Love hates Evil
LOVE DOES NOT ENJOY EVIL.
Could it be that we all really do rejoice in evil? All it takes to rejoice in evil is to approve of its being here, to be content that we have some evil around, even though we may regret that evil has hurt us.
What do I mean by evil?
By evil, I mean everything that happens which hurts people needlessly, they are moral evil, natural evil, and accidental evil. We shall not talk about evils that do not hurt anyone. There are also things that hurt people necessarily like dentists' drills and surgeons' knives; these we do not call evils since they are necessary to bring about.
Moral evil is intentional. Intentional evil is done by devils and people. Natural evil is unintentional. Natural evil is done by nature, though devils and people sometimes cooperate. Accidental evil is done by people when they do not mean to do it
There are subtle ways to rejoice in evil:
1. Philosophical rejoicing.
Sometimes people rejoice in evil by way of a philosophical explanation of it. Good and evil blends well in a giant picture in human history if we stand far enough and don't look too close from a personal view: like your hurt experienced as a first person. Thus, you can rejoice in evil, because it contributes to what, finally, has to be a very good, if not the best possible world.
But love will not join this profound praise of evil. To be sure, love will put up with untidy worlds, and will stand far enough away to see the whole mosaic, but love sees evil only as a monstrous blot on God's creation. It is not seduced by profound speculations about universal harmony. Evil, in love's eye, is obscene, no matter how splendidly and fully it is dressed.
2. Theological rejoicing.
Did God somehow decree evil? No, God do not desire evil. Sometimes people think that without evil, God would never have been able to save a human soul from evil. No! Love does not affirm evil. It is the power standing in the way of yielding to the temptation to believe that God, in search of glory, gives evil a niche in His world. Evil is a strange, mysterious power whose ultimate origin no one can fathom; love is simply and clearly of God. Love does not rejoice in evil, not even in the name of theological profundity.
3. Religious rejoicing.
When religion builds altars to things less than God it brings out people's tendency to applaud evil. Idols always seduce us into an illicit affair with evil. Take devotion to one's country, for example. Patriotism, love of one's nation, is how we express loyalty to the natural group which is second only to the family. When we worship the created state above the creator God, we are ready to call evil good.
4. Personal rejoicing.
We also rejoice in evil in more direct and personal ways - sometimes when other people are hurt by evil, sometimes even when they do evil. We rejoice when our enemies suffer evil. The more certain we are that our cause is right, the more pure our joy when the other side suffers (eg the loss of German in WWII). We rejoice when we think we are only indignant, disgusted, or nauseated. Take the discovery that someone we know - but have never liked very well - has fallen into a sexual sin. We may make use of the occasion in full measure of indignant fury. Others will only be disgusted. And so we have a chance to enjoy the evil.
Love rejects evil
Love, in contrast, is a power that moves us only to regret evil - anywhere, in any form, by any cause. This is a paradox, for agapic love, like God, does its best work in response to evil. It builds a state on which love is forgiving, healing, and redeeming. But love rejoices only when evil is destroyed. It rejoices with the truth. Why is it truth, not goodness, that is contrasted with evil? Truth keeps love honest, reminding it that an enemy loved is still an enemy, a sinner forgiven no less a sinner. Truth keeps love from sweeping the realities about people under a shaggy carpet of agapic good will. So love rejoices with the truth.
Love rejoices with the truth which is Jesus Christ, and rejoicing with Christ we revel in reality as it is meant to be. We are glad to be alive in a world where truth can be known uniquely as the reality that is Jesus Christ. Rejoicing with the truth puts us on the side of the future. To rejoice with the truth is to bet your life on Christ as victor over evil.
In the first place, love lets us see that evil never belongs anywhere; it has no right to exist.
In the second place, love opens our minds to the possibility that evil has in fact been defeated. The truth is victory over evil; this is reality. No wonder that love rejoices with the truth. Love well knows that God is able to bring blessing out of evil.
Love knows that life now is ambiguous. But love can bear it. Love can even rejoice in this mixedup life because it rejoices with the truth, the Truth who will "reconcile all things to himself" (Colossians 1:20) and thus make the whole world i true again. Love manages well in a world like ours; but love never approves of the evil that makes our good world the mixed reality it is.
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撮要自 已故牧師Rev. LB. Smedes之「愛在限制中: 在自私的世界中實踐無私的愛Love within limits: realizing selfless love in a selfish world. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1979. 」 Rev. Smedes was a retired minister in the Christian Reformed Church, a former ethics professor at Fuller Theological Seminary. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lewis_B._Smedes
