God: The most powerful force in the universe

[dslc6487]

God is the most powerful force in the universe. He is the Alpha and Omega. No other entity is more powerful than God.

Then, everything that happens is under God's infinite Wisdom and Control. If it is His Will, it will happen

If it is not His Will, then He can prevent it from happening.

So, why is there so much suffering, tragedy, catastrophes, abuse, assaults, etc, and the list goes on.
Someone explain this to me. In other words, if there is truly a God, then, does He really care............

 

[gemcgrew]

God is the most powerful force in the universe. He is the Alpha and Omega. No other entity is more powerful than God.

He is all power. He is the only power.

Then, everything that happens is under God's infinite Wisdom and Control. If it is His Will, it will happen

If it is not His Will, then He can prevent it from happening.

There is nothing to prevent. If it is not His will, there is no it.

So, why is there so much suffering, tragedy, catastrophes, abuse, assaults, etc, and the list goes on.
Someone explain this to me.

He wills it.

In other words, if there is truly a God, then, does He really care............

He determined the end from the beginning. What is there for Him to be concerned about?

"Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure:"

"And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?"

The proposed problem of evil, no matter how many times the wording is changed, is a mystery to the unbeliever. The problem of evil was answered and defeated the very first time a believer encountered it.

There just isn't very many believers.

 

[gordon 2]

God is the most powerful force in the universe. He is the Alpha and Omega. No other entity is more powerful than God.

Then, everything that happens is under God's infinite Wisdom and Control. If it is His Will, it will happen

If it is not His Will, then He can prevent it from happening.

So, why is there so much suffering, tragedy, catastrophes, abuse, assaults, etc, and the list goes on.
Someone explain this to me. In other words, if there is truly a God, then, does He really care............

Human beings live in a world of fight or flight due suffering in which the remedy's ( their fights or flights) return is also suffering. So the world is a place where suffering perpetuates itself. It is a world of your d--- if you do and your d--- if you don't. The reason most often stated for this state of affaire is due original sin.

The world is like a woman in birth pain that do not stop. God proposes a birth from this state of affairs however. He deposits faith into the world. To faith or to the people of faith God reveals his purpose and especially the element of good (without evil) and love.

It is said that this is the most quoted verse in scripture...

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

So God loves and is active in a ministry of love in the world of suffering, a world where to perish is all in all. The world is perishing and you and I are perishing due the world, EXCEPT...! Except for you and I Jesus came into the world that though we will suffer for it as he did, we will get out of it as he did. We have hope in the victory of the heavenly over the worldly. We have hope in the victory of good over evil. And if we have just such hope itself then God really cares.

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

One day when all is good we don't know what it will be like. Now we have hope and continue with the cross for as long as there is some hope of overcoming in the world ---God cares.

We read in the good book: The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.”

Everything in its time. Perhaps one day the very world itself will be born again.

Sometimes our hope is such that we can joke about the world and suffering as in this case of a joke that never goes old:

"In this world of sin and sorrow there is always something to be thankful for; as for me, I rejoice that I am not a Republican." H.L. Mencken

 

[Israel]

What if God, determined to make His Christ known in and among men called by His name bore with much long suffering the grief of those with whom He suffers, in order that the knowing of Christ could be made known in them called by His name by the mercy they could not refuse toward those in grief.

 

[gordon 2]

What if God, determined to make His Christ known in and among men called by His name bore with much long suffering the grief of those with whom He suffers, in order that the knowing of Christ could be made known in them called by His name by the mercy they could not refuse toward those in grief.

We might have a Bingo after we check if all the numbers were called.

God was easy on Cain.
Good to the Hebrews.
Good to the gentile even,
Who really knew!

"What good he's done for others,
He will do for you."

 

[dslc6487]

And, according to post #2, the grief that He "wills" on others, He can "will" to you and others as He sees fit..........

 

[gordon 2]

And, according to post #2, the grief that He "wills" on others, He can "will" to you and others as He sees fit..........

