It's a tough question, really. The first response is easy. "No! It can't be. It's not acceptable. No way. Not a loving God!" And, truthfully, anyone of us would find the mere suggestion unpleasant at best and abhorrent and unthinkable at worst.
Then you start mulling things over. Thinking can be such a mistake sometimes. Consider God's Omniscience. David wrote (speaking to God), "Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in Your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them" (Psa 139:16). Now, some would like to argue that God's Omniscience means that God knows everything that can be known, but that since future events haven't occurred, He can't know them. This passage says that before we're born God has every day of our lives already written down. That sounds a lot like He knows the end from the beginning.
Now, assuming that God is indeed Omniscient in the sense that He knows all things (including the future to us) and assuming that He knows all things accurately, ask that question again. "Does God make people He knows will go to Hell?" Assuming that no one is born whom God didn't intend to be born and assuming that God knows all things, the answer to the question becomes inevitable: "Yes. Undoubtedly. Absolutely. If God knows all things and people are born who will go to Hell, then God makes people He knows will go to Hell."
Now, there is a biblical reason given and you can find it if you wish, but I'm interested in the reason that we have a problem with this idea. We find this notion repulsive. (Don't misunderstand. It bothers me as well.) Why? I would guess that there are a few reasons.
First, I would suggest that it is a problem of holiness. You see, God is holy. No, more than that. He is "holy, holy, holy" -- holy to the utmost. This doesn't merely mean "completely apart from sin". It means "other". And inherent in human beings is the absolute dislike of "other". It is the source of racism and sexism and the conflict between classes. We are most comfortable with the things most like us. We are uncomfortable with "different". And God is different. So we more closely align ourselves with other humans than we do with God. That's natural ... but it isn't right.
Second, I would assume that it is a problem of self-centeredness. You see, if the natural problem of sin is "I will be like the Most High", then self-centeredness is the natural result. It makes us value ourselves most highly. So while God is actually the highest Being, we tend to think of ourselves as quite important. The suggestion that God doesn't think of us as important as we do is offensive to us.
Related to that is the problem that Paul points to. Describing the sinful decline of Man he writes, "For although they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks to Him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things" (Rom 1:21-23). We call it "idolatry". It's simple. If we exchange the glory of the immortal God for anything at all that is less than God, it is idolatry. And that's the state of Natural Man. "They exchanged the truth about God for the lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator" (Rom 1:25). Sinners worship and serve the creature rather than the Creator. Therefore, for God to actually make creatures He knows will go to Hell would be evil because we serve the creature.
So, let's see where we stand. Does God make people He knows will go to Hell? Absolutely. Given His Omniscience, it can be no other way. Why is that a problem for us? We have a natural distaste for the "otherness" of God, a natural problem with self-centeredness, and a real problem with the idolatry of serving the creature over the Creator. Now, we could continue to be upset about the notion that God makes people He knows will go to Hell, or we can work at eliminating the sinful perspectives that make that so repulsive. You decide.
56 comments:
There is a passage somewhere referring to vessels of wrath created for destruction, but I am sick so you'll pardon me for not looking it up. But the root is arrogance--we see ourselves as perfect, or at least serviceable, and our standards are entirely opposite to God's. How arrogant of the painting to say to the painter, "I'm good enough! You can't paint over me!" or the pottery to say to the potter, "That crack doesn't render me worthless! I can carry a smidge of water, how dare you destroy me!" These are indeed ridiculous analogies, but if God is our Creator, then He has every right to do with His creation as He sees fit. Thinking "I know best" is the source of the sin.
Sick? That's bad for your health!
The passage is Romans 9. "What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction?" (Rom 9:22). It is God's will to demonstrate His wrath.
Interestingly, the passage around this verse says, "The thing molded will not say to the molder, 'Why did you make me like this,' will it? Or does not the potter have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use, and another for common use?" (Rom 9:20-21). Paul, then, goes one step beyond what my post says. I asked if God makes people He knows will go to Hell. Paul says He makes people for that purpose.
"or we can work at eliminating the sinful perspectives that make that so repulsive". I have tried. I can accept in my mind that God is holy, God is right, I am wrong, I am self-centered, etc. but none of that makes the fact of God creating people for hell any less repulsive. I cannot make this horrible conundrum go away. I ask God to take it away, to help me see, to show me the answer. I don't know why He allows me to have this always weighing on my mind.....
Even if I accept that God knows best and is right to send people to hell....that may give me peace of mind and enable me to serve and obey Him, but it certainly does nothing to stir up feelings of worship or adoration. It is very frustrating. I want to be free of this, but I cannot.
Anonymous,
First, I understand the problem. I really do. Here's the question I have to ask myself. Am I more concerned with God, His glory -- His worth, all that He is -- or am I more concerned with His creation -- humans? The truth is that much of the time (for each person and at various times the amount varies) we humans are far more concerned with humans than with God's glory because, well, we are much more closely connected to humans than to God. He is, after all, other. And we are here, in flesh and blood, visible, more sensed, more "real". (Not really, but that's our sense of it.) Thus, to ask us to be more concerned for the God who is other than the human that is here seems a difficult task. And it is. Primarily because of our sin nature.
A couple of thoughts, then. Scripture indicates that our change from purely sinful beings to reflections of Christ is a gradual process, one we refer to as "sanctification". It happens over time. It is not at any time instantaneous. We have to "be transformed by the renewal of your mind" (Rom 12:2), to continuously and repeatedly "make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love" (2 Peter 2:5-7), to learn to eat "meat" rather than "milk" by having our powers of discernment trained by constant practice (Heb 5:12-14), and so on. I've been at it for 50 years and I haven't arrived. Older and wiser saints than I am say the same thing. So when you say, "I don't know why He allows me to have this always weighing on my mind", the suggestion is "God, if He was good, would instantaneously solve this problem" ... and the Bible disagrees. So the process then is a lifelong, continuous one whereby we "walk by faith, not by sight" (2 Cor 5:7). We learn that when we cannot trace God's hand in events and circumstances -- when we don't have an inner sense of Him -- we can still trust His heart. We learn that, while every human is a liar, God is true (Rom 3:4). Indeed, we suffer -- all humans -- from a peculiar problem that the Bible calls "the suppression of truth in unrighteousness and ungodliness" (ROm 1:18). So when my feelings and thoughts run counter to what I know the Bible says and I have to determine which one is correct, I have to keep in mind that I'm a sinful person saved by grace, prone to disbelieve God and in need of taking every thought captive to obey Christ (2 Cor 10:5). It doesn't happen overnight. It will, either here or on the other side.
The question becomes, then, who are you going to believe? Your sinful self or the God who made you? Your call.
Oh, and when you realize (when it becomes real to you) the impact of Paul's statement in Romans 9:22-23 that we are "vessels of wrath prepared for destruction" whom God was willing to destroy, you'll find that the idea does indeed bring worship and adoration. The question is not "Why doesn't God save more?" The question is "Why does He save any?"
We aren't supposed to feel good about the fact that God creates some to be sent to hell. You will never be comfortable with it because God is not comfortable with it.
"As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign LORD, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live." Ezekiel 33:11
"3 This is good, and it pleases God our Savior, 4 who wants everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth." 1 Timothy 2:3-4
It is not part of His plan to save these people, as God is clear that he will accomplish absolutely everything He intends to do. (Isaiah 46:10). But God does not take the eternal suffering of billions of souls lightly, and neither should we.
No, absolutely! This isn't something we would delight in, except to the extent that God's glory is manifested.
Just to be clear, my response was more for the anonymous poster who was wrestling with his/her wretched feelings regarding this matter than anything in particular you had said.
It irritates me when someone posts a response that appears to be chastising in tone that completely agrees with the post it was replying to, especially when the original post is mine :). Just wanted to make sure you didn't interpret mine as such a response.
Thanks for the clarification. Due to the "less happy" nature of these types of posts, my first expectation from commenters will be "You're crazy!" (or worse). But I'm still able to determine, "Hey, that comment wasn't so irate!" I got that from yours. :)
Incidentally, I'm doing a brief teaching series on this and related topics in my church right now, which is how I found your post. I started things off with the sovereignty of God. When you understand the complete totality of God's control over absolutely everything, a lot of intellectual and supposedly Scriptural objections to this doctrine just melt away.
But, what I am left with is a terrible, awful realization that God's glory is worth so much more than I ever gave it credit for, including the eternal, conscious torture of billions of people.
God's Sovereignty is a really big thing, both biblically and personally. We don't get it. We really don't. I've written more than once on the topic. You can find labels for both the Sovereignty of God as well as Sovereignty and Suffering which each contain multiple entries on the subject. In His Sovereignty I, like you, am struck with how very, very big God is, how very poor my perspective can be, and how ultimately valued He must be.
Your insights of this is valid even those who disagree are entitled to their own understanding of this matter. Allow me to share mine.
I was asked of the same question and here are the pointers:
- When God created Adam and Eve, His intention is for them to have a better - sinless life (perfect life) and though He is all knowing, He did not allow Himself to know that Eve and Adam will be deceived by the serpent (Gen 3:1).
- God put the Tree in the middle of the garden as symbolical of His Sovereignty over Adam and Eve (Gen 2:16-17)that the very time they will eat the fruit of the forbidden tree, they will surely die.
