If the christian God is omniscient...?

Question

then he already knows who we are and where we are going to end up. Thats not free will.

Question is how does this work?

lol, sorry hand, it doesnt work that way.

I'm not bashing, thats not what this is for. I just want answers.

Answer 1

The Catechism of the Catholic Church states:

+ The Almighty +

Of all the divine attributes, only God's omnipotence is named in the Creed: to confess this power has great bearing on our lives.

We believe that his might is universal, for God who created everything also rules everything and can do everything. God's power is loving,

http://www.nccbuscc.org/catechism/text/pt1sect2chpt1art1p3.htm

+ Free Will +

God created man a rational being, conferring on him the dignity of a person who can initiate and control his own actions.

"God willed that man should be 'left in the hand of his own counsel,' so that he might of his own accord seek his Creator and freely attain his full and blessed perfection by cleaving to him."

http://www.nccbuscc.org/catechism/text/pt3sect1chpt1art3.htm

+ Example +

I have a small child, I know and love this child with all my heart and mind. This child looks at a cookie on the table. I know this child well enough that I know she will take the cookie. The child takes the cookie. Does the child have free will or did I force the child to take the cookie?

God loves and knows us infinitely more than I know that child. Is it not reasonable that God knows what we will do and still not force our actions?

+ With love in Christ.

Answer 2

Ah, the real question is how can there be free will apart from God?

Assume a humanistic and scientific understanding of the universe for a moment... If the universe is closed (i.e. free from outside intervention), it is merely a series of causes and effects that cannot be stopped or deviated from. The fact that I am writing this response can be traced back to the fact that it is friday and don't have much work to do. That can in turn be traced back (simplistically) to the career choice I made ten years ago, which itself was caused by an odd series of events in my family, which happened because my parents hooked up, which occurred because they were both born in america and went to the same high school......and on and on it goes.

I know this doesn't answer your specific question, but the idea of a closed, rational and scientific universe yields that antithesis of free will.

Answer 3

God, being Omniscient, Omnipotent, and Omnipresent, knows ahead of time that people are being created to burn in hell. He creates them anyway because they don't know where they are headed and he wants them to utilize their free will in order to condemn themselves. That way it isn't his fault that they end up in hell.

Of course they didn't get any free will options when it comes to being created, in the first place.

Free will is the christian excuse for hell, hell exists because of human's free will. They, unfortunately ignore the fact that hell wouldn't have to exist if God would destroy Satan and evil and come down and chat with everyone. Of course the argument against that is that there would be no more free will.

I for one am more than willing to give up free will, for a chance at eternal happiness.

Answer 4

God exists outside of time and space as we know it,He is not restricted in any way as we are,and so it is very difficult for us to comprehend the mystery of God,but He sees all of history from beginning to end at one glance,and this does not mean that we are without our free will choices.
God has given us all we need to know to live as we should and to make the right choices and if we decide otherwise then we are disregarding the knowledge and wisdom of a being infinitly superior to ourselves in every way,this is what theologians would call foolish.

Answer 5

Can you hear the thunk, thunk whaaa. Of Christian brains spinning trying to fathom out how to argue there way out of another biblical paradox.

At least in Mohammed's best seller he says that Allah creates people especially for hell,

Maybe God should have commissioned him to write the bible.
But you know how we Jews are , always doing it on the cheap, that's why there are so many contradictions in it.

Answer 6

What does one have to do with the other?

He knows before hand, but that does not mean the He makes you choose the things you choose. He is omniscient, that means that he knows exactly how you will choose but He is not telling you that you have to choose that way.

Answer 7

He does know our life path and on that path there are several place where we have choices that lead to other paths he gives us the free will to make the decisions and path we deceide to, no the one he would like for us to choose. He is God everyone.

Answer 8

What I've always wondered is, if God is all knowing and not bound by time, then why did he create Satan when he knew Satan would turn against him, create hell, and tempt humankind into evil.

Answer 9

Because God has the ability to peek into the future,does not negate the truth that we have free will.

Answer 10

There is no "Christian God". There is only God. It is incorrect to say that God knows our choices "before we make them", because God exists outside of time, therefore such terms as "before" and "after" have no relevance to Him. God sees the fullness of time continuously, in its completeness, not linearly as we experience time. We see some things before others. God simply sees all things, from all eternity to all eternity. Therefore He sees you making your choices of free will. He sees the choices of every human being who will ever live. Therefore, since He sees your choices, He knows them, but He does not preordain them. His observation of your choices doesn't make them any less free, any more than my observation of your choices would make them any less free. The only difference is that I would have to observe your choices in time, while He observes them from eternity.