Evil exists in the world. A survey of any the news on any given day should be enough to convince a reasonable person evil is real. The question many struggle to answer concerns the origin of evil. Christians have been discussing and debating that question for over 1,500 years. This article offers one explanation for the origin of evil.

The Bible teaches that catastrophe, suffering and death is the result of sin. Man chose to disobey God and his disobedience brought the world under a curse. The curse of sin subjected creation to the many pains of life, from disease to disaster. Sin brought suffering into the world, but what brought about sin?

First, God is not responsible for the existence of sin. He is supremely holy (Isaiah 6:2) and does not approve of sin (Habakkuk 2:13). Every work of God is perfect (Deuteronomy 32:4). Second, God alone is the Creator of all things. Nothing which exists, exists independently of God. (John 1:3) These two statements sound like a contradiction. Many have attempted to resolve the apparent contradiction by concluding God must have created evil.

God could not have created evil. When God finished the work of creation He declared everything was very good. (Genesis 1:31) God is perfectly holy. He does not declare anything good which contains evil. Immediately after the creation week God stopped creating (Genesis 2:2). God has created no new thing since He ended His creative work.

The God who is morally holy cannot create evil. God did not create evil during the week of creation. God declared His work of creation was perfect. He has created no new thing since creation was finished. Therefore, God did not create evil.

God did not create evil, but He did create perfect beings able to freely love, serve and worship Him. In giving those creatures freedom to serve Him they also had the ability to refuse to serve Him. Chief among these perfect beings was an angel named Lucifer. Lucifer was beautiful and powerful (Ezekiel 28:13-14). He became filled with pride and thought in his own heart, “I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God; I will also sit on the mount of the congregation on the farthest sides of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds, I will be like the Most High.” (Isaiah 14:13-14) Lucifer’s desire for self-exaltation is the origin of sin.

Lucifer, who we know as Satan, did not create evil in the sense of causing some new thing to come into existence. Evil is not the creation of a new way of being, but a perversion of the way made by God. Evil is the corruption of the good which already existed. God created the angels to worship Him. Satan distorted that created purpose and turned it inwards towards himself. Ezekiel 28:17 says of Satan, “You corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor.” Satan did not act with understanding originating with himself. He had wisdom given to him. Instead of using that wisdom as it was designed to be used, he corrupted wisdom by the promotion of himself. Instead of exalting God as he was created to do, Satan exalted self. Instead of worshiping God, Satan worshiped self. Instead of serving God, Satan served his own selfish desires. The good things God created were rejected and perverted and perverted by Satan.

Evil exists because God’s creatures rejected the good of God and His creation. Evil began with Satan, the Father of lies (John 8:44) who continues to corrupt and counterfeit the good of God. Satan deceived Eve into rejecting the good God had given her. When Adam and Eve rejected God’s goodness to follow Satanic lies, they sinned. The sin of Adam and Eve corrupted their righteous hearts, polluted the hearts of all their descendants and brought a calamitous curse upon the world. Evil originated in the perverse heart of Satan, was spread to the heart of men through his lies and continues to bring sorrow to all the world.