DanielGracely wrote:Steve 1750 asks:
God creates Eve with impulses built in her before she does anything, to tempt her to sin and then "allows" Satan the master deceiver of the universe to test her , and when Eve fails, God is outraged?
Hi Steve1750,
While God gives us the abilities to think, feel and choose, He never gives us
what we think, feel, or choose. (If He did,
God and
man would be synonymous terms.) Therefore James is able to say that God tempts no one, but that every one is drawn away by his
own lust.
I think Steve's point, if I'm following it, is that God, in His infinite knowledge, knew that Eve would sin in advance. Therefore, why would God create Adam and Eve if He was, at a future point, to become so outraged? I think when we follow this logic to its end, it gives us insight into the eternal purpose of God. If God created the human race with full knowledge that most of the human race would end up in eternal hell, why would He have bothered? Perhaps He saw the "few that find life" on the narrow path worth the immense amount of suffering and pain that would surface in this life and the next, but it seems to remain a valid question in my mind.
Also, after reading this thread, I thought another point was quite pertinent. Since God is so outraged over sin (which He most definitely is), why would He allow sinners in a fallen state, a state that God hates, to continue perpetually in such a state? I think of the many billions in an eternal hell cursing God and becoming more and more evil, and gradually losing all resemblance to the image of God eon after eon. Since God is omnipresent, He would have to put up with this reality. Many people say, "Hell is a God-forsaken place. God's presence is not there". This cannot be true. God is omnipresent, and He would therefore have to put up with all of these beast-like post-human creatures cursing His name and blaspheming throughout all the future ages of existence. Clearly, David said in Psalm 139 that there is no fleeing from God's presence, and even if he made his bed in Sheol, God would be there. Would God permit all of this suffering and sin to perpetuate through all eternity? Perhaps so, but I think it would contradict God's victory over sin, when Paul states:
If the process of death and degradation of the post-fall state continues perpetually throughout eternity, does God ever truly defeat and destroy death?