A friend once commented that he liked reading the book of Revelation in the Bible. “It has a happy ending,” he said. And it does! Though it’s filled with dramatic images of war and conflict, it nevertheless prophesies the destruction of all evil. By the time you get to the end, there is no more curse or darkness forever and ever (see Revelation 22:3, 5).
Many search biblical prophecy for indications that God sent specific individuals to bring mankind salvation from evil. To understand whether God actually did so, it’s necessary to ask the question, “How is evil destroyed?”
Mary Baker Eddy, who discovered Christian Science, insisted that the destruction of evil is simply the recognition that it never truly existed in the first place. This insistence flies in the face of conventional views of evil. She came to this conclusion based on her deep study and lived experience of the words and works of Christ Jesus. If evil—including all sin, disease, and death—were real, it would have to have been created by God, who is the only cause and creator. But Jesus, whom the Bible names as God’s only begotten Son, healed individuals of all of those things. Either Jesus was undoing his Father’s work when freeing people from those challenges or his Father’s work never included evil to begin with.
