Problem of Evil?

[Larniavc]

Tragedies are opportunities and we have lots of opportunities. It is not our job to make more opportunities but to secure the good that can come from these opportunities.

You can have opportunities without tragedy, though.

 

[Larniavc]

God does not like sin, but will allow humans to sin in order to form this huge debt.

That’s the same as saying God does not like drug addiction but allows people to get addicted in order for people to owe him for saving them from drug addiction.

 

[Larniavc]

God is the very best parent and discipline done with Love and the best interest of the child is extremely beneficial (loving).

You keep claiming that but have yet to demonstrate it.

 

[Par5]

God is the very best parent and discipline done with Love and the best interest of the child is extremely beneficial (loving). The discipline can be hard to take at the time but accepted correctly results in a stronger relationship between parent and child.
Discipline:
1. is a deterrent to both the child being disciplined and others around the child.
2. shows the child how great the offence is.
3. Lets the child know his parent really Love him/her since negligent parents do not discipline their children properly when they have the chance.
4. It is a wonderful teaching moment especially of the parent goes through the disciplining with the child (like Christ being crucified with us).
5. It allows the child to put the offence behind him (he did the crime and did the time).

Yes, I am sure his discipline can be hard for a child to take, especially when it involves having them slaughtered which doesn't give them a chance to put their "offence" behind them, and as some children were too young to walk, let alone talk, no time to get to commit an "offence" in the first place unless just being an infant is considered to be an offence.

 

[bling]

I know the theology. It is just not a big sacrifice if it is true in my opinion.

I just cannot imagine a person going through undeserved torture given by a group of truly wicked people, when they could in an instant stop it and punish those administering the torture. He is not being held against His will, but is allowing it and it is all happening because of me.

 

[bling]

Disagree. The debt is fabricated by God as a motivation for humans to accept his forgiveness. If God had not fabricated the debt in the first place there would be no debt.

Admittedly, The value of the “debt”/offence is up to God.

Suppose you are looking for a combination of a: really close friend, spouse, partner, someone you can trust, someone who really wants to be around you 24/7 and really someone who will be codependent. This relationship will last forever. Would you choose the person who boldly intentionally, rebelliously offended you, left you, took what you gave them just to watch them trample it underfoot and then approve of the murder of your first son?

Would you choose a programmed robot to live with for eternity?

God is wanting people with the unconditional, unselfish Love like He has, that want to be with Him, be like Him, and be Loved by Him. Thus the first objective is to obtain this Love and God is doing all He can to help us obtain this Love.

If there is no unbelievable huge debt there is no way to obtain an unbelievable huge Love.

 

[bling]

You keep claiming that but have yet to demonstrate it.

Wow, I thought that was understood without even saying it.

One of the big reasons Jesus came to earth was to show us how God the Father would act if He came to earth, so is Jesus an excellent example of what the best Loving Father would be like. See how Jesus treated the 12 with him, how he taught be example, His patience, his being a servant, his sacrifice for them, and His care for them.

 

[Larniavc]

Admittedly, The value of the “debt”/offence is up to God.

Suppose you are looking for a combination of a: really close friend, spouse, partner, someone you can trust, someone who really wants to be around you 24/7 and really someone who will be codependent. This relationship will last forever. Would you choose the person who boldly intentionally, rebelliously offended you, left you, took what you gave them just to watch them trample it underfoot and then approve of the murder of your first son?

Would you choose a programmed robot to live with for eternity?

God is wanting people with the unconditional, unselfish Love like He has, that want to be with Him, be like Him, and be Loved by Him. Thus the first objective is to obtain this Love and God is doing all He can to help us obtain this Love.

If there is no unbelievable huge debt there is no way to obtain an unbelievable huge Love.

God can’t ever have that kind of relationship with a human. Any given human was created by God. And God knows every thought and deed that person will ever have and commit at every point in time.

Accordingly, from the perspective of someone who knows what we will think and do before we are aware of it our selves we ARE indistinguishable from preprogrammed robots.

 

[Larniavc]

Wow, I thought that was understood without even saying it.

I think that is where we keep missing each other: you have yet to demonstrate that which you assert.

 

[bling]

Yes, I am sure his discipline can be hard for a child to take, especially when it involves having them slaughtered which doesn't give them a chance to put their "offence" behind them, and as some children were too young to walk, let alone talk, no time to get to commit an "offence" in the first place unless just being an infant is considered to be an offence.

God disciplines those that are accepting God’s help/charity.

Yes, we all die if Jesus does not come first, but death is the way good people go home and bad people quit doing bad stuff.

God caused or allows Christ to go to the cross, satan to roam the earth, tragedies of all kinds, death, hell and even people to sin, to help willing individuals in the fulfillment of their objective.

 

[Clizby WampusCat]

I just cannot imagine a person going through undeserved torture given by a group of truly wicked people, when they could in an instant stop it and punish those administering the torture. He is not being held against His will, but is allowing it and it is all happening because of me.

People are tortured for years without the ability to stop it for themselves. Most parents would choose to be tortured even if they could stop it themselves if it would save their child. Jesus was God before and after he was tortured for a couple days. There have been nonbelievers who willingly gave their lives for others believing they would perish forever. Jesus never did that for you. Jesus could stop it at anytime and many of the torturer's probably were tortured by Jesus in hell. There have been humans that have sacrificed much more than Jesus did.

