Why did God make a world like this?

Neogaia777

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Not to sidetrack, but that difference between foreseeing all ultimate things on the one hand, and the separate and further going viewpoint of total predeterminism (that all is predestined even in small details) on the other hand, these 2 understandings aren't the same thing (one assumes many extra things), and the 2nd is only a guess, not the only view that fits the scripture, and we can simply humbly remember it's a mystery about those more fine details, which is not told to us, but instead the wording only locks down as definite that in the only way that matters, the ultimate way, God planned to make a way for us, and has. I think here God has given us real choices to make, a key moments, about what way our souls will go. And He helps us. Praise the Lord.
Causality...

(see my post right above this one)...

It seems to me like, the fall, for example, would be a pretty big major detail or thing, yet "God" didn't seem to know about it, or expect it (to happen, ect) and that's just one example among very, very many...

God Bless!
 
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Neogaia777

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Not to sidetrack, but that difference between foreseeing all ultimate things on the one hand, and the separate and further going viewpoint of total predeterminism (that all is predestined even in small details) on the other hand, these 2 understandings aren't the same thing (one assumes many extra things), and the 2nd is only a guess, not the only view that fits the scripture, and we can simply humbly remember it's a mystery about those more fine details, which is not told to us, but instead the wording only locks down as definite that in the only way that matters, the ultimate way, God planned to make a way for us, and has. I think here God has given us real choices to make, a key moments, about what way our souls will go. And He helps us. Praise the Lord.
OK...

"Does God "always know" (always knew, ect) where we are all going to be, what we are going to doing, ect, at "any or all given points in time (very) specifically, ect...? or not...?"

And if that answer is "yes", then how does or did He always know that...? And how did, or how does He know that, from the "very beginning" as well, ect...?

God Bless!
 
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Yarddog

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Where the rich man is wicked and the poor man is rich in spirit?

Why can't it be the opposite.

Only the rich are righteous and the poor are wicked. God let it the opposite though.
IMHO, God didn't make this situation. Not all rich people are wicked and not all poor people are rich in spirit but a rich person tends to make his money his god and a poor person may have the tendency to rely on God because he has nothing.

As an example, if we look at Israel of the OT, when troubles came they turned to God for deliverance but after God delivered them and good times came, they tended to drift away and embrace worldly things until troubles came again. This is as much true today as it was in ancient times.
 
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Halbhh

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Causality...

(see my post right above this one)...

It seems to me like, the fall, for example, would be a pretty big major detail or thing, yet "God" didn't seem to know about it, or expect it (to happen, ect) and that's just one example among very, very many...

God Bless!
We do know God foreknew the Fall, and even before the world already planned for our salvation through Christ. Just reminding, here. :)

(See? That's the kind of thing that is an 'ultimate thing' that matters. It's the small details instead I meant to point to as more mysterious)
 
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Halbhh

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OK...

"Does God "always know" (always knew, ect) where we are all going to be, what we are going to doing, ect, at "any or all given points in time (very) specifically, ect...? or not...?"

And if that answer is "yes", then how does or did He always know that...? And how did, or how does He know that, from the "very beginning" as well, ect...?

God Bless!

Well, that's another thread eh? :) I probably said my own thoughts a few times, but I never know if my wording is clear enough. And besides, there are real mysteries too.
 
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Neogaia777

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We do know God foreknew the Fall, and even before the world already planned for our salvation through Christ. Just reminding, here. :)

Now, I hate to say this, but, "Which God"...?

(See? That's the kind of thing that is an 'ultimate thing' that matters. It's the small details instead I meant to point to as more mysterious)

Mysterious to us, but "not supposed to be at all" for the true God... Nothing is supposed to ever surprise Him ever, ect... And yet, what do we see...? (in the OT)...?

God Bless!
 
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Foxfyre

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Where the rich man is wicked and the poor man is rich in spirit?

Why can't it be the opposite.

Only the rich are righteous and the poor are wicked. God let it the opposite though.

I don't think you can make a case from the scriptures (or anywhere else) that the rich man is wicked or that the poor are rich in spirit. :) The people of the Bible were not all that different from us. Some good. Some bad. Some leaders. Some shepherded. There is love and generosity and nobleness and greed and jealousy and love and hate and kindness and lust and all other human traits found in different circumstances throughout the Bible just as there is now.
 
