against God, every time that you choose to reject God and not follow His way, YOU are contributing to the evil that is in this world.
I pray today that you keep your heart open to the Lord, and His guiding influence in your life. This is why I emphasize so often how important it is to read the Bible each day, since THAT is how we better understand exactly what God expects from us, how He has asked us to live our lives. That way, we can follow Him in all of our choices, and we don't have to be in rebellion. We don't have to contribute to the evil that already is rampant in our world today.
The good news is this. The Bible tells us that in the end, God will wipe out ALL evil from this world. It will no longer be part of this existence. But until this time, we have a responsibility as His children to not only fight against the evil that exists, but to not contribute to it through the choices that we make each day. God is greater than evil, and one day, very soon, He will wipe evil away!!!