If God knows that people will go to hell based on weather they believe in him or not,...?

Question

why doesn’t he provide some good evidence of his existence?

Is he playing some kind of sick game or something? Christians believe in a God that has created a Hell (or at least permits its existence) where non-believers will go. Yet you’ve seen from the Atheists Q&A’s here that AT BEST, the evidence is shaky for God’s existence (let alone the fact that there is no good evidence that points to any particular religion).

They believe in a God that allows billions to be forever tormented in Hell simply they were born into the wrong culture that shaped their world view that told them it is the Hindu, Muslim, or other Gods that are real.

What kink of God is this? Certainly not a loving one.

If you answer "that's what faith is for," do you really think it's good to play around with something that serious?

Awsome point me, myself, and I!

Oops, I ment "what kind of God is this."

And most of the believers really don't seem to get the point.

And yes, I have read at least most of the Bible (it gets more absurd, and horrible to me the more I read of it). If you really want to know about my religious background, you may check out my blog:

http://blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-SjeD720mcaqNrEHDE3flF3Q-?cq=1&p=3

Fenix E - People only "reject God" by not being convinced that he exists.

mzenner3 - and God appeared to Thomas to prove to him that he existed (pretty good evidence).

Cristofe - all the things you say prove your God exists would also prove the existence of many other gods.

Jenna S
Gunilla
Easy Writer
You guys have written some interesting/thoughtful stuff - Thank you. I want to take the time to write back to each of you. Unfortunatly, I have to go to work right now and I'm working long days. I will respond as soon as I can. But to let you know for now... I have sought God as sincerly as I could. Please check out the blog I've just started on my 360 page.

Jenna S

I can think of lots of ways God could convince me or his validity... Crosses appearing in my house would probably do it; Him speaking to me or appearing to me would do it (as he did to Moses, Thomas, or so many others throughout the Bible). I was asked this question some time ago by another Y-answerer, I told them I was thinking of 3 books and it would be child's play for God to let a believer know what those 3 books are and email me (2nd hint for God: I'm thinking of 3 books - they are NOT The Bible, The Koran, and The Book of Mormon). I would be open to God opening my heart to him after prayer (I have asked him to do that many times).

The miraculous could happen and it would not have to be mundane: in modern times (with video equipment and cameras), God could make stars move into the form of a cross, for say 40 days and nights, then have them move back again.

As for other things that people have claimed are miracles, you are right... I do not find them convincing.

cont... just as you do not find the miracles of Sai Babba very convincing (I'm sure the pre-scientific people of 2000 years ago would have found him to be a diety).

You do make an interesting point in that it is the people who want to believe that will believe. Myself, I want to KNOW what is true, and not delude myself.


Gunilla: That is a common mispreception of Christians (that if you seek him, you will find him). I have prayed, as sincerly as I knew how, many times for over 30 years, for Jesus to open my heart. Nothing ever happens.


Easy Writer: Yes, I'm a botanist. The scientific viewpoint is much more than "seeing is believing." It is also a view that realizes that we are capable of deluding ourselves and that just because we want to believe something, does not make it true. So you believe in a God that only appears to uncritical, and non-rational people?

And if "faith" is good enough for you, how is your faith any more real then that of a Muslim, Hindu, or acient follower of Zeus, or Thor?

Easy Writer: Thanks for responding again... It shows you are thoughtful about what you are doing.

I would agree with you that if one of the religious books had good prophecies in it, that would be good testment to its validity. However, there is a major problem with the prophecy you mention - it was written after the fact.

I know you believe Jesus said it, but the truth is that the first time his "words" were written down was after the temple came down.

If you are really interested in the validity of Bible Prophecy, I suggest you check out the latest book from Tim Callahan: "Bible Prophecy, Failure or Fulfillment?"

Gunilla: Thanks for writing back.

I actually was attending church for some of that time (I have made many prayers to God and Jesus at many times throughout my life). As for my attitude, I certianlly never saw God as a product. And I read/read the Bible with the attitude of "let me see if God will speak to me/open my heart" - afterall, I certianly want it to happen. I have asked the Holy Spirit to guide me. As for being a "God honoring man" I was respectful as I knew how to be, but I was never convinced of his reality (In fact, I had nothing to lead me that way except peoples opinions about various Gods - Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Mormons, etc.).

I'm not looking for control; I just want to know if God exists, and if so, which God. If I knew there was a God, I hope I would be the most humble servent.

But don't you see how this relates to the original question? You are saying, well, if you lived this right way, and said your prayers the right way, then you can find God.

But why would God play such games? Why, wouldn't he give some inspiration to those who seek him? Do you honestly believe in this God that will send me to Hell because I sincerly sought him and never found him?

That was the point of the question. Read what the 3rd responder (Nicky) wrote. Why doesn't God talk to the non-believers or those who do not know?

