on evil

Summary: "1 Evil is only the absence of God. 2 Human evil/sin. 3 Physical evil 4 We have the all-satisfying God even in our afflictions. 5 We are at the beginning of the world."

(btw, number 5 is the reason I started writing this)
And the most logically critical point is number 4.

1 Evil is only the absence of God.
This has probably been stated many times over, but it is always good to remind ourselves. Evil is not something material that we can throw at God to hurt him. It's merely his absence. Light and dark. Order and chaos.

2 There are two types of evil, human evil and physical evil (like tsunamis)
Human evil: It's falling short of the glory of God. Stupid stuff we do, forgetting who rules the universe, and many times simply being ignorant.
A On the justice aspect, sin is absolutely hideous and worthy of death to God because it makes God look like he made a crappy world. If he let's stupid people live (and we're all stupid) it looks like he tolerates shoddy work. What he really should do is demonstrate that our way of thinking won't work by wiping us off the face of the earth. How he somewhat does that is explained in Romans 1:25-26 and surrounding text. However, his primary solution to our sin is crucifying his son and pointing to that and saying "That's how much I hate sin." Though Jesus god demonstrates his justice and correctness and also his love for us.(by the way, 'justice' and 'righteousness' have the same Greek root and I get a definition of 'righteousness' by highlighting 'right' = correct, true, makes sense. God's righteousness is his knowing how to run the show)
B On the love of God side, sin hurts and grieves God because we're hurting ourselves, because he is the greatest good for us and we're missing it. Why is he not enlightening us and saving us? He is doing that right now, every moment that you live. Be patient.

3 Physical evil (tsunamis): Be patient, it will pass at the coming of the new age. "...thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven." Earth will take on some amazing qualities. Romans 8:21 "the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God."

4 The evil that we suffer should not bring us down completely. We have God for us, everything. He is the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end, the great abba father, everything. There is a song by Scott Krippayne which is sometimes played on KTIS called "Sometimes he calms the storm." and the lyrics run thus: sometimes he calms the storm/with a whispered 'peace be still'/he can settle any sea/but it doesn't mean he will/sometimes he holds us close/and lets the wind and waves grow wild/sometimes he calms the storm/but other times he calms his child." God is greater than everything we experience, which makes it all endurable. Actually, we can enjoy it. "Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance." James 1:2-3. Taking away all out physical comfort can actually focus us on God, reaffirming that he alone is our only hope of safety.

5 Ok, here's the real reason I got excited to write this post. (actually, I was surprised what I came up with on number 4, and I think I like it most)
People sometimes say (at least in my philosophy class) "why didn't God, at the beginning of time, somehow someway make perfect humans that could enjoy him perfectly, never sin, never bring evil into the world, and everything would be happy?" well first of all, based on number 4, we wouldn't get a very clear idea of how much God loves us. Second...
Aren't we kind of at the beginning of time? I mean, we have all of eternity after this short life on earth... What if God DID do that, make humans perfect at the beginning. What if this, right now, is 'somehow'?
It is all fleeting persecution and affliction, it will pass within 100 years at the most. And one day in heaven is worth more than a thousand good years on earth.

Just today I was really tired and I had to mow the lawn (we have 5 acres, it took 2 hours or so). Basically most of the time I was being a sour puss and wondering why I had to do meaningless work.
I love janitor maintenance work by the way, I love it. Especially it there is a lot of things happening around me. But when winter is coming on and we could just as easily run through long, luscious grass than through short ugly stuff (hehe) I really would rather not cut the grass.
How to solve this? Keep the end in sight. Heaven. "I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus." Just keep the perspective.