Well... that is a whole other topic. What you are really, really, really saying is that your definition of God or understanding of the God of Abraham is making you say "God wills grief". That is a whole different topic than I assumed was the topic of this post-tread. I assumed incorrectly that the topic was why does God permit evil in the world. But I disregarded your fabrication of what God and his power was as being a teaching of the dynamics of everything- the principle of principles, the paradigm of paradigms.

"A)God is the most powerful force in the universe. He is the Alpha and Omega. No other entity is more powerful than God.

B)Then, everything that happens is under God's infinite Wisdom and Control. If it is His Will, it will happen.

C) If it is not His Will, then He can prevent it from happening."

Such a scheme of reasoning is a set up to make God a failure. I'm sorry I missed this. Nevertheless I still think you can pick up a pearl or two perhaps from the off topic remarks not related to your real question.

So lets get going:

God according to your logic model is Infinite Wisdom and Control and what He can will can happen. It can happen or not happen because he can prevent it from happening according to the model.

So let me put this in my Christianese processor and see what comes out.

God is a Spirit of Wisdom and Control. God is a Spirit. God's spirit of Wisdom and Control can prevent things from happening in the universe. Wisdom and Control together means that a bridle can be pulled starboard or arboard and what is not God's will God can prevent it from happening.

Yes... what is not God's will he can prevent it from happening. This assumes then that man has his own spirit and will to counter God's will or some other force and power does.

Now we have another item to add to the logical model.

"And, according to post #2, the grief that He "wills" on others, He can "will" to you and others as He sees fit.......... "

God wills grief according to your understanding of post # 2. I would go as far as to say that God will not restrain grief, but that to give man grief is not his will. Grief is the will of some other power that is God deems important to let be for now. For an example of what I'm trying to talk about is Paul's willingness and suggestion that a certain fellow which was out of order with what a saint should aspire to be that the congregation should " had him over to Satin" for the salvation of his soul! Go figure! No kidding!

There is often a confusion in the offspring of Christians who keep a faith of face values and superficial or for granted that evil and suffering is willed by God. It is not totally incorrect. God has let the world harden the spirit of its spawning--perhaps to show the man of faith where he takes good and evil to his destruction.

Take the prodigal son. His father could of locked him up to prevent his table being the spread of hogs. But his father did not. There are some things a man needs to know and that is that he can control his outcomes and it depends a lot on how his heart sits on matters. He can farm with his father or he can strike out on his own. I don't think God will prevent the consequences of these things good and bad to make things strait.

But God will prevent things from happening yes. The Hebrews prayed from rock bottom. Lots of people find God's Wisdom only when they are to rock bottom. In some cases grief makes the "real man" come out and knocks him to his senses. In a lot of cases that grief is self inflicted and in a lot of cases he is collateral damage.

"No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it."

So yes God does prevent evil by sometimes letting grief like a fever run its course. Sometimes, for some, grief is a way out of the world. And out of the world is the will of God.

 

[Spotlite]

And, according to post #2, the grief that He "wills" on others, He can "will" to you and others as He sees fit..........

There’s a lot of confusion when it comes to His Will / His Knowledge / His control - they aren’t the same.

Jesus instructed his disciples to pray that God's will would be done on earth. If everything that happens is God's Will, such prayer is superfluous.

1. It is not His Will that any should perish. Those that do aren’t in the Will of God. He knows all will not - knowledge. He can’t Will them to perish if it’s not His Will that any should.

2. It is His Will that all come to repentance. Those that don’t aren’t in the Will of God. He knows all will not. He can’t Will them to not come to repentance if it’s His Will that all would.

3. Not a quote - “IF this gospel is hid, it’s hid to the lost which are blinded by the god of this earth (Satan) because they believe not”. Nothing supports that non belief / the lost / hiding of the Gospel is the Will of God for any man.

Satan is allowed to blind them. That’s God in control. But God isn’t picking Bob to be lost.

 

[Artfuldodger]

There’s a lot of confusion when it comes to His Will / His Knowledge / His control - they aren’t the same.

Jesus instructed his disciples to pray that God's will would be done on earth. If everything that happens is God's Will, such prayer is superfluous.

1. It is not His Will that any should perish. Those that do aren’t in the Will of God. He knows all will not - knowledge. He can’t Will them to perish if it’s not His Will that any should.

