God is Good

[asherahSamaria]

If you're going to appeal to solipsism, I might as well ask how you know for sure that every time you type on the computer, you're not just hallucinating this message board and what you're really doing is pressing buttons that activate gas chambers to kill innocent people.

Oh dear. There is a world of difference between typing on your computer and listening to voices in your head and acting on them in contraction to all understanding of what is right and what is wrong. If you can't see that difference I feel really sorry for you.

I also note - but don't forget - that you ignored the "perceived authority" question.

 

[SteveB28]

If you're going to appeal to solipsism, I might as well ask how you know for sure that every time you type on the computer, you're not just hallucinating this message board and what you're really doing is pressing buttons that activate gas chambers to kill innocent people.

Because we make a fairly safe assumption; ie, that the awareness we have of our surroundings is 'real'. And this assumption seems to serve us well.

Xalith, however, envisages a situation for herself in which she would deliberately have to counter what she knows of the real world, in order to act in the way she has described. Unless she is a psychopath, she would surely not plunge a knife into the chest of her child. The only means by which she would so act is if she suspends reality, suspends her understanding of what is 'right' and 'good' and takes herself to some 'other place' in order to carry out that horrific act.

 

[SteveB28]

I didn't avoid the question on purpose, though I would have to say that my answer might be irrelevant because I do not have any sons or daughters; I'm a single virgin.

However, if God appeared to me on a cloud or what-not like He did with Abraham and commanded it, well... I pray that I would have the faith to do exactly as God tells me, knowing that God has a reason that He would require such, or have faith that God is just testing me (but yet be prepared for the potential that it isn't "just a test").

Is it Good that God would ask me to do that? Of course. Everything He does is Good. We only see a small sliver of the entire picture. God sees everything, He sees the entire picture. If He does something that doesn't seem "Good" in our hearts, there's a reason for it, and it is probably because there's something we don't know, something we don't see. We can only judge the Here&Now based on things we've come to know up until this point.

God, however, has always been there, is there now, and will always be there, and He knows everything that has happened, knows everything that is happening now, and foreknows everything that will happen. Reading the Bible teaches one that He deliberately designs things to work out. He called Abraham to the mountain (btw, if you check out one of Dr. Chuck Missler's videos having to do with the Book of Genesis, he will point out that God called Abraham to the very same mountain Christ was crucified on by using various data from the Bible and also secular sources, topography, etc.

Anyways, God called Abraham to that mountain, in a deliberate design. Why did he do that? IMO: He did it to foreshadow what would happen a few thousand years later. He is willing to do (and prepared/premeditated to do) what most of us would stumble over. He is willing to go to ridiculous lengths to provide us with a way out of our predicament.

The Bible is filled with patterns and foreshadowing. God uses these tools to tell the reader (especially if you were able to read Hebrew) that the ultimate designer of the Old and the New Testament are one and the same -- The Holy Spirit. Both come together as one whole unit and all of its 66 books are interconnected, and the removal of any one book of the Bible breaks the whole thing apart, and none of it makes real sense.

I could go on about the Hebrew Foreshadowing thing, but I've digressed enough for now.

I'll just suffice it to say that the writer of the first 5 books in the Bible (Moses as inspired by the Holy Spirit) knew the places, names, and things that were going on around 25-30AD a thousand or more years prior.

Oh my.

I'm going to proceed on the assumption that you are speaking honestly; that you actually believe that you would slaughter your child in response to a Divine Command. (I am actually hoping like mad that you are fooling yourself and would never act in this way)

You are situated somewhere between the Stockholm Syndrome ('my captor really loves me and I love my captor') and the Nuremburg Defence ('I'm just following orders'). Not a very good place to be.

And I can tell by your phrasing and the volume of 'waffle' in your response that you find such a prospect as being abhorrent. You are as horrified as any of us at such a prospect.

Just consider. The only way that you can make such a proposition acceptable is to jettison all that you know to be right and good and to act contrary to those principles.

This should tell you something.

 

[Lukamu]

And so we have a contradiction in just two sentences. Not a good start.

