Injustice, Addiction, Hatred, Cancer, Earthquakes, Disease, Human trafficking, Famine, Pride, Revenge, Depression, Greed, Torture, Murder, War, Genocide, Darkness
Those are the words in a TV commercial advertising a sermon at Second Baptist Church in Houston concerning EVIL as in “Really evil. Like so evil, that you would say it was E-VEEL, like it’s the FRU-ETS of the DEV-EEL. E-VEEL.” 1 But wait! The plot thickens to include Satan (sticking with SNL folks, see the included video for emphasis on SATAN!!!) and his dreaded agenda.
Why am I being so over-the-top about this commercial? I’m glad you asked. It’s because the whole commercial and sermon are so over-the-top in preaching fear and dread and God’s gonna save ya, and we’re here to tell you how.
With this type of fear-inducing propaganda, no wonder people have lost God and religion. I mean several of the items mentioned in the commercial are God’s handiwork, and God doesn’t produce evil only love. And then some of them, just because some people don’t understand the world and science, might seem evil, like we should be burning a witch at the stake evil for causing the dastardly deeds. Of course, the producers did manage to slip in a few truly horrific acts to boost and group the seemingly every day acts as works of the devil. I mean when you see earthquake in the same sentence as genocide, you just gotta run and get a bible. So let’s examine these words and breakdown how they are evil… evil…evil… fades into scary Vincent Price laughter.
Injustice – Right out the gate, that’s not evil; the world isn’t fair; life sucks. We all have hard times. That doesn’t make injustice evil. We don’t understand it, but again, doesn’t make it evil. Sometimes, bad things happen to good people, and good things happen to bad people. But really, we don’t know who is good and who is bad. Only God know that. We only know what we perceive. If this life was all fine and dandy why would we need to go to Heaven?
Addiction – Not evil, it is simply science. Our bodies and brains are wired for addictive habits and chemicals. Other animals, besides humans, become addicted. Is Satan smiting them as well? No. Calling addiction evil is displacing the blame, and it doesn’t really help the individuals who are addicted. I’m not saying God can’t cure addition. I’m just saying that this human function is not evil.
Hatred, Revenge – I am grouping those two together because they are the polar opposite of what Jesus taught. They are not good, but it is human nature to feel hatred or want revenge. That is why Jesus taught love and forgiveness. We shouldn’t mention the negative words of hatred and revenge. A church that only talks of love and forgiveness every Sunday for a hundred years will heal more hurt, generate more love, and bring more peace.
Cancer – Kind of created by God. If you believe he created our bodies and God’s work is perfect, then, cancer plays some role in God’s work. We don’t understand it clearly, but that doesn’t make it evil. Trust me. I don’t like cancer. I have lost loved ones to cancer, and I have loved ones battling cancer. It is an awful disease, but caused by Satin it ain’t.
Earthquakes – Created by God. If you believe he created this world, and again, that God’s work is perfect, then earthquakes play a role in our world, and in fact, they do; earthquakes relieve tension built up in the earth’s crusts. Without earthquakes, this world would not be the same place. Tragic as they are when people lose their lives doesn’t make earthquakes evil.
Disease, Famine – I grouped these two because I am getting tired of stating created by God, and if you believe blah… blah… blah. Both of these are part of this world. They are terrible. I don’t want people to die due to famines, but famines are simple science. Science sometimes sucks. Sometimes the science of the world we live in creates organisms that kill us. Again, these are terrible circumstances in our world, but not evil.
Depression – I jumped to this one in the list, because I wanted to conclude the list of items that are clearly not evil with this one. I suffer from depression. I have my whole life. I know it is not evil. Depression is caused by a chemical imbalance in our bodies. You would think that with the recent death of Robin Williams that people would quit stigmatizing depression, but leave it to the “Christians” to demonize a condition that affects millions of people.
Pride, Greed – Clearly these are not our best qualities, but we all sin. We all feel pride. We all feel greed. Ask for forgiveness from God and move on. Don’t dwell on the bad aspects of who we are. While I wouldn’t call these sins evil, I can see how someone might. Are they caused by the guy with horns and a pitchfork? If they are, he gets around more than Santa Claus. Wait a minute. Santa. Satan. Church lady do we have a problem here?
Human trafficking, Torture, Murder, War, Genocide – I’m not going to argue against evil. These are evil. But I will add again, I believe they are simply sprinkled in this list to make the other items seem evil by association. What are we to make of these? Jesus said wars would happen. People die. TV shows and churches love the gory details. They get ratings and fill the pews.
Darkness – This is so vague that I don’t even know where to begin.
I’m glad I don’t have to give a couple of sermons on these topics. I don’t know how I would fill the time, but I bet, a lengthy sermon will not be difficult to achieve. I don’t know why this commercial moved me so much. Some people might argue it was the devil that made me write this. If they want to believe that, I can’t help them. I will pray for them. I will pray that everyone caught up in this hoopla sees God’s glory through love, forgiveness, and grace. You don’t need to know bad stuff is out in this world to know that God has got your back. He does. Trust me.
If you’re wondering why I didn’t include a link to the video or website about the sermon, I just didn’t want to promote any more than I already have by writing this blog post. If you want to see the video, Google it. I’m sure evil Google will have no problem directing you to the proper website.
1 Mike Myers in So I Married an Axe Murder
Compiling God's Code 