2. It is His Will that all come to repentance. Those that don’t aren’t in the Will of God. He knows all will not. He can’t Will them to not come to repentance if it’s His Will that all would.

3. Not a quote - “IF this gospel is hid, it’s hid to the lost which are blinded by the god of this earth (Satan) because they believe not”. Nothing supports that non belief / the lost / hiding of the Gospel is the Will of God for any man.

Satan is allowed to blind them. That’s God in control. But God isn’t picking Bob to be lost.

But beyond the unbelieving, which may have a choice, what about everything else that an all powerful God could control, if he had a mind to? Like natural disasters, etc.

Isaiah 45:7
The One forming light and creating darkness,
Causing well-being and creating calamity;
I am the Lord who does all these.

Amos 3:6
If a trumpet is blown in a city will not the people tremble?
If a calamity occurs in a city has not the Lord done it?

Jeremiah 32:42
For thus says the Lord, ‘Just as I brought all this great disaster on this people, so I am going to bring on them all the good that I am promising them.

 

[Spotlite]

But beyond the unbelieving, which may have a choice, what about everything else that an all powerful God could control, if he had a mind to? Like natural disasters, etc.

Isaiah 45:7
The One forming light and creating darkness,
Causing well-being and creating calamity;
I am the Lord who does all these.

Amos 3:6
If a trumpet is blown in a city will not the people tremble?
If a calamity occurs in a city has not the Lord done it?

Jeremiah 32:42
For thus says the Lord, ‘Just as I brought all this great disaster on this people, so I am going to bring on them all the good that I am promising them.

He controls it. He allows it. He creates all. He’s all knowing so He knows who will serve him and who won’t?

When He destroyed Sodom He knew.
Although it rains on both the Just and Unjust, it’s a hard reach to take the stance that He’ll destroy a man that’ll become a preacher before that man has an opportunity to become that. If He plans to allow the innocent to be taken out in a “calamity” I’m confident that He’s not slack concerning His promise and He’ll deal with that man prior.

What we see as calamity in Job’s dead sons, might not be calamity for them if they’ve entered into rest with God. Our treasures shouldn’t be laid up here.

 

[Artfuldodger]

He controls it. He allows it. He creates all. He’s all knowing so He knows who will serve him and who won’t?

When He destroyed Sodom He knew.
Although it rains on both the Just and Unjust, it’s a hard reach to take the stance that He’ll destroy a man that’ll become a preacher before that man has an opportunity to become that. If He plans to allow the innocent to be taken out in a “calamity” I’m confident that He’s not slack concerning His promise and He’ll deal with that man prior.

What we see as calamity in Job’s dead sons, might not be calamity for them if they’ve entered into rest with God. Our treasures shouldn’t be laid up here.

Would it be safe to say that God reached every person in the whole world taken out by a calamity, before they died?

Also when a young preacher is dying and his family is praying, God has the will to save that preacher from a physical death. He may not have actually caused the calamity that took him out but he sure has the power to save a man from one. And if God doesn't, it's still His will. The person died because it was not God's will to save them.

 

[Artfuldodger]

Let's say that an all powerful God can't control all future events but can only see. We know that he does have the power to intervene in each and every future event. Consider the Cross. Didn't God give us His son? He controlled the birth of His son to a human virgin, even picking the mother. Weird to think he didn't control how the sacrifice would happen. Perhaps He couldn't but we do know that with His foreknowledge he could still intervene and stop the death of His son. By not intervening, God let calamity happen for His plan to happen exactly as He wanted it to happen.
Either way whether God causes or stops, his omniscient power allows everything to happen. Unless He doesn't want it to and it won't.

 

[Artfuldodger]

He controls it. He allows it. He creates all. He’s all knowing so He knows who will serve him and who won’t?

When He destroyed Sodom He knew.
Although it rains on both the Just and Unjust, it’s a hard reach to take the stance that He’ll destroy a man that’ll become a preacher before that man has an opportunity to become that. If He plans to allow the innocent to be taken out in a “calamity” I’m confident that He’s not slack concerning His promise and He’ll deal with that man prior.

What we see as calamity in Job’s dead sons, might not be calamity for them if they’ve entered into rest with God. Our treasures shouldn’t be laid up here.

