Why did God create Lucifer with the pride or whatever it was that made him rebel?

[seeingeyes]

Well, we know the tree and everything God had made was good. He didn't make anything in the garden that was dangerous in itself, and all the fruit were good for food--scripture tells us that.

Well, I would consider a fruit that could kill you 'dangerous'. Whether that makes it 'evil' is another thing.

So the rule was more or less arbitrary as far as we can tell--God could have said, "Thou shalt not pat your head and rub your stomach at the same time."

I don't think it was arbitrary at all. "There's one thing that can kill you, don't do it", is not arbitrary. It divides that which can kill you from that which can't.

Jews have a particular word--Chukim--for the commandments of God that make no seeming sense to a man, such as not wearing blended fabrics and not cutting the corners of their beards. Some appear to have no function except to make Jews look peculiar compared so surrounding peoples, and certainly appear to be arbitrary.

But as a rabbi once told me, "We don't obey God because He makes sense to us; we obey God because he's God."

I agree that we follow God because He is God, but some people follow God because He is big enough to kill them, and some follow God because they like Him best.

I have been both. The latter is far, far better.

 

[Messy]

What I think is that if Adam listened to God and not put his wife first above Him and had eaten from the tree of Life (this is eternal life, that they might know You), that he would have really known God and never listened to the devil and never eaten from the tree, would have been able to see the difference and had become like God, because in the end we will be like God and eat from the tree of life.

 

[Calminian]

I already have another thread about my opinion on free will....I don't want to make this thread into a free will argument

So we have to grant your premise there is no free will?

Your question has a false premise. I don't accept the God created Lucifer with pride.

Gen. 1:31 God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the sixth day. ​

Pride is not good, and therefore was not part of the original design. Freedom was.

This thread is actually an argument for the existence of incompatiblistic libertarian free will.

 

[Second Phoenix]

I see no difference between 'foreknowledge' and 'planning' when it comes to the Creator of all things. If He foreknew how this world would be, and found it lacking, why did He still create it?

Because that's not very loving.

Not creating someone because they won't end up as you would will is not a loving reason.

 

[Second Phoenix]

People are afraid to admit to the ramifications of God's sovereignty--they don't want to see the ramifications of God's omniscience, His omnipotence, and His omnipresence. So they reduce God to someone who is not really omniscient, not really omnipotent, not really omnipresent in order to avoid acknowledging what scripture says:

Everything is unfolding precisely as God always intended it, it was always in God's plan for Satan to do precisely as Satan has done. Satan was intended for the purpose he is fulfilling.

Thinking otherwise means believing in a God who is kind of weak and stupid.

That's not what scripture says.
God is not stupid and weak - He is merciful and loving.

God is sovereign, He knows it and still gives people the right to freely choose. His sovereignty is not compromised by giving people the freedom to do as they will.

Ironically, you are the one compromising his sovereignty. You believe He must exercise His sovereignty over everyone and every time. God demonstrates that He is free and sovereign, because He lets His creation be free. Otherwise, God is just like a weak dictator that forces his people into submission out of fear of them. God doesn't not need to be a dictator because He is a charge and He doesn't need to assert it constantly.

 

[Hentenza]

If Lucifer decided to rebel, couldn't it only have been because God created him with the pride or whatever it was the made him want to?

God created you with the ability to have pride also. Do you think He should not have?

 

[RDKirk]

Yes I realize that it isn't a perfect definition that is why I equate it further (put limitations in the definition). For practical purposes it helps to define responsibility unto the one with the overriding will in the situation. If you have not the will in a situation then the responsibility lies in the one that hampered your will.
In this thread the OP is equating that Lucifer had no will to resist sinning and that shifts the blame to his creator. If in this one instance he had free will to chose to sin or not then his sin is his own doing.

I have no problem with Lucifer not having free will or even a choice. I have no problem with Lucifer and his angels having been create by God to do precisely what they have done.

But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and of silver, but also of wood and of earth; and some to honour, and some to dishonour. -- 2 Timothy 2

I have no problem seeing Lucifer as a "dishonorable vessel"--made to be so.

God provided a path of redemption for man, while scripture tells us that God created hell expressly for Satan...not even the possibility of redemption for Satan was ever considered.

We are not angels. Although we may be physically weaker than angels, we are God's children--angels are not. We are the child, angels are the nannies. The master might have high regard for His children's nanny, but it's nothing compared to His love for His children. Children can disobey and be forgiven; a disobedient nanny is fired.

 

[applepowerpc]

I'm going with Lucifer having a free will. That gets my vote.

