Where does evil & suffering come from?

By: Kyle Austin

If evil & suffering exist today then it must have come into existence at a specific point in time. When? Go all the way back with me to the beginning when God created the heaven and the earth. God created man on the sixth day and He gives us a summary in Genesis 1:31 of creation at that point. It says, "And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good." So we learn that up to this point there is no sin, no evil, and no suffering in the world. God's creation is perfect at this point. So where does evil and suffering come from? Let me give you three points to consider.

God created the possibility of evil.

Notice I did not say that God created evil rather God created the possibility of evil. God created the first humans, Adam and Eve, and placed them in the garden of Eden. He then gives the two clear instructions of what to do and what not to do. He says in Genesis 2:16-17, "And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." So think about this with me. God gives Adam and Eve everything in the garden to enjoy except for one tree. They can have it all to enjoy except for one tree which is forbidden.


At this point is man holy or is man sinful? Man is neither at this point, instead he is innocent. Man cannot be holy nor can he be sinful without the exercise of his free will which was going to be tested by God's law. God tested man by the one prohibition of this tree. The consequences were very clear. For obedience it was physical immortality and for disobedience it was physical death. So if God only created the possibility of evil then where does evil and suffering come from?

Man produced evil's potential.

Man's free will produced evil's potential. The source of evil is not God but man's freedom to choose or exercise his free will. God created human beings with a free will which allows you and I to choose. We choose what we want to eat, what clothes we want to put on what, and we want to watch on TV. We choose if we want to love someone or not. We choose if we want to obey the laws or not. You and I are free to choose but we also understand there are consequences for certain choices.


Adam and Eve were placed in the garden where they exercised their free will and in doing so they disobeyed God's clear command. Genesis 3:6 says, "And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat. And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons." Something changed dramatically at this point in time. The Bible says their eyes were opened and they realized they were naked. Right at this point is where the evil and suffering in our world originated from. This sin of disobeying God's command produced all the evil, all the suffering, and all the death that you and I experience. It moved from potential to actuality. Romans 5:12 is a commentary on this verse and says, "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." So the one decision made back in Genesis 3:6 at the very beginning produced all the evil and all the suffering that you and I experience in life.

Free will allows man to choose evil over good with suffering being the result.

Now you may be tempted to say something like this, "God is all powerful and could have created a world where there is no suffering and no evil in it. God should have created a world where there is no suffering! He is God after all!" Can i say that He did. God did create a world where there was no suffering, no evil, and no sin but humans messed it up! We must remember that creating a world where there is free will and no evil or no possibility of evil is a self-contradiction. You can't have the ability for man to choose and not have the potential for evil. God did not create us as robots but instead God created man with the free will to choose. We can choose to love him or hate him and we can choose to obey or disobey His law.

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