Sorry, I think I may have misread you. Are you saying God allows and creates calamity but he only lets it kill people who he knows won't ever accept him and people like Jobs sons that have accepted him? That really only leaves out calamity for folks that God knows will accept him but haven't yet.

I guess that's a possibility. Not all calamities kill though. Not sure how we got off on deaths from calamities and not just all the other calamities of the earth and every day living.

 

[Spotlite]

Would it be safe to say that God reached every person in the whole world taken out by a calamity, before they died?

Also when a young preacher is dying and his family is praying, God has the will to save that preacher from a physical death. He may not have actually caused the calamity that took him out but he sure has the power to save a man from one. And if God doesn't, it's still His will. The person died because it was not God's will to save them.

It’s safe to say that somehow, someway, somewhere He has the power to reach anyone at any given time, even wiping the scales off blinded eyes. Weather He does or not I can only assume is because He already knows they’ll reject Him. What I’m saying is take one like Paul that He knew would listen, a sovereign God will keep Paul alive until it’s time for paths to cross with Paul.

It’s appointed unto man to die once. So no need in getting hung up about death.

He extended the life of Hezekia, why? How many passages deal with God changing his mind?

 

[Spotlite]

Sorry, I think I may have misread you. Are you saying God allows and creates calamity but he only lets it kill people who he knows won't ever accept him and people like Jobs sons that have accepted him? That really only leaves out calamity for folks that God knows will accept him but haven't yet.

I guess that's a possibility. Not all calamities kill though. Not sure how we got off on deaths from calamities and not just all the other calamities of the earth and every day living.

I think it’s just natural to relate death to calamity.

I’m saying God creates and allows calamity and we’re all subject to it because of the environment we live. In the mix of that, I’m saying He will reach those that He knows will accept Him prior to their calamity - I’m confident that He’s not slack in His promise, not willing that any should perish.

I think a question of yours eluded to people having a chance to accept / reject before they’re “wiped out.” This was just my uneducated way of trying to express my thinking on that subject.

 

[Artfuldodger]

I think it’s just natural to relate death to calamity.

I’m saying God creates and allows calamity and we’re all subject to it because of the environment we live. In the mix of that, I’m saying He will reach those that He knows will accept Him prior to their calamity - I’m confident that He’s not slack in His promise, not willing that any should perish.

I think a question of yours eluded to people having a chance to accept / reject before they’re “wiped out.” This was just my uneducated way of trying to express my thinking on that subject.

I think maybe where my belief differs from you is you see the all powerful God intervening and causing based only on His Omniscience. In other words God's Omnipotence can only be based if His foreknowledge and not his power.
I on the other hand see His Omniscience based off his Omnipotence. His all-power allows Him to foresee. I once believed as you and justified it by thinking God wore special goggles where he wouldn't see all the bad stuff or he'd constantly be trying to save his children from the calamities that he already foresaw. Like if I had foreknowledge, I'd have to wear goggles to keep from seeing my children or I'd be intervening all the time.

Now I just look at God as the Great Potter and I really aren't suppose to question if He is making vessels of wrath by Omniscience or Omnipotence. Considering God is all powerful, I don't have to question why he does what he does.

 

[Spotlite]

I think maybe where my belief differs from you is you see the all powerful God intervening and causing based only on His Omniscience. In other words God's Omnipotence can only be based if His foreknowledge and not his power.
I on the other hand see His Omniscience based off his Omnipotence. His all-power allows Him to foresee. I once believed as you and justified it by thinking God wore special goggles where he wouldn't see all the bad stuff or he'd constantly be trying to save his children from the calamities that he already foresaw. Like if I had foreknowledge, I'd have to wear goggles to keep from seeing my children or I'd be intervening all the time.

Now I just look at God as the Great Potter and I really aren't suppose to question if He is making vessels of wrath by Omniscience or Omnipotence. Considering God is all powerful, I don't have to question why he does what he does.

1. I think maybe where my belief differs from you is you see the all powerful God intervening and causing based only on His Omniscience.

