If you truly loved someone would you let them be born knowing they would go to hell?
The free will cop out doesn't work because he is all knowing and knows what your choice will be! If he truely loved all people than he should only let those be born that he knows will choose his way and end up in heaven, not an everlasting fire!
Or maybe he isn't all knowing OR all loving after all...
2006-10-30 15:19:50 · 25 answers · asked by Mars Hall 3 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
Any parent or lover knows this: love is chosen. You cannot,
in the end, force anyone to love you.
So if you are writing a story where love is the meaning, where love is the highest and best of all, where love is the point, then you have to allow each person a choice. You have to allow freedom. You cannot force love. God gives us the dignity of freedom, to choose for or against him (and friends, to ignore him is to choose against him).
This is the reason for what C.S. Lewis called the Problem of Pain. Why would a kind and loving God create a world where evil is possible? Doesn’t he care about our happiness? Isn’t he good? Indeed, he does and he is. He cares so much for our happiness that he endows us with the capacity to love and to be loved, which is the greatest happiness of all.
He endows us with a dignity that is almost unimaginable.
For this creator God is no puppeteer.
“Trust me in this one thing,” God says to us. “I have given the entire earth to you, for your joy. Explore it; awaken it; take care of it for me. And I have given you one another, for love and romance and friendship. You shall be my intimate allies. But on this one matter, you must trust me. Trust that my heart for you is good, that I am withholding this for a reason. Do not eat of the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil . . . or you will die.”
And this is where our Story takes its tragic turn.
(Epic , 52–54)
John Eldredge
2006-10-30 15:24:23 · answer #1 · answered by WindWalker10 5 · 2⤊ 1⤋
If He only allowed people to be born who were going to heaven, what would be the purpose of being born at all? Why not just create us already in heaven? Why put us through 50 or 70 or 90 years of suffering on earth for no reason, before allowing us to go where everyone would be going anyway? Would that be loving?
God creates every individual with the freedom to choose eternal life, or reject it. That is His incredible gift of love to us, and that is the purpose of earthly life. The fact that He exists outside of time, and therefore has seen our choices, doesn't make those choices any less free.
2006-10-31 00:00:58 · answer #2 · answered by PaulCyp 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
God does know all and see all. But God is love and not hate. God will not send you to hell. Only you can do that. It does not work to blame God for your sins. Satan wants us to think we are so bad we can not go to Heaven, Satan wants us to think there is no heaven or hell . If we believe the Deail then we can sin all we want . then we will just die. The truth is the Lord loves you and always will. The only way to heaven is by Jesus our savior. Man will not let you forget what you have done. But if yoi repent God will no longer see anything you have done. You will be white as snow. the lord is so sad when you betieve the lyes of the devil. But the day you give your life to the Father in Heaven the angels in Heaven will sing and dance and shout Glorey glorey to yjr Father. So remmber it does not make a differance what you are doing or what you have done. you need noy hate the Lord becaues the Lord loves you. And only you can send you to hell.
2006-10-30 23:39:29 · answer #3 · answered by ldp999000 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Hang on, you're looking at this as us somehow deserving Heaven. God doesn't owe us eternal life! Adam took the whole human race down, and we are nothing but dirty rags before His glory.
That means you're right, though, God doesn't have to love everyone. Yet for some reason, from before the beginning of time, He chose His own to enter into a relationship with. He saved them through the death on the cross of His Son, Jesus Christ. And He will hold His own in the palm of His hand, forever.
This should answer each of your questions: all knowing yes, all loving, not the way Calvinists interpret it. He truly loves the ones He predestined, and they enjoy a wonderful relationship with Him.
2006-11-03 22:14:14 · answer #4 · answered by ccrider 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
OR ... maybe we're not born knowing we'll go to hell. Something (or someone) is giving you a signal that this doesn't make sense. Investigate, pray and meditate and, no doubt, the answer will be made clear. Hell is not a place, but rather distance from God. God does not desire for any of His creatures to be far from Him, but some of His creatures choose that path.
www.bahai.org
2006-10-31 03:14:40 · answer #5 · answered by Linell 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
God desire is that no one goes to hell. Hell was created for Satan and his falling angels. I know that many people confess that they do not want God in their lives and that is why we have suffering. It sounds cruel but not when it comes to our salvation. I believe that even in our last moment on earth if one was to ask Jesus into their life, they will be saved. God didn't make it hard to have salvation, just asking .... that's all. It take one minute of our time. He is so accessible. Do you think that a judge shouldn't let anyone go to jail? it's a just thing to do. The punishment fits the crime.
2006-10-30 23:28:40 · answer #6 · answered by ckrug 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
To give us a life we choose. Free will of mankind. He doensn't make people go to hell it's the individuals fault. Just because God knows what is going to happen to a person doens't mean they shouldn't live at all. This question question comes up a lot. Why would you care?
2006-10-30 23:22:27 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
You are beginning to understand; no such monstrous extremity could exist. God knows we have not been "born", but live forever within the perfect heart of God. The truth of us lives, is not born, and cannot die. There is no weak and enraged deity; these are tales told to keep the peasants in line.
There is only God, and everything God and Its creation (us) creates.
2006-10-31 06:08:02 · answer #8 · answered by Sky in the Grass 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
You aren't born knowing anything. You learn from what's around you. It doesn't mean it's true though. Make your own choices and decisions. Religion was created by people. No one knows anything. Start from their and decide how you want to live your life. Believe as you choose, not as others wish you to.
2006-10-30 23:27:49 · answer #9 · answered by quietwater 4 · 1⤊ 0⤋
The God of the Old Testament is jealous and sadistic, not loving. The God of the New Testament is supposedly loving but not jealous. You can't have both because they are contradictory.
2006-10-30 23:28:19 · answer #10 · answered by Cinnamon 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