Calzaer

So God lied to Abraham.

Magus55

You guys are confining God too much to human understanding. Free will is a concept for humans. God's nature is far and above free will. He created free will for us and the angels. God cannot commit evil, because it violates His nature. Sure you say that means He isn't omnipotent or is confined, but its just the opposite. Being able to commit evil is confining; being wholly good and righteous is the epitome of perfection because evil is inferior to good.

To your second question, I think you are looking at it wrong. God isn't outside time in the sense that it confines Him to that which isn't part of the universe. God isn't bound to time or the universe, like matter and us are. He created time and the universe, and therefore exists independently of it, unlike us. Since God has sovereign authority and control over the universe and time, while not being bound to it, He can move in and out of time at will. In the case of Adam and Eve, in the Garden, God entered His creation and the bounds of time, to interact with His creation. But after entering time, He can just as easily move out of it - because Time has no meaning to God. God can work within His own creation, but His creation doesn't control Him, like it does us. We can't be out of the bounds of the universe and time ( not yet anyway) because we are finite, material beings. God on the other hand, is infinite, and spiritual.

Magus55

Nope, God did what Abraham asked, but God already knew Abraham was gonna ask that, and He would agree to it before time. God had already planned to do what Abraham wanted, before Abraham ever asked, God just allowed Abraham to be a part of God's plan by asking the favors.

And I will be the first to admit, trying to understand God's nature and being is extremely difficult for a finite mind. We restrict God too much in order to fit Him into our understanding. God's character as outlined and explained in the Bible is only a tiny fraction of the extent of God's being. The Bible is the way for our puny minds to try and conceive an understanding of God. To know and understand Him fully would required us to be infinite.

Spenser

So yet you still hold that God knows what Abraham was going to do, yet Abraham some how still has free will even though there was no way that he was going to do anything other than what God already knew that he was going to do. How do you sit so comfortably in such contradictions?

Hawkingfan

Regarding the flood, god must be extremely cruel. Because if his plan to send Christ in order to forgive man of sin was in place for eternity, then the act of drowning everyone (including innocent babies, except for Noah's family) in the flood for their wickedness was unnecessary. Those people died in vain for arbitrary reasons. God treated them unfairly by drowning them, yet forgiving everyone else through Christ. This would also apply to Soddom.

Magus55

Because it isn't a contradiction. You automatically assume God's omniscience, pre-determines our actions. It doesn't. You have every ability to make choices on your own for or against God. The only difference is, since God can see the future as though its the present, He sees those choices you make already played out. God's omniscience doesn't prevent free will. You still have the ability to make choices, God just sees you already make them before you do.

Magus55

How is it unfair? Do you know every single detail and circumstance related to creation from the beginning to the end? Do you fully understand the reasons behind God's methods? ( in otw, do you claim to fully know the mind of God). You don't, so how can you claim unfairness? Its based on your perception, not the truth.

Hawkingfan

If you were a parent and you had a child who did something wrong and you drowned him for it, but then years later another child comes along and does the same offense, you forgive him--and claim that you had planned to forgive each child even before they were born, that is dishonest and unfair.
Off topic.
I understand the reasons described in the bible.
There would first have to be a mind of god for me to fully know it.
I have a thing called an intellect that helps.

winstonjen

So he created us knowing which would go to heaven and which to hell, but he created us all anyway. How loving.

beastmaster

It is not necessary to understand the motive in order to condemn the murderer.