Why does God allow evil to prosper?

But Zophar had no difficulty at all. That is generally the case with people who know very little; they fancy they know everything. Zophar, therefore, keeps up this — that there is the great fact, there is a righteous God above, and there are unrighteous, wicked people below, and God invariably deals with these wicked people now. That was not true. A large part of the world has always been allowed of God to apparently prosper in their evil, and the reason is that the time of judgment is not yet come. There may be judgments; there may be exceptional dealings with the wicked just as Job's case was a very exceptional dealing in the severity of his trial, and in the manner in which Satan was challenged by God to do his very worst; and God was secretly keeping up Job even when he was finding fault with God and thinking He was very hard upon him to allow all this. But he was kept up not only for his own good, but for ours. Now we have the Book, and are meant to profit by it for ourselves and for other people. "Though his excellency mount up to the heavens, and his head reach to the clouds; yet he shall perish for ever like his own dung; they which have seen him shall say, where is he?"

Many like the Psalmist are perplexed at the prosperity of the wicked (Psalm 73:3). Everything seems to go well with them in life, and even in death. It was only when the Psalmist entered the “sanctuary of God” that he understood their end (verse 17), and it is the end that matters. God in His wisdom may allow His children prosperity in present things to carry on His work, but He may allow them to know adversity and poverty, giving them a rich compensation, for “Has not God chosen the poor of this world, rich in faith” (James 2:5).

Job knew that “The tabernacles of robbers prosper, and they that provoke God are secure” (Job. 12:6), though Eliphaz thought that “in prosperity the destroyer shall come upon” the wicked (Job 15:21). What Eliphaz thought was sometimes right, but it was not always right, as the writer of Psalm 73 knew, and as we know from what is all around. When we realise that God has allowed Satan to become the god and prince of this world, and that he has the authority to dispose in some way of the kingdoms of this world (Luke 4:6), we will not be perplexed at the prosperity of the wicked.

But there was something still more perplexing, for there were times in the lives of the most honoured servants and saints, when they were suffering, and being made to pass through the deepest trials when the wicked were prospering, and at their ease. This was, to the righteous, most baffling. The patriarch Job, who was perhaps the greatest sufferer in the Old Testament — but there were many others (James 5:10-11) — had to say: "Wherefore do the wicked live, become old, yea, are mighty in power? Their seed is established in their sight with them, and their offspring before their eyes. Their houses are safe from fear, neither is the rod of God upon them. …" (See Job 21:7-13). So also with David "I have seen the wicked in great power, and spreading himself like a green bay tree" (Psalm 37:35). Such things these men could not reconcile with the justice of God's moral government. In His revealed will, the order seemed to be joy and happiness for the good, but sorrow and suffering for the evil. The law had laid this down very fully and clearly, and it had been said, "He that will love life and see good days, let him refrain his tongue from evil, and do good; let him seek peace, and ensue it" (1 Peter 3:10-11; also Psalm 34:12). Yet those who sought to live according to this were kept in suffering. Think of a man like Job of whom Jehovah could say to Satan, "Hast thou considered My servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth," yet his suffering were prodigious. It is just at this point that we may learn the wonders of God's wisdom, and see the richest and choicest of His dealings with His children in the world. The wicked may prosper for a brief season, as we have seen, but in a moment their candle goes out, and then for them it is the blackness of darkness for eternity. The righteous may suffer in a world where sin and death are permitted, but, this, in the hand of a Father, is educative in view of forming the character, and making them morally Christ like in view of future glory.

(Vv. 4, 5) This leads to the assertion of the second great principle of God in regard to judgment, namely, God invariably gives space for repentance before He executes judgment. The execution of the judgment of God will most surely come, though, in the goodness of God, it may be long delayed. In His goodness God forbears to judge and suffers long with evil. It was so in the days of Noah, when God lingered for One hundred and twenty years before executing the judgment of the flood: it was so in the history of Israel, with whose evil ways God bore long before destroying Jerusalem and scattering the nation. It is so to-day when God in grace lingers over this judgment doomed world. How then does man treat this longsuffering of God? Alas! men despise the riches of His goodness. Because of this "for-bearance" men think that God will never judge: because of His "longsuffering" men think that God is indifferent to evil. Thus men despise the goodness of God, not seeing that the reason God "forbears" and "suffers long" is to give men space for repentance. The goodness of God thus makes manifest the hardness and impenitence of man's heart. God acts in goodness, and men despise "the riches of His goodness". God gives space to repent, and men are impenitent. Men condemn one another for doing evil, but they refuse to repent of their own evil. The fact that God gives space for repentance, shows that repentance is a necessity for each man in order to be right with God, and escape the judgment of God.