2. Considering God is all powerful, I don't have to question why he does what he does.

1. I don’t see Him intervening or causing based solely on His omniscience. His omniscience is just Him knowing the vessel’s and how they’ll react. He has a plan. If you honor your parents your days will be long in the land. Honor your wife so your prayers aren’t hindered. He knows who’ll respect their parents and honor their wife. He knows who won’t but He’s not “willing” no one to not do the things of God. God isn’t going to Will anyone to break his commandments or act in disobedience to His Word. He knows what “calamity” will wake you up so you will do those things. He knows that with some it doesn’t matter, they’re going to follow after their own fleshly desires.

2. Agreed

 

[Artfuldodger]

1. I don’t see Him intervening or causing based solely on His omniscience. His omniscience is just Him knowing the vessel’s and how they’ll react. He has a plan. If you honor your parents your days will be long in the land. Honor your wife so your prayers aren’t hindered. He knows who’ll respect their parents and honor their wife. He knows who won’t but He’s not “willing” no one to not do the things of God. God isn’t going to Will anyone to break his commandments or act in disobedience to His Word. He knows what “calamity” will wake you up so you will do those things. He knows that with some it doesn’t matter, they’re going to follow after their own fleshly desires.

2. Agreed

If he knows beforehand who won't accept him, why does he let them be born if he desires every person in the whole wide world to have everlasting life? If He does have to let them be born, why does he not give every Hindu an effectual calling to believe in Jesus?

 

[Spotlite]

If he knows beforehand who won't accept him, why does he let them be born if he desires every person in the whole wide world to have everlasting life? If He does have to let them be born, why does he not give every Hindu an effectual calling to believe in Jesus?

Good question. Very legitimate, too. Another view - If it’s predestined why even allow the non believers to be born? Why was sin even allowed to enter man? Why do we have to keep His commandments? Does it indicate there’s actually a choice man has? Knowing which way man will go doesn’t mean there’s no choice.

Could it be that He knows if you do that, this will be the outcome? But if you do this, this will be the outcome? Knowing the outcome to every situation possible? Why would He plan evil in Exodus and then repent of it because they turned from their evil? Why would even plan evil? All I know is He’s all knowing and all power.

There have been those that have fallen away that led many to God prior to their falling away. Maybe we’re all tools for His bigger plan for mankind?

How do we know who He’s not called? I can’t say that the Hindu hadn’t had an opportunity. All I can do is trust that He’s handling that situation His way.

 

[Artfuldodger]

Let's go back all the way to God choosing Israel and later the people who were not His people. Did he do that based on foreknowledge? Let's start with 1 Peter 2:8;
and, “A stone that causes people to stumble and a rock that makes them fall.” They stumble because they disobey the message—which is also what they were destined for.
It's possible to say God knew they would stumble and the only thing destined was what God foresaw.

verse 9; But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.

Again, they may have been chosen because of their actions or the foreknowledge of their knowledge.

verse 10; Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

Maybe they were once not God's people but he chose them because His foreknowledge let God Know that they would one day become his people.

Deuteronomy 10:15
Yet the LORD has set His affection on your fathers and loved them. And He has chosen you, their descendants after them, above all the peoples, even to this day.

Ephesians 2:12
remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world.

God must have looked ahead and knew that all those Gentiles that were without hope were probably just gonna refuse the future grafting in to the Jews so they were without God for this reason.

Acts 2:39
This promise belongs to you and your children and to all who are far off--to all whom the Lord our God will call to Himself."

Again, God has looked forward and knows who to call to Himself.

Romans 11:27
And this is my covenant with them when I take away their sins.”

God has looked forward and knows the Jew will believe in Jesus and will therefore take away their sins.

It would be easier for me to believe God chooses by using foreknowledge if there was more scripture saying that is how He operates. Yet we see verses about a Potter choosing or verses like Romans 11:33 when it comes to how God uses His mercy;

O, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments, and untraceable His ways!…

No foreknowledge excuse used here either;
Romans 9:18
Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden. 19 One of you will say to me, “Then why does God still find fault? For who can resist His will?”

“Why does God blame people for not responding? Haven’t they simply done what he makes them do?”

The reasoning given in verse always points to God's power more than His foreknowledge,