The denial of evil
It's easier to live with the delusion that people and systems are basically good.
In February 2022, I was at a birthday party when our table somehow got onto the topic of covid vaccines. My husband and I stated our opinion that they were harmful. One other person at the table shared our viewpoint, while the others did not. One of them said something I haven’t been able to forget: “I just can’t believe that there could be such evil in the world.”
This is a thoroughly unsupportable viewpoint, especially given that the woman who said this is a Christian (and a lovely person, if a touch naïve). It is somewhat understandable that people not familiar with Scripture could sustain the delusion that great, systemic evil is not possible (although difficult to square with reality); but it’s totally incompatible with what Scripture tells us about the powers that are in control of our fallen world system.
Like all of us who are awake to the vast fraud that was perpetrated on the world in the form of covid and the “vaccines”, I have wrestled with trying to understand how it came about. It is difficult to explain such a massively coordinated set of events across most of the world, with few outliers. No wonder many make sense of it by positing conspiracy theories, whereas others think it’s explainable simply by idiocy and groupthink.
While I don’t have definitive answers about specifically how this delusion was perpetrated, whether it was deliberately created or simply the result of panic and conformity, or some mix of both, I personally came to believe some time ago that there are spiritual forces of darkness behind it all, and that as outlandish as it might seem to modern materialist minds, that was actually the most reasonable explanation for the coordinated madness that gripped most of the globe.
I suppose I have somewhat of a head start on most people in coming to that conclusion, although it took me a while. While I won’t recount the story here, becoming a Christian involved coming face-to-face with the reality of spiritual evil (i.e., Satan and demons), and being delivered from said evil by Christ. Prior to that, I was a typical Western materialist, who while I would have said I believed in spiritual entities, thought they only operated in far-off places where people still believed in that stuff.
Despite that history, it’s still easier for me today to reach for materialist explanations than spiritual ones. We are far more steeped in our culture than we realize, even as Christians whose beliefs and worldview should be shaped by Scripture rather than our culture. The reality is, even Christians think, act, and believe much more like the world around us than people who believe in the reality of the supernatural. E.g. the refusal in most of our churches to pursue the miraculous gifts and operation of the Holy Spirit (that’s a topic for a whole other post).
So what does Scripture tell us that should lead us to accept the reality that evil has an origin beyond and more powerful than the CCP, the WHO, the WEF, and politicians, albeit working in and through those unwitting entities?
We know that we are from God, and the whole world lies in the power of the evil one. (1 John 5:19)
The above is the verse that constantly comes to my mind when trying to grasp the magnitude of the evil we’ve seen in the past nearly three years.
And you [believers in Christ] were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air [Satan], the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience (Ephesians 2:1-2)
It shouldn’t be surprising, to those who are awake to spiritual reality, that great evil like the covid fraud and its accompanying tyranny can happen. It should be surprising that we’ve previously enjoyed several decades of relative peace and prosperity in the West.
The big picture Scripture paints is of two kingdoms: the kingdom of darkness, lies, evil and death, ruled by Satan; and the kingdom of light, life, goodness, and truth, ruled by Jesus Christ. Every single human being, whether they know it or not, belongs to the first kingdom and is only liberated from it through faith in Christ. The first kingdom, for the time being, rules this world, although Christ defeated it in his death and resurrection and purchased liberty for those who trust in him. Although those who belong to Christ have been spiritually liberated, we continue to suffer the effects of living in a first-kingdom world, including our own struggle against living according to first-kingdom desires (our sinful human nature versus the Spirit of God, as Scripture puts it). Only when Christ returns will his kingdom fully and utterly defeat Satan’s kingdom and become the entire reality. You don’t want to be on the wrong side when that happens, so accept Christ’s offer of a transfer to his kingdom while you still can.
I am well aware even as I’m writing this of how crazy it sounds to modern, materialist, Western ears. But I’ve had a glimpse “behind the curtain”, as it were, and as much of a natural cynic as I am, I can’t unsee it.
What, then, explains most people’s, even Christians, inability to believe in the reality of evil?
It is painful, uncomfortable, and frightening to come to grips with the fact that evil exists. As humans, we like to believe in the illusion of basic control over our lives and our circumstances. The idea that we are at the mercy of malevolent forces more powerful than we are is a terrifying one. We do with it what we do with most uncomfortable ideas: reject it.
It is far easier to live with the comforting delusion that life is basically safe and predictable, that people are basically good, that we live in an ordered and reasonable world, that governments and medical personnel work for our benefit, that news media are dedicated to telling only the truth, than to contemplate the opposite. It is far easier to believe what we are told than to realize that we must actively evaluate and reject much of what we are told by institutions we are supposed to be able to trust.
We’d rather keep working and shopping and watching Netflix and keeping ourselves occupied with inanities until we die. Even Christians live in pleasant rhythms of nice church gatherings that never address or experience grand spiritual realities, amusing ourselves while the world burns.
But if we don’t come to grips with the existence and activity of evil, we do not and never will come to grips with reality.
Christians, of all people, are the ones equipped to do so. We belong to someone who said:
In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world. (John 16:33)
The denial of evil
You said it. I agree wholeheartedly. When all this crap started, it was worldwide and I knew. The fact that it wasn't D or R starting "it" just opened my door to the real world with a jarring entrance. The fact that I have been waiting for just this thing since the 70's was most helpful. And the fact that "Christians" go about their everyday lives as if nothing is up, and pastors and teachers IGNORE the moaning of their flocks and teach or preach about things that have no bearing on current events just trips my trigger. I live in Idaho half the year, in a small town. There are 2 classes of people, "Christians" and those who, well, don't go to church. Down here in Florida, in my neighborhood, there are many "Christians", but therein lies the division. I have never seen anything like it. It is denominational division and it is HUGE. So, first there was the mask. Dividing. Then the Vax. Really dividing, like the civil war in some families, but underneath it all is the spiritual division that this nation and it's "Christians" are letting happen. Fiddling while Rome burns. I. Can't. Stand. It. Well said. Wish you didn't have to spend your talent writing about this, but know you are bound to hit someone with an arrow and if what we say saves just one more person for The Kingdom, then it is good. ♥
Excellent essay.
Back when nearly the whole world fell in line with what was obviously irrational behavior and the governments operated in lockstep, I decided it was prep work or a trial run for the one world government that will exist under the Antichrist.
The devil is able to see the spiritual activities of God clearly and the fact that he’s operating in hyperdrive makes me convinced that he sees something. God is moving.