Good, we tend to think, is the absence of evil. But this reversal of the formula can only have disastrous consequences.

When we — sinful, reprehensible we — become the enforcers of justice, we never bring about true justice. We either go too far or not far enough.

When sin comes out of the shadows and makes itself known, Christians can rest in and declare Christ's resurrection.

Now more than ever, it's good to take a closer look at the Christian confession about evil, pain, and suffering.

Sin is driven by disordered love, and it is love in this sense that leads to all the pain and suffering in the world.

Thank God for heroes: they inspire us to be better, to help others, to live and work for the good of our race. And thank God for villains, too: they incarnate our shadow side, our nocturnal soul, the dragon within us that must incessantly have its throat slit on the altar of repentance.

The following is adapted from Called to Defend written by Valerie Locklair (1517 Publishing, 2017).

One of the biggest challenges to the Christian faith is sorting through our question of “Where is God in the trials of our lives?”

Premeditated or not, you and only you invited this venom into your body, this evil percolating in your soul, and now you don’t know where to turn.

I think the chief reason that a faction within me welcomes the disintegration of the American ethos is this: it makes me feel so much better about myself. The smut makes me quite smug.