Answer 1

It is His promise that when you seek Him you will find Him. Study His Word, He will communicate with you. He is loving God but He is going to carry out His plan. We have a big freedom, but that comes with a big responsibility.

Edit: Believe me that I know what you are talking about. God felt very distant for me too. When I started to realize that I cannot think of God as "a product" which could do something for me, I took a step closer to God. We need to have the attitude of a servant. I do not know about your prayer life at that time, I do not know if you actually attended the church and what kind of teaching you got, I do not know how much you studied the Bible with the attitude that the Bible was actually God talking to you, I do not know if you ever asked the Holy Spirit to guide you, I do not know if you led the life of God honoring man, I do not know many things about you.

Intimacy with God is possible only if you submit to Him. You cannot have both control and intimacy with Him. I am so sorry for the connection problems with our Lord, but it is His promise that He will reveal Himself to us when we seek Him with whole heart. What about if you prayed " Dear Father God, talk to me, your servant is listening".

Edit.
I am confident that God will not send you to hell if you sincerelly seek Him and He is still hiding. We are going to be judged by how much information we had and how we carried out His plan for us = how much we helped each other. When you are living a honorable life and help others, you are doing what God wants you to so. He knows you and He does not want to lose anyone.

God is not playing any games. He did not promise an easy life. Jesus came down here to show us that He knows how it is in here. He is going to be our Mediator in God's kingdom.
It is a different to pray some prayers than to have a personal relationship with God and have a prayer life.Many times we ask God to answer to us, and then we do not recognize His answer because maybe we wanted a specific thing and He gave an answer that we did not expect.

We have different seasons in our life, and I cannot answer why He is hiding from your life. I do not know if there is something in your life that is hindering your relatiosnhip with Him. Maybe you have a sin issue in your life that He wants you to solve, maybe He needs you not to see Him know for the later purpose, maybe He has a big plan for you and the timing is not right right now, maybe He is alrady directing you to a direction that you are not wanting to go. He is patient with you. He can take your doubt, it is harder for yourself. I can clearly see that you are a good person and you are honesty seeking the truth. He will have a job for you, maybe it is something very big, maybe something that you want to escape from it. Listen. You do not want to end up in a whale's tummy ; )

Answer 2

Well, the thing is what evidence would you accept? If God whispered in your ear tonight, would you believe it was God or that you were hallucinating? If crosses suddenly appeared all over your house: God or act of the neighborhood kids? So much 'evidence' could be explained away through trickery or hallucinations. As far as I can see there are 2 ways for God to prove himself to humanity.

1. The way we prove scientific things, through repeatable experiments. This basically means spells though. I say words in a certain way, God does what I want. Which means humanity would control God. If you were all powerful, would trust your power over everything to be in the hands of any random human being?

2. God would be highly visible all the time. Lots of miracles, many smitings, lots of angles wandering the streets. But there are two problems. a) If God shepards us through everything holding our hands like 2 year olds in the shopping mall, what's the point of free will? What's the point in anything? b) If the miraclulous was always around it would become mundane. Okay angles are walking the roads everyday. The first generation to see this thinks "proof of god!" but the generations born after that will see them as just other inhabitants of Earth. After all creatures of flesh and blood evolved and believe in God and that doesn't mean He is real. Why should transluscent beings of spirit be any different?

And remember Adam and Eve supposedly talked directly to God, and still turned away from him. Jesus was God on Earth, people saw miracles performed and didn't believe.

People report seeing angles and other visions currently, do you believe them, or do you cast aside their reports as untrustworthy? The Catholic Church has documented miracles, medical miracles are usually confirmed with doctors, do you believe in them or do you cast them aside as biased? Even medicine has cases where someone recovers for no discernable reason against all odds, the result of prayer or something unknown?

I guess my point is that good evidence in this case is a judgement call. Just as humans can have a greta capacity to believe we can also have a great capacity not to believe. And the more you don't want to believe the more spectacular and intrusive this 'proof' has to be. To the point that proving His exsistence to the enitre world would start to impinge on free will. And again if God forced you to believe in Him, what's the point? How do you ever become your own person if you don't leave your parents house?

And just as a closing note: I spent 13 years in Catholic school and I can definitively say that we do not believe believers in other religions or nonbelievers automatically go to hell. While we believe that our path is the 'straightest' or 'easiest' path to God, we also acknowledge that there are many other paths that will still get you there. Good works are a big part of getting to heaven.

PS sorry, I was reading some of the posts above me and I just wanted to say that you should never stop asking or trying to understand. Free will is a gift from God but so too is intellect. Don't move on from the subject if you're not ready to and don't think your dammed for asking the question. I've never had a teacher/priest/sister that wouldn't debate with me or told me I sinned just for asking.