 

[bling]

God can’t ever have that kind of relationship with a human. Any given human was created by God. And God knows every thought and deed that person will ever have and commit at every point in time.

Accordingly, from the perspective of someone who knows what we will think and do before we are aware of it our selves we ARE indistinguishable from preprogrammed robots.

This is the reason God created humans with a very limited amount of autonomous free will.

Normally I would just ask questions but here is what I support at this point in my spiritual growth:

1. Time is relative, God could have created the existence of time for humans, and God is not limited by man’s time.

2. God exist outside of human time, yet exist simultaneously within human present time.

3. God communicates with man in words that fit man’s understanding like the four corners of the earth, the sun rising and setting, and the future for God. In other words, God does not convey the idea of time being relative for God or God being outside of time.

4. There is no reason for time to not be: totally relative to God.

5. God knows what is happening in some distant Galaxy (billion light years away) at the same time knowing what is happening on earth.

6. Just as God knows simultaneous what is happening throughout space instantly, God would also know what is happening throughout time in the Space Time Continuum.

7. God exist throughout time, so His existence at the end of time could “communicate” within Himself to His existence at the beginning of time.

8. History is fixed; nothing can change what has already happened. Even If God wanted to destroy the first Adam and Eve and start over with a second Adam and Eve there would always have been a first Adam and Eve, even if God was the only being to know of them.

9. God’s existence at the end of man’s time would know historically everything that happened throughout human existence.

10. The whole history of humans would be “communicated” back to God at the beginning of time as pure history from God’s existence at the end of time.

11. God from the beginning of human time (when every that was) knows all human future as pure history, so God knows all human’s future.

12. Since God’s existence at the end of human time and knows everything humans did historically, it cannot be changed and God “communicating” that history to Himself at the beginning of time means nothing can change in human existence from the way it “did” happen for God’s existence at the end of time.

13. The moment God decides to make a particular human (which can be at the beginning of human time) that human has a future know as history by God’s existence at the end of time.

14. If God decides never to make a particular human (there could be a virtual infinite number of these) than that never to exist human has no future and thus no history to be known by God.

15. Just because the history of a made choice is known, including a choice already made by God, does not mean that choice was not an autonomous free will choice. We cannot proof a former historic choice was not an autonomous free will choice, just because we now know historically what was chosen.

16. Again, just because God at the end of time knows all human choices as historical, does not mean some of those choices were not autonomous free will choices.

17. It also logically follows: if the existence of God at the end of time communicates to himself at the beginning of time all human history as set in stone, does not mean some human choices made could not be autonomous free will choices by the human.

18. If God is never ever going to produce a specific individual with ability to make just a very few autonomous free will choices, God would not know exactly the choices that specific individual would make if he/she were made, but would only know all the possible choices. That never to be made individual has no future to be known and if the limited choices are truly to be that individual’s autonomous free will choice there is no way to know, unless that individual is going to be made. God would know human seemingly free will choice that are the result of the person’s environment and genes (programming) which are most of what we consider to be free will choices (like the flavor of ice-cream on choses on a specific day), but those are not the choices which matter.

19. Once you agree to the concept of God being outside of time (existing throughout human time) and the definition of autonomous free will, all my ideas logically follow.

 

[bling]

I think that is where we keep missing each other: you have yet to demonstrate that which you assert.

I went on to say look at Jesus:
One of the big reasons Jesus came to earth was to show us how God the Father would act if He came to earth, so is Jesus an excellent example of what the best Loving Father would be like. See how Jesus treated the 12 with him, how he taught be example, His patience, his being a servant, his sacrifice for them, and His care for them.

 

[Par5]

Wow, I thought that was understood without even saying it.

One of the big reasons Jesus came to earth was to show us how God the Father would act if He came to earth, so is Jesus an excellent example of what the best Loving Father would be like. See how Jesus treated the 12 with him, how he taught be example, His patience, his being a servant, his sacrifice for them, and His care for them.

I thought that we already knew what your god would be like if he came down to earth.
You can read all about it in the old testament, and Loving Father is not the first description that springs to mind.

 

[Clizby WampusCat]

19. Once you agree to the concept of God being outside of time (existing throughout human time) and the definition of autonomous free will, all my ideas logically follow

Can you give us good evidence there is an outside of time?

 

[bling]

People are tortured for years without the ability to stop it for themselves. Most parents would choose to be tortured even if they could stop it themselves if it would save their child. Jesus was God before and after he was tortured for a couple days. There have been nonbelievers who willingly gave their lives for others believing they would perish forever. Jesus never did that for you. Jesus could stop it at anytime and many of the torturer's probably were tortured by Jesus in hell. There have been humans that have sacrificed much more than Jesus did.

Do they allow themselves to remain being tortured for unworthy people?

 

[Clizby WampusCat]

H

Do they allow themselves to remain being tortured for unworthy people?

How does this make the torture worse?

 

[bling]

I thought that we already knew what your god would be like if he came down to earth.
You can read all about it in the old testament, and Loving Father is not the first description that springs to mind.

That is the same God just working from heaven instead of on earth with us. We need Him really close.

 

[bling]

Can you give us good evidence there is an outside of time?

Good question because our universe only appears to have time.
God's foreknowledge would suggest He is outside of time, knowing man's future.
It has been show repeatedly with our science that time is relative, so if there was an all powerful God time should be completely relative to Him.

 

[bling]

H

How does this make the torture worse?

It tkes an extremely strong commitment every second for as long as the torture is endured.