No, I'm not deliberately misunderstanding you. I hope I'm not misunderstanding you at all. What I am doing is attempting to point out the inconsistencies in what you are saying.
I think that the salient point you are making is that God does not
wish for everyone to be saved. Very well, if that is what you believe, I have no objection to your doing so, though other Christians might.
But consider: if God is planning to only save some, then it follows logically that he is planning - that he
intends - that others should be damned. And that is a - well, there's no nice way to say it, a bad thing for Him to do.
So in order to rescue your image of God's consistency - in order to justify the clear fact that not everyone is going to be saved - you are forced to sacrifice the view of Him as being good.
This seems very much at odds with the Bible, with the beliefs of other Christians, and with the view of God as being a moral creature.
Logically, then, if you find that He has made a mistake, you must conclude that there is something wrong with your view of reality. The obvious solution is that you are wrong about God existing at all. Accepting this would certainly solve the problem.
How horrible. How morally abhorrent.
Fine by me. But the logical consequences of this are incompatible with the Christian religion. An entity that cared for everything would use its power to make sure that all was cared for. Since God doesn't, we can see another logical inconsistency here. This brings us on to the Problem of Evil, which is rather too big to be explored here, however.
When you say that someone is a good person, you are making a judgement of them - an assessment of how you see their character. If you are unable to criticise God - that is, to judge Him as being bad - then you are also unable to judge Him as being good. Because to have an opinion on something is to make a judgement.
I'm afraid that doesn't logically follow. What makes you say God would have no reason to create if He were not just? Why would an evil, or morally neutral, or morally complex entity lack the capability to create?
Looking back at it, it seems I may have misunderstood you after all.
In
Post 49, you said:
I may indeed have misunderstood that. When you said God was "not willing to lose even one of those He had chosen," you were referring to the relatively small number of souls God has determined should be saved?
Alright. If you like. But, as I said earlier, if God has
decided not to try to save some souls then (a) this goes against what most Christians believe (that there can be salvation for any who repent) and (b) it makes God into an immoral entity.
And yet they claim to understand Him. If God were really beyond their understanding, they would be unable to say that He was good.
So you're saying that what most people think about God is illogical - or at least has some illogical ideas - but that your own beliefs about God are logical and make sense?
You've discuss a range of interesting subjects at length. But as to answering the question in this thread - no, I wouldn't say you've addressed it at all. An honest answer to "If you had God's powers, how would you communicate with people?" would be: "If I had God's powers, I would..." and then continue to answer the question. Now, in your next paragraph you attempt to do this, and
immediately try to dodge the question.
See? You didn't answer the question at all.
Look, no thought experiment is perfect, but this one is worth trying. Just imagine God popped up next to you, said "Mark, you shall have all of my powers. Go and sort it out down there," and then tell us what you'd do. It may not be an exact analogy, but you seem much more interested in evading it than answering it.
Since I have done what I can to answer your thought experiment in other posts I have written since yours I am answering now, I will try to deal here with the other questions you ask; if I may summarize/ categorize them:
1. Is it not morally abhorrent for God to create most people ultimately for the purpose of destruction?
2. What makes you say God would have no reason to create if He were not just? Why would an evil, or morally neutral, or morally complex entity lack the capability to create?
And so:
1. As First Cause is necessarily the only source of absolutes, including moral, how can it be called "bad" even if bad people are created for the purpose of destruction? But I don't say they are --I say they are created for the use of First Cause. In Christian terminology, GOD made all of us for his own purposes, which we may or may not understand to any significant degree. That is just a fact, and not a cop-out, since I intend to answer you more specifically.
I often say, "this life is not for this life". I expect it is pretty nearly impossible for one who doesn't believe in God to see that as meaningful. But this life is a vapor compared with with next. What we take as importance during this life is barely significant. Our pain and suffering, anguish, even our madness, our destruction, death, in this life is by comparison of little significance in the life to come. But it is not by comparison that I like to consider it, but by the manner of that life to come. Our sin against one another is more sin against God, than against our fellow man. Infinitely more, actually, since it is against God.
So why would God make them, anyway? For his own glory, according to Romans 9, to show his power and justice to the objects of his mercy --the rest of us, those he has chosen to show this to. He is that much above us that this motivation on his part is unassailable. You might not see that, and so rail against it, but it is impossible to hold him accountable to our silly concepts.
(For what comfort it may bring against the abhorrence of the idea of God punishing those who were not even able to choose right (as Reformed Doctrine has it), I don't think of the being, soul, whatever, that ends up in eternal condemnation as even human anymore. It is stripped of all virtue, abandoned by God, hardly what anyone would recognize in this temporal existence, unless, as CS Lewis says, perhaps in a nightmare. They are wraiths, all regret, pain, despair, hate, baseless direction devoid of satisfaction. Nothing you would pity in this life. Nor are these innocent victims; they willingly participate in their own wrongdoing, and receive according to their sin, which is primarily against God. --more on that perhaps in another post)
You say, "But, as I said earlier, if God has
decided not to try to save some souls then (a) this goes against what most Christians believe (that there can be salvation for any who repent) and (b) it makes God into an immoral entity."
I say: (a) so who is it that repents, but the ones God has chosen for himself, and in fact to whom he grants the ability to repent, since they are without him no more inclined to do so than anyone else?
(b) answered above and below here, I hope understandably, though probably not sufficiently.
You also said, "And yet they claim to understand Him. If God were really beyond their understanding, they would be unable to say that He was good."
I say: That claim to me is a bit disingenuous. God can both be understandable (to some degree or in some ways or concerning certain things) yet on the whole be considerably beyond our comprehension (or understanding).
2. I do not say that a morally evil, neutral or complex First Cause would lack the capability to create, but would lack the motivation. By comparison, the creation is insignificant if he did not create something particular about it for his own pleasure. The thing the Bible talks about --the Elect, the Church, the Bride of Christ, the Body of Christ, etc --all names for the same thing-- are that particular creation. The rest of his creation was made for the purpose of glorifying himself, and specifically to these objects of his mercy (See Romans 9). For First Cause to create simply for the purpose of destruction is to gain nothing. To squelch the insignificant beneath his feet would be no accomplishment, no pleasure in itself.
Also, for what it is worth, and I find it fitting perfectly into "First Cause" theory that, the human is in itself of little more significance to God than anything else in his creation. It is only in that we made by him and more, that we are made in his image that we are barely even worthy of his concern, and it is only in that we are made FOR him that he takes more than a little notice (of course, those two ideas are inseparable). We are not even complete beings apart from unity with God. Certainly he does not take us as seriously as we take ourselves, except in ways that we cannot assess well, and do not take seriously.
Reading through your post again, I see the same thing I see in every objection I hear concerning predetermination or even simple predestination, or even when I hear the reasoning by anyone concerning the impossibility of God existing, by virtue of the ugliness of this life. This is what I see --the attributing of substance to this veil of existence, this temporal, passing life. Oh, it has its eternal effects --I don't mean to disparage that-- but relative to the solid existence from which God operates, this is next to nothing. Some have conjectured that this is only the imagination of God, and I have to say, that doesn't sound so far off base.
