We have free will and God can not force us to do anything unless He decides to stop loving us. (He gave Adam and Eve free will because He loved them, right?) If God stopped loving us, He would not be God anymore. So you see, He simply can not take free will away from us. If God can not do certain things, is He still All Mighty ?
2007-10-30 14:30:52 · 14 answers · asked by Gone 4 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
You need to read Romans 9 and 10.
God is sovereign. His power is absolute it is not relative. Nothing happens with outside of Gods will. It can be his permissive will where God allows something to happen. An example of this is when God allowed Israel to be destroyed by the Babylonian empire. Or his providentially will where he completes his will through man. An example is when God hardened the heart of the Pharaoh when Moses tried to get him to set the Israelites free. Yet at the same time mankind is responsible for his actions and God will hold us responsible for our sin. This is sometimes referred to as a biblical antinomy which simply means that two laws or truths appear to be in conflict when they actual are not. This is found in science. A scientific antinomy would be found in light. Light exist as both wave and particles at the same time though it would seem in conflict.
Be careful to understand what free will is. Many do not understand this concept. We have free will but there are only two choices. Be a slave to sin or serve God. (Read Romans 6 to fully understand this)
Another point you touch on is are there things God can't do. The answer is yes. God can not sin nor can he do evil or the illogical. Like the old question "Can God create a stone to heavy to lift or Can God create a round square". Of course not. That is illogical.
Lastly, You need to understand that God did not give us free will because he loved us. We have free will so that WE can show our love towards him. What God did to show how he loved us was to sacrifice his son Jesus Christ while we were still sinners so that we may be set free from sin. John 3:16
2007-10-30 14:55:11 · answer #1 · answered by Praise to the Trinity 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
God is omnipotent and omniscient. You can't get much more powerful than that. God's power is therefore absolute.
God can decide to do anything. God can then change His mind and undo it all so that He never did it in the first place. God can tell the truth; God can then undo that truth into a lie, and then start all over again.
Since God's power is absolute, it follows that God can be good and evil at the same time; God can even exist and not exist simultaneously; His power isn't even limited by Time, Probability, or Logic, because it all flows from Him in the first place. He is indeed the alpha and the omega; everything between and everything beyond.
Who said God had to keep loving us? It may well be true that He loved us enough to give up His only son so that we might be saved, but if he was bound to keep loving us, then that wouldn't really be love, then, would it? ....because in the end, the act of loving is a choice.
The problem is not God's omnipotence, but rather the tendency of many people to believe that their own actions are somehow in accordance with God's will. I have a major problem with that one. By definition, God has the absolute power to stop this tendency of Man to invoke His name to justify all manner of evils, but He won't; at least He hasn't... up to now.
While God wields absolute power, a significant degree of relative power nevertheless remains in the hands of humankind. It may not make one hoot-n-holler of a diffference what we do with our collective lives here on our puny planet Earth... but then again, it may... God willing.
2007-10-30 21:58:00 · answer #2 · answered by @lec 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
There is a difference between God not being able to do certain things and God deciding to leave well enough alone. It has nothing to do with absolute or relative power and trying to distinguish them is a wast of time. It has everything to do with His/Her character, including how much God will permit.
What God decides has less to do with whether He/She would stop loving us if intervention is involved. Intervention could be the loving thing after all. But the issue is more the intention for humans to be sovereign beings. And God did not order that within a context of force outside what holds the universe together.
2007-10-30 21:45:43 · answer #3 · answered by Withdrawn 1 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Gods power is absolute and God will never stop loving us. He gave Adam and Eve free will because he loved them and wanted them to make up their own minds. God doesn't want people to be forced to love Him b/c it isn't the same kind of love. Our love means so much more to Him when it is real and true.
2007-10-30 21:45:08 · answer #4 · answered by Urbangrl21 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
God is almighty, He is the creator of everything and everyone! He is also love and Holy and for some strange reason wants to have a relationship with us and loves us. Love is a feeling and we can force ourselves to love someone or something given time but we cannot force someone else to love us. Same with God, he wants our love and can not force us to love him, so we have free will. The free will to accept him as Saviour and Lord or to reject him and face the judgment.