There is no contradiction. God would only do what is good. Whatever God does is good because he would only do what is good. God would not do something that was bad because it is against his holy nature.

Because, independently of your God, you have made your own determination of what is good and what is not. Well done.

Thank you for arguing my point. People make their own determination of "good". Whether or not it is in line with God's definition of "good" is the question we are trying to answer. I may call something "not good" that God calls "good". Man's opinion does not change God's definition.

And yet Abraham was. Not to mention all the others who carried out similar commands.

There are no other people in the Bible that were commanded by God to sacrifice their child, unless you have evidence to prove otherwise. Abraham is the only instance.

Irrelevant. The point is not when or to whom he issued those edicts. The point is that he did. And you have to decide for yourself whether or not those commands were 'good'.

But you've already stated that they aren't good, haven't you? So, you have a problem. Inside your brain, you are holding two conflicting beliefs simultaneously; viz, that everything that your God does is good, and that some of things he has done are not good.

That's called, amongst other names, cognitive dissonance.

I pity you.

The relevance is as equally important as the single occurance of this command to Abraham. To say otherwise is to vastly misunderstand the Bible.
God is good whether I say so or not, and whether you say so or not. As for cognitive dissonance, everyone experiences this at some point or another. So your pity extends to yourself and the rest of mankind.

 

[Xalith]

I said "similar commands". Your Bible claims that God commanded the slaughter of many other babies and children. In order to maintain your "God is good" charade, you have to conjure up some means of determining that all of those infant deaths are 'good', all the while realising that you don't think they are!

This is debated in Christian circles as well, but there's some good evidence as to why God commanded Joshua to wipe out every man, woman, child, and all of their livestock during the conquest of Canaan. It is very controversial, and many Christians find a hard time swallowing it, even though if you look at the Hebrew texts, it appears to mean exactly what the controversial claims say it means.

It has to do with the corruption of man's bloodline by fallen angels. Basically, the third of the angels that rebelled along with Satan before Man was created were thrown out of Heaven. During the Pre-Flood days, some of them manifested in human bodies (like God's loyal angels do several times in the Bible) and saw "that the daughters of man were fair" and had children to them resulting in "mighty men of renown" (the "giants" that some translations speak of). Well, God wiped those out during the Flood.

However, there were still some of Satan's fallen angels left apparently, and this happened again (but to lesser extent) in Canaan after Jacob's family went down to Egypt, during the ~430 years they were in Egypt.

God did not want this bloodline to survive whatsoever, so He commanded Joshua to wipe everyone out, to the last child to get rid of this tainted, cursed bloodline. He didn't want any of their genetics to get passed on whatsoever. As for why kill the livestock too? Maybe they (the fallen angels) were fooling around mixbreeding the livestock too? I dunno. I don't underestimate the things Satan would do to destroy Mankind; that's all he wants to do is destroy everything God creates.

Like I said, this is a controversial thing even in Christianity and many refuse to even consider the idea that this is true... but it would explain why He would go to such lengths to wipe out the Canaanites.

Yes, I am sure many of us find ourselves in this conflicting situation. But most of us do something to remedy it!

See, the problem is... you don't actually believe in God. I can say this, because the way you speak about Him lacks the type of reverence that a believer would have. Or, if you DO believe in God, then you haven't fully grasped the concept of a Being who is capable of doing what He did (do you have any idea how many stars (not counting planets!) that are in the galaxy, let alone all of the other galaxies as well?

You're going to go in front of this Being... who created everything... and tell Him that His version of "good" is wrong and that yours is right? Seriously? The One who could end you with the snap of His fingers (He wouldn't even have to do that), but hasn't yet because He's trying to give you all the chances in the world to realize your error and come back to Him?

Also, again... many non-believing people fail to realize the temporary nature of Life on Earth. Yes, a child is killed. That is never a good thing, unless God wills it, because God put that child on Earth for a reason and He could have easily prevented that child from being born if He so wished. But yet, if God wills or even allows that child's death, there could be an infinite number of reasons why that outcome is better than the child surviving. We just don't know that, because we aren't God, we can't see the whole picture like He does.