 

[WisdomTree]

I'm going with Lucifer having a free will. That gets my vote.

This topic is about angels and their fallen, as such you don't get to vote unless you're one of them.

 

[applepowerpc]

This topic is about angels and their fallen, as such you don't get to vote unless you're one of them.

You are incorrect.

The exact words of the topic are:
"Why did God create Lucifer with the pride or whatever it was that made him rebel? "

 

[WisdomTree]

You are incorrect.

The exact words of the topic are:
"Why did God create Lucifer with the pride or whatever it was that made him rebel? "

Irrelevent, votes indicate that there is some kind of democracy going on. We humans are not part of that "demo", thus not allowed to vote.

 

[applepowerpc]

LOL. You're the one who brought it up.

 

[WisdomTree]

You're the one who had the nerve to vote!

 

[RDKirk]

That's not what scripture says.
God is not stupid and weak - He is merciful and loving.

God is sovereign, He knows it and still gives people the right to freely choose. His sovereignty is not compromised by giving people the freedom to do as they will.

Ironically, you are the one compromising his sovereignty. You believe He must exercise His sovereignty over everyone and every time.

No, I haven't said that at all. In fact (in argument with Calvinism) I said that God provides a path of redemption for man...that is because He relaxes his sovereignty in giving man the ability to choose Him as master instead of the flesh--or to deny Him as master.

But we're talking about Satan here, not man, and whether Satan can thwart God's intent. If God had planned the path of man's redemption from before creation--which scripture says is so--then all of Satan's actions have been necessarily part of God's plan.

 

[Gregory Thompson]

LOL. You're the one who brought it up.

You're the one who had the nerve to vote!

oh you two

 

[seeingeyes]

Because that's not very loving.

Not creating someone because they won't end up as you would will is not a loving reason.

Wait, in order to be loving one has to create everyone that they can?

How many kids do you have?

 

[Rev Randy]

oh you two

They must have read and heeded your siggy.

 

[RDKirk]

Well, I would consider a fruit that could kill you 'dangerous'. Whether that makes it 'evil' is another thing.

The fruit was not toxic. Scripture already said that all the fruit in the garden was good for food. It wasn't the fruit that was deadly, it was the breaking of the commandment that was deadly.

I don't think it was arbitrary at all. "There's one thing that can kill you, don't do it", is not arbitrary. It divides that which can kill you from that which can't.

It's arbitrary from the point of view of human understanding. It's "arbitrary" that observant Jews can't wear wool blend fabrics. Did you know there is an entire clothing and textile industry for Jews who religiously avoid any items that have mixed fabrics? They can buy a suit that is guaranteed to be all-wool even down to the threads holding the buttons. They can buy sofas that are guaranteed to be all one fabric, even to the stitching of the inner lining.

But here is the point: If we obey God's commandments because they make sense to us, that is not obedience. That's merely agreement. And if we add to the context until it makes sense to us (such as supposing the fruit must have been toxic), that's still only agreement, not obedience. We've just rationalized it in our own heads so that we can agree with it.

Obedience is following commandments even when they don't make sense--even when they seem "arbitrary" and even "irrational."

 

[Rev Randy]

Now this is a deadly fruit;

Billie Holiday - Strange Fruit - YouTube

 

[seeingeyes]

The fruit was not toxic. Scripture already said that all the fruit in the garden was good for food. It wasn't the fruit that was deadly, it was the breaking of the commandment that was deadly.

The fruit was deadly. Whether that's because God created it with some physio-spiritual toxin, or whether that's because God said, "Don't eat it" is irrelevant. It's still dangerous to man by God's design.

It's arbitrary from the point of view of human understanding. It's "arbitrary" that observant Jews can't wear wool blend fabrics. Did you know there is an entire clothing and textile industry for Jews who religiously avoid any items that have mixed fabrics? They can buy a suit that is guaranteed to be all-wool even down to the threads holding the buttons. They can buy sofas that are guaranteed to be all one fabric, even to the stitching of the inner lining.

But here is the point: If we obey God's commandments because they make sense to us, that is not obedience. That's merely agreement. And if we add to the context until it makes sense to us (such as supposing the fruit must have been toxic), that's still only agreement, not obedience. We've just rationalized it in our own heads so that we can agree with it.

Obedience is following commandments even when they don't make sense--even when they seem "arbitrary" and even "irrational."

Well, I disagree with that premise. Or at least with the idea that what God wants from man is obedience whether he understands or not. That is perhaps a phase that must be grown through, but it's certainly not the end goal.

"No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you."