Can a christian explain this?

Question

I should know better than to ask christians about logic, buuuuut...

According to christians, god is omniscient (all knowing), omnipotent (all powerful), and infallible (doesn't err)

Since god is all of those things, he would have known, before creation, the destiny of all people for all time. Therefore:

1) No one has free will because god made you the way you are, knowing full well the outcome of your life.
2) god made people with the intent of making them suffer, when he could have done otherwise.
3) god made Hitler, Stalin, and every mass murderer in all of history.

So, given that information, is god not omnipotent, not omnicient and not infallible? Or is god intentionally cruel to people without cause, by condemning a selection of people from the moment of creation?

The best answer without invoking a cop out will get the prize.
Cop outs include:
We can't know god's will
We wouldn't know good without evil
god doesn't control free will (thus isn't omniscient)

No one is up to the challenge? I am disappointed. I was hoping someone would have some kind of insight. I will give the prize to the funniest athiestic answer, if no one even tries.

Freewill proponents are automatically disqualified. Reread the question.

Victor V, wow... quite a bit of hate and defensiveness blossoming from your christian soul. I don't consider it an insult to christians by saying they disregard logic, because they do. That is a fact, Jack, because logic has rules that can't be bent or broken (unlike the bible)

I never said christians are stupid. I will say that they are always misled, often hypocritical, and seldom logical. It is not logical to accept something as fact without evidence.

Answer 1

It's questions like this that got me kicked out of sunday school

Answer 2

People sometimes imagine that God is micromanaging the world. If that were the case we could wonder why he makes all of this bad stuff happen. However we do know from scripture that God established natural laws to govern the way the world works. That is why we can have science and know about consistent physical phenomena. God knows all of our futures and in the grand scheme, everything will work out for good. However one of the natural laws he created is that combining a male and female sex cell is going to make a child. God does not have a little microscope where he puts the two together and then implants them in the womb. He lets the world run its course. People have sex, babies are born. Some times they grow up to be bad people. Every single person has the free will to choose to be on God's side or the enemy's. Even though God knows what we will choose, he still lets nature run its course. IF GOD ONLY PICKED PEOPLE WHO WOULD CHOOSE HIM TO BE BORN THEN THERE WOULD BE NO FREE CHOICE. This is because, what other option would there be? The fact that he still allows dissenters into this world, truly shows that God values our freedom to choose. Just because he knows the end from the beginning, does not take that away.
If you are talking about suffering and why does bad stuff happen, that is due to sin which has entered the world. God still has his natural laws working, but even they have been tainted by sin. Children are born with deformities, tidal waves smash into beaches and sweep people into the ocean, and the list goes on and on about natural things that make bad stuff happen. Sometimes God causes natural events to happen that take people's lives. I have to trust that He knows best in those cases. Other times, they are directly caused by Satan. But usually God is often holding back the winds of strife and protecting mankind from Satan's evil wishes, and yet he still gets blamed for everything else as well. This world is not perfect. It is not as it was originally created. That is why we work to alleviate human suffering and wait for the day when he will make everything new.

Answer 3

Maybe you shouldn't ask christians about logic, because if you get a logical answer you may not be able to comprehend it.

1) He gave us free will to choose our own outcome in life. Just because He knows what it will be doesn't change that (He is all knowing).
2)Yeah, what are your sources for that one. The bible teaches us to return evil with good, and Jesus suffered so others do not.
3)God made people and this maybe to much all at once, but they have free will to do as they wished.

So, given that information, GOD is what He says He is and people like me and you can be the hitlers and the spurgeons of the world.

Answer 4

I wrote a longer answer but decided to revise my answer because:
1. You assume "Christians" are stupid and in a sense I guess we are...you asked serious questions and Christians try to answer them in a way that would make sense to a non-christian and that is the same as the definition of insanity..repeating the same task hoping for a different out come..but in fact you can't make a non- believer believe and there in lies the error.
2. If the truth were to be presented to you, you wouldn't accept it because you have no knowledge with which to compare it. You only have the milk and bread aspects of Christianity.
3. You have made false assumptions and then made the assumptions as a bases for rejecting the answer. So actually you have answered your questions already and pre-rejected any other.
Example" "we can't know Gods will"...Gods will is thru -out the Bible..of course we know Gods will....We know certain aspects of Gods charactor..but we do not know the complete godhead.
For me though..if we are to live a Christian life then one must assume the position of a clay pot....the pot does not ask the potter why he made him like he did... enjoy being the pot and all that god puts in you. And don't over analyze everything.

