True Christian Religion #490
490. It is plain from the first chapter of Genesis that everything created by God was good. It says there that 'God saw that it was good' (verses 10, 12, 18, 21, 25), and at the end 'God saw everything that He made, and behold, it was very good' (verse 31). It is also plain from man's primeval state in paradise. Evil, however, arose from man, as is plain from Adam's second 1 state, that is, after the fall, by his being expelled from paradise. It is clear from these facts that if free will in spiritual matters had not been given to man, God Himself, and not man, would have been the cause of evil; in this case God would have created both good and evil, and it is wicked even to think that God created evil too. The reason why God did not create evil, since He bestowed on man free will in spiritual matters, and never puts any evil into his mind, is that He is good itself, and in good God is omnipresent, continually urging and demanding to be received. Even if He is not received, still He does not go away. For if He did, man would instantly die, or rather dissolve into non-existence, since man gets his life, and the continued existence of all he consists of, from God.
[2] Evil was not created by God but introduced by man, because man turns the good which continually flows in from God into evil, by turning away from God and turning towards himself. When this happens, the pleasure given by good remains, but it now becomes the pleasure given by evil; for without an apparently similar pleasure being left man would cease to live, since it is pleasure which makes up the vital principle of his love. These two pleasures are still diametrically opposed, though a person is unaware of this so long as he lives in the world. After death, however, he will know this and indeed feel it plainly, for then the pleasure given by the love of good is turned into heavenly blessedness, but the pleasure given by the love of evil into the torments of hell. These arguments prove that everyone is predestined to heaven, and no one to hell; but it is the person who commits himself to hell by misusing his free will in spiritual matters. As a result he embraces the ideas wafted from hell, since, as was said above, everyone is held mid-way between heaven and hell, so that he can be in equilibrium between good and evil, and consequently have free will in spiritual matters.
Voetnoten:
1. Reading secundo for secundum.
2 Corinthians 9
1
For as touching the ministering to the saints, it is superfluous for me to write to you:
2
For I know the forwardness of your mind, for which I boast of you to them of Macedonia, that Achaia was ready a year ago; and your zeal hath provoked very many.
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Yet have I sent the brethren, lest our boasting of you should be in vain in this behalf; that, as I said, ye may be ready:
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Lest haply if they of Macedonia come with me, and find you unprepared, we (that we say not, ye) should be ashamed in this same confident boasting.
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Therefore I thought it necessary to exhort the brethren, that they would go before unto you, and make up beforehand your bounty, whereof ye had notice before, that the same might be ready, as a matter of bounty, and not as of covetousness.
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But this I say, He which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly; and he which soweth bountifully shall reap also bountifully.
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Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver.
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And God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work:
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(As it is written, He hath dispersed abroad; he hath given to the poor: his righteousness remaineth for ever.
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Now he that ministereth seed to the sower both minister bread for your food, and multiply your seed sown, and increase the fruits of your righteousness;)
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Being enriched in every thing to all bountifulness, which causeth through us thanksgiving to God.
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For the administration of this service not only supplieth the want of the saints, but is abundant also by many thanksgivings unto God;
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Whiles by the experiment of this ministration they glorify God for your professed subjection unto the gospel of Christ, and for your liberal distribution unto them, and unto all men;
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And by their prayer for you, which long after you for the exceeding grace of God in you.
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Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift.
