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Let's try it a different way and give the inventor of the vaccine the same attributes as your god.....
...a guy invents a vaccine that helps millions, but he knows, due to some psychic ability, that if he leaves the vaccine on the table a criminal is going to come in through the window, steal the vaccine and use it for nefarious purposes...but even though he is fully aware of what will happen if he leaves it on the table, he leaves it on the table anyway.
Are you getting it yet??
No because you are still demanding an all or nothing standard for God. Either the vaccine must NEVER produce a single negative effect or it must not exist. Doesn't matter if it saves millions of lives. If one person is harmful, it's gone. You think God should have only set things in motion and only created humans if nothing bad resulted from their independent actions or not create them in the first place. Really, at one point do you EVER hold man accountable for their actions?
No because you are still demanding an all or nothing standard for God.
Well of course for goodness sake...he's an omnimax deity isn't he??
Look, I really don't understand why you aren't getting this Jeff. What is it that you don't understand about the word omnimax?
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You think God should have only set things in motion and only created humans if nothing bad resulted from their independent actions or not create them in the first place.
Yes....now you're getting it man. That is providing that he WANTED humans that wouldn't do bad things to others of course. If on the other hand his plan was to create humans/things that were going to upset his 'perfect' world, well..... See where this is going?
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Really, at one point do you EVER hold man accountable for their actions?
Not as long as theists keep telling me that there is an omnimax deity overseeing our every move.
What you need to do is study Epicurus and come up with an answer to his question...
Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then He is not omnipotent.
Is He able, but not willing? Then He is malevolent.
Is He both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is He neither able nor willing? Then why call Him God?
No because you are still demanding an all or nothing standard for God. Either the vaccine must NEVER produce a single negative effect or it must not exist. Doesn't matter if it saves millions of lives. If one person is harmful, it's gone. You think God should have only set things in motion and only created humans if nothing bad resulted from their independent actions or not create them in the first place. Really, at one point do you EVER hold man accountable for their actions?
So you are essentially admitting that the Christian God is incapable of producing a perfect solution to a problem. You are throwing omnipotence under the bus, and possibly omniscience as well.
So you are essentially admitting that the Christian God is incapable of producing a perfect solution to a problem. You are throwing omnipotence under the bus, and possibly omniscience as well.
Which might, hopefully, turn on a light for jeff, as something did for you, mordant and other ex-fundies.
No because you are still demanding an all or nothing standard for God. Either the vaccine must NEVER produce a single negative effect or it must not exist. Doesn't matter if it saves millions of lives. If one person is harmful, it's gone.
Why not?
It's God, correct?
According to the legend, it can literally do anything. Anything...period.
JerZ, it is my understanding that we all have wills. But the Scriptures say it is the will of the flesh or the flesh's will. That doesn't make us robots. It is just that our decisions are controlled mainly by our flesh. Our wills, being controlled by the flesh, are not free to please God.
Of course God created us flesh and God knew well in advance that "those in flesh are not able to please God" (Romans 8). And those in flesh cannot do God's law (Rom.8). So, in effect, God did make it so the human race cannot please Him unless He intervenes.
This all gets back again the the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. God deemed it necessary for humanity to get a knowledge of good and evil. It isn't a sinister plot. All God does eventuates in good for He is working all together for good.
In heaven people's will will be ruled by the spirit rather than the flesh. We will be freed from flesh's will.
Thank you for this explanation. It was stated in a kindly way that I appreciated.
Re: the underlining...that means, no free will. "Freed from flesh's will." Freed from free will. Which, again, points to NO free will as a POSITIVE, yet it is stated as a NEGATIVE when we talk about why God won't change things in a positive way for people. Again, this is a contradiction. If it is good not to have free will - to be "freed from flesh's will" - then it's good. If it's bad and restrictive and creates robots, then it's bad and restrictive and creates robots. It can't really be both.
`Whether one thinks God is sick or should have prevented perilous situations, He will be the one to judge the wicked when they depart from Earth. Life on Earth is a brevity of time and poof we are gone from the planet, it is where we choose to spend eternity that matters. I know the God I follow is the righteous one who sent His Son to die on the cross for my sins.
