God and Evil (or, A Rose Out of the Mud)

"Oh that men would praise the Lord for His goodness, and for His wonderful works to the children of men! For He satisfieth the longing soul, and filleth the hungry soul with goodness; souls that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, being bound in affliction and iron.
"Because they rebelled against the words of God, and despised the counsel of the Most High, therefore He brought down their heart with labor; they fell down, and there was none to help.
"Then they cried unto the Lord in their trouble, and He saved them out of their distresses. He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death, and broke their bands in pieces. Oh that men would praise the Lord for His goodness, and for His wonderful works to the children of men." Ps. 107:8-15

This passage's series of events is a fascinating spectacle. It starts by exclaiming that only the goodness of God can satisfy the longing and hungry soul, souls that sit in darkness without the goodness of God. To ask how they got into such darkness is to ask how they lost God's goodness (for apparently the two cannot coexist: you have either one or the other, never both). They lost the goodness by their rebellion against God's "word" and "counsel," i.e., His authority as God. In response, God let the consequences of their rebellion fall: a horror of great darkness fell upon them, and when all had abandoned them ("there was none to help"), then and only then did they look to God for satisfaction.
That last part is the most interesting part. Here is revealed a deeper application of Joseph's oft used (to ad nauseum) phrase that God works evil for good (Gen. 50:20). Rebellion against God (in any sense) is the proper understanding of Sin, and the natural consequence of Sin is Death (Rom. 5:12; 6:23). Now, it seems that the Psalm is explicitly saying that God's immediate response to Sin is to not shield people from its consequences. He actually lets the death and darkness fall, the disease and destruction wreak and rage, the evil and the wicked pollute and corrupt. The honest man asking sincerely (and the skeptic asking sneeringly) will ask, "Why?"
The answer is startling: "Then they cried unto the Lord in their trouble" (emphasis added). It seems that God actually lets us go astray so that we will learn (1) what the right way is and (2) to stay on it when we get there. Think of it like this: God alone is the satisfaction of the soul. Thus, every time we head to something else other than Him, He will let us go and starve on its hollowness until we finally (like the prodigal son) "come to our sense" and cry out for what is truly satisfying, which is only found in God.
Only a moral coward would call such a set-up "cruel". Many today whine for God to shield us from every possible ill, but such a recommendation (however sincere) is intolerable for two very good reasons: (1) The issue of free-will. True free-will is contingent upon the possibility of true evil. Thus, to actually "shield" us from all ill would mean doing away with free-will, reducing us to mere machines, beasts, or other subhuman and inhuman entities. Therefore, to ask for Him to shield us is to not know what we are asking; we have requested that God spare us from one cruelty by inflicting us with another, i.e., the loss of our humanity. (2) The necessity of "the hard way." It is just plain old practical truth that sometimes the most merciful course of action is to allow one to learn things the "hard" way. If a truly free-will agent utterly refuses to heed your sound and truthful warnings and advice, then sometimes their refusal and subsequent disastrous consequences are the only way that they will finally heed. Such a fact is common sense, and to deny it is to accept blatant ignorance for the sake of argument.
This is not to say that God never shields us. Indeed, there is much that He shields us from (e.g., Ps. 105), and much more that we will probably never know. The point here is that God's modus operandi with people is not mere shielding anymore than it is mere allowance of the consequences. The point is that if your stubborn rebellion (whether you are an unbeliever or one of His children) leads you into the deathly consequences of Sin, their is a gracious miracle at work: the very consequences that seem so horrid are the very things that will lead you back to God. The sovereign will of God has decreed that out of every evil work, redemption will bud like rose out of the mud.

-Jon Vowell

Jesus: Light of the Dark World

"In Him was life, and that life was the light of men; and the light shineth in the darkness, and darkness cannot lay hold of it." John 1:4-5

"Everyone that does evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds shoould be exposed." John 3:20

"The world cannot hate you; but me it hateth, because I testify of it that the works thereof are evil." John 7:7

"To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth." John 18:37

"For this purpose the Son of God was manifested: that He might destroy the works of the devil." I John 3:8b