- If Adam, did not chose to eat the fruit and even if Eve have eaten or disobeyed God, sin will remain only on Eve and she will die but as for Adam, he will be alone again and since it is not good for the man to be alone (Gen 2:18), God will create another woman for Adam although we know this is not the case. Adam chose to eat the forbidden fruit and so he too committed sin and destined to die.
- From then on, due to our inequities, God have hidden His face (Isaiah 59:2)from us that anyone who will look to His face will surely die but His unconditional Love is always there for us. He does not want us to go to hell he designed this for the devil. Because of His love for us, He gave His only begotten son to become the bridge between the God and Man to give hope to every one.
God bless to all...
Interesting perspective. I'm not at all clear on what you're saying.
"He did not allow Himself to know that Eve and Adam will be deceived ..."
Are you suggesting that 1) God is not Omniscient and 2) He is capable of withholding specific information from Himself (you know, without knowing the information He's withholding from Himself)? If this is the case, what else doesn't He know? And how does that correlate to all the other stuff the Bible says He knows? (Note: "He is all knowing" and "He did not allow Himself to know" are contradictory phrases. You have to decide on one or the other.)
"God have hidden His face from us"
It is (obviously) true that He has hidden His face from us, but do you understand that to mean that He is withholding information from Himself, or do you understand that to mean that He is withholding Himself from us? The text you reference indicates the latter -- "the Lord's hand is not shortened, that it cannot save ... but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God" (Isa 59:1-2). The line of reasoning you used earlier suggests the former.
If the argument is that God doesn't know who will and won't be saved because He's withholding that information from Himself, then the argument is, in fact, that there is no Omniscient, Sovereign God. I don't know if that was your argument or not.
It appears to me that the arguments posted here really do not fully resolve the issue at had; at least not for me. I have struggled as "Anonymous" has with this issue. For that reason I will refrain from scripture use as much as possible, as I don't believe it answers the question for people like us. It, unfortunately, comes across as "because I said so," which might be suitable for some, but has never worked for me. Okay, this is all in the goal of open discussion and I honestly hope I get feedback.
1. Simply explaining that God is "different" does not justify the suffering that He knowingly inflicts upon us. As humans, I do not believe it is our LACK of understanding of Him that causes alarm, but our FULL understanding of one another- the idea of truly eternal torture for loved ones as we (hopefully, we) sit in Paradise stirs feelings of sorrow, empathy, love. I do not have to "align" myself with horses over God to empathize with a mare He has cast into eternal fire (if the animal were to have a soul, of course)
2. Self-centerdness or a feeling of being more important than God believes us to be also does not seem to mesh with scripture or the argument itself. First, there are many passages stating God's incredible love for each of us- and I would hope any amount of love would be enough to prevent my eternal soul from unending torture. Second, if He didn't have the same appreciation for us that we have for ourselves, then casting us into everlasting hellfire (in which He "take[s] no pleasure") is a strange way of showing it. A more appropriate response from a God who "doesn't think of us as important" would be to simply end our existence and move on. Ironically, this would also be the more loving one, I would argue.
3. Finally, the argument that the Creator, and any creator apparently, has complete dominion over that which he creates is hard to accept. Comparing us to cracked pottery that is tossed aside is beyond stretched. Our casting of inanimate objects to the floor and dashing them in an instant is really not a one-to-one comparison of God casting living, feeling, loving beings into eternal pain and suffering. That said, I really cannot think of anything that would compare. And, "because I am God and I can" is an argument heard more from children and not one I'd ever hope to hear from the infinitely "compasionate" creator of all things.
At the end of the day, my biggest concern is this- regardless of any false sense of free will that we might believe to have, God created us as we are, knowing full well what our fate would be. So, saying we have a choice in the matter seems false. No one ever has or ever will surprise Him by changing their fate. And if that's the case, why didn't he just make us a little different in the first place? Mold us to be a little more like our devout neighbor. It's an issue I worry I will never be able to resolve within the confines of a Christian theology. Thanks for your comments
Patrick, I'd love to interact with you on this. I'm not entirely sure I understand your objections.
It appears that your requirement is that God views human beings as worthy of ultimate value. As such, God has a moral obligation to value humans as you require Him to. If He fails to meet that moral obligation that our existence has imposed on Him, He fails.
It would appear, as well, that your position is that God cannot know the outcome of things (and, therefore, must not be defined as omniscient) and He cannot make choices about whom He will or won't save (based on the moral obligation our existence has imposed on Him). Thus, by your definition, God cannot exist (since no omniscient and moral being meets your criterion).
Given these objections and rules, I don't exactly know how to proceed. You appear to have set up requirements that cannot be met and then want an explanation about why they aren't met.
If that sounds argumentative or like some sort of complaint, please don't read it that way. I'm simply providing feedback to what you appear to have premised. Since your requirement is that a God who is not human (is supernatural by definition) must confine Himself to the value system of His creation and meet the requirements of His creation, I think you can only conclude that no such being exists. To me that's somewhat like saying "If Patrick is to exist at all, he must be a round square. Oh, he isn't? Well, there it is, proof that he doesn't exist." You've created (what appear to be unfounded) definitions for God that require His non-existence.
(By the way, as a side note, I would guess that you are not a parent. No parent takes pleasure in, for instance, having their child be hurt by inoculations or whatever other pains in life may be inflicted, but every parent knows that pain in life is sometimes necessary for a greater good. The question is is it possible that can God have a greater good in mind that would explain the value of eternal punishment of some of His creation? I would say yes. You would say no.)
Stan,
Thanks for the speedy and thorough reply; it's greatly appreciated. I'll simply tac on to your comments above beginning with P2 ("It appears..."): I would adjust the comment here from "ultimate value" to "worth of value enough" to warrant an eternal life void of excruciating pain and suffering. I would further assert that He has a "moral obligation" only to the extent that He created us as we are. To fabricate my own scripture-esque metaphor, the shephard should not punish the sheep for straying, but blame himself for allowing it to do so. So, the obligation (as He is Shephard AND Creator/Designer) is truly self-imposed.
P3- This is the root of my concern/issue, but I feel the His Word as provided creates this paradox/conundrum, not me. I'm simply trying to flesh it out as I see it.
P4 (Given these...)- I don't think I've provided unreasonable objections. For example, we praise God for saving the people of Israel from the Egyptians, proclaiming His mercy and compassion because this earthly salvation resonate as merciful or compassionate within the confines of our human understanding of such values. Yet, when it comes to our everlasting existing (much higher stakes, of course) a human understanding of values is suddenly unqualified. Why does it work for the first instance but not the second?
P5- "Your requirement is that...God...must confine Himself to the value system of His creation." Here I would like to emphasize that our value system is (or is supposed to be) derived directly from His Word. And I suppose that's my point- the value system of "His creation" (ie, us) is the value system that He has offered us. But that set of values does not appear compatible with this one critical issue, within our Christian context. Other topics we can rectify within the values set at hand, but here we are usually left with an ambiguous and open-ended comment about His mystery, which we cannot know. Of course my trouble here is due to the magnitude of the issue.
I hope these additional comments help clarify my thoughts, though I worry I've only muddied it in some places. All the best
Well, again, with the value that you're demanding of God to place on His creation, it would seem as if there is no option but "no God". That is, "Here is my position. God fails to meet my position. Thus, no God." It isn't, as it is, a valid question, but simply a "ruling from the court" of humans against deity. Nor is it entirely rational. For instance, the claim that a deity would be obligated to His creation simply because He created it means that He cannot be God. Humans are obligated to, using your example, their sheep not because the sheep demand it, but because the shepherd is a steward. No one, for instance, complains if the owner of a sheep kills that sheep for food. "Oh, you can't do that! The sheep are too valuable to do that!" Nor is there any biblical sense that God is under any such obligation.
And, as I pointed out (P3) and as you concur, it is a no-win possible scenario. God cannot be both omniscient and existent. Any existing deity could only have limited knowledge (and thus, by definition, isn't deity). All circles must be squares or they don't exist. The definition is arbitrary and irrational, based entirely on a previous demand that God value humans as much as we do.
Indeed, it is your view that God cannot exercise justice toward His creation and be God. Simply because He created humans they are "worth of value enough to warrant an eternal life".
It's true that our value system is derived from His Word. He says, for instance, that humans must respect the value of other humans because they were made in His image. Thus, from your line of reasoning, God, too, must respect the value of His creation. And, again, I would suggest that normal human relations illustrate that this makes no sense. As a parent, I am well within my rights to tell my children, "Don't take your siblings' things" and still be allowed to take them myself. There are orders of beings, orders of authority, orders of values. Yours demands that all orders be essentially equal.
I still maintain that God has a fundamental "good" in mind that is more valuable than the pain caused His creation by His exercise of justice. Your suggestion is that He would be immoral for exercising justice, which doesn't work at all in my head. So I'm not sure at all how I can help clear these things up.
Hi Stan,
I think we both believe we're getting close to running in circles on this, so I will probably make this my last post, assuming we or anyone else, does not open a new vein of discussion/reasoning. Please provide any further thoughts you might have, as I'm still very interested in getting your insights:
It looks as though the center of our discussion rests on whether or not God must "value human beings as we do," as you put it. This also goes back to your 2nd point (P6) from your original post- "The suggestion that God doesn't think of us as important as we do is offensive to us." Can we concur here?
