If you ever travel to Concord, New Hampshire, you might see a friendly, older fellow who is excited to share his faith in God. The more I discussed spiritual matters with him, however, the more I felt like something was missing from his thought-process. Something was definitely wrong with this picture.
That’s when it came up. Genesis 3.
“I don’t believe that should be taken literally,” he explained.
Now, I’ve met plenty of people who refuse to believe Genesis 1 and 2, the chapters related to the creation of the world. But Genesis 3 explains the “Fall of Man” into sin, the choice Adam and Eve made to go out from under God’s authority. I’d never heard someone single that out as the part of the Bible they don’t believe.
“Evil is more of an illusion than a reality,” he went on to say. “The physical world is not the ‘real’ world; the spiritual world is. And no one sins in the spiritual world, only in the physical world.”
What?
This guy has lived a long time; he even told me he fought in North Africa during World War II. And he doesn’t believe evil is real? He doesn’t see the effects of Genesis 3 all around him, every day? Doesn’t he read the news?
Perhaps denying evil is a way of coping with suffering. Perhaps it’s a way of excusing some personal sin habit. Perhaps it’s a way to shirk responsibility to follow God’s instructions. Or, perhaps it’s what this guy grew up believing, and never became convinced of what most of us assume is obvious.
Upon further study, I found that there are a good number of people out there who deny or redefine evil in one way or another. Rarely, however, do any of these folks live in a way consistent with their beliefs. This is illustrated well by Steve Kumar, author of “Christianity for Skeptics”: “If evil is an illusion, it is pointless to try to improve the conditions of life. Hence, the destitute would be left to starve, the sick left to die, there would be no need to have hospitals, schools, and universities. Learning would cease and a new dark age would descend upon the earth. Thus, we reject this view [that evil is an illusion] as inhuman, impossible, and irrational.”
My New Hampshire friend might counter that he’s not actually denying the existence of evil, he’s denying the significance of the physical world in which evil occurs. That’s a nice philosophical work-around, but it doesn’t deal with issue.
Here’s what the Bible has to say:
1. God views sin as a real, serious condition. “Take your evil deeds out of my sight! Stop doing wrong, learn to do right! Seek justice, encourage the oppressed.” (Isaiah 1:16-17, NIV)
2. Evil is the cause of death and suffering. “…sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned.” (Romans 5:12)
3. Jesus came specifically to deal with sin in the real world. “Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness. But you know that [Jesus] appeared so that he might take away our sins. . . The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil's work.” (1 John 3:4-5, 8)
4. While the physical world is temporary, it is not insignificant. God is the creator and owner of this physical realm, and he cares about the “body” in the same way he cares for the soul. “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body.” (1 Cor. 6:19-20)
When God looked at the post-Genesis 3 world, he saw something radically wrong with "this picture." He saw how evil was twisting and ruining the lies of the people He had created. That's why he sent Jesus.
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