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If one believes that God created the world it isn't much of a leap to believe that he could flood HIS world. He caused it to rain. Alot.
The problem with what you're saying is that whenever you run into a problem with logic you can just say that God fixed it and dodge a very tough question. Why would God hide the evidence of such a massive flood and then just make the water disappear?
At least you are honest enough to say that god poofed the water away and that you have no real explanation.
Is a big bang any tougher to believe than a god that was always there? I admit that I do not understand the fine points of cosmology, (most of the rough points either), but bang (universe appears) is not so different from ...................god.................more god..............more god.........poof universe appears.
The problem with what you're saying is that whenever you run into a problem with logic you can just say that God fixed it and dodge a very tough question. Why would God hide the evidence of such a massive flood and then just make the water disappear?
I wonder, too, why, if God is all-knowing and all-seeing, He thought the Flood would accomplish anything. The Bible relates that within generations, people were all worshipping calves and statues and what-have-you again. So I'm not sure what the purpose of the Flood would even have been.
Was it to teach people a lesson? Obviously they didn't learn it, since they were worshipping idols again fairly quickly. (Why didn't God foresee that?)
Was it to destroy evil in the world? Again, obviously, evil returned. (God could have taken care of that by plucking Satan out, rather than killing all people and even most very innocent animals, BTW. And once again...why didn't God foresee that evil would definitely not be destroyed? Especially when He Himself allowed Satan to keep taking day-trips to earth?)
Was it to test Noah? A test wouldn't be needed if a God were all-knowing. He'd already know the results of the test so whom would it serve?
Was it out of anger? Anger doesn't fit in with perfection from my viewpoint. But then again...I'm just a person...and the Biblical God's ways are mysterious...obviously.
Very good points. Also, why kill all of the animals? Were the kangaroos having unclean thoughts or were the elephants committing unnatural acts? Makes no sense to me. And by the way, was this rain coming down as fresh water or salt water? If it was fresh water (rain always is) then the change in the composition of the ocean would have left it uninhabitable after the flood and if it was salt water all of the fresh water creatures would also have died. Did anybody ever think about that one?
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JerZ
I wonder, too, why, if God is all-knowing and all-seeing, He thought the Flood would accomplish anything. The Bible relates that within generations, people were all worshipping calves and statues and what-have-you again. So I'm not sure what the purpose of the Flood would even have been.
Was it to teach people a lesson? Obviously they didn't learn it, since they were worshipping idols again fairly quickly. (Why didn't God foresee that?)
Was it to destroy evil in the world? Again, obviously, evil returned. (God could have taken care of that by plucking Satan out, rather than killing all people and even most very innocent animals, BTW. And once again...why didn't God foresee that evil would definitely not be destroyed? Especially when He Himself allowed Satan to keep taking day-trips to earth?)
Was it to test Noah? A test wouldn't be needed if a God were all-knowing. He'd already know the results of the test so whom would it serve?
Was it out of anger? Anger doesn't fit in with perfection from my viewpoint. But then again...I'm just a person...and the Biblical God's ways are mysterious...obviously.
So just what was the purpose of the flood?
Many people believe God doesn't violate the free will of beings - whether human, angelic, or otherwise. He's also a just God, giving people the chance to turn from their wicked ways and serve Him. Even knowing that there would be future evil generations, He also knew there would be more people who would love and serve Him. He wanted to give them that chance, even though it meant there would once again be idolatry and evil in the world. By wiping out humans entirely, He would not have been giving future generations the free chance to worship Him. God doesn't want a bunch of robots who are going to worship Him because they are forced to. He wants people to come to Him freely, on their own, by their own volition. THAT is the only real way to know that someone loves you for who you are.