"Love one another as I have loved you" John 13:34
"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him, shall not perish, but have eternal life." John 3:16
Also, see Romans 8:37-39
The argument we are having of whether a Creator must love His creation (us) as we do is aimless since He ascerts above that He does love us this much, and more. This is a basic understanding of Christianity, which, outside the context of this discussion, would be unquestioned. I think anyone reading this would agree: Q- Does God love us? A- More than we could ever begin to know. We are all familiar with it.
I have not created some sort of arbitrary, theological "Catch 22." I am not arguing that God "fails to meet MY position" and "thus, no God." I am arguing from a position backed by His own Words, which rests on probably the single most fundamental belief of all Christians- God's love. With this in mind, I don't believe there is anything "arbitrary" or "irrational" about my inquiry. I hope it helps to substantiate the previous arguments I have made, in light of your rebuttles based on the above argument.
I also do not pretend to believe that "all orders (of beings, authority, or value) be essentially equal." We are all familiar with Job 1:21. The issue here is that your purpose for taking away toys from your child (I hope) is to teach a lesson that will help cultivate them into a better person. Where is the lesson and what is its purpose when the means (punishment) is also the end? Here, there is no greater good for the unfortunate ones. It is an undeniably complicated concept (I would argue impossible) to grapple with, as evidenced by the many nuanced apologies and post-hoc creations (limbo) theologians throughout the ages have created just to account for it.
I feel that a response to the above would potentially resort back to the scripture I qouted: "For God so loved the world...that whoever believes in Him...shall have eternal life." So - as the argument would go - He leaves us all with a very, very simply solution: Believe in Him. But again, this just brings us back to the beginning- if He knows all that will ever be, why would He make me as I am, knowing that in this form I will simply deny Him? "Free will." Is it? If He already knows, isn't it just the perception of free will from our limited perspective?
Thanks for providing the open forum for discussion, Stan. I look forward to your feedback.
Yes, you're likely right about the "running in circles" thing. But I will need to respond to some of your response if I'm going to be responsive (intended to convey as much humor as I can in order to avoid coming across as argumentative).
Last year I wrote a piece entitled Does God Love Everyone? In it I pointed out the problem with that premise -- it doesn't actually work. So when Jesus told His disciples in John 13 that He loved them and they were to love one another that way, it was not a claim that He loved everyone. It would pertain to all His disciples, but not everyone. And when Paul wrote Romans 8, he wrote it to "all those in Rome who are loved by God and called to be saints" (Rom 1:7), so it would pertain to "saints", but not everyone. (Note the premise of Paul's gospel -- "the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth" (Rom 1:18).) And when Jesus told Nicodemus that "God so loved the world", He was not expressing a quantity of love ("so much") but a quality ("in this way") and it was "those who believe in His Son receive eternal life", which means not a generic, all-encompassing "I love you all so very, very much." Is it a basic understanding of Christianity that God loves all humans without limits? To some, perhaps, but not to me. And that's because of so much I read in Scripture to the contrary.
Fundamental to Christianity in Scripture is that God loves those whom He loves (e.g., Rom 9:13) and that to great measure (Eph 3:17-19), but not universally or unlimited.
What is typically (as in "nearly always") missed is that there is one being that God loves more than He loves any of His creation, and that would be Himself. Indeed, to do otherwise would be idolatry and insanity. So in Romans 9 Paul indicates that God's will is "to show His wrath and to make known His power" on "vessels of wrath prepared for destruction" (Rom 9:22). And now those vessels of wrath prepared for destruction are complaining that God isn't being nice enough to them.
That's one point to which I needed to respond. The other is the problem of "free will". Apparently the definition of the term is nearly impossible to nail down. What is it? Some argue for "libertarian free will" which demands complete and total non-interference from any source whatsoever. This, in its final analysis, is irrational. If there are no forces at work, making a choice is not possible. It is random. Others argue that no free will exists at all. Hard determinism. This is perhaps rational, but not biblically so. If you don't have any chance of making a choice, you can't be held responsible for your choices. Those would be the extremes. Luther wrote The Bondage of the Will explaining the problem of Natural Man and his inability to choose good, and Jonathan Edwards wrote The Freedom of the Will explaining how humans will always choose according to their strongest inclination. Both are biblically accurate. But your argument is indeed a Catch 22 if your definition of "free will" requires that God cannot be omniscient in order for free will to exist. I define free will as the ability to make choices without coercion within the bounds of possibility. God knowing (accurately) what I will choose to do is not coercion, so I don't see a problem. But if you're going to define "free will" as you do, then God cannot exist. And that's atheism by a priori definition, not by reason.
Stan,
This last post of yours makes more sense to me. It's not one that I believe most Christians would be confortable with (which is why, as you pointed out, most will stick with the all-loving version of God), but I think as a part of a general morality/justice/etc it is at least cohesive; not contradictory as I had thought. Thanks for clarifying.
That said, and with all respect, I do hope you're wrong :) Not to prove a point, just for the sake of those who would not find His favor. Great discussion!
Patrick, always happy to engage in friendly dialog, even with people who don't agree with me. Thanks for that.
I do indeed understand the sentiment that those who face God's eternal wrath are greatly to be pitied, but you have to understand on the other side that I believe (and I believe the Bible teaches) that their torment will ultimately be for the ultimate good. If I'm wrong, then, that ultimate good will not be achieved, God will not be omniscient, and we (who believe as I do) are most to be pitied because neither the Scriptures nor god (because it will have to be a lowercase "g" in this case) will make any sense at all. So I can't share your hope that I'm wrong. :)
Thanks again.
Stan,
Been reading your comments and I think you have a misunderstanding about ALMIGHTY GOD.
The truth is, GOD does not know what a person's future is because HE has chosen NOT to know; and GOD does not burn people in hell fire. In Jeremiah 32:35 the ALMIGHTY said HE never even THOUGHT about making anyone pass through the fire.
I cannot think of any scriptures that say GOD knows what you are going to do before you do it. You mentioned Psalm 139:16 but if you look at the original words and not the text added for "clarity" you will see that the scripture says that GOD knew the writers "members" before they were formed - not his days.
Also that scripture in Romans 9:22 about GOD displaying HIS wrath says "what if..." It does not say GOD does indeed display HIS wrath.
GOD is not WILLING that any should perish and HE - SO LOVED the world that HE gave...
GOD does not create a man specifically for torture in hell.
Thanks!
Mr. Brickson,
You’re expressing the view known as Open Theism. God does not know ... something. He cannot if Man is to have Free Will. It is a fine attempt to excuse God from the mess we’re making, but it doesn't fit with Scripture.
Do you know the balancings of the clouds, the wondrous works of Him who is perfect in knowledge. (Job 37:16)
Great is our Lord and mighty in power; His understanding has no limit. (Psa 147:5)
For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts. (Isa 55:9)
By this we shall know that we are of the truth and reassure our heart before Him; for whenever our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and He knows everything. (1 John 3:19-20)
And no creature is hidden from His sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account. (Heb 4:13)
I am God, and there is none like Me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done. (Isa 46:9)
But even the hairs of your head are all numbered. (Matt 10:30)
Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O LORD, You know it altogether. (Psa 139:4)
In Your book were all written the days that were ordained for me, when as yet there was not one of them. (Psa 139:15)
That's for starters.
Beyond Scripture, it doesn't fit with the entire history of the Church. The suggestion is that they never got it right but here, late in the 20th century, we finally figured it out. It would appear that Jesus was somewhat optimistic when He told His disciples that the Spirit would lead them into all truth. Some truth apparently takes a lot longer than others.
An "Almighty" God is not almighty if He has chosen to limit Himself. He is not almighty if He wants to save everyone but just cannot, even if the reason is that He has chosen to limit Himself. So I have a view of God that says that He does make beings that He knows will not be saved and you have a view of God that says He doesn't really know and can’t really do anything about it. Difference of opinion.
Stan,
You say that GOD cannot be ALMIGHTY if HE has chosen not to know the future, thereby limiting HIMSELF ??? If this logic is correct then GOD cannot be ALMIGHTY when the bible says HE is not willing that any should perish yet many perish!! It is obvious in this case that HE has limited or prevented HIMSELF from saving ALL - but I would bet you still consider HIM to be ALMIGHTY . GOD limiting HIMSELF does not make HIM less ALMIGHTY GOD!!
NONE of the scriptures you quoted state that GOD knows the future. Yes HE knows your thoughts, but thoughts are present tense; yes HE knows what you are going to say before you say it - but you 1st have to think it before you say it and again thoughts are present tense; yes GOD is Great and nothing (that is currently happening anywhere) is hidden from HIS sight!!
And yes GOD declares the end from the beginning....but declaring it is different than knowing it. The NFL declares the end of the season from the beginning every year but they do not know which 2 teams will still be playing on that last declared day. Declaring is different than knowing!!
The scripture you love in Psalms 139:16 says NOTHING in the original text about GOD knowing the writer's days before they came about. What the scripture does say is that when the writer was nothing but a cell (substance in the KJV) made up of his mother's egg and his dad's sperm, ALMIGHTY GOD recognized his "members" or body parts and it reveals that GOD considered a blob of fluid a real person. Nothing said about "ordained days" of one's life in this scripture.
If you are honest with yourself Stan, you will admit none of those scriptures you mentioned said anything about the future.
And here is another point that I would like you to honestly consider:
Is ALMIGHTY GOD wishy washy or double minded and does HE makes poor decisions like we humans do?