Answer 3

Well, God does not base where people go simply on believing in him or not. There are so many things which are all accounted for. How can one not allow someone from a poor African nation into heaven when he/she has not even heard of Jesus. And people are given free will, if God were to intervene then he would be taking that away from us. Sure the free will would allow for human error, hence sin, but its still our choice and a gift from God. God does what is necessary and questioning his existence is obviously and simply a matter of faith. this bible quote shows you what Jesus says when he is asked to make God make his power known. Matthew 4:1-11 Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. 6"If you are the Son of God," he said, "throw yourself down. For it is written:
" 'He will command his angels concerning you,
and they will lift you up in their hands,
so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.'[b]"

7Jesus answered him, "It is also written: 'Do not put the Lord your God to the test.'[c]"
So it all boils down to faith, and perhaps you could look into a theology course where this woudl all be explain much better.
<> hope this helps--

Answer 4

Seems that you have been told some erroneous information about God, by someone who does not know God or his attributes, now do you really believe it to be fair to decide that God is unloving on the basis of erronious information. or let me put it to you this way,if you were being judged in a court would you think it a fair judgement, if the judge judged you solely on the basis of the one person against you and refgused to hear any testamony that is in your favour?No, I doubt that you would.
While I agree with you that what you state about being tormented in hell forever would not be fasir,I will explain my reasoning shortly as to why I say that, but first I would like to say that your judgement is wrong, for it is based on an erronious belief.Here's why I say this:
Have you ever seen someone tortured? Hopefully not.Deliberate torture is sickening and abhorrent.What though, of torture inflicted by God? Can you imagine such a thing? Yet, this is exactly what is implied by the teaching of hellfire, an official doctrine in many religions.

Imagine for a moment, the following horrific scene: A person is being roasted on a hot iron plate. In his agony he screams for mercy, but nobody listens. The torture goes on and on,hour after hour, day after day...without a pause!
Whatever crime the victim may have committed, would not your heart go out to him? What of the one who ordered the torture? Coluld he be a loving person? In no way!Love is merciful and shows pity. A loving father may punish his children, but he would never torture them!
Nevertheless, many religions teach that God tortures sinners in an eternal hellfire. This, is claimed, is divine justice. If that is true, who created that terrible place of eternal torment? And who is responsible for the excruciating agonies inflicted there? The answers would seem obvious. If such a place really exists, then God would have to be the creator of it, and he would be the one responsible for what happens there.
Can you accept that? The Bible says:"God is love"(1John4:8)Would a God of love inflict torture that even humans with any measure of decency find revolting?Surely not!
Still many believe that the wicked will go to a fiery hell and be tormented forever.Is this teaching logical? The human lifespan is limited to 70 or 80 years. Even if someone perpetrated extreme wickedness for his whole lifetime, would everlasting torment be a just punishment?No.It would be grossly unjust to torment a man forever for the limited number of sins that he can commit in a lifetime.
Who knows the truth about what hapens after we die?
Only God can reveal this information, and he has done so in his Word the Bible. Here is what the Bible says: "As the beast dies; so the man dies; and they have but one spirit....All are going to the same place. They have all come from the dust, and they are all returning to the dust."(Ecclesiastes3:19,20)There is no mention here of a fiery hell, Humans return to dust--to nonexistence--when they die.

Answer 5

God has offered lots of proof for His lifestyles which entails hanging the abilities of HImself in each and every person in order that the entire global will don't have any excuse to not consider in Him. Romans one million:19-20 Since this query has been replied so generally within the final month you may also desire to study out the leisure by way of the solutions given on YA. You would additionally learn Psalms 19 within the Bible that makes it transparent that God could be very noticeable in construction and there is not any speech or language that does not pay attention Him talk to them by way of His construction. As some distance as Atheists pass - there are not any precise atheists considering that the proof of God is written in them whether or not they decide on to disclaim it or now not. So we come again to the ancient argument that has been round YA for many years - Can an Atheist end up there is not any God? The reply is without doubt NO. So your premise is shaky throughout.