We are flawed, we can only apply our concept of Good to our very, very tiny limited range of understanding that is reliant upon what we've been taught (which could also be tainted). If your learning is tainted, or if your understanding of a given situation is limited... can you truly tell what "Good" is rather than what it appears to be?

God is Truth, He already knows the truth of everything. We can only make guesses based upon what we've been taught, and what we know of the situation (most times we don't know the whole story behind it, and we certainly don't know the future).

 

[fhansen]

I said "similar commands". Your Bible claims that God commanded the slaughter of many other babies and children. In order to maintain your "God is good" charade, you have to conjure up some means of determining that all of those infant deaths are 'good', all the while realising that you don't think they are!

The writings in the bible are the story of man's relationship with God, of man regaining the "knowledge of God" that he soon, in Eden, had scorned and dismissed. God, in his mercy, didn't abandon man but instead had planned to bring him back to his senses, in time, revealing Himself to a greater and greater extent as man became able to receive it. This is done both individually and corporately. Humanity fell with Adam and, in some sense, must rise as one body as well. We must, as a people, be led out of darkness and into light historically. Our God, that which we value and esteem as the greatest thing, changes for us-as we change. We sort of make God in our image, dragging Him down to our level, so he's not so superior to us, as we tend to prefer our own way of doing things anyway. It's been taught that man conceived a distorted image of God early on. It can be said that we're in the process of rectifying that image, as God increasingly ups the standard for that which constitutes Himself, for that which constitutes the greatest conceivable being for man.

And, IMO, the OT often records a lesser, more human, version of that Being, while, later in history, with man in a less primitive state, God reveals His true face as never before via the incarnation of Christ. Then humanity was becoming ready, just barely, to receive a new light, brighter than ever, a light defined by love, a revelation which would continuously have its affect on humanity in the ensuing centuries.

Where beforehand violence and anger and power and pride were generally man's natural god, with man said to doubt, mistrust, and even hate the real God, now humility and truth and love, even of one's enemies, were being offered as the highest values. It takes time for real change, just going by man's proclivity towards war and strife alone.

 

[asherahSamaria]

"He could have easily prevented that child from being born if He so wished" - and yet according to your giants and sex crazed Canaanites story he couldn't wave the divine finger and stop that (whatever "that" is) but had to go down the arming the neighboring tribe to commit barbaric acts route.

Interestingly he couldn't do similar with the angels who apparently chose to do something different from what he wanted - hence a war. So this eternal, omnipresent, omnipowerful, creator of the universe etc, entity has to be involved in a war because he can't just divinely stop it??

I smell something and it's not the fragrant aroma of plausibility.

 

[GillDouglas]

"He could have easily prevented that child from being born if He so wished" - and yet according to your giants and sex crazed Canaanites story he couldn't wave the divine finger and stop that (whatever "that" is) but had to go down the arming the neighboring tribe to commit barbaric acts route.

Interestingly he couldn't do similar with the angels who apparently chose to do something different from what he wanted - hence a war. So this eternal, omnipresent, omnipowerful, creator of the universe etc, entity has to be involved in a war because he can't just divinely stop it??

I smell something and it's not the fragrant aroma of plausibility.

Oh but He could. In fact He didn't have to create any of this or all of us if He had chose something different. But you know something, since He is the Author He had the right to write the story the way He thought it should be. If that includes sex crazed Canaanites and half breed angels then it must have been for a purpose and just because you don't understand it doesn't make it any less relevant because the fact that you do not believe is His own doing. You have the privilege, as we all do, of living in the world He created, the ability to ponder it's mysteries and the means by which to be redeemed of our corrupt nature. Maybe someday you can appreciate that, and I hope that you do.

 

[asherahSamaria]

Oh but He could. In fact He didn't have to create any of this or all of us if He had chose something different. But you know something, since He is the Author He had the right to write the story the way He thought it should be. If that includes sex crazed Canaanites and half breed angels then it must have been for a purpose and just because you don't understand it doesn't make it any less relevant because the fact that you do not believe is His own doing. You have the privilege, as we all do, of living in the world He created, the ability to ponder it's mysteries and the means by which to be redeemed of our corrupt nature. Maybe someday you can appreciate that, and I hope that you do.