Your theory that HE knows everything before it happens would cause one to draw the above conclusions when we look at Genesis 6:5 & 6
According to those who believe GOD knows everything BEFORE it happens, the ALMIGHTY GOD created the heavens and the earth, mankind and all creatures KNOWING that HE would regret making man and therefore would wipe them all, except 8, off the face of the earth.
Seriously???
ALMIGHTY GOD would KNOWINGLY do something that HE would regret doing?? That's what we simple minded men do. We eat something knowing that we will come to regret it because it will cause us to have an allergic reaction - but we do it anyway; we marry a person that we know will cause us heartache and money....but we do it anyway; we buy things on credit that we don't need and cannot pay for, knowing that we will default...but we do it anyway - BECAUSE WE ARE SIMPLE-MINDED!!!
How can we DARE say ALMIGHTY GOD does the same thing???
On the other hand, since ALMIGHTY GOD CHOSE NOT to know what will happen before it happens, HE then created mankind and gave them freewill to chose between life and death. Then ALMIGHTY GOD stepped back and watched what man did and when HE saw that man's thoughts were evil CONTINUALLY, HE (ALMIGHTY GOD) then said "I regret that I ever made man".
This makes absolute sense.
But the teaching that GOD knew that HE was going to regret making mankind before HE created mankind, but HE did it anyway is either a ridiculous, senseless teaching or it implicates ALMIGHTY GOD as being fickle.
Which one do you chose?
I say it is ridiculous!!!
JC
Thanks for the friendly conversation, Mr. Brickson. I guess, in general, it isn't easy to have a pleasant dialog with someone with whom you disagree. You've demonstrated this truism.
Not one? Really? I am honest with myself. Every one of those passages repeatedly told me that God knows all things -- past, present, and future. "His understanding has no limit." You would say He "chose not to know" -- a limit. "He knows everything." You would say everything except the future. "... declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done." You would say He cannot (because He chooses not or because it doesn't exist -- seems like these contradict) know "the end from the beginning" in terms of "times" and "things not yet done".
I find no reference to cells in Psalm 139. In fact, what it does say is "And in Your book were all written The days that were ordained for me, When as yet there was not one of them." (Psa 139:16 NASB). (Hmm, looks like I incorrectly addressed that verse in my previous comment as verse 15.) Not cells. Not substance. "The days". And, specifically, "When as yet there was not one of them." Yes, it says that God's eyes "have seen my unformed substance", but that's only the first clause of the verse. That which is written in God's book, according to David, are the yom -- days. Time periods, not cells. And however you wish to define these time periods, they did not yet exist prior to being written in that book.
I find no reason to limit God's omniscience to the past and present. Nor has anyone in the past up until the advent of Open Theism. Your view, very popular among that crowd, is new and, for some reason, doesn't cause a single question about the veracity of Christ in claiming that the Holy Spirit would lead His disciples into all truth or the capability of the Church through 2,000 years to figure it out until now.
Beyond this, you are using the word "Almighty" to mean something different than I am. The term "all" alongside anything connected to "limited" doesn't work. You can't have, for example, "all the money that exists" and not have some. God cannot have all power and not have some. He cannot be "Almighty" and be limited in power.
So, yes, I'm serious. Yes, I'm honest with myself. Yes, I find your view inconsistent with Scripture, with reason, and with historic orthodoxy. You find my view ridiculous. You're free to do so. Not a problem. But we can stop this dialog now, right?
Stan,
In no way have I meant to be disrespectful to your opinion and I apologize if I came across as such. I would like to continue the discussion if you don't mind.
Concerning the scriptures provided, I believe we have to look at what is said rather than what we want it to say. I believe there is a distinct difference in declaring the end from the beginning and knowing the end from the beginning. My example with the NFL schedule proves that.
As for being ALMIGHTY - how do you explain the fact that the bible says in 2 Peter 3:9 that GOD is not willing that any should perish and it also says in Romans 9:19 "...who has resisted HIS will?", yet people perish?? If GOD cannot be ALMIGHTY and limited, then how can HIS will be resisted and/or negated?? It seems your logic says "to be ALMIGHTY, one's will cannot be resisted or unfulfilled because if it is, then one does not have all might".
You did not address the point about the fact that it is virtually impossible for GOD to REGRET making man when HE already knew what man was going to do. How can GOD repent of creating what HE KNOWINGLY created?
Also, what would you think about a preacher, who in order to get his parishioners to give more money, told them that he was dying and did not have any insurance for his family. He does this strictly knowing that this will prompt the people to give and when the money comes in, he then uses the money for the assembly, not himself. Would this be okay since it was for a good cause?
Now tell me, why is it okay for GOD to tell Ninevah that HE is going to destroy the city when in fact HE KNEW that HE was NOT going to destroy it!! Since GOD knew the future, HE purposely said HE was going to do something that HE knew HE was NOT going to do. But it was for a good cause right - to get the people of Ninevah to repent. Is this okay?
Is it okay for a woman to say she was going to kill herself (KNOWING within herself she was not), just to get her husband to stay with her?
If it's not right for man to knowingly make a false statement in order to manipulate others, how can it be okay for ALMIGHTY GOD to do so?, because iF what you say is correct, GOD already knowing the future purposely made a false statement in order to manipulate the Ninevites.
And lastly Stan, you have said GOD purposely creates people to go to hell, but please tell me how can HE create people for hell and turn around and say HE is not willing that any should perish??
JC
This is going to take two entries. Too many characters for just one. But it remains doubtful that this can remain a friendly dialog. Notice, for instance, your interesting set of assumptions. I read Scripture to see what I want it to say rather than what it says? And your view is consistent with the texts and context, but mine isn't? Let's see.
The text in Psalm 139 says what it says. "The days of my life were written in His book before there were any." I didn't make it say that. And clearly there is a large segment of people, you included, that doesn't want it to say that. Doesn't change that it says it.
Your complaint about 2 Peter 3:9 proves one of two things: either God is not Sovereign or you've misunderstood the verse. If 2 Peter 3:9 is saying that God's Sovereign Will is that everyone is saved (and we know from the rest of Scripture that not everyone is saved), then God's Sovereign Will is not achieved, Paul was wrong when he wrote that God works all things according to the counsel of His will (Eph 1:11). The psalmist was wrong when he claimed "Our God is in the heavens; He does all that He pleases" (Psa 115:1). Solomon was wrong when he wrote, "The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps" (Prov 16:9). Jeremiah was wrong when he said, "Who has spoken and it came to pass, unless the Lord has commanded it?" When Paul wrote of God's Sovereignty in Romans 9, he addresses the complaint, "Why does He still find fault? For who can resist His will?" not with, "Oh, don't worry, He has limited Himself to Man's Free Will", but "Who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, 'Why have you made me like this?' Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use?" (Rom 9:19-21). Over and over and over again the Bible repeatedly affirms that God is Sovereign, that all that occurs occurs according to His will, and that what He Sovereignly wills always happens. So if 2 Peter 3:9 is saying what you claim it is saying and God wills that everyone be saved and everyone is not, you have not only established that He is not Omniscient, but you have also established that He is neither Almighty nor Sovereign. (Hint: The passage doesn't say what you think it says. For further consideration, note that you have filled in a word that doesn't exist in the text. It does not say to what "any" refers. You assume it is "any persons", but that is not present in the text, not consistent with the context, nor consistent with the rest of Scripture on the Sovereignty of God. The "any" is in reference in context to the "you" addressed in the verse, which is a reference to "those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours" from the address of the epistle.)
Your complaint about God "repenting" (Gen 6:6) also contradicts other Scriptures and other attributes of God (such as Immutability). We read in multiple places that God doesn't change His mind. You understand that, apparently surprised by Man's sin, He does just that here. The text actually says that He "was sorry", literally that He "sighed" (nacham). No demand that He was caught by surprise here or didn't know or changed His mind. "Sigh! I knew this was coming. Makes Me sad to see it. Now I have to do what I have to do." The language is an anthropomorphism, expressing God's presentation in human terms. God doesn't have hands or head or eyes (because He is spirit), but we read of His hands, head, and eyes. This is a similar type of expression of sadness in human terms. It doesn't require ignorance on God's part.
(continued below)
(continued from the previous comment)
And note that God did destroy Ninevah for unrepentance. The reprieve they received in Jonah's day only lasted while they repented and the promised destruction and judgment came later. The text is written just like the story of Paul in the boat in the storm (Acts 27). God promised no loss of life. When the sailors attempted to sneak away, Paul warned that if they didn't stay on board, everyone would die. Now, which was it? (And how could God know either way if He doesn't know future events?) It was presented as a contingency, but doesn't require that God didn't know what would happen "if" and what would actually happen. That is, because of Paul's warning, everyone stayed aboard and everyone lived as promised. God temporarily spared Ninevah, knowing that the eventual result would be judgment.
Nor does Jer 32:35 (and other similar references) require that God didn't know. It says it didn't "enter My mind", a way of saying, "It wasn't My idea." He didn't command the sacrifice of children to Molech. It wasn't His design. It wasn't His idea.
