Question of the Week: If God created everything and sin exists, does sin belong to God or did the devil create it? If the devil created it, does the devil have creation powers?
My Answer: One purpose in God’s creation activity was to magnify the expression of his love. Hence, he created beings with the capacity to receive and express love. That capacity requires that these beings be granted free will. Free will implies the capacity to choose to receive or reject God’s love, to choose to submit to God or rebel against him, to choose to love or to hate. Therefore, it was inevitable that at least a few of the freewill beings that God created would choose to rebel against him and engage in sin.
God created the universe, however, with specified, fixed laws of physics and space-time dimensions so that once sin entered the universe, he could use those laws and dimensions, tests of our wills by Satan’s temptations, our physical deaths, the death and resurrection of his own Son, and the work of the Holy Spirit to eradicate sin and evil. Simultaneously, for humans who choose God’s redemptive offer, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit exponentially enhance their freewill capacity to receive and express love.
