Unmasking Evil

Steven J. Cole refers to the Apostle Paul’s spiritual experience as described in Romans 7:14–20 (KJV) as the merry-go-round of sin. It is an experience that I believe every child of God is subject to as a result of the evil in our world. The crust of it is this: “For the good that I would do I do not: but the evil I would not do, that I do” (7:19).

Without question, we want to get off this merry-go-round of sin, but that is not an easy task, for we are held there by an unseen master—a masked evil whose presence has gripped the whole of our society and the world and placed in it a mind-set that is deprived of understanding, judgment, and perception. Paul, through spiritual discernment, exposed this evil in Ephesians 6:12. He said, “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of darkness in this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” He unmasked the evil in our world, revealing that we are all affected by its presence. Christ has called each of us to recognize this masked evil and expose it to the world that we have been charged to impact positively for him.