Your suggestion, whether overt or implied, is that I'm ignoring some Scripture to conclude what I conclude. The simple fact is that your position ignores much Scripture to arrive at your conclusion. The answer to this dilemma is not to embrace a contradiction, but to correlate Scripture. I am able, in every case that I've found, to provide a satisfactory explanation for the passages that seem to say that God does not know something, keeping God's Sovereignty, Omnipotence, Immutability, and Omniscience as well as a correlation rather than contradiction of biblical passages. (I haven't done it here. I simply mean that I have done it over time.) Your view requires that God is not Sovereign, Omnipotent, Immutable, or Omniscient in accordance with what I see in Scripture and certainly not in any sense that historic Orthodoxy has embraced. Until you can correlate the Scriptures, retain the biblical attributes of God, and find some explanation why you've managed to figure out here in the 21st century what no one prior to the 20th century seemed to figure out about the nature of God and how these Scriptures work, I'm going to have to disagree with your view and keep mine.
Stan,
This may also require 2 post
In some of your replies you state that I am arguing one point or another when in fact I am not arguing that position to prove my case but rather to show the flaws in the position you have taken.
For instance you wrote to me:
"your complaint about GOD repenting (Gen. 6:6) contradicts other scriptures....."
I never had a "complaint" about this scripture. I use the King James Version which says the LORD "repented". It appears you like the Amplified Version and the term listed there is "regretted".
My point to you about this scripture is - IF you are correct that GOD knew everything that was going to happen before it happened, then GOD performed an act that HE KNEW HE was going to regret. I argued that this is exactly what man does and when men do this, other men consider them unwise. BUT somehow lots of men see no problem with ALMIGHTY GOD doing something that HE knew He would regret doing.
No complaint from me about the scripture....but I am confused at the contradictory attitude of believers.
If I let my young daughter go over a neighbors house with the trepidation that something evil would happen to her... and she was sexually abused,... you would cringe and consider me a bad parent if afterward you heard me confess "I KNEW this was going to happen!"
You would most likely look upon me with disdain and question me as to how I could let my daughter go into someone's house with the slightest inkling that anything bad would happen to her; yet you turn around and argue that it is okay for ALMIGHTY GOD to do the same thing with billions of people!
You wrote:
The text actually says that He "was sorry", literally that He "sighed" (nacham). "Sigh! I knew this was coming. Makes Me sad to see it. Now I have to do what I have to do."
Can you give me any reason, other than "because HE is GOD and you are not", why it is okay for GOD to sigh and say I knew this was coming, but it would be wrong for me to do the same thing with my child?
Regarding Jonah and Nineveh, GOD did not say "I will eventually one day destroy the city for a lack of repentance": HE told Jonah to tell them "in 40 DAYS GOD will destroy the city".
The 40 days came and went Stan, and Nineveh was not destroyed.
But again, IF you are correct, then it is okay for GOD to say HE is going to do something that HE ALREADY KNOWS HE is NOT going to do. Go back to my last message and tell me what you think about the church pastor. If GOD can say HE is going to do something knowing HE is NOT going to do it, then can't the church pastor use that same technique on his congregation?
Regarding Acts 27, I do not see any future or fortune telling in the scriptures...but I do see wisdom and warning. Just recently in Oklahoma a devastating hurricane flattened the town of Moore. There were some survivors that hid in a bank vault. If one would have told the others, "unless you stay in this vault you will not survive", would that have been a prediction of the future? I don't think so. The bank was destroyed but the vault remained intact btw.
As I told a few post ago, ALMIGHTY GOD can make things happen and HE can discern things without having to peer into the future. Just by speaking the word that the ship in Acts 27 would be a safe haven was all that was necessary: stay in and live or abandon ship and die. Where does looking into the future come in to place here?
(continued from previous comment)
Stan, please get my position straight: I am not saying ALMIGHTY GOD is incapable of knowing the future - I just say that HE chooses NOT to know. To you this makes GOD weak or somehow less than ALMIGHTY. But to me it makes GOD even more awesome and mighty.
Have you ever seen an attorney make a statement that he knows is going to get tossed out, but he does it just to plant a seed in the jury member's minds? The judge tells the jury to disregard that last comment - but how can they? It's in their mind and it can't be wiped out. ALMIGHTY GOD can hear or see something and then CHOOSE not to have any idea about it - and it's gone, completely wiped out! We can't do that but HE can! Isn't that a sign of awesome power, strength and ability.
In Hebrews 8:12 the LORD says HE will not remember the believers sins anymore. This does not mean that GOD knows about your sin but HE doesn't dwell on thinking about them. This means it is now as though you never sinned. If you were to say - hey LORD, remember that time I lied to my spouse....?, HIS reply would be "no I don't remember" !
I'll bet you can't wipe things out of your memory AT WILL. GOD can because he CHOOSES to do so and HE is still ALMIGHTY after HE does it! To me this is a display of tremendous power but to you it is a sign of weakness??
You also wrote:
...you are using the word "Almighty" to mean something different than I am. The term "all" alongside anything connected to "limited" doesn't work. You can't have, for example, "all the money that exists" and not have some. God cannot have all power and not have some. He cannot be "Almighty" and be limited in power.
But Stan, you willingly accept GOD to be limited here and there yet still ALMIGHTY and then you turn around and say to me that if GOD is limited anywhere then HE is not ALMIGHTY GOD.
Let me prove where you have a double standard:
Are you of the Trinitarian faith or the Oneness belief?
It doesn't matter because either way you accept that GOD is ALMIGHTY while at the same time HE is connected to a limitation.
If you are Trinitarian, you believe that the Father and the Son are 2 separate beings but somehow you accept the fact that the Father is ALMIGHTY and you believe that the Son is also ALMIGHTY (Matt. 28:18). But how can this be Stan when you just said "you can't have all the money and not have some"? How can the Father have ALL the power & might and the Son who is a separate being also have ALL the power & might?
If you are Oneness, you believe that Jesus is the Father manifested in flesh. You believe that Jesus is the ONE and only GOD. But you also believe that Jesus does not know the day or the hour when the last trumpet shall sound - only the Father knows that. But how can this be Stan, because if Jesus is GOD the Father, how can he be limited in His knowledge about anything??
Whichever is the case, Trinitarian or Oneness you accept ALMIGHTY GOD with certain "limits" and you still call HIM ALMIGHTY.
But then you turn around and tell me that GOD cannot be ALMIGHTY GOD with any limits.
Why the 2 positions??
The "complaint" I referenced was your complaint against orthodoxy (it's not just "my position") that says that God is omniscient and immutable, not a complaint against Scripture.
My point on your use of the concept of God "repenting" is that your concept of God regretting requires that 1) He couldn't know it was coming, 2) never does anything that makes Himself sigh (the literal Hebrew word), 3) and, most importantly, violates multiple Scriptures, the nature of God, as well as historical orthodoxy. (Note: By "couldn't" I don't mean what you are understanding me to mean. I understand that you hold that He could, but limits Himself from doing so. Logically, then, by His own self-limitations, He could not. That is, He couldn't violate Himself, so, if He is preventing Himself from knowing the future, then He cannot know the future.) (Note, by the way, the inherent illogic. If the future does not exist as you claim, then He cannot in any sense of the word know it. It wouldn't be a matter of limiting Himself. But, hey, that's your problem, not mine.)
But, look, this has clearly degenerated into a conflict rather than a discussion. You are convinced I'm misrepresenting your arguments, your intentions, and your character. And I understand why you would feel that way. I'm attacking your beliefs. Of course, on the surface I'd like to think that we're talking about beliefs, something external, something standing "over there", like a painting or something that we can both stand here and examine and critique without requiring that one or the other be insulted in the process. It's a belief, not the person. But this ignores the fact that these are your beliefs and, as such, when I attack these beliefs, the feeling is that I attack you. I get it. It's not impossible. In fact, it's often a favorite method, attacking the holder of a view in order to attack their view. I'm not doing this, but I get it.
In two entries here you haven't offered me any reasons to change my perspective. You're suggesting that my understanding of all of Scripture and the understanding of Scripture for all of Church History has all been wrong. You're suggesting that we never figured this out right. You're requiring, from your perspective, that in order to be right, I and the rest of Christian orthodoxy needs to jettison God's Omniscience in favor of self-limited knowledge, God's Omnipotence in favor of self-limited power, God's Immutability in favor of, well, an absolutely mutable God. All the logic and language that we've built up in this topic is required to be thrown out in favor of this "new and improved" understanding. You made this case in previous comments and now, in these two additional comments, you've offered no new arguments that should compel such a massive change nor even answered the objections of Scripture and history that I've offered in response to your position.
What am I saying? I think you've made your point. I think I've explained why I disagree. I don't think you're making any further points and I don't think I need to explain it further. Readers can look at Mr. Brickson's line of thinking and Stan's line of thinking and say, "Well ... hmmm ... I think I agree with ______" to their heart's content. In other words, I think we're done here.
As a postscript, your question from the Trinity shows a serious misunderstanding of just what that doctrine holds. I'm not answering your objection on that point because it doesn't pertain to the question and because it completely misses the Doctrine of the Trinity.
As a post-postscript, remember the original question: "Does God make people He knows will go to Hell?" Even from your perception, I don't know how you can answer that question with anything other than the affirmative. Even in purely human terms with purely human knowledge, I know that some of my offspring will go to Hell without even knowing who they are or when they will come to be. Thus, if God makes people and some of the people God makes will go to Hell and God is aware of that, isn't the only possible answer, "Yes"?
OK Stan,
Thanks for the unfinished discussion. I never attacked you and I am not mad about your position. Why should I get mad about how you feel?
I was on the other hand hoping for a direct answer to my questions from you.