Answer 5

The end is not here yet. Have you ever seen a movie that seems like it was just tragic, bad things happening to the hero, and it looked like the final outcome would be more of the same, and somehow, someway, it ended up with a happy ending? We do not know the future, but God does. So how can you be so sure that all will not be well in the end? I think that God has more faith in us than you do.

Second: We are created in God own image, this means that we have the ability to create a positive outcome to our situation as human beings.

You have asked me not to use the F word to discuss our ability to choose, so this is the best I can do with two hands ties behind my back.

Answer 6

God is omnipotent, omnicient and infallible. He gave us free will. He doesn't force us to follow him, we do that on his own. He is all loving. If he wasn't, then you wouldn't be criticizing him, you wouldn't have that free will to do so. Humans have the free will to be evil, and it hurts God when we are.

There is also the Devil. He wants humans to be evil, to fall away from God. Nothing pleases the Devil more then to see people turn their backs on God. For every good that God brings in this world, the Devil works to erase it. Sometimes, his influence is stronger, thus making people like Hitler and Stalin.

Because God has given us free will (and yes, he knows what we'll do) he has also promised to not interfer. that's why you think there is so much evil in the world, God isn't allowed by his own word to force us to do good. Our minds are more scientifically tuned that we almost always tell ourselves that a miracle is easily explained. I've asked a few questions about miracles, and I am always told that it's a coincidense or luck.

In a world that doesn't want to believe in God, it's easy to say that all bad means he doesn't exist. I think it proves he does. If loving God was supposed to be easy, it wouldn't be worth it. It's easier to say "if I can't touch it, it doesn't exist" then it is to say, "I believe even though I can't touch or see it"

Answer 7

I sure don't know it all, but as near as I can figure- The one thing that separates us from animals is that humans have free CHOICE. We can choose do to good or evil- act bad or good- we can even choose to reject or accept God. When God made the men you mentioned, he did't make them evil- somewhere along the line they were influenced and became what they were. Look at how many people who were once evil, living immoral and evil lives, then accepted Jesus, and now live good lives- not perfect, but following Jesus as best they can.
We do have a free will and when we choose to do evil, God will not stop us- thats why we have murders and rapist, etc. THis world is evil because of the choices of men.
Remember: Foreknowledge does not equal predestination. Just because He knows something is going to happen, doesn't make it happen.

Answer 8

You do err not knowing the scriptures. You speak as a fool. You have taken your own reasoning to try to explain God and His ways. First of all it was not God's fault man choose sin in the garden. satan seduced Eve and Adam chose sin deliberately. They both knew the commandments and they both chose to believe a lie just as you are doing now. We bring the evil upon ourselves when we believe lies from satan or anyone. The commandment still stands today God says chose me but you have chose death. Why will you die? Why will you believe a lie and be damned? Believe God and Live forever more. Jesus said I am the way the truth and the life!!!! Choose Life you will be glad you did!!!!!!!!! Praise Him He is worthy of all Praise!!!! He sitts on the Throne of His majesty and rules the heavens and the earth and all things that are therein. Let Him rule you. He won't make you. You have freedom of choice. What will you choose? Life or Death. Life is in the power of the tongue!!!!

Answer 9

1.You still make your own choices.Being omniscient and controling free will are two totaly different things. For example, you can know that someone will do something, but you didn't force it to happen or make it happen. 2.God allows suffering to strengthen us and get us closer to Him.
Romans 8:28 "and we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, who have been called according to His purpose." I have been through a lot of hard tragedies. To name one, I was abused as a kid and was adopted. That's how I met my adoptive family. 3. It goes to the free will thing. God loves us so much that He wants us to have a choice in life, not do everything against our will.

Answer 10

God did know in advance if a person would choose Jesus and go to heaven, that didn't take the choice away from the individual.Everyone has the chance to do right or wrong. Because of bad choices many people suffer on earth.

Answer 11

The honest answer, as one of the True Christian Faith, is: No one can answer that question.
man has been trying for at least 6,000 yrs... or more, depending on your view of Creation.... knowing the answer to this is, fortunatly, not a requirement for anyone's Salvation... I personaly do not get too concerned over it. There are much more important things to concider in ones relationship with God..