You keep arguing that you cannot force a person to do something. But if you're FORCING them, wouldn't that be against their WILL? Therefore, they still HAVE a will--you're just trying to get them to do something that goes against it.
So......if God is all-powerful, it seems like a simple task to create humans that are instilled with a love for him and a belief in him, yet still have free will otherwise.
If you say its not possible, you're saying God can't do it.
2007-09-13 11:27:24 · 49 answers · asked by Linz ♥ VT 4 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
Okay, let me clarify. When I have asked questions about why God thinks it is better to give us free will and run the risk of us going to Hell, rather than take away our free will and allow us to live eternally in Heaven, you always argue that God doesn't want to FORCE us. But if he created us with a genuine love for him, it wouldn't BE forcing.
2007-09-13 11:32:55 · update #1
Okay, Epaphras:
Everyone keeps arguing that if you try to force your child to love you, then it won't work, and your child will grow resentful at being forced. THIS idea suggests that the child has his OWN will, and that what is being forced upon him conflicts with it. I am suggesting that God create us with a will to love him, rather than not love him. Therefore, we would not feel resentful because we would feel as though loving God is what we want to do, since that is how he would have made us. Get it?
2007-09-13 11:41:31 · update #2
Yeah, well, the kind of "free will" we are purported to have now is similar to the kind of "freedom" we have when Christian doctrine is legislated into secular law. Sure, we have "freedom of religion"... we have the freedom to adhere to the Christian religion as it's now translated into law. Lucky us.
So with God's "free will", we have the "freedom" to buckle under pressure if we're SANE and don't want to be tortured for eternity as punishment for not following the will of God.
2007-09-13 11:32:01 · answer #1 · answered by ZER0 C00L ••AM••VT•• 7 · 4⤊ 2⤋
God wants us to love each other but....he wants us to do it by our own free will. This way God will know if you are really someone God wishes to bring into God's heaven after death.
Let me make it simple. Say you wanted to know who was the BEST at playing a board game. So you took six people and let them play together. Would you give one or some of them the answers so they would do better then the rest or would you just let everyone play and see who came out the winner? If you gave out some of the answers, you would really not kinow who was the best. Think about it. GOD wants the best for us but GOD wants us to find it. This is what will make us the quality individual GOD wants in GOD'S heaven.
2007-09-13 11:39:11 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 0⤋
Right. God doesn't force you to. When was the last time you heard from Him insisting that you love Him or else? LOL. Only people interpret it wrongfully. You can't love a personality until you know that personality. God will never force you or anyone else. Being all powerful doesn't mean taking liberty wityout a license. What good would it be if He just created everyone already knowing and loving Him? You have to decide on your own if you want to get to know Him so you can find out if you want to love Him. That's it in nutshell.
In His all perfection, and if you think deeply about it, it would never do to just make a boring old set of creatures and beings doing everything you want all the time. It's got to be far more interesting giving beings and creatures personalities which are all unique and different, and all of whom can choose to find God and get to Know God and discover if they want to Love God. Isn't it? And yes, children do naturally love God when they discover Him in their lives.
I certainly would never force my children to love me, and so...again here is a perfect example of how your reasoning is mistaken.
2007-09-13 11:36:02 · answer #3 · answered by Holly Carmichael 4 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Free will includes how we are able to choose the opposite of love. There are a lot of shades of emotions between love and hate besides indifference. There is even ambivalence, where it is sort of a love-hate feeling (like when you break up). If everyone had a natural inclination to love and only love, wouldn't it be more like a lot of puppies instead of human beings, with a wider range of emotions that we as humans have? It's the risk God takes for having children. Same as with all parents.
2007-09-13 11:45:03 · answer #4 · answered by Cookie777 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
The whole reason that we are on this earth is so that we can learn about God and become like Him. To do that, we must have our own experiences to shape us into who we are. God does not want to force us to love Him, although He undoubtedly could, because that would defeat the purpose of us being here. As Feral stated in your last question, we believe that Satan wanted exactly what you are saying, but God said no, because again, that would defeat the purpose. How can you learn and grow if you are made to do what is right and nothing else? There is no growth, and you will be stagnant, and unthinking.
God is all-powerful, and it would be a simple task for him to do that, but that is not what He wants. He wants us to love Him and want to return to Him through our own free will and choice. We must learn to love Him and believe in Him by ourselves.
Free will means that you make your own decisions, possibly influenced by other forces, but you are not FORCED to do anything. That is free will. Anything less, is being controlled. All choices have to yours to make, or it is not free will. Period. ALL of them and this includes loving God and having a belief in Him.