You never answered the question about why it is okay for GOD to "sigh" about something HE knew was going to go bad, but it would be wrong for me to do the exact same thing with my child.
You never answered the question about whether or not it is okay for a pastor to tell his congregation an untruth simply for the purpose of manipulating them to do something "good".
Also rather than dealing with the point about the FATHER being ALMIGHTY while at the same time a "separate" being - Jesus, being ALMIGHTY as well in light of the fact that STAN said "you cannot have ALL and not have some",...instead you state something along the lines of "I'm not going to answer you because you don't understand the trinity".
And I'm sure Stan you don't want to deal with the fact that Jesus whom you believe to be ALMIGHTY - DOES NOT KNOW the day or the hour for the last trumpet. How can that be Stan? - Don't you remember what you said?
"The term "all" alongside anything connected to "limited" doesn't work."
Thanks for the unfinished discussion! and all the best Stan!
Over and out!
JC
Sigh. You cannot say "I never attacked you" when, as an example, you use phrases like "I'm sure ... you don't want to deal with the fact ..." which requires a conclusion about my motivation rather than a consideration of my arguments.
God says, "You thought that I was one like yourself." The Scripture says about God, "The Glory of Israel will not lie or have regret, for He is not a man, that He should have regret." But your standard of measurement is "If it's not right for me, how can it be right for God?" I've indicated that some depictions of God are anthropomorphisms, representations in human terms for One who is not human. The things He does are sometimes phenomenologically described. (You know how that goes. We call it "sunrise" because it seems as if the sun actually rises, but we know better. That's phonomenological language.)
My answer, then, is two-fold. God can do things we cannot. And all language depicting God as "sighing" does not require that He exhale (the definition of "sigh"). While I am unwilling to hold to contradictory statements in opposing hands and call them both true, the position that God actually regrets what happens and does not regret what happens is required from your position.
Ultimately, the perspective that God doesn't know (by choice or for any reason) what will happen and is actually surprised about what happens requires that God does not work all things after the counsel of His will. Thus, He is not actually Sovereign -- just somewhat or mostly so.
I have no contradictions in my system of theology. I am in concurrence with historical orthodoxy and find nothing at all in it that contradicts anything else in it. Sure, there is some that is mysterious or hard to comprehend, but nothing contradictory. And, ultimately, I am not allowed to judge God's actions by my standards. What is right for Him and what is right for me are not equivalent. I think you have misjudged God as shortsighted and done so in order to defend Human Free Will and to defend God's honor. I think your view ends up elevating Man and lowering God. Nor can I manage to come to your view without discarding Scripture, coherence, reason, or orthodoxy, none of which I am willing to do. But I don't think the discussion is unfinished. I think we're done here.
Please do not take this as irritable. I know I am often argumentative, and I look to the book of Job for my justification that arguing is okay. I know that a lot of my comments can be taken as attacking, but please know that I do not mean them that way. That's just the way they work in my mind. That being said:
First I would like to explain my understanding of the scriptures. 2 Timothy 3:16 says that all scripture is inspired by God and useful for teaching, but I have not found a verse of scripture that says all scripture is the literal word of God and is beyond reproof. I do believe that scripture is inspired and useful for teaching, but that it was written at a specific time and place, to a specific people, with a specific purpose. Consequently, we need to exercise caution when simply quoting one verse or one passage of scripture to support a view point, even if we say our viewpoint came from scripture. Any one with a concordance can find a verse to contradict. That being said, I see scripture as something that was inspired by God, but which we must use the brains God gave us to interpret.
I do struggle with the idea of an omniscient, omnipotent God, perhaps because I have had more opportunity to study Hebrew and the Hebrew scriptures. In the Hebrew language, there were not words like that, and with reading the early stories in Genesis, I cannot see how those writers would support the idea of a God who does have all power and all knowledge. The story of the Tower of Babel shows God needing to "find out" what was going on (the Hebrew word is ra'ah, and BDB says it can carry the sense of to discover, or find out). Later, God tells Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, and then commands him to stop because "now I know" (gen 22:12). This same conundrum occurs in Job 1 and 2, where God has to test Job. Now, the question I ask, is what could a God who already knows everything possibly learn from testing God's subjects?
I am quite content with the discussion that has already happened over Paul's words (and as I do not have anything further to contribute to that trail of thought) I will leave that as is.
However, I would like to add another voice to the discussion of the Psalms and some of the other poetry. The scholars I have read and learned from have all agreed that Psalms was the hymn book of the Hebrews. It never claimed to be a source for head oriented people, but for the heart oriented people. What I mean by that is that it shows examples of how humans respond to God, not God's words to humans.
I realize this is somewhat off topic, but I think it gets at the underlying assumptions in place in this discussion. As I said, I have done more scholarly work on the Hebrew Bible than the New Testament, and the concept of Hebrew concept of death was that everyone, righteous and wicked, foolish and wise (see most of Ecclesiastes) went to the same place: Sheol. The concept of Hell seems to have come about during the Apocryphal times, and the concept of Hell as most people now think of it came later yet, from Dante's Inferno (which is only the middle section in a greater work called the Divine Comedy, which does have a happy ending).
I do not think God has given us all the answers pertaining to Hell, Heaven, the Resurrection, and life after death in general. That is for God to know, and we can speculate (which you can probably tell I greatly enjoy doing), but we cannot, without great arrogance, claim that we know. I do think this is a continuing question for the Church, not because the early Christians got the answers wrong, but because there are now new questions in new contexts.
Again, I apologize if any of this seems less than friendly. I tried to keep myself in check, but I think it is valuable to have multiple viewpoints.
I'm not entirely sure what point(s) you are trying to make. I will respond to what I think you intended.
You have a different concept of "inspired" than the Church has held for ... well, it's entire history. You are using the term as in modern, 21st century English. The Church has understood the term as "God-breathed" and "the Word of God". We might say, "That's really inspired writing" without actually intending that God breathed it. We all know there is "inspirational writing" and such. But Paul didn't use that term and the Church has never understood it as such. So the logic trail is something like this: 1) The Bible is the Word of God, breathed by God into selected writers to, in their own words, say what He intended. 2) God cannot lie or be wrong. 3) Therefore, the Bible cannot lie or be wrong. On the other hand, if we're willing to set all that aside -- we're willing to throw out Church history, standard Christian orthodoxy, the reliability of God in offering His Word and the reliability of the Holy Spirit in superintending, protecting, and leading His own in the truth -- then the ballgame is changed and, in all honesty, Christianity is dead and people are free to believe whatever they wish. I won't argue further. If it is not God's Word, I have no reason to stand on it or depend on it or hold it as the sole authority on matters of faith and practice. It's just an "inspired" book with no more value than a good C.S. Lewis novel. Nice, but not authoritative.
Having said that, I do believe the Bible needs to be read as written. Poetry is poetry, doctrine is doctrine, wisdom is wisdom, historical narrative is historical narrative, etc. So while I believe that the Psalms are poetry and would offer them poetic license, I would still conclude that "In Your book were all written the days that were ordained for me, when as yet there was not one of them" (Psa 139:16) is consistent with every other passage in Scripture with the view to what God knows and, therefore, rightly illustrates His omniscience. That is, I don't need to go to poetry to see this fact in the Bible; it just says it so nicely and clearly there. So 1 John 3:20 says, "God is greater than our heart and knows all things." Hebrews says He is "able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart" (Heb 4:12). Isaiah, quoting God, says, "I am God, and there is none like Me, declaring the end from the beginning" (Isa 46:9). David assured us, "The LORD searches every heart and understands every desire and every thought" (1 Chronicles 28:9). And doesn't the vast amount of biblical prophecy assure us that God knows the future? The point is that the Bible in every place and in every aspect argues that God and God alone is omniscient.
As for "Hell", I'm using the common terminology -- the necessity of communicating. I understand that much of the Old Testament used the term "Sheol" and meant simply "the grave". Nor am I calling on a "Dante's Inferno" concept. I'm referring to, oh, I don't know, Jesus's version: "the unquenchable fire" (Mark 9:43ff). A popular New Testament idiom refers to Gehenna, where the fires are never quenched and the worm never dies. That's not Dante's version; that's Jesus's. And while I don't necessarily subscribe to a literal place of eternal fire, I cannot avoid a place of eternal torment too horrible to imagine -- Hell.
And, we're back to the original question. If God makes all people and if He knows that some will end up in that place of eternal torment commonly referred to as "Hell", is it not a given fact that God makes people He knows will go to Hell? All of this without an ounce of "less than friendly".
Two more key points.
First, none of this has changed with time. These are not new questions. Nor has the Church had questions on these points. Orthodoxy is orthodoxy. And if Jesus was right when He promised His Holy Spirit to lead us into all truth, it is inconceivable to me that He has failed to accomplish this until now.
Second, I understand that in some circles it is considered rude to be certain. Eternal speculation is all we are allowed. It is arrogant to know. I would disagree. If God says x is true and it is clear, then it would not be humble of me to say, "Yeah, well, maybe, but we cannot know that." So I constantly question myself on my understanding and interpretation, but I am -- pardon the expression -- quite sure that there is a lot we can and should know with confidence and it is not to our benefit or consistent with Scripture to deny it.
I apparently was quite unclear about my points in my attempt to be polite.