As for what the flood may have accomplished, it could be that by destroying the earth, even knowing that evil and idolatry would return after the waters receded, He was basically just letting man know that HE was in control, and that it was HIS earth to do with what He wanted. Think about it......try to put yourself in a position where you have created something, including a race of beings that are intelligent and have the capacity to love you. You give them chance after chance to worship you in truth, but instead they keep choosing to ignore you and worship idols instead. You see there are actually very few beings that actually love you, and since you don't like what the rest of your creation has become, you decide to start over again. You save those who truly love you, destroy the rest of what you created and then start over, allowing those who love you to start anew. They will have children and their children will have children. Again, some of those beings will love you, and others will ignore you. But instead of choosing to once again destroy what you created, you decide this time you're going to try a different approach. You're going to create a system whereby those who love you are separated from those who don't. Those who love you will have your blessings. Those who don't will be left to fend for themselves, and if they die, they die. It's their own peril they've brought on themselves. You gave them a chance, but they ignored it time after time. So you decide to focus on the group that loves you.
Perhaps that is what God did. It's not as if He made a mistake or something. He's infinitely more intelligent than we are, and likewise in ultimate control of existence, so He doesn't have to answer to anyone for His actions. If He wants to do something, He does it. If He wants to change His mind, He has that capacity. Since we are fashioned in His image, why would we have a capability that He doesn't? Those who refer to God as never changing don't seem to understand what that actually means. It means His nature - His character - never changes. It doesn't mean He never changes His mind about something. And even if He does, how does that mean He's somehow imperfect? If you have always baked a chocolate cake for your mother on her birthday, year after year, and then one year choose to bake a yellow chiffon cake instead, does that mean that the chocolate cake was never perfect? No. It's irrelevant. It's just that you wanted to do something different this time.
And how does anger not fit in with perfection? There is such a thing as righteous anger. Anger is an emotion. God has emotions. He's not a piece of wood that exists according to how we've defined Him. Anger is simply what we feel when we observe that some wrong has taken place, and we are offended by that wrong.
As for where the water came from: It came from above and from below. The springs of the deep burst forth, and rain fell from the sky.
As for where the water went: Surely some of it evaporated back into clouds, but much of it may have actually settled into depressions that became the world's oceans. Think about it.....vast amount of underground water reservoirs that suddenly burst forth from the deep. The cavernous structures may have supported shallow seas above them, and those sea floors could have been vast stretches of rock and soil above the springs of the deep. Those sea floors may have been miles higher than current ocean floors - perhaps only a little lower than what we consider our current sea level - but upon being emptied of their waters, those caverns later collapsed into what became the ocean floors. The receding waters would have filled those depressions and allowed dry land to once again appear on the planet. Is that not something that currently happens with some volcanoes? Does not the ground heave up, spew out the lava from above, and then collapse upon itself, leaving bodies of water as a result? Don't scientists even think there is water beneath the surface of Mars? Why is it such a leap to think that the same situation may have been present on earth at some point in the past?
When you believe in an invisible God who is spirit, and capable of doing anything, it becomes easier to see how the global flood could have occurred. When you don't believe in God, you can't conceive of the possibilities.
Although not dogmatic, many Christians understand that there was a vapor canopy above the earth and the great deep below the earth. Certainly if these came together to flood the earth, a great catastrophic upheavel of the entire earth commenced. Water now covers about 70% of the earth's surface and there's much evidence of water once covering areas that are now completely arid - even mountaintops. It likely wouldn't have dried up in a few days, but perhaps took a few centuries, the remaining water making deeper oceans and rivers, and settling back into the interior of the earth.
Just because Science doesn't understand God doesn't mean God or the Bible is wrong!
There is a very interesting book written by Henry M. Morris, The Biblical Basis for Modern Science. It's now out of print I believe, but a few years ago I did get a nice used one through Amazon if memory serves!
First of all, your post was nicely worded. But Satan is apparently in control of my fingertips right now because a few things jumped out at me.
Quote:
Originally Posted by WCRob
Many people believe God doesn't violate the free will of beings - whether human, angelic, or otherwise.
You know what? Call me picky, but being drowned would DEFINITELY be against my will. How is killing someone *not* a violation?
Quote:
Originally Posted by WCRob
He's also a just God, giving people the chance to turn from their wicked ways and serve Him. Even knowing that there would be future evil generations, He also knew there would be more people who would love and serve Him.