2007-09-13 11:35:53 · answer #5 · answered by . 7 · 1⤊ 1⤋
God has created us that way; we all have a longing in our hearts to be with God. Those that are without Him just don’t know what it is that they are missing, they tell their self, that “if I only had more money, or if I only had a bigger house, or if I only had a new car, or if my children behaved better, or if I could just get along with my parents, or if I could get a better job, or if I could have a better husband, or wife, or if I could do this or that or have this or that {then} I would be happy.” “I’ll be happy when I………..” “I’d be happy if I had…………..” The truth is they will never be happy no matter how much they have. They will never be happy until they have God, because God created them to be His companion, and with out Him they will always feel like they are missing something in life that would make them complete. †
2007-09-13 11:44:34 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
Certainly when we want to marry some one we want it to be the result of a love tha is mutually inclusive. It has to come freely out of free will.
So it is between the relationship between us Humans and our Creator.
And a religion which tell us believe, ostrasize or kill you ,is basically saying you are to love God by force.
That is not what the Salvation ,that our Creator has given to the believers ,is about.
So as it was predicted ; there shall be false Prophet which will deceive people so they will not know the Real Love of God and his Salvation.
"Narrow is the door of Savation and wide is the door of perdition"
2007-09-14 03:59:08 · answer #7 · answered by goring 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
If you knew God, you would want to serve Him out of love, not fear. Sometimes my child obeys me out of fear and that is a good thing. But discipline is tempered with love and affection. My child truly loves me and does not fear me. She does fear disobeying me, but she trusts me to know I love her even if she doesn't understand why I say no sometimes. There are some things she is just too immature to understand and I cannot convince her by reason. That's where the 'force' comes in. We obey God out of trust and love and He has warned of the consequences of disobedience. Why are there consequences for disobedience? Because we must grow or mature enough to incorporate His commands into our hearts. Until then, we must obey on faith. God wants Christians to become like Jesus, the perfect human being. We are incapable of becoming that on our own, just as a child left to himself is incapable of becoming a responsible adult but will do whatever he/she 'wants' or 'feels' like doing at any given moment. We are like that unless we have the indwelling Spirit of God to guide, guard and direct us.
Sending you a smile to help pick up your day.
2007-09-13 11:51:46 · answer #8 · answered by Prof Fruitcake 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
You are using faulty logic here. if God made us so that we would want to, that is still forcing, it is not free will. The problem you are having is your logic. You are using a premise that is inconsistent with its own definition. It does not mean God is not omnipotent. (By the way omnipotence only means that a being has all power to act within its nature, not that it can act in ways inconsistent with its nature. In other words God cannot NOT be God.)
Your logic is bad. I know you are getting frustrated now because you keep repeating the same illogic. Forcing them to do something against their will is not Love. It is obligation. The two stand opposed to one another.
You still haven't responded to the question I posed. Do you WANT god to force you to be with him when you don't want to be?
2007-09-13 11:37:14 · answer #9 · answered by epaphras_faith 4 · 1⤊ 1⤋
Right now my one year old son, pretty much loves me unconditional. Can i force him to keep loving me? I hope not. I hope he grows and developes into a fine young man, AND i hope that he grows to love me by choice, because he understands and respects me. He has free will, he could make mistakes, even ones so horrific as to make me not want to be around him. I'd still love him, but he has to live with is descions. I think GOD feels that way about us.
2007-09-13 11:40:38 · answer #10 · answered by Karl S 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
First of all, if God could exist, he would be one sadistic son of a ***** for not making us Omniscient like himself, which proves he could not be omniscient, because if he were, then he wouldn't let us suffer like we do. Most Christians like to believe that WE are the cause of our suffering and yet somehow satan pulls everyone's strings and tempts us to do bad things. My question to Christians is: How the hell do we control our suffering if we are ALL tempted to sin? Also, since whatever we do is meant to happen, if we do something unforgiveable by this God of yours, why should we burn in hell? It was meant to happen and God already knew it was going to happen. So why would he let us suffer? Yeah, I just destroyed christianity. Thank you, Thank you very much.
Second of all, you can't 'choose' to love someone. You either love everyone, or you don't love anyone at all.
Most people in the world are incapable of love. Very few are, and they happen to be the most intelligent. Sad fact of life. A good thing about love though, is that it is Knowing. Even though animals are incapable of love, they know when they are loved (known) and are compelled to let us help them.
2007-09-13 11:39:17 · answer #11 · answered by Josh 1 · 0⤊ 1⤋