First: On the topic of the Bible and Orthodoxy's inerrence, one only needs to look to Genesis to find contradictions. Were there two of every animal on the ark (tradition and Genesis 6:19) or were there seven pairs of the clean animals as later defined in Exodus, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy (Gen 7:2)? Mathematically speaking, there cannot simultaneously be only two of each kind and seven pairs of some. Moving later, tradition holds that Moses wrote the Torah: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. However, in the final chapter of Deuteronomy, Moses is quite clearly dead. So which is it? Is Moses writing, or is Moses dead? Proverbs teaches us that wisdom will be beneficial, that it will improve our lives, and that we can become wise. Ecclesiastes teaches the opposite. Wisdom is hevel (mist, vapor, absurdity, vanity), or "chasing after the wind". So which is it?
I am not trying to discredit the Bible (even though it may seem like it, hear me out). We simply have a different understanding of what the purpose of the Bible is. I do not see it as a textbook, but rather as an arrow. The Bible as I read it (the aforementioned flaws and all) has never given me an answer to a problem I have had, but it has pointed me to the One who does have the answers. I do not think this means that Christianity is "dead" by any means. The Wesleyan Quadrilateral has four parts to faith: scripture, tradition, reason, and experience. Christianity does have all four parts, not just tradition and scripture. Just because the scripture begs the reader to think and pray, even without all the answers, does not make the scripture any less meaningful. Using the brain God gave me (and that Proverbs commands me to use), this understanding of the Bible actually makes me respect it more.
My point with the first comment about that was merely to point out the dangers of relying on stand alone verses for justification. Slavery has been and sometimes still is justified by stand alone verses or stories from the Bible. It is a very dangerous book.
Second: because of the stories I mentioned in my first comment, I have difficulty imagining an omniscient God who is good. If God knows our responses, then God cannot learn from our tests, for in order to learn, one must not know. If God does know, then why would God test humans, at times when the Bible shows that God received the benefit of the testing? (Again, see Abraham sacrificing Isaac or Job.) If God already knows the results of the test, then what benefit could God received from the test? If God receives a "high" or glorification from the suffering of God's servants (whom God has already called loyal), is God good? As I have never believed in all the "omni"s, and have had little scholarly influence from people who, I am interested to see how someone who is convinced of the "omni"s explains the passages of testing.
Concerning the question of God creating people God knows will go to Hell: I can agree with the statement you made on May 23, that someone, somewhere down the road, will go to Hell. So using that logic, yes, God creates people God knows will go to Hell. But does that mean that God creates some people for the sole purpose of punishing them eternally? Reason and experience tell me no. Others have already provided scriptural evidence supporting the side that says God does not want to punish God's children, so I will let their arguments stand. I cannot argue from tradition, as I have never been impressed with doing or believing something simply because others do and have, so I have spent little time studying tradition. However, I do know that tradition says God loves us. Perhaps the best way I can phrase my stance is how another friend of mine phrased it: "While we cannot have a doctrine that says there is no Hell, it can be our Christian hope that God's love will win, and no one will go to Hell."
(Side note: my comments about the history of "Hell" were musings on my part, not a criticism of your views. I understand how you could see it as such, but that is not how it was intended. I warned you ahead of time that I can come across as aggressive, and that anything seeming aggressive was not intended as such. I would kindly ask you to treat me with more respect in the future, as I am not an imbecile, and I do not appreciate being treated as such. You asked for a friendly discussion, even if we disagree. I expect you to play by those rules as well.)
Conclusions that must be drawn:
1. Those who believe that the Bible in its original text is inerrant (a necessary conclusion if it is actually "God-breathed" as Paul claimed) is not "using the brain God gave me".
2. The Bible is "an arrow" that points to truth but certainly not "God's Word" which is truth ... without error.
3. Using Scripture as I do is using "stand alone verses" and should not be practiced ... even if it is a consistent practice without contradiction.
4. Two thousand years of Christianity have been wrong. The Bible is a good book, but not the "sole authority". If, for instance, reason or experience contradict tradition or, better, Scripture, then clearly reason and/or experience are right and Scripture and/or tradition are wrong. Or, to put it another way, I am the ultimate arbiter of truth.
5. Your Wesleyan Quadrilateral only has two reliable legs -- reason and experience. As you've demonstrated, Scripture is not reliable I mean, seriously, can't a single author writing a single story like Noah's ark get a single fact like "How many of each animal did Moses put in the ark?"? If the best one author can do with one story is fail to count properly, how in the world would we expect any of them to get the serious stuff right? And since tradition has held to the Bible as the Word of God, the primary authority in matters of faith and practice, clearly tradition has always been wrong as well. Besides, you've "never been impressed with doing or believing something simply because others do and have", so that whole tradition thing is dead right alongside the Scripture. Reason and Experience, don't fail me now.
Now, as to the objection. I don't think I ever suggested anywhere that "God creates some people for the sole purpose of punishing them eternally." I'm pretty sure that thought never crossed my mind. If it did, shame on me for such a horrendous fallacy of the false dilemma. I do know that I have never believed it was true and I do know that I have offered biblical reasons that some are damned.
I understand that you find contradiction in the Noah story (for starters), so it is no surprise that you find contradiction in God. He loves us but made Hell. He warns of Hell but wishes there will be no one in it. He claims Sovereignty but can't seem to pull it off. Given the two-legged stool of Reason and Experience on which you have to balance, it will likely be a difficult act to pull off. I, on the other hand, haven't found a problem when I view that quadrilateral as a prioritized one with Scripture over Tradition and Tradition over Reason and Reason over Experience. I haven't yet found a genuine biblical contradiction, and finding one in the doctrine of eternal punishment hasn't posed a logical problem for me yet.
And I have read your comments as a point of view opposed to mine, but not as a personal attack. I've taken no offense. I didn't even see your comments as "aggressive" and haven't treated them as such. If I come across as treating them that way either before or now, it's due to the poor medium of Internet dialog, because I'm not feeling offended or assaulted.
hell does not exist in the first place it was created by people like us. just think what the world would come to if the myth about hell was never there. actually the life you are living now is heaven and hell. be good and you will have peace in your heart(thats heaven) and try to do bad things, you won't have peace(thats hell) think what your life would be without peace. god said he created man on his own image. why would god send his loving children to hell? u can email me at huvikaassumi@gmail.com for more ans..
Anonymous (huvikaassum?)
Yours, I'm sure, is as warm and friendly perspective. It's just that it's neither biblical nor rational ... in so many ways.
1. No heaven or hell (except what we create ourselves) means no justice. No justice means no objective moral code and no god. No objective good and no god means that a question about why (a non-existent) god would send his loving children to hell is without object or point.
2. With no justice, no objective moral code, and no god, "be good" is a meaningless term defined by each individual user so that "Give all of your goods to the poor" would be the height of "good" to one user and the ultimate "evil" to another while "Murder every man, woman, and child in your neighborhood" would be the worst "evil" to some and a pleasant pasttime to another and there is no way to tell the difference.
3. If heaven and hell are simply what we make of them, then "If it feels good, do it" is "heaven" and no one on the planet has the right to suggest you don't do what feels good to you ... even if that's inflicting pain or torture or any other commonly accepted "bad".
4. Having eliminated justice and, as a necessary consequence, god, there can be no "god" who "created man on his own image".
5. It is the height of naivete to believe that human beings are "loving children", given, as first evidence, the fact that Man cannot likely put together 500 years total in human history without being at war.
6. Heaven, Hell, God, good, evil -- all of this is defined for Christians in the book that God had written for that purpose. Offering the warm and friendly notion that all of that is false as you have is not good news to Christians. It is the end of Christianity, God, heaven, hell, peace ... anything we know to be true. Not so warm and friendly anymore.
You'll quit being so silly.
There, I posted your comment ... I just don't know what it means.
I quit reading the comments about halfway through because the forest was lost in the trees. The simple question, unanswered in this forum, remains; if God is omniscient, and we accept the Word at face value, Why does God create people, billions of people, that he knew before they were created, that would not accept the Grace of Christ, and would, as such, die separated from God.
I am a Christian, by faith. It is however disappointing that Christian apologists have no reasonable response for this question. Like this forum, the basic question is quickly tossed aside in favor of discussions of holiness, fairness, sovereignty, mystery etc... The fact is, God created Adam/Eve knowing they would fail, Cain/Abel knowing Cain would murder his brother and subsequently hundreds of billions of unnamed people would would never accept him. Why.
So here is the answer: we don't know why, we will never know why. Science, in all its supposed wisdom and knowledge, still cannot explained the observed act of a caterpillar transforming into a moth, much less know the mind of God. They don't call it "faith" for nothing.
While I'm quite sure we'll never (or, at least, never this side of heaven) understand fully, I personally am content with the answer in Romans 9. Paul tells us there that it is God's will to demonstrate His wrath and power on vessels of wrath prepared for destruction. That's a purpose statement. That's a reason. I'll trust that His is a good reason.
Then why was I for some unknown reason,why was I forced to marry a man I didn't love and committed adultery.I am not now nor have I ever been an atheist.I have done things in my life ,like marrying out of fear instead of love and then cheating on him. Is that not a vessel of wrath fitted for destruction? Why would I want to marry someone to cheat on him and be beaten and choked by him.Why would I marry someone who would choke me and try to put my head through a window.Where I tried to leave him, he said if I didn'the come back home,he would kill himself.I didn'the want to marry and to be an adulterer.God knows my life and I don't lie when I say,Why would God turn away a child that was abandoned and mistreated and put her in a relationship to be abused and mistreated even more? I keep asking Him why if He loves me,why didn't He save me and keep me from harm and abuse? I want to be saved and go to Heaven, UT that choice is not up to me.If I had my way,God would have been # 1 in my life as a child and I would be married to the love of my life, instead of who I'm married to.Feeling totally condemned.
