05-14-2019, 06:46 PM
(05-14-2019, 12:21 PM)Matt_Crimson Wrote: I believe God is good for a few reasons.
1) God always gives people time to turn to him.
Gods punishments usually come with a warning. He warned Adam and Eve at the beginning of creation about not eating from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil when he could have just put the tree there and not told them anything about it and then punished them for eating from it because he thought it'd be fun to do. He warned the people in Noah's time about the flood when he could have just flooded the earth and laughed in enjoyment. He warned the Egyptians and their Pharaoh multiple times and sent plagues with the most deadliest plague being last when he could have just killed them all off with the first plague.
God has a tendency to warn us about destruction before he sends us destruction. In fact, the bible even ends with a warning to the people living in modern times that Jesus will return and destruction will come with him, yet we ignore it just like all those who came before us.
Why is this important? Because it tells us that God doesn't have the evil intention of wanting to destroy us. Rather, God wants to live in peace with us, but it is our own disobedience that leads to our destruction and not that God has the evil intention of actually wanting our destruction. Satan however does want our destruction and further leads us into it with Adam and Eve being the prime example of this. If Satan cared about Adam and Eve he wouldn't have told them to eat from the tree, yet he did.
As the "creator" - he is the author and definer of what is good and evil.
He created Adam and Eve without the any knowledge of good and evil.
He endows them with both curious minds and the freedom to make choices.
He tells them they must not partake of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.
Then, he either places - or allows - temptation [the serpent] to persuade Eve to make a "wrong" choice.
He then punishes Adam and Eve [and their entire lineage] for:
Engaging the curious impulses that he created them with,
which caused them to exercise the free will he endowed them with,
that led to making the very decision they he knew they would make.
After all, he is omniscient. He knew they would fail his "test" - however, he created them anyway, knowing full well that he would be punishing a creation for utilizing the very impulses and curiosities that he created them with, and to which they [Adam and Eve] had no realistic comprehension of -- because he would not allow said comprehension.
I'm sorry, but the story of Adam and Eve - in my opinion - portrays God as rather sadistic and extremely capricious. I see nothing in that story which leads me to believe that he "cared" for his creation or that he intended anything more than confusion and suffering for them.
(05-14-2019, 12:21 PM)Matt_Crimson Wrote: 2) God punishes us because of our disobedience, not because of some evil desire to watch us suffer or for his own enjoyment.
As I mentioned above, God didn't have to warn any of us about the destruction he sent/is going to send, yet he did/does. Why? Because he cares about us. If God didn't care, the earth would've been thrown into the sun by now, yet we're all still here rotating around it endlessly. Nowhere does God ever punish someone because he just felt like doing it out of some pleasure. Satan however doesn't care about us. He didn't care that telling Adam and Eve to eat the fruit was going to cause them to experience God's wrath. If he did, he would have never persuaded them to do so knowing what it would cause, yet he did. And what's more disturbing is that Satan did this KNOWING that in the end he is NOT going to win. So in other words, not only did Satan tell us to rebel against God, he basically told us to fight a war that he knows will only lead to our eternal destruction.
If God truly did not want Adam and Eve to have knowledge of good and evil, it seems either curious that he [purposely] would place among them the very source of the knowledge he was forbidding. Furthermore, he gave them the freedom to choose said knowledge. He then goes even farther and allows/provides temptation to an infantile and ignorant creation -- which seems to all but ensure only one possible outcome.
(05-14-2019, 12:21 PM)Matt_Crimson Wrote: 3) God offers us salvation
Just as God didn't have to give us warnings for coming destruction, he also didn't have to offer us salvation. Yet he did. This is because God again cares about us and actually doesn't want to destroy us. If he didn't care about us he wouldn't have offered us salvation. What has Satan ever offered anyone that is good?
How did Satan get access to the garden?
How was Satan allowed to test Job?
How many genocides did Satan oversee?
How many virgins did Satan say to keep for yourself during a time of war?
How many times is Satan on record as condoning the ownership of other people?
I could go on and on, but I imagine you can see my point rather clearly. Notice the stories of Genesis, Job, the tempting of Christ, etc -- the character of Satan is always tends to play a very unique role. I'm sure you've observed the similarities in these roles and know what I'm alluding to, which is a rather stark contrast to many of the abominable actions, orders and scenarios attributed to God.