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grasping the after wind

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Where the rich man is wicked and the poor man is rich in spirit?

Why can't it be the opposite.

Only the rich are righteous and the poor are wicked. God let it the opposite though.

That is not how the world actually works. God did not make the world you propose He made. There are no righteous people rich or poor and not all rich people are wicked. I suspect the ratio of wicked to decent people is equal among the poor and the rich but as no one envies the poor there is much less profit in demonizing the wicked poor than there is in demonizing the wicked rich.
 
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YHWH_will_uplift

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Where the rich man is wicked and the poor man is rich in spirit?

Why can't it be the opposite.

Only the rich are righteous and the poor are wicked. God let it the opposite though.
Haven't you read the scripture? Here what king Solomon has to say:

"A good man leaves an inheritance to his children's children: and the wealth of the sinner is laid up for the just".
Proverbs 13:22

King Solomon was rich like his father before him. But David started out as a shepherd boy with no wealth. However he fulfilled this proverb after He slew Goliath, and he inherited Saul's wealth after his death. The same story applies to Joseph the son of Jacob who inherited the riches of the Egyptians and ruled over them. The same can be said of many men and women in the Bible. Why Jesus promises that those of us who become poor now will inherit the new world with its enduring riches.
 
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Josephus

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Where the rich man is wicked and the poor man is rich in spirit?

Why can't it be the opposite.

Only the rich are righteous and the poor are wicked. God let it the opposite though.

G-d made the world this way because G-d is Just. The wicked are rewarded in this world so that G-d doesn't have to reward them in the next. The righteous receive suffering in this world so that G-d doesn't have to make them suffer in the next.

Romans 5:3. The wicked don't receive hope.
 
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Kaon

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Where the rich man is wicked and the poor man is rich in spirit?

Why can't it be the opposite.

Only the rich are righteous and the poor are wicked. God let it the opposite though.

Because Adam chose to give up his dominion over this planet, and put it in the hands of the entities that swindled him out of life.

All of his children are under the curse, and under the subjugation of these entities - unless you have the Most High God. Some people are getting their heaven here on purpose; they won't get one in their afterlife. Moreover, He allows them as many resources, and as much time as necessary to come to repentance - if it were possible.


But, Someone has already saved the world, and provided a way to actually have Life (as opposed to corpse animation).
 
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fhansen

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Where the rich man is wicked and the poor man is rich in spirit?

Why can't it be the opposite.

Only the rich are righteous and the poor are wicked. God let it the opposite though.
God doesn't hate the rich while favoring the poor. And not all rich are wicked nor are all poor men rich in spirit. Rather, God opposes the proud, and the rich tend to be slaves to pride, often feeling securer and quite self-sufficient in their status while the poor are forced to recognize their dependency and insecurity more easily. So it's kind of the other way around, the rich are more stubborn at turning to and loving God, a fault we all start with to begin with and the very thing that separates us from Him.

And even the apostles were surprised by Jesus's words, "...it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God", because in their world, as in ours, the rich were generally more highly esteemed, thought to be "doing things right" as it were. But remember Jesus's other words on this, "With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible."

Nothing
is possible for man on his own-we all need grace. And God can certainly break even the rich man, with any number of trials: illness, death of loved ones, a sudden change of heart, who knows?
 
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Hawkins

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Where the rich man is wicked and the poor man is rich in spirit?

Why can't it be the opposite.

Only the rich are righteous and the poor are wicked. God let it the opposite though.

Simple. This is not our world. Christians will be persecuted here as sheep in the wilderness being preyed as victims.

The theory is simple, wherever lying outside of God's realm is hell like. That's why we pray for His Kingdom come. We are looking for a way to get back to heaven - God's dwelling place.
 
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FireDragon76

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In the words of the Latin Exsultet,

O felix culpa, quæ talem ac tantum meruit habere Redemptorem!

"Oh happy fault, that we should merit such a Redeemer!"

A world without the potential for suffering and injustice would simply be a world without Christ.
 