God Bless
Todd
There is a fairly bad movie called Bruce the Almighty that left out Jesus but did kind of get the relationship between God and man right.
2007-10-30 21:44:04 · answer #5 · answered by Pilgrim in the land of the lost 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Very quickly
1. God is Omnipotent and omniscient
2. God is Love. It is of his definition.
3. God is Free. He has Freedom. Because of what and who he is He always chooses what is right, what is licit, waht is truth.
4. God is NOT Good and evil at the same time. nor exist and doesn't exist simultaneously. That is a purely illogical statement. That statement violates one of the most basic Philosophical Laws. That being: "that something can not Be and Not Be at the same time and in the same respect"
Example: you can't be both dead and alive. One can not be sitting infront of your computer reading this and at the same time not sitting infront of your computer reading this.
God is all that is Good and all that is True ALL of the Time
5. B/c of this God does have limits. Sorry to say that. he does have limits...BUT they are very few.
to explain better. God is Free willed himself. He to act in accord with his nature. His Nature is GOOD, and by that i mean the definition of Good..The Good...absolute truth. B/c of this he can't act in opposition to his nature.
meaning, HE CAN'T DO EVIL.
that is his only "limit."
Humans see this as a weekness b/c he isn't at liberty to do whatever he wants but that is foolish. And it comes back, in part to the Theory stated earlier. If God is all Good and in no way evil. He won't have anything to do with evil. therefore think of it at God Will never do or think of Doing evil.
6. God doesn't have to continue to love us. But he does. that is the Beauty behind all this. B/c if God didn't love us...aka "find us to be good" as genesis says..., we would cease to exist. But we don't even though we screw up and doubt his existence and basically spit in his face, HE LOVES US.
7. though God is love. He is not bound to Love. but he does anyway.
8. The Beauty of Man is that God chose to make us like Himself. God Gave man a free will. That is what "God making us in His image and likeness means" (not simply the Human being look, aka species). God gave us the ability to act in accord with our nature.
So, Since we are made in God's image and likeness, we too are good. therefore We are geared toward the good. we have the freedom to chose the good.
And God Love this. Though we take this huge gift for granted at time by "saying the Lord's name is vain" (as a previous person wrote), he won't take it away from us. B/c that would make us slaves. But the amazing thing is, god lets us chose. He (in a sense) lets us share in an inkling of his power.
Did I cover it all? Hope So
read your ancient Greeks. They cover all this. you don't even really need to get into the Christian philosophers tilly ou want to delve deeper.
Summary'
It's not that God can't do things. It is that God would NEVER choose to do certain things.
2007-10-31 01:00:45 · answer #6 · answered by Bubba Crowell 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋
And the LORD said, "I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the LORD, in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. (Exodus 33:19)
Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good;
his love endures forever. (1 Chronicles 16:34)
He is the Almighty be/c it is in His nature to love and have compassion. We try as humans to put God on our level but that is the mistake---He isn't!!! God cannot stop loving us be/c it would go against His nature. For ones who say that God doesn't love us and even hates those who turn him away, you OBVIOUSLY haven't read a Bible. You are sitting whereever you are and you can read what I am typing, can comment such awful things, and can breathe? How dare you say He isn't compassionate? You have a life and a soul no matter how damage YOU have made it. God has compassion; it is YOU who would reject it.
2007-10-30 21:51:33 · answer #7 · answered by frenchredhead21 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋
He is almighty. What he says, is done. He said that humans were to have free will, and they did. Because we have free will, we are capable of being either loved or hated by God, based on our works. But God showed that we are all worthy of his love by sending Jesus Christ to die for us. And now if people worship God through Jesus Christ and follow the commandments of God, they will be go to Heaven when they die. And if people do not accept Jesus, then God hates them and he will burn them.
2007-10-30 21:36:46 · answer #8 · answered by unfit_commander 5 · 0⤊ 1⤋
God's power is absolute AND is relative in my life.
2007-10-30 21:35:25 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 1⤋
He can't take your free will because he promised not to and he keeps his promises. He can take your life. Does that make him Almighty?
2007-10-30 21:35:52 · answer #10 · answered by sisterzeal 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