This the same God that created me?

Jythier, I found this article to be very insightful and marked it as such.

Almighty God knows everything--- past, present and future. That He knows every little detail of what we choose to do or not do , the fact that He has knowledge of it doesn't make us do it or not do it.

Knowledge doesn't cause an event, rather the event causes knowledge. An example would be becasue John Doe is running, I know that he is running. But he certainly isn't running becasue I know it.

Concerning God and destiny, the only destiny human souls are meant by GOd to attain is a destiny of eternal happiness...and every single soul is able to attain eternal happiness. But man's destiny is in his own keeping that is every one of us is endowed with free will.

We could say life is a journey of making choices. It's our choice to be good and do good and avoid evil or not. On the topics of destiny and free will, the Church contents herself with the advice which CHrist gave when He said, "What does it profit a man to gain the whole world, if he suffers the loss of his soul? Seek first the kingdom of God and His justice. "

OckhamsRazro

Yes. Same God that created me created you. Who knew He was so diverse?

Lula:

Every soul HAD the ability to attain eternal life, but not all exercised the ability, and God knew whether they would or not.

I once had this discussion with my priest.  He was not able to explain it to me.  I will comment more later, but I have to say I do not agree with you totally (but do have to read it again and think on it more).

That seems a little mean. (understatement)

Who knew He was so diverse?

Well, if one accepts the dogma that before the universe, there was only God, he wasn't DI-verse at all....he was all that existed. Nothing to compare himself to. He was UNI-verse, not DI-verse.

For that same reason, he can be proven to be perfect, because if you're all that exists, how can you not be?

Anyway, so God is proven perfect. Cool. And so we're back to my first sentence up there. What you're saying makes God out to be pretty horrible.

Because it means that God deliberately created some people knowing full well and ahead of time that they weren't going to make the grade. That means some people were purposely created to suffer - FOREVER. It seems a bit inane to consider we have free will. If I had free will and knew that that is how things were going to work, I'd just say "No thanks, big guy...I'll take my chances with never existing at all. Thanks for the choice.

I'd say the grand majority of even semi-literate and above in intellect people decide NOT to sleep with their brother or sister (or other close relatives) Forget the social issues with it, and that it probably seems gross (I'm an only child, so I'm guessing.) Why don't they aside from that? Because they know full well of the genetic difficulties involved in that. You might accidentally create a human who's going to do nothing but suffer from some abnormality all their lives. And that's enough to stop *most* humans. I wonder what it would take for God to stop cranking out souls at a massive rate knowing for a FACT that this guy or that gal was going to suffer for eternity to pay for the crimes they weren't saved of (through lack of Jesus for whatever reason) that they committed in a mere 70-100 years in a universe that fundies say is 10,000 years old. The punishment doesn't really fit the crime. Especially considering the ultimate crime was bringing that poor fool into existence in the first place.

Murderers that are proven to do so with forethought receive stiffer penalties when caught. Where's that leave God? If he created me knowing I was going to pull the proverbial trigger, and did so willfully, then I'm just a smoking gun that he's holding.

If I bake a cake, and it doesn't turn out perfect, that's my fault. I messed something up. But it's impossible for some being that is perfect to ever mess up. That's the definition of perfection, no? Never messes up. If I deliberately put sardines in the cake knowing full well ahead of time that it's not going to be a good cake, you think I'm guilt free? Well yeah, because Ock bakes in mysterious ways...

But if I ever tell someone I'm going to take them to get a really cool present, but they have to be blindfolded, and then I lead them onto the tracks to be killed or maimed by a speeding train, completely on purpose, knowing full well exactly what was going to happen, I'll at least know it wasn't a mean thing to do. That person could have chosen to refuse the blindfold, so it's their own fault. And who is to question the mysterious ways of Ock, anyway?

I'm going to go with a different thought. If there's a God, he IS perfect. And no mistakes were made. And though many things seem atrocious to us here, there's a reason for it all, and everyone is exactly how they are supposed to be. I guess I give him more credit than most.

This is why I'm not a Christian. If I'm more forgiving than God is, something is terribly wrong.

I will look forward to your counterpoints, Dr. Guy!

God is perfectly forgiving, Ock. He is willing to forgive everyone for whatever they have done, except one thing - rejecting His Son. He will not forgive that, after what His Son went through for you.