The Lord is not slack, not lax or undependable, of which, by some men He may be accused; though He is marvelously patient. It is folly to mistake His patience for indifference. If indeed He is long-suffering, yet it is because of His concern for the souls of men, that they might have opportunity to come to repentance, and therefore escape the judgment that must necessarily fall upon a guilty world.

Asaph discovered that God intends to settle His accounts with the ungodly in His own time and way, and that He has unlimited time at His disposal wherein to do it. He is in no hurry, and He will do it in an hour of all hours most inconvenient for them. If we too have been troubled about this particular point, let us also lay hold of the fact that God's ways, whether with the ungodly or with His people, can only be interpreted in the light of eternity.

This, however, is not all, for in the sanctuary we learn many truths. Thus it is that he discerns a second great truth that, though God apparently takes little notice of the prosperity of the wicked, or even the afflictions of the godly, yet actually God and His government are working behind all (verses 18-20). Thus he is brought to confess, "Thou didst set them in slippery places: Thou castedst them down into destruction … Thou shalt despise their image." It looked, indeed, as if the Psalmist had been in the slippery places, for had not his steps well nigh slipped? and on the other hand the wicked appeared to be firmly established on a rock, for did they not prosper in the world and increase in riches? Actually the godly soul was on the rock though shaking; and the wicked were in slippery places, though prospering. Viewing the prosperity of the wicked apart from the sanctuary the godly man was cast down; viewing the wicked from the sanctuary he sees, that in the end, they will be cast down. Away from God the prosperity of the wicked appeared very real and lasting, in the sanctuary it was but an evil and passing dream.

God allows the wicked seeming prosperity with the intention of destroying them forever. Wickedness loves to flaunt itself, but suddenly it is dashed down from its proud height of self-confidence (v. 7).

The righteous can look up! However, evil seems to prosper in its destructive ways, "the Lord is in His holy temple: the Lord's throne is in heaven." He is in perfect control of all the circumstances of earth. "His eyes behold, His eyelids test the sons of men." He is cognizant of every detail of men's activities, and he allows the evil of men to continue up to the point of His completing His test of them. Let us remember that God is testing the ungodly by bearing long with them. But they fail the test, and the results will follow.

But the very contrariety of the world now to God and to His children only the more proves that the righteous Lord will surely intervene and vindicate in that day all that looks tangled now. One understands easily that, if Satan is as God calls him the god of this age, it can only be in the age to come when the Lord Jesus governs publicly and in power, that as a rule the wicked shall be put down and the righteous prosper. The unbeliever is hardened at the sight of the just man perishing in his righteousness, and of a wicked man prolonging his life in his wickedness. The believer awaits the kingdom of God and suffers for its sake. "Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil." Unto the sons of God it is given in the behalf of Christ not only to believe on Him but to suffer for Him. When the day comes all will be changed.

"If so be [it is] a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to those that trouble you, and to you that are troubled rest with us." This none can dispute who believes that God is, and that He is a rewarder of those that seek Him out, and an avenger of all wrong against God and man. He is now dealing in grace; in that day He will judge the habitable world (and the dead also in due time) in righteousness by the Man whom He hath ordained; whereof He hath given assurance to all men in that He hath raised Him from the dead. In that day, as even a godly Jew did know, He will be merciful to His land and to His people, as surely as He will render vengeance to His enemies and reward those that hate Him. What then will be His attitude toward the persecutors of His children and to those of them who thus suffered? He will dispense to such as troubled them tribulation, and rest to His now troubled children — rest with Paul and His companions in loving service for their sakes.