Answer 6

Speaking metaphorically, there are two parents and out of LOVE they create a child, saying these are the rules, and this is the system of rewards and punishments we'll give you depending on your behavior, but you still have free will.
Is it the parents fault the child may have been disobedient? Certainly not! Just because God knew some people would go to Hell, DOES NOT make it his fault. Instead of just complaining and wining, and questioning your God, why don't you stop this absolute NONSENSE, get RIGHT with him, repent, accept the true Lord Jesus, and wait an eternal paradise of love, peace, and immense happiness. Yet you refuse, in your ignorance, to see the truth. Demons are gathered around you, whispering in your ear "Yes, what kind of a God is that? Not loving... He may not even be real..." Your spirit is weak, and your soul faces the eternal agony and suffering of the lake of fire, the pits of Hell. Don't you even tell me you don't care, you WILL when you are being tortured for eternity, stop being so ignorant. You atheists are becoming more pitiful, so ignorant to not believe, placing so easily your soul to damnation. When you get right with God, he'll bless you, love you, and offer you eternal life. God gave us FREE WILL, to oppose him, just like YOU are now. Henceforth, now you say he was not loving to give you this free will.
And by the way, you are contradicting yourself.
You started out saying, why doesn't he provide good evidence of his existance, then said he's not a good God.
If you don't believe in God, KEEP it at that, because the questions of whether or not he is good is no longer relevant due to your lack of belief. It fascinates me hearing the story of atheists who died and came back in a hospital, describing the pits of Hell. You should be trembling in fear, but wow, what a LOVING God to give you this free will, and you abuse it. God's existance contains great proof and is very obvious,
look at how many historical documents there are such as the Bible (there's proof right there but then you decide to go to Hell instead of reading a single verse), also are you ignoring people who have talked to God? Ignoring near death experiences thousands of people have whether to Hell or Heaven? You cannot deny the existance of the Lord thy God anymore than you can deny yourself. That is why you cannot just say he isnt real and keep it at that- because you know that is not the truth. You have a soul, henceforth, how can you convince yourself that he's not real?
Remove this blindfold from your heart and eyes. See the truth of God. You MUST repent if you desire eternal life, you must accept Jesus, and tell God you're sorry for such complaints against him. I don't care what you believe, for I know the truth, nor would I lie before God. But you know what? God once talked to ME. He showed me his love for me. I cannot begin to describe to how uttermost loving he truly is.

Answer 7

I've pondered this very point myself. Someone told me of the thousands of people in Africa and stuff that have never even HEARD the name Jesus or know of the christian God. When I heard this, I thought it was really bogus. Why would God send people to hell who have never even known his name? If no one ever enlightened them on the fact that there is a "holy man" named Jesus, and that all his teachings are in a book called the Bible, are those people condemned to hell? That's pretty sick if you ask me. I'm not bashing on anyone, mind you, but it is the subjects like this that remind me more and more of why I'm not part of any established religion. Ciao!

Answer 8

Well, very interesting post. It raises some avoided issues. I'll address them.

Don't be miseld, God created hell as a punishment for Satan and the demons. "They smoke will rise for eternity from hell as a pleasing aroma for the Lord" is what hell is for. God is pleased with hell. It is not some unfortunate side effect that he messed up on.

People are evil, they deserve destruction. You can observe this by the colussal amount of time they spend destroying eachother.

God allowed humanity to fall, he didn't mess up on that either. He left us to make our choice, and we choose evil. Evil is essentially rejecting God, humanity has rejected God over and over again.

God planned to redeem those who would be redeemed, he planned this as well. In the bible it calls Jesus Christ "the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world" meaning, the plan was always to redeem humanity.

So God planned to do these things. I'm not going to explain his reasoning, I'm only glad that he has chosen to love me and redeem me. This is the Good News we've preached for two thousand years, that God has chosen to save a few. It's very good news.

Oh, and SodaJerk50, hell is largely considered to exist outside of time. With this is mind it is already in existence and there are souls there that have not yet been born yet. Our perception of hell being made in the last few chapters of revelation could be considered erroneous because it is only at that point in time that time and eternity meet with eachother and it is considered created. I could be wrong, though. However, Jesus Makes it very clear throughout the Gospels. Hell is forever. Eternal punishment after having rejected eternal life. The oblivion theory goes against the authority of the scriptures, as unfortunate as that may be for our public image.

Answer 9

Gee, how does one answer a question like this? You're a botanist, right? So naturally you're going to approach anything on this subject from the standpoint of the scientist's microscope and frame of mind that "seeing is believing". As far as faith is concerned, that is just too simple an answer for your scientific mind to get around and comprehend. Ironic isn't it? For all of your education and knowledge as a trained scientist, yet you've lost eternity because you just can't get comprehending so simple a matter as a five letter word. I certainly won't presume to instruct a learned man of earthly knowledge such as yourself. How dare I?

Answer 10

Free will.
That's what he gave mankind; the ability to love, kill, hate, and destroy. Free will determines whether or not you accept him into your heart as your Lord and Savior. There are countless of times in the bible that Christ takes the "late arrivals" or the ones who ask for forgiveness on their death beds. He doesn't care when you do it,just that you do it.
As far as your proof, look around. The Earth is situated in a PERFECT spot for life, any other planet near us, is either, too hot, or too cold.
Secondly, those who claim the "big bang" created the earth, who started the the big bang? How is it possible that we are created from millions of sperm and one egg, and once that egg is fertilized, the "new creation" has all the genetic coding it needs to become a human being?
I could go on and on, but what's the use?
The non believers will believe what they want, and at the end of their lives, they will be forced to deal with the consequences.