He created people knowing full well that some of them would reject His Son, and some of them would accept His Son. It was worth it to Him to create that many people so that He could exist forever with those who would accept Him. He does not care to exist forever with those who do not accept Him, of their own volition. But, perhaps you're overlooking an overarching purpose for those who do not become saved. They absolutely must be necessary for some purpose, but I will not claim to know what it is - only that, no matter how many people were created, the differences between us would still be there, and some people would not be saved. Just look at Cain and Able - the first brothers. The first two people, and they knew all about God because Adam and Eve told them, from first-hand experience - and still, Cain did not follow God. 4 people in the world, and already 1 non-believer. So, I think He could not have just made people who loved Him - but He could make SOME people who loved Him out of a multitude of people. A percentage. So that's what He did.

Let's think about this. The whole God's plan thingy. If God had a plan, knowing how things turn out, what's the point? It makes him a wacko gamer. He creates beings who are obviously flawed according to this scenario, and then he watches to see how his creations fail or succeed? Oh, and because he needs company he stacks the deck by creating lots of folks? Sick joke or absurdist drama? Oy, we are to praise such a him?

And then there's the love the guy you fear thingy. What's up with that?

I don't think I'll ever get this theology of yours. It makes me think we create an image of God in the images we both fear and desire regarding ourselves.


Be well.

A being with infinite power over you is something to be feared, but He is so beautiful in his mercy to us that we must love Him.

Well, what's the point of anything? What's the point of living, Sodaiho? The major difference between your Buddhism and my Christianity is the focus - I couldn't see it before in the difference between 'do no harm' and 'love thy neighbor', but I see it now. Buddhism is focused on the self - getting yourself to such a state where you can exist forever in Nirvana. Yes, this involved other people, but the focus is self.

Christianity focuses on others - on Jesus, on relationships with other believers and reaching non-believers.

If I could make a million dollars, knew I could do it, and that my quality of life would be better afterwards, I would still do it. The point would be to improve the quality of life. I think that might be part of the reason it was worth it to God to create life. It was for HIS glory. To improve the quality of HIS existence.

He's not just watching us succeed or fail - He is calling us to success, His definition of success.

It's not fear as in afraid but as in fear as in awe. It's like a small child who loves his dad but there's that level of fear as in respect for his dad, that fear as in not to disappoint him because he loves him.

Jythier

I'm up to my neck right now on this subject as it's very big right now around here. I'm very, very big on predestination or election. I don't believe there's anyway to get around it when you read scripture. For many they want to believe in the freewill for salvation bit because it makes them feel they've done something to contribute when in fact, it's all God....not man.

Even in the denomination I now attend most are freewillers and it drives me crazy because I know it's unbiblical. While I can easily explain the "freewill" scriptures they bring up, they are at a loss to explain the very clear God's sovereignty ones and instead will refer you to another scripture to back up their belief. They always do this. Always. Because they can't explain it.

For instance one I like to use is John 1:13 which says:

"Which were born NOT of blood, NOR of the will of the flesh NOR of the will of man, but of God."

I put it this way:

God chooses...regeneration
God calls....gospel
We respond....belief
We follow....obedience

Since we are "dead" in our sins we can do nothing until God regenerates or breathes life into our hearts.....what can a dead man do?

We can have quite the discussion on this topic Jythier.

We can! And we have the free will to do so, too! Or was it predestined to happen?

no it makes Him a God whose attributes were meant to be used....in this case his biggest attribute is love. He created us out of love. His desire is to have a people for his name to love. It's not about us loving God so much as it is about him wanting and desiring to love us.

And of course he knows the ending from the beginning...He's God afterall...would we expect anything else from God?



no, he created human beings to be perfect in the first place. He didn't create them flawed. It was their exercising of their freewill in disobedience that made them flawed. They had a choice to obey and keep sin out of the scenerio or disobey and let it in. They chose to let it in...and we've been flawed ever since. Since God knew this would happen He also provided an answer for us right from the get go and of course you know the rest of the story.



hahahh you know of all the theologies out there, this is the simplist...God created us to have a relationship with him, we screwed up and therefore broke connection with our creator, he made restitution for us, relationship is restored for those who accept his offer of restitution, we are once again walking and talking with him like Adam and Eve were way back when this all started.

