Is Cancer Evil?

Oh my ... now that's a thorny question, isn't it? Put another way, are only "good" things the product of God, and all else the product of the devil?

The theology on this runs deep and turbulent. After all, Satan is a created being, and God created him. God did not necessarily create the evil but rather allowed it to happen. Why? Who knows ... we've wrestled with that question before without much success.

Are aggressive plants "evil?" I'm not sure ... they're just doing what they're genetically programmed to do ... which is to spread rapidly. I doubt their motivation is one of intentional ill-will towards other plants. I doubt they have any motivation at all.

Oh my ... my poor brain throbs on a Sunday morning. :-)

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I've been thinking more and more about Dallas Willard's definition of "love" -- "Acting with the intent to do what is right and good for the object." I'm really coming to appreciate the utility of this definition, for several reasons. One is that it helps cast a light on our contemporary understanding of "love" and helps show the distinction between "desire" and the new definition of "love." But perhaps the aspect of this that's most helpful to me is that it finally allows me to understand how I can "love" someone I do not like.

That was always the stumbling point for me. There are people in this world I simply do not like. I have long labored under the misunderstanding that the Biblical commandment is to find a way to like them -- to admire them -- and thus be able to love them.

But some people behave in such a way that I can find no basis for liking them.

Hence I could not understand how I could love them.

But with Willard's definition of "love," it is now more understandable. Perhaps not any easier, just more understandable. If "love" means to "act with the intent to do what is right and good for the object," then even with people I do not like I can see that my actions can be in the form of what is good for them or what is not good for them. Big things like physically harming them. Small things like talking ill of them behind their back.

Yes, this is very much in alignment with the "treat others as you wish to be treated" rule.

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Here's the curveball question -- why is it so hard to "love" (using Willard's definition) oneself? Why is it we do things to ourselves we know are not right and not good? That is the nature of intentional sin, isn't it?

The Bible is clear that our lives would be as God would wish for us if we obeyed his commands. We don't ... which is what "sin" is. And when we disobey then things do not always go right for us. In my mind I can see the connection quite clearly -- I have concrete examples in my mind where behavior X leads to uncomfortable or harmful Y. Yet in many cases people do not entirely give up X.

I guess psychologists and therapists have been trying to figure that one out for centuries.