`Whether one thinks God is sick or should have prevented perilous situations, He will be the one to judge the wicked when they depart from Earth. Life on Earth is a brevity of time and poof we are gone from the planet, it is where we choose to spend eternity that matters. I know the God I follow is the righteous one who sent His Son to die on the cross for my sins.
Or to judge based on what He thinks is wicked for people to do, but not for Him to do.
Which means that you really don't know how you'll be judged - even if you think you're doing everything right because of a book.
You may be just as you-know-what-potted as the rest of us in the afterlife, so your belief that you are doing what God wants is a gamble that makes you feel better for now; it eases, at least during life, your terror of an unpredictable being - as based on your first sentence which basically admits that we don't know what God's motives are, we can only "think" what they might be. Therefore, you really have NO MORE insurance than I of a reward later on.
I mean that's just the simple truth.
You don't know the God you follow is righteous. You know the conflicting information you've read in a book and you know how you have interpreted it and how others have interpreted it (based on the ensuing dogma though the centuries). But I think your second sentence was very telling. As much as Christians say they love God just because they love Him...period, it really all comes down to fear. Deep utter terror of judgment...and what the punishment is supposed to be.
I don't think that may Christians electively "love" God. I think they're afraid not to.
That's not love.
And it sure as shoot is not love for any being to require, in the face of sheer terror of an eternity of torture, to act like they "love it (the being)." In fact that's a horrific and very, very sad thing, IMO. Just so very sad...so very like a little abused child terrified not to give Mama, who allowed Papa to rape her yesterday, a kiss on the cheek before bedtime.
I know, I know. No, YOU just "really" love God just because.
I mean if you say anything else, you might be in the flames too eventually...I understand.
But even though I understand...it just makes me so very sad.
It is possible because such a place is void of sin. It doesn't have the curse of sin which was placed on this world and the reason for all those dangers and negativity.
If God desired pain and enjoyed watching people suffer, why did He sent a part of his own being to endure hours of extreme physical torture on a cross just to save the very mankind that spits in His face? If God desired pain, He would take away all the pleasures in this physical world and just keep on creating new humans to suffer here over and over again. God created man because He is so full of love that He wants to share that love. He created the world as a gift to man giving us ownership of this realm. Man gave over the keys to Satan when he chose to betray God. That's our fault, not God.
Yes Jesus experiencing physical torture sure saves women from being physically and sexually abused. Jesus doing that also keeps children from starving in countries like Africa. Jesus doing that keeps parents from having their child abducted. Jesus doing that keeps terrorists from bombing.
Oh wait...
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Originally Posted by Eusebius
Of course God is in complete charge of His universe concerning global warming. But I would not consider it a "fault" but rather His intention.
Why don't you focus on what happened to God's perfect Son? God is, in the absolute sense, responsible for the death of His Son. Yet we know the Jews and Romans had Him crucified. Yet we know it was Judas who betrayed Him.
But the really great thing is that little did the ones who crucified Christ know that their very actions would eventuate in their very salvation.
Since God did not save the 10 year old girl in your make-believe story, of course the ultimate responsibility rests with God. But God didn't rape that girl Himself. A man with a very evil heart did so. This is why we have police and courts and prisons. This is God's way of dealing with evil people in this eon.
Psh police. That's if they even catch them and sometimes the police don't care about crimes. What a lovely way of dealing with people considering police are flawed and sometimes ignorant.
Even so, if they catch the bastards that doesn't negate that abuse is serious enough to not be fixed just because the criminal was put in prison. No matter how much jailtime a physical/sexual abuser gets it still changes the woman's whole life. Some never get through it. Others are stronger but why put them through it in the first place? Oh excuse me let them be put through it...*rolls eyes*
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Originally Posted by Rafius
Interesting to how this god who values 'free-will' so highly doesn't seem to place much value on the free-will of people not to be violated.
It really is. It pretty much implies that this god cares more about the bad people of the world (the murderers abusers etc.) than the good. The funniest part of it all: we are expected to worship this god even when he lets bad people do those things to us.
It's funny how humans are so flawed and yet some of us are better than somebody who is supposed to be perfect. Guess their perfect god isn't so perfect after all.
I'm probly sorta echoing some atheists on here but I guess I'm reiterating the points they've made.
Last edited by Nickchick; 01-13-2016 at 07:49 PM..
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