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If you think this is the area where you tell everyone you are sorry for eating their lunch out of the fridge, it probably isn't the place for you
This forum is open discussion between atheists and all theists to defend and debate their views on religion or non-religion. Please respect that this is a Christian-owned forum and refrain from gratuitous blasphemy. VERY wide leeway is given in range of expression and allowable behavior as compared to other areas of the forum, and moderation is not overly involved unless necessary. Please keep this in mind. Atheists who wish to interact with theists in a way that does not seek to undermine theistic faith may participate in the World Religions Department. Non-debate question and answers and mild and less confrontational discussions can take place in General Theistics.
Forum Rules: Here
This forum is open discussion between atheists and all theists to defend and debate their views on religion or non-religion. Please respect that this is a Christian-owned forum and refrain from gratuitous blasphemy. VERY wide leeway is given in range of expression and allowable behavior as compared to other areas of the forum, and moderation is not overly involved unless necessary. Please keep this in mind. Atheists who wish to interact with theists in a way that does not seek to undermine theistic faith may participate in the World Religions Department. Non-debate question and answers and mild and less confrontational discussions can take place in General Theistics.
Forum Rules: Here
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The Problem Of Evil?
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Originally posted by seer View Post
One could ask this. If man never fell, could we have ever known, in practical application, the depths of His love and mercy? How far He was willing to go to redeem us?
That was the best way an all knowing /all powerful (and loving!) being can think of to teach us stuff?
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Originally posted by Alien View PostBoy this a good old one, but there's always a bit of flavor left in a stick of gum, no matter how long you chew it.
This has been mostly covered, but I'll throw in another idea. Why would a perfect and all powerful being need to be loved? Or to have glory (in the eyes of whom?). I got the following from a Da'var I get from a Rabbi (nice guy, he'll answer my questions sometimes). Basically, it goes like this: God needs nothing from us. His only desire/function (that's not quite the meaning) is to help us.
Though I don't think the evidence supports that, it does make sense from a logical point of view. What would a 3-omni God need from us? Maybe he got bored and made the universe and us to pass the time? That still doesn't explain the problem of evil though.
Mossy, you threw in the "mysterious ways" card. It makes sense in a way, but it makes all this discussion redundant. "Don't try to understand God because you can't".
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Originally posted by Sparko View Post
He sounds a bit like Dave L. Calvinism.
But yes, it's still essentially "God wants everything to be the way it is, get used to it". Which kind of shifts it from "the problem of evil" to "the problem of God" in my view. I have a mental picture of a parent beating a child and saying "this hurts me more than it hurts you" *. And he lost me when after admitting God wants evil to exist, he claims that God is still "holy", whatever that means.
* I think the best response from the child would be "OK let me hit you and we'll both feel better".
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Originally posted by seer View Post
Right, it really is only a matter of timing. God will eventually end all evil and harm."It ain't necessarily so
The things that you're liable
To read in the Bible
It ain't necessarily so."
Sportin' Life
Porgy & Bess, DuBose Heyward, George & Ira Gershwin
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Originally posted by Machinist View Post
Very well. And if they didn't choose to partake of the fruit, then life on Earth would have carried on per plan B.
God's need for humans to love Him with their own free could still be fulfilled.Geislerminian Antinomian Kenotic Charispneumaticostal Gender Mutualist-Egalitarian.
Beige Federalist.
Nationalist Christian.
"Everybody is somebody's heretic."
Social Justice is usually the opposite of actual justice.
Proud member of the this space left blank community.
Would-be Grand Vizier of the Padishah Maxi-Super-Ultra-Hyper-Mega-MAGA King Trumpius Rex.
Justice for Ashli Babbitt!
Justice for Matthew Perna!
Arrest Ray Epps and his Fed bosses!
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Originally posted by NorrinRadd View Post
Nitpick: "God's need" is a poor choice of words, at least to those with a relatively orthodox view of the Deity. God doesn't "need" anyone or anything.
For me though, Norrin, I have never reconciled the opposites. In my mind, it is incomprehensible to me that God had eternal foreknowledge that man was going to fall, yet proceeded with his plan nonetheless, without considering the the possibility that man may not fall. If it cannot be said that God had a plan B just in case Adam and Eve resisted temptation, then what Dave L has been preaching around here would actually be more logically consistent.
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eOriginally posted by Hypatia_Alexandria View Post
That has echoes of the White Queen's comment about jam.Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s
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It seems to me, especially for Christians, that if we really believe that God is the standard for goodness and justice we must have confidence that He knows what He is doing. We are living in the shadow lands, we don't see the end of things, we don't always understand why He allows what He does. Often it seems that our moral sense does not track with our concept of how a loving God should act or be. But we have to ask, on what basis could our ethical sense rise above His? Could a stream rise above its source? I think the question for Christian is - will we trust that God is good - even here in the light of so much evil?Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s
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Originally posted by seer View PostIt seems to me, especially for Christians, that if we really believe that God is the standard for goodness and justice we must have confidence that He knows what He is doing. We are living in the shadow lands, we don't see the end of things, we don't always understand why He allows what He does. Often it seems that our moral sense does not track with our concept of how a loving God should act or be. But we have to ask, on what basis could our ethical sense rise above His? Could a stream rise above its source? I think the question for Christian is - will we trust that God is good - even here in the light of so much evil?
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Originally posted by Machinist View Post
So you do see that it doesn't track? For me, it really doesn't track. I'm just thinking that maybe there are other views worth exploring that would provide better answers.
Like the old song says:
"Trials dark on every hand
And we may not understand
All the ways the God would lead us
To that blessed promised land
But he'll guide us with his eyes
And we'll follow 'til we die
And we'll understand it better by and by..."
The question isMachinist, can you wait for the answers yet still remain faithful?
Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s
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