Unsubstantiated claims just don't do it for me - but I understand the "God works in mysterious ways" line very well

 

[Xalith]

"He could have easily prevented that child from being born if He so wished" - and yet according to your giants and sex crazed Canaanites story he couldn't wave the divine finger and stop that (whatever "that" is) but had to go down the arming the neighboring tribe to commit barbaric acts route.

Interestingly he couldn't do similar with the angels who apparently chose to do something different from what he wanted - hence a war. So this eternal, omnipresent, omnipowerful, creator of the universe etc, entity has to be involved in a war because he can't just divinely stop it??

I smell something and it's not the fragrant aroma of plausibility.

Perhaps He wanted Joshua to wipe the Canaanites out to show His power and might to the people of Israel and the rest of the world? No doubt Babylon, Egypt, etc saw this rag-tag bunch of guys who came out of Egypt as slaves, wandered the wilderness for 40 years, and then came out of the wilderness stomping about the land of Canaan laying waste to everything, including the feared giant men?

From what the Bible implies, people were scared to death of Israel after some of their victories. I believe this is what God intended to do -- show people what happens to those who follow God, and what happens to those who oppose Him.

He uses everything for His own goals, His own purposes. Yes, He coulda snapped His fingers and wiped every Canaanite out of existence, or even Satan. But yet, He chose not to, for reasons that we can only guess at. He could have wiped Satan out before He even made the Earth. He didn't have to put the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden, or He coulda had a Cherub guarding it before Eve took the fruit from it.

But yet, the Bible implies that God knew Adam was going to do it before he actually did. Why do you suppose He allowed it to happen? Maybe because the whole story of Mankind would give Him glory in the end?

 

[Lukamu]

My point with this thread is that when people evaluate God's character (and determine He is good) they use their own sense of what is right and wrong. You can't make the statement "God is good" without a sense of what good is and you can't just let God decide what is good, otherwise you have no way to determine if what He does actually is good or not.

The question in your thread is a great one to ask. Christians do let God decide what is good, rather than trying to decide for themselves what is good. This doesn't preclude Christians from evaluating good and bad from a human perspective, but they do it with the foreknowledge that God's "good" is eternal and immovable. Check out Romans 3:4, it shows us that "good" defined by a human perspective - even a Christian one - may be incorrect! But God's "good" is always correct.
Another thought to consider is this: there are many things that non-Christians believe that align with Christianity. For example, most people would agree that it is good to help someone in need, or that we shouldn't lie about other people, or that we shouldn't be wasteful, etc. These are thought of as "good" things from a human perspective - and also from God's perspective (Hebrews 13:16, Psalms 34:13, John 6:12) . However, there are some "goods" that the human perspective may disagree with, such as loving your enemies (Luke 6:27-28).
Finally, Isaiah 55:8-9 clearly tells us that there are some things that we just won't understand - hopefully that helps you understand more about the question you are asking.

 

[Lukamu]

And yet, in your very next paragraph, you are going to argue the opposite. You are going to argue that your God does do things that are "not good". This is the contradiction to which I refer. If you prefer, I could describe it as circular reasoning as well.

There is no contradiction, and again you are arguing my own point. Just because you call a tomato a rose, it does not mean that therefore the tomato is a rose. You have simply made an error in judgement. If I call God's actions "not good", it does not make them "not good." God is eternally and immovably good, whether you or I agree with that statement or not (see Romans 3:4). However, your original question was hypothetical: "If God told you to sacrifice your child, would you consider it good?" God has never commanded me (or anyone else besides Abraham) to sacrifice their child. Therefore I am not living in "cognitive dissonance" on this issue because your hypothetical question does not apply to real life. It seems however, that you are ready to move on to the next question - but first you should indicate whether or not the original question has been answered sufficiently.

 

[FreeinChrist]

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[David4223]

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