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Blade

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Not sure what your quoting? Thats not in the word.. There are way over 5000 promises in Gods word. "And the wealth of the sinner is stored up for [the hands of] the righteous." for one. If one talks about RICH many Christians will tell you how they personally feel believe praise GOD! But.. its what that BIBLE says. You either believe it or you dont. Its for you or its not. Its ALL Gods word or its not.. We must make a personal choice to follow Him..

" Seek ye the Lord while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near: Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon." Now..if your saved.. how much CLOSER do you need Him to be? JESUS IS REAL!

What is it you want? Is it in His word..goes in line with His word? See the WORLD steals..takes.. but GOD your FATHER HELLO! Loves to GIVE! But we know how evil we are so.. we just cant believe God would give give give... talk to Him.. ask to see people this world through HIS EYES! He WILL show you..

you pray.. you press in.. you dont stop! You keep pressing in! He said not me.. He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him. Try to think this "GOD CANT LIE". <---learn that. NOW read HIS WORD! But.. be like a child.. HE said.. must be like a child.. Children believe ANYTHING! A woman.. wanted her child healed.. Jesus "I was sent only for the lost sheep of Israel." Still she came fell at His feet "Sir help me" He said " it is not right to take the childrens food and toss it to there pet dogs" She said ""that is true sir but even the gods eat the leftovers that fall from their masters table" "Lady you are a person of great trust/faith. Let your desire be granted".

At that time she had no right..yet. she never stopped pressing in. Its so different now. Yet.. so many times we see the same "YOUR FAITH". A promise.. "Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart". To many times we look around us.. not just on HIM! And what HE SAID.. no matter how bright dark it gets.. you must come to understand.. GOD CAN NEVER LIE! You read that bible.. GOD CANT LIE! Its not how you FEEL. That woman BELIEVED... now you have HIM IN YOU! He has not changed.. your looking at TIME.. there is no time with GOD! Jesus just left about 2 days ago..NOTHING has changed.. what HE started.. can ONLY GROW!

Sorry.. got lost.. see this world people through HIS eyes.. ask Him to show you
 
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paul becke

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Where the rich man is wicked and the poor man is rich in spirit?

Why can't it be the opposite.

Only the rich are righteous and the poor are wicked. God let it the opposite though.

This is meant to be a place of trial. Like the rich man in the story of Lazarus, we do tend to want to have our cake and eat it, don't we ? It is a fact that we tend to get out of life what we want to, at least in the West, and it is certainly the case that the worldly-wise, those of a primarily worldly intelligence (what we call 'the intelligent') generally tend to be so, at the expense of the spiritula wisdom of the heart.

Why do you think so many people in our countries are forced to sleep 'rough', sleep in the street, in their car, etc. Because those with much more than they could ever use, buy politicians to keep their taxes low, and use most of them, in any case, to wage wars, costly in terms of armaments and oil.
 
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Where the rich man is wicked and the poor man is rich in spirit?

Why can't it be the opposite.

Only the rich are righteous and the poor are wicked. God let it the opposite though.

I totally understand, I feel your pain brother. It can be difficult to come to terms with when thought through. I mean if we slightly revise the atheist argument against God from evil, it's a real headache. I will try to roughly work through it here briefly in layman terms. Our God is all powerful, Holy, He is love, there is no greater love, and we are His children. Now I am a parent of one child, and I have a special love for him that is greater than love for others. I want what is best for him, though admittedly as a finite human being, I may not always know what is best for him. By the same token, we may not know what is best for us, and given our nature may strive against what we know is best. Because God is all powerful, Holy, Love, and we are His children, we expect Him to take care of us, not just our Spiritual needs but our earthly needs. Here is another point to stop and take notice, the difference between need and want. We need enough to survive, but we want so much more. Now going back to my role as a parent, my wife and I take care of our sons needs, but out of love for him, we want to do more than provide the bare minimum needs or anything resembling bare minimum. We want him to be happy and enjoy life while remembering safety first. Here is another point to stop and take notice, safety may require sacrificing an extent of temporary happiness and enjoyment. I could go into examples but I think the reader can come up with them. Reeling this back in, we can look to Scripture and see examples of where God's people would prosper and where and when they were impoverished. One example of prosperity that comes to mind is King David. Look at his humble roots though and all that he went through before becoming a wealthy King. Same goes for Joseph. But consider the ratio of poor to prosperous in Biblical times. Consider the standards of living for the poor and prosperous during Biblical times. Well I do not want to write a book here and probably should be doing something else, but wanted to write a little on this topic to let you know you're not alone, it is something I've struggled with on and off at times. Not really a topic where simple flippant answers settle anything I think, and it does involve the problem of evil. I'll tell you one Scripture that has baffled me for a long time. It's one of Jesus' "beatitudes", the one along these lines:

