The appearance of evil

“Avoid every kind of evil.” 1 Thessalonians 5:22
The NIV takes an unfortunate translation of this verse. The KJV and other translations render it as ‘Avoid every appearance of evil.’ The first key word is ‘evil’. The Greek here is poneros, meaning bad or evil in effect or influence (as distinct from the Greek kakos, meaning intrinsically evil in character). The second key words is ‘appearance’, which is eidos in the Greek, meaning form, shape or appearance, from eido meaning to see or perceive. Thus the verse means, avoid everything that has the form or appearance of being evil in effect or influence.
There are two spheres where this can be applied. In the preceding verse, Paul exhorted the Thessalonians to “Test everything; hold on to the good” (1 Thess. 5:21) – referring to how they should listen to teachers and prophets. In that context, we are to avoid every kind of teaching or intellectual input that could be considered as having an evil influence.
The other, much broader application is concerning our own actions and what we allow ourselves to do. One example might be spending a lot of time with a married person of the opposite sex who is not your spouse. It might be completely innocent, but (a) it doesn’t look good, and (b) it could open the door for temptation. Paul said elsewhere, “Do not allow what you consider good to be spoken of as evil” (Rom. 14:16). We should be living above reproach – neither indulging in sin, nor giving the appearance that we are living in sin. I once heard a youth preacher say, concerning purity: ‘Purity is not seeing how close you can get to the line without falling over it – it’s running as fast as you can in the opposite direction.’ We need to be like this with respect to every kind of sin. Live for God, but remember, other people are watching you too.