I'm Christian, this has been one of two questions that I'm not sure how to understand yet. It would be easier to understand if we chose to live this life, but we really didn't ask for it. The other would be why God allows unequal opportunity to come to know God, i.e. some grow up in atheistic worldviews making it not impossible, but harder to seek and understand God, while some are born into a Christian household.
Please only people with a mature faith who know what they are talking about like William D or Kait or someone.
2007-11-21 06:36:02 · 17 answers · asked by Let's Debate 1 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
And I already know the basics, like God is above our understanding or God is a just God.
2007-11-21 06:36:44 · update #1
Thank you guys for your effort in helping me understand this.
2007-11-21 07:12:20 · update #2
2 Peter 3:9 The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.
Matthew 25:41 Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels....
Genesis 6:6 And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.
God did NOT make hell for sinners. That's where those who reject Christ wind up, but it was originally made for the devil and his angels.
Secondly, God only knows what can be known. For example, given man a free will, God would have to let man make his own choices. God would not know what choice a person would make until he made it. Otherwise, God would know before he made you whether or not you would wind up in heaven or hell.
If God knew what you were going to do before you did it, then then how could God repent that he made man, especially if He is not willing that any should perish? How could he make you knowing beforehand that your choices in life would send you to hell?
Conversely, some denominations believe that we simply play a preordained role in life and use Romans 8 to justify this belief. I totally disagree with this viewpoint.
At minimum, reconciling the concept of an all knowing God with man's free will is a very contentious issue that won't be resolved in a forum like this.
2007-11-21 06:51:19 · answer #1 · answered by johnson88 3 · 1⤊ 2⤋
Job 38:6, 7 also seems to indicate that these “Sons of God” existed before our world was made. But while the Bible seems to support the notion that there is life on other worlds, we should be careful to remember that the devil and his angels can easily create illusions to deceive us (2 Corinthians 11:14). Remember that un-fallen worlds are probably restricted from mingling with our sin-diseased planet. That’s why most UFO sightings are likely mere optical illusions or dangerous satanic deceptions. No, E.T. has not been here … yet. After God creates the new earth, we will be able to freely travel and visit with all of His creation (2 Peter 3:13).
2016-05-24 22:09:08 · answer #2 · answered by leah 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
First, do you question man or God. You should be careful about that.
Now, being born into a Christian household has nothing to do with knowing God. God chose His people before the creation. He knew you before He created you. His elect, according to His Word, cannot resist the call to come to Christ, and others are never able to do so.
2007-11-21 07:41:04 · answer #3 · answered by joseph8638 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
the Bible says that Jehovah is a God “abundant in loving-kindness and truth.” (Exodus 34:6) He would never offer something he knew that it was impossible for one to obtain. Jesus Christ asked: “Who is the man among you whom his son asks for bread—he will not hand him a stone, will he? . . . Therefore, if you, although being wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more so will your Father who is in the heavens give good things to those asking him?” (Matthew 7:9-11) Furthermore, if God long ago foreordained precisely who would gain eternal salvation and who would be eternally destroyed, why does the Bible say that “Jehovah . . . is patient with you because he does not desire any to be destroyed but desires all to attain to repentance”?—2 Peter 3:9.
Predestination, therefore, runs counter to what the Bible actually teaches about God. ‘But would not limiting God’s knowledge of the future undermine his almightiness?’ you might ask. Not at all. At Titus 1:2, for example, we learn that “God . . . cannot lie.” But does this undermine God’s almightiness? No, rather, it highlights God’s truthfulness.
The apostle Paul counseled Christians endowed with the gift of prophecy: “Gifts of the spirit of the prophets are to be controlled by the prophets. For God is a God, not of disorder, but of peace.” (1 Corinthians 14:32, 33) Such prophets would not speak out indiscriminately but would share their prophetic messages in an orderly way. To do this, self-control was needed. Certainly, then, God is also able to use his foreknowledge selectively, using it only when there is a reason or a purpose for doing so.—Compare Genesis 22:1, 12.
2007-11-21 06:43:22 · answer #4 · answered by Everlasting Life 3 · 1⤊ 1⤋
Broad is the Way and Wide is the Gate that leads to Destruction----Narrow is the Way and Narrow the Gate that Leads to Heaven;
Those that care nothing about Jesus in this Life span of 70 yrs more or less;Why would they desire Heaven,The followers of Jesus love Him
and desire to be with Him for Eternity;
Heaven is for Whosoever Will,That is good enough for Me, To be" Wanted" by Jesus is the Best thing that ever Happened to Me;He Wanted Me and I needed Him,;and Today, more than ever;
In the end it is" Unbelief" that sends a Person to Hell;
2007-11-21 07:25:06 · answer #5 · answered by section hand 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
God gives EVERYBODY a chance for salvation.
John 3:16-17 (New International Version)
New International Version (NIV)
Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society
16"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son,[a] that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 17For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.
People are responsible for their own fates.
Nobody can make what is the most important choice in their lives for them.
Sad? Yes, it is sad. But if God didn't give us a choice, we would be nothing more than robots to Him. God wants us to interact with him, not just be machines with no free will of our own.
2007-11-21 06:44:23 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 1⤋
God created everything for His glory. He created man for His glory.
God didn't miss the fact that Satan was talking to Eve. He didn't make a mistake in letting Adam and Eve sin. That was all part of His plan.
God gets glory from all parts of His creation. When people go to Hell because of their sins, He gets glory since He is justly punishing their sins against Him.
When He saves men and they get to be with Him for eternity in Heaven, that gives Him glory for His wonderful plan and for the grace to save them.
In the end, He gets all the glory.
2007-11-21 06:41:06 · answer #7 · answered by Yun 7 · 3⤊ 0⤋
God created man with free will like someone already said in this answers section. Since man has free will, man decides if he wants to be good and listen to God or bad and listen to the devil (children of God, or children of the devil). Thos choosing God will not burn in hell but have peace forever. Those choosing the devil go to the devil and burn, but not forever. It just means once they are burned, they are gone forever. God don't torture because God is love.
So man makes his own choice if he wants to live forever or die forever. You see it now?
2007-11-21 09:08:25 · answer #8 · answered by Marina C 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
why do we have children? why do we teach and protect them? why do we eventually let them live on their own? God made man for the same reason to have a relationship with him. but what is forced love? is it anything at all to you if your wife only loved you because she had no choice? we were born so that we could have the chance to be one with GOD (which is heaven itself) forever...so we didn't ask to be born, but it was a privelage. unfortunately we were born in the midst of his enemies, but he has given us everything we need to make it to heaven. Jesus Christ and the Gospel.
it is up to us to believe it or not; respond to it or not; accept it or reject all that God is and has done and has left us to know Him with. and my freind you are mistaken...many not a fews will not make it to heaven.
Matthew 7:13-14 "Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it."
2007-11-21 06:58:09 · answer #9 · answered by GARY R 3 · 1⤊ 1⤋
God gives us the free will to chose between beleiving and not beleiving. He allows us to determine that. It is up to the atheist to chose between Hevean and Hell. They make the choice. Not God. God already knows in advance who will chose what, but that does not mean that God has made an atheist an atheist
2007-11-21 06:49:46 · answer #10 · answered by Mohammed G 2 · 2⤊ 1⤋