Did God know we would create plastic or does that fall under free will?

Question

Plastic saves lives. If God knew about plastic why didn't he put plastic in mines so we could dig it out and use it instead of having to invent it?

Answer 1

You're confusing foreknowledge with causation. Of course He knew we would invent it. But it was still invented through human ingenuity and choice.

God told Adam and Eve to have dominion over the earth; He also put them in the Garden of Eden to "dress it and keep it." That was before the Fall, when nature was still perfect. Yet Adam and Eve were to manage it, to change it, to learn about it and use it (not abuse it).

He intends for us to be creative, to learn about His creation and to do creative things with it. I am quoting loosely, but the Bible says that it is the glory of God to conceal a thing and the glory of kings to find it out. He intends for us to study His creation.

He has basically put our destinies in our hands. He intervenes sometimes, such as when He drowned most people in the Flood, to preserve humanity.

Look at it: He has put the most important thing--evangelism--in the hands of humans! If we don't do it, it doesn't get done, with tragic consequences for millions. He has given us all the tools we need, including His own Holy Spirit to indwell us; but if we are selfish and lazy (and we are), then His work goes undone. (BTW, He has also put a witness in nature such that all are without excuse, even those who have no one to tell them about Him--see Romans 1.)

Answer 2

God knows everything that has happened, and everything that will happen. He knew that plastic would be invented, but he does not interfere. You could ask this question about anything that has improved our lives. Computers, assembly lines, antibiotics, etc. have all improved our lives. In God's infinite wisdom, he knows our levels of capability and maturity, and what we can handle at the time. If antibiotics had been introduced 2000 years ago, the population of the earth would quickly have outgrown the ability to produce food, and the ensuing deaths would have been much worse than the few deaths caused by illness. If God had introduced all the modern inventions and processes we have now, 2000 or 3000 years ago, the people of that time would not have had the ability to deal with all the changes at once. We are growing in our knowledge and abilities as a race at an incredible pace, but can you imagine putting a computer and an automobile in front of Moses? He would not have been able to fathom what to do with them.

Answer 3

I don't think it is a far stretch to say that God gave wisdom to Alexander Parkes who first invented plastic and demonstrated it in 1862.
At the time it was called Parkesine.

However I am not sure how plastic saves people that could not have been saved through another means.

I have a heart valve and it is a titanium valve, no plastic.

I give real credit to John Heysham Gibbon.
The first heart-lung machine was built by physician, John Heysham Gibbon in 1937 who also performed the first human open heart operation.
Who is to say that God did not inspire him to invent this machine.

I have friends who have had a triple by-bass and they did not use plastic arteries, they used sections of arteries from out of the leg.

My wife has a replacement knee made of titanium.

Plastic was not important for life, but it has made life nicer.

grace2u

Answer 4

Both. God know what choices we will make before we make them. In God's infinite wisdom and kindess, he knew that the happiness we would have from inventing plastic would outweigh any of the negatives, especially how mining plastic would not have made that scene in the Graduate nearly as memorable.

Answer 5

Lol I dont know..He must of known we would have invented it. If thats like that with plastic why not have just put computers for us in mimes? lol it doesnt all work like that. God knew we were invent knew things from the beginning.

Answer 6

Call free will anything you like, just don't call it an ability to look to God for salvation. He's the one that needs to come to us in spite of ourselves. Yes, God would have known about the plastic, but making that stuff doesn't save anyone in the eternal sense.

Answer 7

Not only did He know it, He knew you would ask the question and I would answer. Come now, if God just handed all things to us, what would our scientific minds do all day. God gave us mystery's to find and discover. You see He is the Great Scientist.

Answer 8

God gave us the power to create, plus the raw materials.

Answer 9

1. God knows all
2. You got to be kidding me.

Answer 10

I think he loves "cheap sunglasses".



good luck & blessing