There wouldn't have been more people in the future if he *hadn't* killed most of humanity?
Quote:
Originally Posted by WCRob
God doesn't want a bunch of robots who are going to worship Him because they are forced to. He wants people to come to Him freely, on their own, by their own volition. THAT is the only real way to know that someone loves you for who you are.
If you're God...surely you already know.
Quote:
Originally Posted by WCRob
As for what the flood may have accomplished, it could be that by destroying the earth, even knowing that evil and idolatry would return after the waters receded, He was basically just letting man know that HE was in control, and that it was HIS earth to do with what He wanted.
That's an interesting point but it puts a very human face on God. Sort of making God in man's image rather than the other way around. It's also, by the way, a LOT like how my father, who used to beat the living cr*p out of us, used to explain his own decisions on discipline, though he couldn't have topped God on sheer largesse.
Quote:
Originally Posted by WCRob
Think about it......try to put yourself in a position where you have created something, including a race of beings that are intelligent and have the capacity to love you. You give them chance after chance to worship you in truth, but instead they keep choosing to ignore you and worship idols instead.
Again...he foresaw this, supposedly. Even before he made Adam. Yet he did it anyway. That's not disappointment. That's masochism.
Quote:
Originally Posted by WCRob
If you have always baked a chocolate cake for your mother on her birthday, year after year, and then one year choose to bake a yellow chiffon cake instead, does that mean that the chocolate cake was never perfect?
Well...no. On the other hand, if every year I allowed my mother to stay alive on her birthday, and then suddenly I decided one year to drown her for her birthday, she might have a slightly different reaction than if I had baked her a different flavor of cake.
Quote:
Originally Posted by WCRob
And how does anger not fit in with perfection?
Anger does not fit in with perfection because in order to be angry about something, you have to have thought at least to an extent that things could have turned out differently; hence, you were, at least to a degree, surprised; hence, you are NOT all-knowing.
Your answers were very, very good...from a *human* standpoint. I would expect a whole lot more from a God.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by MontanaGuy
JerZ wrote:
Very good points. Also, why kill all of the animals? Were the kangaroos having unclean thoughts or were the elephants committing unnatural acts? Makes no sense to me. And by the way, was this rain coming down as fresh water or salt water? If it was fresh water (rain always is) then the change in the composition of the ocean would have left it uninhabitable after the flood and if it was salt water all of the fresh water creatures would also have died. Did anybody ever think about that one?
Apparently there have been people that have thought about that...
Location: Somewhere along the path to where I'd like to be.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JerZ
Your answers were very, very good...from a *human* standpoint. I would expect a whole lot more from a God.
Then why don't you ask Him?
Seriously.
I mean, you're coming to an internet message board, asking us humans a bunch of questions that we obviously (in your opinion) can't answer. If we try to answer, you don't accept our answers. So why bother asking us to begin with? Is it because you think your questions are going to stump us just enough that it will plant a seed of doubt in our minds about what we believe? Do you think you will somehow trip us up enough that we will abandon our belief in God?
If that is your aim, I got news for you dude - it ain't gonna happen.
I don't ask Him, because I don't believe this is who He really is. I believe this is how an isolated god of the Jewish faith was believed to be, who was then basically stolen by people who came much later, wanted to change a bunch of details they weren't happy about. So they wrote a bunch more books, changing the things that were getting in their way, like foods they'd really like to eat or like not performing circumcision or not wearing certain clothing, and said, "This is the SAME God! Except with all these changes. And guess what! The Jews can't have Him for their own anymore. Now He accepts all of us...because we're the ones who wrote that he does. And guess what else? Now this god of the Jews isn't even accepting the Jews themselves anymore, because they don't believe in our added-on person. Ta-da!"
But I'm the blasphemer.
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) then the change in the composition of the ocean would have left it uninhabitable after the flood and if it was salt water all of the fresh water creatures would also have died. Did anybody ever think about that one?