The destruction of the enemy and his works begins and ends with the proclamation and revelation of the truth. Jesus was not hated because He lead military uprisings (which He didn't), nor because He merely taught us to love each other (which He also didn't); rather, He was hated because He spoke the truth to those in and of the darkness. The result was like fire and deadwood, or vampires and the sun, or sodium and water: it was not a pleasant mixture.
Jesus, however, was not here to mix pleasantly with all things: he was here to start a fire (Luke 12:49), to break a spell, both in word (His teachings) and in deed (the Cross). Jesus was the Light not just because He is and came from God, who dwells in Light inaccessible, but also because He was the truth and spoke the truth, and the darkness hated Him for it.
We too are called to be such a witness; not a witness to our own ideas or notions, but to the truth: the truth that God has revealed in His word and in Christ. As Christ was the light of the world (John 8:12) so too are we (Matt. 5:14-16). We are called to pierce the darkness with a hated yet unquenchable light, and thus we can expect the same ire but also the same victory. The world loves two things: (1) convenient lies that are easy to forget while they support our congenial apathy towards and complacency in Sin, and (2) uncertainty and doubt as an appropriate hiding place for our pet preferences and opinions. They love these things because they fear what truth and certainty will reveal about themselves and their preferences, viz., that they are weighed and found wanting before the holiness of God.
We are told to sow the word like seeds; what an image to think of the seeds as sparks of flaming light that illuminate the night and burn up the dead and rotting things! We are the light-casters: we bear witness to the truth, and in doing so cast shards of Heaven's light like fire round about. This is the fire that Christ has started and that we continue, until perhaps all the elements of the earth will melt by its fervent heat.

-Jon Vowell

On Darkness (and a word on Light)

"...Thou that dwellest between the cherubims, shine forth. [...] Turn us again, O God, and cause Thy face to shine; and we shall be saved." Ps. 80:1b, 3, 7, 19

"In Him was life, and the life was the light of men." John 1:4

Jesus spoke of the "light of life" (John 8:12), a characteristic obviously belong to Jesus (the light of the world; John 8:12) and God (who is Light; I John 1:5). According to Scripture, being outside of God is properly understood as being in darkness, for what is darkness? Firstly, it is a confusion and deception, for it hides and distorts all things, so that our perception is clouded and unreliable. We follow every shadow and shade, our blinded eyes unable to see what is real. So also, those outside of God are blind (II Cor. 4:3-4), and they cannot see what they stumble over (Prov. 4:19).
Darkness is also a terror, a terror because of its deception. To be lost without sight or clear perception is to be trapped in the utter unknown, as if the unknown were dark ocean depths that one drowns in. We see no paths, we cannot identify any sound or face, whether they be real or of our own imagination. We cannot discern between friend and foe, threat and comfort. We cannot even identify ourselves, for every mirror merely reflects the darkness. So also, those outside of God know only fear and dread, for the world is dark and pitiless (I John 5:19), and they cannot find a place of safety and rest; neither can their hearts comfort them, for they are dark as well (Jer. 17:9).
This is the proper state of man outside of God: deceived and afraid. Thus, being redeemed by God is properly understood as being in the light; not just a single flash, but a continuous burning that illumines the darkness without and the darkness within, serving as guide and revealer not only for the pathways of the world but also the depths of the soul. It is this light that man desires, this light that Christ reveals: God is that light.

-Jon Vowell

"...while ye have the light..."

"Fearfulness and trembling are come upon me, and horror hath overwhelmed me." Ps. 55:5

"Yet a little while is the light with you. Walk while ye have the light, lest darkness come upon you; for he that walketh in darkness knoweth not whither he goeth. While ye have light, believe in the light, that ye may be the children of light." John 12:35-36

We err if we see the Christian life as all sunshine and roses. If we are not in a horror of great darkness right now, we are at least in a frustration of plain darkness, a seemingly endless waiting period where nothing seems to happen (except, perhaps, what you do not want to happen). God gives us light, such as His word (Ps. 119:105) and His Son (John 1:4-5), as well as His general revelations (Rom. 1:19-20). When the moments come that He enlightens our minds and illuminates our pathways, we must be sure to open our minds and hearts so as to close them again on the solid natures of His truth, beauty, and goodness. If we walk in the daylight flippantly, taking nothing that we see or hear to heart, then we will be dismayed in the night season. We can only be "the children of light" if while we have the light we believe in it.
This is not to say that there are moments when God is not with us. God is always with us (Matt. 28:20b). What happens is that there are times where God hides Himself from our view (e.g., John 12:36b - "When Jesus had said these things, he departed and did hide himself from them"). Where once His presence and purpose seemed so clear, now it has faded like a dream. The point is that we remain true to God and what He has revealed to us even and especially when He is hidden from us. There are stabs of light that pierce the darkness, pieces of Heaven that come raining down like manna in this vestibule of Hell that we call earth. While we have it, we may walk; when it goes, we must sit and wait. "Walk while ye have the light," for "he that walketh in darkness knoweth not whither he goeth." Sitting and waiting is the hardest thing; it is the hardest thing to sit and trust in the light and what it has shown you while your immediate circumstances seem to mock your faith, and the only light that you have is what you received the last time you walked in the light. It is our lot, however, to walk in the light so that we may burn in the night. Whatever opportunities we have, however, to meet with the light, let us take them gladly and vigorously, like a traveller in the desert stumbling across an oasis. Let us fill up for our journey so that we may have for ourselves and for others that we meet along the way.

-Jon Vowell