Man–Why There Is Sin
Many people have often wondered or even verbalized the question as to why everything is so messed up if God really exists and created the world and mankind.
Genesis 1:31, “And God saw that everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. . .”
To understand why things are so different now from the way that God created them in the Beginning, we need to examine the matter of sin and how it entered into the world bringing with it fear, sorrow, destruction, and death.
Could God have created a world without the possibility of sin and thereby kept its consequences from wrecking havoc? Yes, He could have; however, without the possibility of evil there can exist no possibility for good either. God wanted good and its great blessings for His creation, but the blessing of obedience follows only a genuine not a pretense obedience. If the opportunity for disobedience does not exist, does obedience exist either? This principle is seen in Isaiah 45:7,
“I [God] form the light, and create darkness: I make peace and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.”
Think of it in this manner. How would one create nothing? The answer would be to create something because nothing as something’s opposite would also come into existence with it. When God formed the light, darkness, which is the absence of light, also come into existence. Likewise, when God ordained for peace to be in His creation the absence of right which is evil came to be a possibility as well. God’s purpose was for good to be, but for it to be truly good the possibility and opportunity for evil had to exist as well.
Another important factor in this equation is that of love. Without the ability for man to have a choice to love and obey God rather than to love himself and disobey God, man would simply be a puppet.
Song of Solomon 8:7, “Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it: if a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would be utterly condemned [despised].”
If God is to be truly loved by us, it must come as a expression of our will. Love that is not freely given is love that will be despised in the end because it is shallow and superficial. Love that is not programmed, forced, coerced, or purchased but that exists as a free expression of our volition due to the worthiness of the object of our affection has depth, is meaningful, and is a delight to the one loved.
With these possibilities for good or evil and love of God or love of self before him, Adam chose to disobey God’s command by eating of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. In that one act of disobedience he plunged himself and all his posterity into sin bringing all of its consequences of evil upon himself and his children.
1 John 3:4, “. . . for sin is the transgression of the law.”
Romans 5:12 and 19, “Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned. . . 19 For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners. . .”
While the past of how sin came into the world cannot be changed, your present sinful state can be changed by believing in the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal Savior.
“These were more noble. . . in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether these things were so.” Acts 17: 11