I argued that God makes people He knows will go to Hell. I did not argue that He makes them go to Hell. That is, it is His influence that makes them earn or choose Hell. I also didn't suggest that I know who those people are.
On your comment, then, the bad news is that, from what you said, you have nothing to be ashamed of. You were "forced to marry a man" and apparently forced to commit adultery because of it. You were forced to stay and forced to be miserable. Since you have no choice, you have no culpability.
The good news is that if you are actually the sinner you seem to say behind the reasons you were forced to be one, there is a solution. There is no kind of sin Jesus can't forgive, no kind of sin He didn't die for. Repenting and placing your faith in Him for salvation will certainly and always produce a changed heart and sure salvation. That feeling of total condemnation is helpful if it drives you to Christ.
“WOW,” I was taught and believed that multitudes upon multitudes of humans will suffer “eternal torment” for 100 trillion years, and then another 100 trillion years, and then another 100 trillion years, and it goes on and on with no hope of it ever ending.
I am certain that each one of us, deep inside of our very being, know that something just does not add up concerning this picture, but we just can't quite figure out what is it that we are not understanding correctly.
The true biblical teaching is neither the traditional Christian view of hell, nor the view of annihilation. Our great God is neither a great torturer nor a great annihilator, but He is the great Saviour of the world.
The mystery of the finished work of Christ on the Cross will one day reveal the perfect plan of God for the entire human race, which does not include “eternal torment” or “eternal annihilation” for one single person!
I have written upon this topic, but it is much too lengthy to post on this site. Below is a sample. If anyone would like a copy in it's original Word Document Format, feel free to e-mail me and request a copy, and I will e-mail you a copy.
candy33alan@aol.com
………. What is the “GOOD NEWS” of the Gospel of Christ? ……….
(Re-examining the widely held belief of “eternal torment” in “Hellfire”)
There are some Biblical topics which in order to get a better and clearer understanding of, require a lengthy Biblical explanation. This Biblical topic is certainly one of them. After all, there is certainly NOTHING MORE IMPORTANT than “our eternal purpose” & “our eternal destination!” Therefore, it is of the utmost importance for us to have a better and clearer Biblical understanding concerning this most important topic.
My purpose for this writing is to Biblically “expound” upon (1)is there really going to be “eternal torment?” (2)is there really going to be “eternal annihilation?” (3)to give a Biblical answer to the question “If there is no “eternal torment,” and if there is no “eternal annihilation” of our very being, then what are we being saved from, and what is our being here during this present time on earth really all about?”
I was a Christian for 38 years before the Lord opened up my Spiritual understanding to see more clearly some Biblical truths that I had not properly understood in regards to the finished work of Christ on the Cross.
Anonymous (weird ... we have quite a few people here named that, but I know almost no one by that name),
I'm glad to hear that you've figured it out. I'm happy that you have obtained a special pipeline that gives you knowledge of God and His Word that no one else has. It is sad to hear of the failure of Christ when He promised to send His Holy Spirit to lead us into all truth and the failure of the Holy Spirit to do it until you came along and the failure of Scripture when Jude suggested that our faith was "once for all delivered to the saints" (Jude 1:3), when, in fact, it wasn't finally delivered until your special revelation appeared.
All that to say that 1) Scripture doesn't agree, 2) Christ didn't agree, and 3) the entire history of the Church doesn't agree. I have sufficient "audacity" to say, "Well, if the Bible says it and if Christ said it and if the Church has always agreed on it, I guess I'll go along, too." I don't have what it takes to hold, "They were all wrong and I know better now."
"I am certain that each one of us, deep inside of our very being, know that something just does not add up"
Yes indeed. For you the thing that didn't add up was that a just, Holy, Righteous God would judge sin that harshly; for me it was that if that's what God's Word says about the judgment of sin, then my view of sin was too trivial and it's much worse than I originally thought. To put it another way, you decided to align sin with your view and I decided to adjust my view of sin to fit with God's view.
Stan, My name is Alan Finch.
Below are some e-mail comments that I have received from people who took the time to read my entire 24 page article.
Good morning Alan,
Your wonderful comment about universalism greatly touched my heart. My eyes have only recently been opened to that sublime truth and the way you stated the case was music to my ears - and my heart. Excellent teaching. Thank you very much.
I just happened upon your comment in my search for more understanding about the sweet truth and extremely "Good News" about God's intention to eventually gather ALL of us back to Himself. And your comment did indeed increase my understanding of this marvelous subject, so I'm in your debt.
I don't think I'm dreaming when I envision the entire world being transformed by this teaching. I hope to follow your lead, Alan, and play a part in spreading this "heretical" teaching, because I believe that it is anything but. The heresy is the traditional teaching of damnationism. What a slur upon God's loving character. I seriously have to question myself for ever having bought into such insanity. And for sooo long.
Thank you again, Alan, for your balanced and well thought out comment. You have enriched me. Robert.
Hi Alan,
Just wanted to say thank you for sharing your thoughts in the comments section. And thanks for sharing the context and validation for writing it as well.
I have been struggling quite a bit with the concept of Hell and found your comments right at a time when I was deciding that I simply have to believe that we must have understood something wrong. I simply can't fit eternal pain for no other reason than punishment with my experience of unconditional love. It doesnt compute and I believe it is keeping a lot of people away from God.
With blessings,
Teemu Mäki-Patola
Good evening Mr. Alan Finch
Can you please send me a copy of your article... "What is the Good News of the Gospel of Christ?"
I read it on Facebook but would like to print and read it again. It's fascinating and brought me a lot of joy/understanding that I haven't had in quite a while.
Thank you
Sincerely...
Christina
Alan,
I enjoyed your article and it has confirmed so much for me. Can you email me a copy and anything else that you may have?
"As the Father has sent Me, I also send you." -Jesus Christ-
Alec Martin
Fatherhood Initiative
alecfatherhood@gmail.com
334.306.8267
Hello Alan,
I read your comment on the “Hell in the Bible” post on branzenchurch.com and would like to accept your offer of a copy of the complete writing that you’ve done on the subject. I have been wrestling with the subject of hell for a while now but still have some unanswered questions. It sounds like your writings may be helpful to me as I continue to work through this.
Thanks for all the work you’ve done!
Blessings,
Patti
Thank you so much for your knowledge and commitment to the good fight.
Randy Brasier Jasper Products, LLC 3877 E 27th Street Joplin, MO 64804 417-206-3877
Please send me an e copy.
Thank you. Very enlightening. I found your insights refreshing. Well done.
Robert Bondurant
Hi Alan,
Could you please send me a copy of your article on Hell?
I have been struggling with this issue throughout my life but especially in the last 17 and a 1/2 months. As my Dad died in September 2016!.......
Blessings,
Heidi
Dear Alan, I am requesting your article on hell as I saw your comment on Brazen Church , com. I have been struggling in my search for biblical truth for quite some time and the more I search the more confusion I an experiencing. I keep praying, but still tortured by confusion. I am so turned off by main stream Christianity. I am feeling so desperate for truth. Help. Thanks for the opportunity to benefit from your knowledge.
Raven
I'm sorry, Alan. I'm afraid you are misguiding people, twisting the Scriptures, ignoring the problem of sin, diminishing the justice of God, demeaning the sacrifice of Christ, and bringing great joy to the enemies of God.
I read the article and a chunk of the arguments, to me however, the bottom line is this:
By creating something you know will be tortured, and be aware of being tortured (no being knocked out because of the pain, sorry!) FOREVER, you deserve nothing but disdain and contempt. What do we do to people that have babies and treat them in a violent or neglectful way? Do we simply say "Oh, that is their baby, they can do as they wish?". No, we don't.
If you have one of your children with you (adult or otherwise) while reading this, look over at them and imagine torturing them in the worst ways possible for all of eternity. Can you even imagine doing it? Can you imagine letting someone else do it (IE the devil, your scapegoat, whom you also created and knew what would happen when you did)? Do you want to worship a god who condones this? If God considers us his children, why would he treat us this way?
Debate free will any way you want, for me, if god has written down every day of your life before you are even created, then you do NOT have free will. It has been dictated and there is nothing you can do about it. Thankfully I do believe we have free will (in our own, limited way) and personally I choose not to worship the god of control and torture. Thanks, but no thanks.
That's fine, Jason. You are, of course, in the vast majority of those who decide "The god I believe in must conform to the standards I hold." Regarding this god you believe in, you will need to figure out 1) in what sense (if any) god is omniscient because if he's making people he does not know will go to hell then he's not and 2) in what sense he's omnipotent because if people are coming into being out of his control, he's not and 3) in what sense he's sovereign because if all this is happening and he's at the mere whim of Human Free Will, then he's not. For starters. Further, if it is your plan to proceed with this god and to claim that he's the God of the Bible, you'll have to figure out how to correlate all that the Bible says about him (like omniscient, omnipotent, sovereign, etc.) with the version you have where he's not. Since you didn't offer any biblical reasons for your view, I don't know if that's an issue for you.
Defining god by our own standards is very common; it just doesn't generally align with God's self-expression from His Word.
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