What if God took the radical step of setting a deadline for ridding the world of evil? Suppose God announces that next Monday at midnight he will step in and stop all suffering caused by evil people. How would he do that? Let's say God decides to use a tool carried by many police officers—a Taser gun.

A Taser gun shoots an individual with a temporary high-voltage current of electricity. The makers of Taser guns claim that a shock lasting half a second will cause intense pain and muscle contraction. Two to three seconds will cause a person to become dazed and drop to the ground. Anything longer than three seconds will drop an attacker for up to fifteen minutes. The makers of Taser guns boast of a 95 percent compliance rate. In other words, hit a person with enough electricity and you can get him to do anything.

When the deadline for stopping evil comes, God gets us to comply with his wishes by shocking us. Start to tell a lie, and you are hit with a half-second zap. Try to rob a person, and you get two seconds of shock. A would-be murderer would be incapacitated. However, knowing that evil thoughts often lead to evil actions, God also zaps us for sinister thoughts. But God's still not finished. Since it's evil to fail to do good when given the opportunity, God zaps us for failing to show mercy, kindness and justice. As a result, people are zapped for doing evil acts, thinking evil thoughts, and failing to do what is right.

What would be the result? A world of twitchy people, who obey God like cowering, beaten dogs.