God knows whats going to happen before it happens, so why does he give life to someone he knows is.....?

Question

.....destined for hell? I'm a christian and I believe that while God gives us free will he still knows whats going to happen. But I was thinking about something today. Sense he knows whats going to happen, why does he create something that he knows is destined for hell? I'm not meaning all that he creates is, but some are. I know nobody will know this answer for sure because thats impossible, I'm just looking for opinions. Thanks!

Answer 1

The supposition of God's omniscience was one of the issues which perplexed me from a young age. To my young self, this confounded the issue of free will. If God knew everything from the moment of creation to the end of eternity, this seemed to me to indicate that the choices had already been made for me, that everything I did was preordained. In the Urantia Book, we find answers that seem to indicate that my worries were unwarranted.

Omniscience means that God has complete knowledge of everything – past, present and future – or does it? The simple answer is that being omniscient means God knows all that is possible in principle to know – what is actual as actual, probable as probable, and what is possible as possible. This of course would mean he doesn't know the future because it is impossible in principle to know something that has not yet happened.

In studying the Urantia Book we find that there is a more complex and complete answer. To break down this issue we have to understand that there are certain levels to reality that have been deliberately delineated to suit the Universal Father's purposes. At the top we have the existential level. This is the level that has no beginning, no ending, has always existed and will always exist. There is neither time nor space on this level. It simply is. The Trinity personalities (Universal Father, Eternal Son, Infinite Spirit) exist on this level. At the bottom we have the experiential level. This is the level in which we currently live, where time and space serve to limit our existence by providing a linear learning experience.

Because of the limitations inherent in each of these levels, limitations which God himself created, God's knowledge is also therefore limited. On the existential level, God is omniscient with regard to existential and experiential actuals and experiential potentials. This means that he knows what does exist already because it is has always existed (existential actual) or because it has already happened (experiential actual) and he also knows what might happen (experiential potential). On the experiential level, God is omniscient with regard to experiential actuals and experiential potentials. He knows everything that has already happened and what might happen. By these explanations we can see that neither our free will nor God's omniscience have been transgressed when we view them both in the proper context.

The only caveat I will add to this is as follows. The Universal Father possesses an infinite deity intelligence. I suspect that possessing such an intelligence would allow him to examine the possibilities for any particular event and subsequently make a determination of the probable outcome such that the probability would approach 100 percent. Having said that, I'm also positive that because we possess the gift of free will given to us by the Universal Father, we can and do prevent that probability from reaching 100 percent.

Answer 2

The christian answer: because he hopes you will make the right decisions and go up instead of down. Since he gave you the gift of free will, this is possible.
The atheist/agnostic answer: because it's all a bunch of bunk. There is no god, heaven, hell, or destiny.

This is a variation on the classic problem with the opposing ideas of an omnipotent deity and free will in the christian religions. Since god knows everything, including the future, he knows what you will do every second of your life until you die. However, he gave you the gift of free will, so you can decide to do whatever you want. But god knows what you will choose to do, so there was really no choice involved. It is an irreconcilable question, it just comes down to what you believe.

Answer 3

Simply it is free will. A person is not destined for hell. Maybe circumstances cause that person to reject Christ. In fact, it may not be simply rejecting Christ. We all have free will and when abused it can impact others. Think about a Christian who does something horrible which causes someone to doubt christ. Think about a child who is abused and that caused the child to reject Christ rather than cling to Christ. The abuser also had free will. Life, I guess, is like one of the DVD's with alternate endings. I know that was corny....c'mon...just a thought. There are many alternate endings and our free will determines which ending will be ours. God allows us that choice. People only have a problem with free will if it leads to pain or hell. But we sure love it when it works to our benefit. Free will is just that....free and anything can happen.

Answer 4

Your question just suggests to me that there is no God. It says an awful lot about this God if he knowingly lets bad things happen to good people or just stands by and lets someone do something bad. People do good things, people do bad things. Most of us do a combination of both. We'd have to go through some kind of celestial checkout when we die where it's all added up.

Secondly, why would a loving god let someone do something that condemns them to suffer dreadfully in hell forever?If this god exists then he's not the loving, forgiving god people speak about but something altogether different. In fact, I wish to make a complaint. Who is god's complaints officer?

Answer 5

If there's a god, that created this complete universe, understanding precisely what would happen, and the innovations each and every persons would make at any component, then each and every thing we do is the alternative of that god, no longer us. That god would have created the universe in a various way, so as that our options would have been diverse as a results of fact we could have been inspired with the aid of diverse circumstances. To then postulate that this form of god would punish some and reward others for performing precisely the way he/she/it knew we would act whilst he/she/it created us, is to thoroughly negate any concept of justice in the device. in my view, i'm particularly happy that it relatively is all purely mythology. Evil fascist overlords at the instant are not possibly my cup of tea.

Answer 6

I can liken it to a computer program that plays chess.

after the first move the program calculates all possible moves to where it wins the game, then makes its move.
you move then it recalculates all possible moves to where it wins the game and makes its move
then you move.
and so on each time it recalculates to see the end.

God does not know what choice you are going to make you have free will but after your choice he can see your end as of that moment. over the course of a lifetime he can see you swing from going to hell to entering heaven.

Now because of something called human nature, generally one headed for hell will continue making choices that take them in that direction. sometimes God places an object in the way of a sinner, that may cause him to make different choices.

Answer 7

Whats more important, being able to make the choices you make, being able to learn from them, and grow, or the actual choice you make?

God gives them all the info they need, and the same oppotunity the rest of us have, to accept or reject it. On their own, as adults will all the info they need, they choose.

Who does it hurt worse. Dont you think it probably hurts God to be rejected, hurt him to know Jesus would be rejected, tormented, tortured, riducled and persecuted just to give them a choice. And yet, he gave it, gives the chance everyday for them to choose or reject. Why create it? To give it the opportunity to make the choice.

Side note, Im not sure about pre-destination, but I am a Christian.

Answer 8

As an opportunity for the rest of humanity to seek strength in God through the suffering that those "hell bound" persons bring on the world (and by "hell bound" I refer to people like Hitler and Sadam et al.) Also as a way for humanity to come together to help those injured by the "hell bound".

No one knows, but that is just my opinion.

Answer 9

You answered your own question. free will, everyone has the choice to follow Jesus or not. Even those who turn out not to choose Him at one point had the choice. If we did not see evil for how evil it really is then what would stop it from coming back after Jesus destroys sin and sinners in Hell?

Answer 10

Paul speculated on this in chapter 9 of his letter to the Romans. It appears that God knows that condemning certain beings to hell (like Satan, or the Pharaoh who opposed Moses) somehow serves the greater good.