"the meek shall inherit the earth". What can this possibly mean? The wealthy own most of the literal earth, and we can all point to Scriptures about money, camels and needles, to support the notion that for the most part, "the meek" are not the wealthy as a general rule.
 
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Tone

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Where the rich man is wicked and the poor man is rich in spirit?

Why can't it be the opposite.

Only the rich are righteous and the poor are wicked. God let it the opposite though.

"Why did God make a world like this?"

What would you have done differently?
 
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paul becke

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I totally understand, I feel your pain brother. It can be difficult to come to terms with when thought through. I mean if we slightly revise the atheist argument against God from evil, it's a real headache. I will try to roughly work through it here briefly in layman terms. Our God is all powerful, Holy, He is love, there is no greater love, and we are His children. Now I am a parent of one child, and I have a special love for him that is greater than love for others. I want what is best for him, though admittedly as a finite human being, I may not always know what is best for him. By the same token, we may not know what is best for us, and given our nature may strive against what we know is best. Because God is all powerful, Holy, Love, and we are His children, we expect Him to take care of us, not just our Spiritual needs but our earthly needs. Here is another point to stop and take notice, the difference between need and want. We need enough to survive, but we want so much more. Now going back to my role as a parent, my wife and I take care of our sons needs, but out of love for him, we want to do more than provide the bare minimum needs or anything resembling bare minimum. We want him to be happy and enjoy life while remembering safety first. Here is another point to stop and take notice, safety may require sacrificing an extent of temporary happiness and enjoyment. I could go into examples but I think the reader can come up with them. Reeling this back in, we can look to Scripture and see examples of where God's people would prosper and where and when they were impoverished. One example of prosperity that comes to mind is King David. Look at his humble roots though and all that he went through before becoming a wealthy King. Same goes for Joseph. But consider the ratio of poor to prosperous in Biblical times. Consider the standards of living for the poor and prosperous during Biblical times. Well I do not want to write a book here and probably should be doing something else, but wanted to write a little on this topic to let you know you're not alone, it is something I've struggled with on and off at times. Not really a topic where simple flippant answers settle anything I think, and it does involve the problem of evil. I'll tell you one Scripture that has baffled me for a long time. It's one of Jesus' "beatitudes", the one along these lines:

"the meek shall inherit the earth". What can this possibly mean? The wealthy own most of the literal earth, and we can all point to Scriptures about money, camels and needles, to support the notion that for the most part, "the meek" are not the wealthy as a general rule.
-------------------------
Two things that have struck me about this matter :
How often wealth is spoken of in the Bible in terms of eating rich food; dining on rich food ! Weird, in a way. Even granted their techology wouldn't have risen to the level of Mercedes cars, Rolex watches, etc.

Also, and far more germane, is the fact that the prime villains of scripture seem to have been the Philistines and the Egyptians, two highly sophisticated peoples - the kind whose rich men would today endow museums and art galleries, rather than pay their employees a living wage - or do both, which they could with ease.... the kind looked upon as benefactors by the Gentiles. (Now, where did I read that expression ?)

However, the Hebrews were a pastoral people, initially, nomads, not even settled peasants. Jacob and his famly would seem to have been settled, but were still an unsophisticated pastoral people in the eyes of the Egyptians. Country bumpkins, not to put too fine a point on it.

On the other hand, Abraham seemed to be a man of considerable substance. There is nothing wrong with the good things of this world, other than the fact that by them we tend to reinforce the wrong image of virtue, i.e. associated with wealth, and thus get drawn into idolatry. Charity, and detachment seem to be the principal keys to the rich man's virtue.
 
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