Question 3 for Christians

Christians say God gave men free will, to choose good or evil. It must be clear now to God, actually long ago, what the result of the experiment is -many people choose evil. So why carry on the experiment? Why doesn't God end it, and prevent further evil? In fact, why did God create fallible people in the first place - certainly knowing that much evil would be created? Why didn't He simply create heaven, where there is no evil? It sounds very much as if God created the circumstances where He must have known there would be some evil. And for what?

 

The argument tends to be humans cannot be good if they have no choice in the matter and there is no point living without having choice.

However, it makes you wonder, what is the point of living now anyway? What is the point of living, dying, then living for ever in heaven. If its going to happen anyway, why doesn't he just make everyone infallable and send them straight to heaven.

Or just not create anything at all.

 

Why doesn’t God end the experiment? According to Revelation and a few books in the OT, He does end it. There is this final war called Armageddon. The people are weeded out then. But even after this war some corruption comes back to the surface and there is a final smack down (separating sheep’s and goat’s) then it is finished. After this the people who remain are in utopia.

What would it take to become the kind of person who could live in a utopia type place? Someone who has already learned the important things life has to offer.

Have you ever grown spiritually during good times? I have not. Did you learn compassion because everyone you ever knew or saw was compassionate? Not me, I learned it by seeing someone who was not given compassion, or because I myself wasn’t compassionate and it hit me later, how wrong I was.

I think part of the human experience is to grow and learn as a person how to be all the wonderful things we can be.

Why did God make fallible people in the first place? If all he was going to do was make perfection to sit on a cloud, playing harps never having the chance to grow or learn or become great…that would be far more pointless than what He did do.

Why make a tree that only gives fruit once a year? Why not make a tree that is always green and always has fruit? Doesn’t the winter barren tree seem ugly, and those fall leaves are a pain in the butt to rake up. Why bother with the process? Well we know the leaves go back into the ground to fertilize the dirt, helping the next year’s crop. The winter time is good for the tree to rest from producing. And each year the fruit becomes better. It’s a process.

To me they seem the same. It takes people making bad choices for the people who pick good choices to rise above blossom and flourish. I think bad people, doing bad things is almost like the fertilizer the good rise from. We all have the potential for good, we just don’t all, always choose it.

People for the most part go on with their lives till something happens. Katrina, the Tsunami, exc... Then ordinary people rise above. We as a human race are still barbaric in many ways, but we have in a lot of ways grown, but we have lots more to learn to be ready for any utopia.

I don’t speak for Christians; I shouldn’t probably be answering this. But I like the topic. 

 

He loves a good joke

 

No, all it would take is God creating perfect people, which presumably He could.

There is some "point" in allowing holocausts?

 

It seems kind of cold to say "a point the holocaust" but the direct result of it was Israel again became a nation after about 2,930 years. And it fulfilled a very old prophecy.

 

Because somewhere along the line, you would realize that doing evil will only cause harm to others and ultimately, to yourself - that there is a logical and immutable relationship between an evil deed and personal harm.

Hell isn't a punishment god concocted to punish you. It is the logical consequence of your own actions.