Actually if you just read the first 11 chapters of Genesis, you've got the whole story including plan of redemption. Everything is in those first 11 chapters. The rest of the bible is basically repetivie with diff characters and examples of what life is like when we either obey or disobey God and practical advice to help us day to day.

I have to disagree. I believe that God gave us free will precisely so that He wouldn't know what we will choose to do, otherwise the entire Eden thing was nothing more than a very cruel joke and I refuse to believe that He is that cruel.

I do not believe that He knows what any of us will choose to do from one moment to the next. The concept of God knowing everything that will happen in the future is a man made concept and is contradictory to everything we know about time and space. The idea of God manipulating events in a way that spans a long amount of time indicates a vast intelligence, which I don't have a problem with, but is not the same as a God who actually knows the future. There are a number of events described in the bible that indicate that things did not happen as God intended although many Christians will say that it's exactly what God knew would happen even though that defies common sense.

I do believe in God, but I do not believe in this modern day God that most Christians try to depict. If anything I believe that our entire universe is nothing more than an experiment that He is conducting. Many phrases in Genesis would tend to support this idea. "He saw that it was good" doesn't indicate a being that already knew the result but rather one that was pleased with the unsure result.

Once upon a time, even way before Jesus, we didn't have science. There was no way to explain anything at all. Why did the rain stop falling? Why are our crops not growing? And people feared they had angered the Gods and composed all manner of rites and whatnot to try and make them happy again. They had faith, just like you, J. If they just did X, Y, and Z, the Gods would be happy and let them keep scratching out an existence.

Gods, Chapter 6

But then it happened, after seven years of plenty of everything, that things went wrong,
2 As they often do,
3 And there wasn't any rain, and the crops were pitiful,
4 And the game got scarce,
5 And one of the neighboring tribes invaded the valley, and took away most of the virgins, as well as plenty of heads and other body parts,
6 Whereupon the apes cried out angrily to the priests, saying,
7 "Hey, we don't understand this at all.
8 What about all the food and weapons and body parts we've given to the Gods?
9 Have they forgotten about us already?
10 "Honestly, we're very discouraged by the whole thing."
11 The priests considered the words of the tribe carefully,
12 For about six weeks,
13 Which was way too long,
14 But at last the priests triumphantly announced that they had the answer,
15 And the people crowded around to listen, saying,
16 "This had better be good."
17 So the priests cried aloud, in a high, shaky voice, saying,
18 "The Gods have become bored with your offerings,
19 "Which are puny and insignificant, consisting of little more than food and weapons and body parts, and every once in a while a virgin.
20 "The Gods need more than small change if they are to go on giving you rain and crops and so forth."
21 "Well, then, what do they want?" asked the tribe, and beads of sweat stood out on their forehead.
22 They want monuments and temples, made of stone, with plenty of writing on them, singing the praises of the Gods, as well as prayers and idols and that sort of thing."
23 "What is writing?" asked the tribe. "We have not heard of this before. Is it hard to get? Does it involve killing?"
24 But the priests smiled broadly and replied, "Writing is not hard at all. It does not involve killing, but you'll like it anyway."
25 And then the tribe was well content, saying,
26 "We'll get right to it, then. But what is a temple?"
27 And the priests smiled, saying, "Don't worry. We'll explain everything as we go."

OCKHAMSrAZOR POSTS:

In this scenario, you ask where does this leave God. This is an old and difficult question to answer with our limited intelligence we cannot ever expect to comprehend God who is incomprehensible.

Even though God is able to know of or "see" the murder, and World Wars, and everything for that matter, He may not be held to have determined them. God didn't forecause the murder or the World Wars.

The blame falls entirely upon man, upon the misuse of the power to determine the course he would follow. That man has power of choosing between good and evil is beyond a question of reasonable doubt for all of our family, economic, and social relations are based on that principle.

If man did not have free will nor a responsible being, God would not have set down precepts for him to follow, nor would He have warned him to do this or not do that through the Commandments.

God's foreknowledge doesn't interfere with man's use of his free will. Our actions don't take place becasue God has foreknowledge of them, and so foresees that they will take place. We can't blame God for murder or World Wars just becasue He foreknows that they will happen. The blame lies in man's misuse of God's gift of free will and of his liberty of action.

In short, God made the man, the man made himself a murderer.